In recent years, steadily growing awareness of Tibet and its rich and ancient culture has sparked interest in the successive lineage of the Dalai Lamas as an institution. This is, I am sure, a result of the closely entwined relationship that has historically existed between Tibet, its people and the Dalai Lamas.
Seventh-century Tibet was a militarily powerful nation, unified under a single ruler, whose influence was felt far and wide. King Songtsen Gampo was the first of three religious kings whose efforts resulted in a complete change in the Tibetan outlook. They introduced Buddhism from India with the effect of shifting the focus of conquest from neighbouring peoples and lands to the inner workings of the mind and heart. In the ensuing centuries, as the Buddhist way of life, with its rich art and literature, was steadily assimilated, the Tibetan nation became politically fragmented.
Tibetan Buddhism reached maturity at a time when Buddhism was disappearing from India, the land of its origin. The Dalai Lamas emerged, therefore, at a time when not only the Tibetan people and their peaceful way of life needed leadership and guidance, but when the very existence of Buddhism needed protection.
I believe that the activities of the first four Dalai Lamas can be viewed as each contributing to the Great Fifth’s ability to provide the strong leadership that unified Tibet for the first time since the early religious kings. He therefore made Tibet great once more and inaugurated a unique religious and secular form of government. Since
then, the Ganden Podrang government that the Great Fifth founded has been a major unifying factor in the life of Tibet, and this is a responsibility that has now fallen to me, too, at this most difficult time in my country’s history.
The first Dalai Lama, Gendun Drubpa, was a direct disciple of Jey Tsongkhapa, and all subsequent Dalai Lamas have been staunch followers of the Gelukpa doctrine he propounded. It is noteworthy, for example, that of the standard set of Eight Editions of the Stages of the Path or Lam Rim, three were composed by Tsongkhapa himself, two were written by Dalai Lamas—Essence of Refined Gold by the Third and The Transmission of Manjushri by the Fifth—and the remaining three were composed by direct teachers of the Dalai Lamas. Few of the Dalai Lamas, however, have been exclusively Gelukpa, but have followed the ecumenical example set by Tsongkhapa himself. For he studied not with the lamas of any single tradition, but with the greatest teachers of his day.
Several Dalai Lamas, particularly those who were influential rulers like the Fifth and the Thirteenth, have had notably strong relationships with Guru Rinpochey, Padma Sambhava. This, I believe, has less to do with questions of doctrine and much more to do with Guru Rinpochey’s special pledge to King Trisong Deutsen of support for the welfare of the Tibetan nation.
In Tibet we had a vast literature, much of it consisting of translations of Sanskrit scriptures into Tibetan and subsequent commentaries to them. But more popular were the smaller indigenous works. Many of these told the stories of the lives of great teachers and practitioners. Others were the small works of individual lamas containing pithy advice based on their own experiences. In this book readers will find a selection of such works related to the Dalai Lamas. There are accounts of the lives of each of the Dalai Lamas up to and including myself, and there are examples of the writings or teachings of these masters. In compiling this selection, the author not only sheds light on the contribution past Dalai Lamas have made to the religious and political life of Tibet, but he also gives the flavour of the sort of writings that are treasured by ordinary Tibetans.
It is nearly thirty years since Glenn H. Mullin first arrived in Dharamsala and began to take an interest in the works of the Dalai Lamas. I admire the persistence with which he has pursued this interest and have sometimes wondered if he has not found out more about them than even I know. Many people have told me that he reveals an ability in his books to make things Tibetan accessible and easily understood to ordinary readers. Therefore, I welcome this volume that is the first to give some account of the lives of all the Dalai Lamas, along with examples of some of their works. I pray that readers will find here some inspiration in their own quest for inner peace. I hope, too, the book will yield some appreciation of the role that the Dalai Lamas have played in the history of Tibet and how important that history has been in the living transmission and practice of the fruitful spiritual tradition that is Tibetan Buddhism.
Tenzin Gyatso, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama