By Tom LaVenture
Thomas Laird, author of “The Story of Tibet: Conversations with the Dalai Lama” (Grove Press; $27.50, published November 2006), will be in St. Paul to speak on Thursday, February 1, 2007, 5:30 p.m. at the Tibetan American Foundation of Minnesota, 1096 Raymond Avenue, St. Paul, MN 55108. The event is free and open to the public.
Laird is a journalist turned author who was selected personally by His Holiness the Dalai Lama to write his historical biography to convey a life of work. The effort required more than 60 hours of interviews over a course of three years in Dharamsala, India. It took ten years in all to research and write the book.
Laird, 53, was a reporter and photographer based in Kathmandu, Nepal for 25 years, and one of first westerners in Tibet after it reopened in 1985. He first met the Dalai Lama in 1996 after converting to Buddhism. It was a special moment because as a converted Buddhists he was overwhelmed with trying to work his new faith into every aspect of his life.
“For me it was a really personal journey meeting him, and the culmination of a life�€™s work,” said Laird.
He did not expect for this discussion of history to become such an intimate biography that worked on many levels. The most enlightening revelations came from seemingly simple topics, more than even the tough line of questions.
“The Dalai Lama is a very powerful man and when you discuss simple things with him it opens up in a very interesting way,” said Laird.
Yet, with all this knowledge and devotion, Laird challenged His Holiness on issues from
Buddhist teachings to his work for a peaceful resolution with China. He discovered that despite his advanced learning, he still held many western misconceptions of the Dalai Lama, Tibet and China.
The book makes its deepest and most abiding contributions, says Laird, with addressing the areas where westerners often “mis-imagine” the Dalai Lama at a personal level, a political level, and on a Buddhist philosophy level.
Most non-Buddhist believe that the Dalai Lama is the 14th reincarnation of the human soul of the first Dalai Lama.
“When we say the 14th Dalai Lama, he means the 14th manifestation in a human body of Chenrizi (Bodhisattva Chenrizi – The Holy One – whose spirit many Tibetans believe resides within the Dalai Lama),” he said. “He doesn’t mean the same human soul reincarnated 14 times. I didn’t know that and I don’t think most Americans know that now.”
When the west encountered Tibet and the Dalai Lama in the 1880s, they called the Dalai Lama the “God-King”, a term Laird says the Dalai Lama dislikes as sarcasm, because there is no concept of a god in Buddhism.
“The idea of what he is – is more nuance and is rooted in Buddhist philosophy and has nothing to do with western concepts,” he added. “That is the power of this book. It is unpeeling our assumptions about him and trying to get closer to what he sees.”
Laird’s narrative includes Tibetan and Chinese history and the Dalai Lama’s belief that history should be examined holistically. He discusses the era of Great Tibetan Emperors, whose reign stretched from southwestern China to Northern India. They talk about the greatest yogis, the meditation masters, and how the institution of the Dalai Lama was founded.
Laird’s frame of mind is that while most people will assume that the modern world and all of its technology and improvements has changed mankind for the better; we really have not changed that much fundamentally and the message of the Dalai Lama today is essentially the same as it was 500 years ago.
The 14th Dalai Lama is on the world stage today, and the 5th Dalai Lama went to Beijing in 1653, because the Manchu emperors needed him to control the Mongol warriors in inner Asia.
“For the Tibetans, he is the leader of the nation politically,” he said. “No one can speak to the Tibetan nation as he can.”
With all that is documented about the Dalai Lama’s meetings with Mao Tsetung, Laird found these discussions to heated, because of what he said are more misconceptions about what was going on. He said the west betrayed Tibet, when United States voted with the Soviet Union in the United Nations Security Council to block open debate about China’s invasion of Tibet.
With no opposition from the west, the Dalai Lama said that he had choice but to accept Mao’s “invitation.” He said Mao really wanted to “win him over,” to show that the Communist nationalist movement meant there was not need for Tibetan nationalism.
“I really wanted to get at his feelings about that and pushed very hard to provoke him to speak on what he has been so political and diplomatic, and sensed there were deep emotions about that,” he said.
Despite his resolve for a free Tibet, the Dalai Lama, 19, still considered Mao in his 60s, a great revolutionary leader. He was not aware of the millions of people who died at the hands of Mao at the time.
Laird was fascinated at the Dalai Lama’s whole life devotion to pursuing the study of a philosophy that eases human suffering and that shapes his personal and political relationships. In practice, his country is occupied and millions have died, and yet he harbors no anger toward the Chinese.
“As an outsider it seems like not much is being accomplished and that China is just waiting for Dalai Lama to die for the problem to go away,” said Laird. “The intelligence community says that this is a big mistake.”
Even the most peaceful Tibetans believe that the only option is an independent Tibet and will not even accept status as an autonomous region. They believe there will be violence once the Dalai Lama passes on with an occupied Tibet.
“This Dalai Lama has the power to convince the exiled Tibetan community to accept Tibet as part of China,” he added. “If he were to return and to die in the Potala Palace and say that Tibet is an autonomous region of China, then he has the power to make that happen.”Laird is concerned that the world is Dalai Lama and Tibet have become the only present-day nation that is attempting to achieve their goals through nonviolent means. The world has turned away from that approach and if terrorism can result in gaining an independent state in one part of the world, when Tibetans have a Nobel Prize but are still an occupied country.
“The story of Tibet challenged me at the core of my being to be good enough,�” said Laird. “You start out as the young journalist confident that you can accomplish the story no matter what they throw you in to. But this one I lost that because it was so challenging, and I had to summon resources that I didn’t know I had. I had to become a better writer, I had to be a stronger editor, I had to be able to willing to let go of the extraneous, and follow the real heart line of the narrative without any sympathy for interesting side facts.”
Laird’s visit is sponsored by Wells Fargo Bank. For more information contact: Karma Wangchuk, executive director, at 651-917-9556 or edirector@tafm.org, or Dr. Tsewang Ngodup, president, at tafm04@hotmail.com.
