with a religion that enjoyed high prestige because of its well-
established status in the mighty neighboring countries of
India and China. The first Buddhist temple was built at
Bsam yas (Samyé) in approximately 779; soon afterward the
first monks were ordained. From the very start, the Buddhist
monks were given economic and social privileges.
When Buddhism was introduced, the Tibetans had a
choice as to whether the new religion should be brought
from India or China. Modern scholarship has established the
important role that China played as a source of Buddhism
in the early stages of its history in Tibet. Nevertheless, it was
the Indian form of Buddhism that eventually predominated.
According to later sources, the Tibetan kings were guided by
spiritual considerations and the proponents of Indian Bud-
dhism emerged victorious from a doctrinal debate with Chi-
nese monks representing a form of Chan Buddhism. Howev-
er, hard political motives were surely equally important: in
military and political terms China was Tibet’s main rival,
and China’s influence at the Tibetan court would be unduly
increased if it gained control of the powerful Buddhist
hierarchy.
In any case, Tibet turned to India for its sacred texts,
philosophical ideas, and rituals, in the same way as it had
adopted, in the seventh century, an Indian alphabet. Once
set on its course, Buddhism rapidly became the dominant re-
ligion, suffering only a temporary setback after the collapse
of the royal dynasty in 842. In several important respects,
Buddhism in Tibet remained faithful to its Indian prototype.
It must, of course, be kept in mind that this prototype was,
by the seventh and eighth centuries, a form of Maha ̄ya ̄na
Buddhism that was, on the one hand, increasingly dependent
on large monastic institutions, and on the other, permeated
by Tantric rites and ideas. Both these features—vast
monasteries and a pervasive Tantric influence—have re-
mained characteristic of Buddhism in Tibet. Similarly, there
has been little development in the realm of philosophical
ideas; the Tibetans have, on the whole, been content to play
the role of exegetes, commentators, and compilers. However,
the political domination that the monasteries gradually ob-
tained was without precedent. A uniquely Tibetan feature of
monastic rule was succession by incarnation—the head of an
order, or of a monastery, being regarded as the reincarnation
(motivated by compassion for all beings) of his predecessor.
In other cases, a religious figure might be regarded as the
manifestation of a deity (or a particular aspect of a deity). In
the person of the fifth Dalai Lama (1617–1682) both ideas
were combined. Each Dalai Lama was already regarded as the
incarnation of his predecessor; the fifth, who established
himself as head of the Tibetan state, also came to be regarded
as the emanation or manifestation of the great bodhisattva
Avalokite ́svara (Tib., Spyanrasgzigs), as have all subsequent
Dalai Lamas down to the present, the fourteenth.
The choice of Avalokite ́svara was not made at random.
As early as the twelfth or thirteenth century, Avalokite ́svara
had come to be regarded in a double respect as the divine
protector of Tibet. In the form of an ape he had, in ancient
times, assumed the role of progenitor of the Tibetan people
in order that the teachings of the Buddha might flourish in
Tibet in due course; in the form of the great Tibetan king
Srong bstan sgam po, who created the Tibetan empire in the
seventh century, Avalokite ́svara had established Buddhism—
according to this retrospective view—in the Land of Snow.
The Potala Palace in Lhasa, the ancient capital, was built in
its present form by the fifth Dalai Lama and made his resi-
dence; situated on a hill, it symbolically reestablished the pre-
Buddhist connection between the divine king and the sacred
mountain.POPULAR RELIGION. It would be illusory to draw a sharp line
of demarcation between popular and monastic religion. Nev-
ertheless, while the study of the Maha ̄ya ̄na philosophical sys-
tems and the performance of elaborate Tantric rites take
place within the confines of the monasteries, monks actively
participate in a wide range of ritual activities outside the
monasteries, and beliefs that do not derive from Buddhism
are shared by monks and laypeople alike.These rites and beliefs may be styled “popular religion,”
a term that only signifies that it is nonmonastic, traditional,
and related to the concerns of laypeople. It does not imply
a system representing an alternative to Buddhism (or the Bon
religion). For the last thousand years, Buddhist ideas have
provided a general cosmological and metaphysical frame-
work for popular religion. In many cases one may also as-
sume that there is continuity with the pre-Buddhist religion,
but it is often a delicate task to determine this continuity in
precise terms.Turning, first of all, to elements inspired by Buddhism,
the most important—and conspicuous—are undoubtedly
the varied and ceaseless efforts to accumulate merit. The law
of moral causality (karman) easily turns into a sort of balance
in which the effect of evil deeds in this life or in former lives
may be annulled by multiplying wholesome deeds. While an
act of compassion, such as ransoming a sheep destined to be
slaughtered, theoretically constitutes the ideal act of virtue,
the accumulation of merit generally takes a more mechanical
form. Hence the incessant murmuring of sacred formulas (in
particular the mantra of Avalokite ́svara, “Om mani padme
hum”), the spinning of prayer wheels (ranging in size from
hand-held wheels to enormous cylinders housed in special
buildings), the carving of mantras on stones (which may
eventually grow into walls several miles in length, so-called
mani-walls), and the hoisting of banners and strings of flags
on which prayers are printed (“prayer flags”). Ritual circu-
mambulation of holy places, objects, and persons is also a
distinctly Buddhist, as well as truly popular, practice. Show-
ing generosity toward monks and observing—lightly or scru-
pulously, as the case may be—the universal precepts of Bud-
dhism (particularly the prohibition against taking the life of
any living being, however small) are ethical norms that Ti-
betans share with all Buddhists.9184 TIBETAN RELIGIONS: AN OVERVIEW