Word: shugden
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Shugden practitioners deny that they are fundamentalist, purist or violent, and have renewed their complaints in light of an intensifying crackdown by the Dalai Lama. He - or people acting in his perceived interests - has expanded the loyalty demand from abbots to monks and even laypeople as far afield as France. In a nod to the Tibetan Government in Exile's self-definition as a democracy, each monastery has been taking a referendum on Shugden. When the "anti" faction inevitably wins, the monks pledge to renounce Shugden and deny spiritual or material aid to those who hold out. In transcripts that...
...rights matter is the contention that those who won't take the oaths are denied monastery I.D. cards that the Tibetan Government in Exile allegedly requires to process visa requests through to the Indian government. (Most of the Tibetan diaspora lives in India.) "Families are being torn apart," reads Shugden literature...
Experts seem to think that there is something to the Shugden allegations. "There is considerable anecdotal evidence to support what they say," Stephen Batchelor, co-founder of the Sharpham College for Buddhist Studies and Contemporary Enquiry, wrote in an email to TIME, although, he adds, "I have yet to see any hard evidence." Wrote Donald Lopez of the University of Michigan, "Buddhist monks who apply for an Identity Certificates must also submit a letter form their abbot. I was told that there may have been cases in which, contrary to the policy of the Government-in-Exile, monks who worship...
Pema, the Shugden spokesperson, observes correctly that even if the Dalai Lama is not behind the current Shugden woes, "if he wanted it to stop, all he'd have to do would be to snap his fingers." Yet no one expects that. Most scholars e-mailed for this story were hesitant to line up behind the Shugdenpas, partly because of insufficient data, partly, perhaps, because of a feeling that this was a Tibetan issue ("these are monk wars," said one), partly because many are themselves deeply invested in the Dalai Lama, and partly because of the whiff of fundamentalism...
...original version of the story had the name of the Western Shugden Society spokesperson as Kelsan Norden. Her name is Kelsan Pema. The original version also misinterpreted the 1998 Amnesty International report, saying that the humans right group believed the claims of the Shugdenpa were exaggerated. Amnesty International's more nuanced view is now quoted in the story...