rather like the idea that we Westerners, so often condescending, should occasionally be slapped down by Hindu prejudices; yet there seems to be a flat contradiction between the Hindu philosophers’ teaching on the Oneness of the Universe and this priestly ban on non-Hindus entering certain temples.
The Bodhanath stupa – on which are painted four pairs of enormous eyes, gazing gravely in the four cardinal directions – is one of the highest Buddhist stupas in the world; one sees it first from afar, across the flat fields, and unlike most religious buildings here it is freshly painted and in good repair. Pasang told me that it is more than 2,000 years old;but one keeps an open mind on the dates, measurements and general statistics quoted by either Tibetans or Nepalese – though this date may well be accurate enough, since Professor Tucci thinks it possible that Nepal formed part of Asoka’s empire in the third century BC .
Bodhanath is now chiefly associated in foreign minds with the rich and influential Chine Lama, a prominent character who is sometimes erroneously described as the Dalai Lama’s representative in Nepal – a position that in fact is held at present by a Khampa layman named Sergay. I can think of no two men who are less alike than the Dalai and Chine Lamas; yet foreigners accept him as a bona fide example of a Tibetan lama – which error might be funny were it not so unfair to many thousands of genuine lamas. As Pasang and I cycled towards the monastery around the base of the stupa, past scores of giant copper prayer-wheels set in the circular wall, we saw a Tourist Office minibus decanting some dozen wide-eyed visitors outside the Chine Lama’s house. Pasang then asked me if I too would like to meet him; but I declined with thanks.
The Bodhanath Tibetan monastery was built about thirty years ago and now houses some forty monks and lamas, ranging in age from a charming sixty-five-year-old Rimpoche to several Incarnate Lamas of eight or nine, who when we arrived were happily scampering around the courtyard in their long, ragged maroon robes. I visited the temple first, with some excitement, being conscious that it was the nearest I’m ever likely to get to a genuine Tibetan temple of the traditional style. And indeed it was as genuinely Tibetan as could be – filthy and magnificent and untidy and awe-inspiring, with gross, ferocious effigies of gods and goddesses lurking in the gloom, swathed in ceremonial white scarves and presiding over the hundreds of tormas and wispily luminous butterlamps that had been laid before them. The monks’ praying-seats lined the aisle in front of the ‘High Altar’, facing each other. Some had incongruous tins labelled Farex Baby Food or Andrews’ Liver Salts beside them, containing roasted flour for making that tsampa on which the monks somehow survive during their long chantings from the scriptures – and when there are a hundred and eight thick tomes to be chanted aloud quite a lot of flour must be required.
Each member of this community has his own cell, and from the temple Pasang and I were conducted to the Rimpoche’s quarters – a tiny cupboard of a room, some ten feet by four, with a plank bed, one thin blanket and a miniature shrine where eleven butter-lamps burned before a picture of the Lord Buddha. Here we each consumed five cups of heavily buttered tea – a smiling young lama stood beside us throughout with poised kettle – and reluctantly ate the damp but very expensive Indian biscuits which, despite this monastery’s evident poverty, were produced from a tin trunk under the bed.
Here one soon sensed a concentration of all that is best in Tibetan Buddhism – simple, ardent piety, cheerful courage, gentleness, instinctive courtesy and a quick sense of fun. Then, as we talked with the Rimpoche and the four other lamas who had squeezed into his cell, I became painfully aware that now I was glimpsing part of the last act in the drama of a
The Bodhanath stupa – on which are painted four pairs of enormous eyes, gazing gravely in the four cardinal directions – is one of the highest Buddhist stupas in the world; one sees it first from afar, across the flat fields, and unlike most religious buildings here it is freshly painted and in good repair. Pasang told me that it is more than 2,000 years old;but one keeps an open mind on the dates, measurements and general statistics quoted by either Tibetans or Nepalese – though this date may well be accurate enough, since Professor Tucci thinks it possible that Nepal formed part of Asoka’s empire in the third century BC .
Bodhanath is now chiefly associated in foreign minds with the rich and influential Chine Lama, a prominent character who is sometimes erroneously described as the Dalai Lama’s representative in Nepal – a position that in fact is held at present by a Khampa layman named Sergay. I can think of no two men who are less alike than the Dalai and Chine Lamas; yet foreigners accept him as a bona fide example of a Tibetan lama – which error might be funny were it not so unfair to many thousands of genuine lamas. As Pasang and I cycled towards the monastery around the base of the stupa, past scores of giant copper prayer-wheels set in the circular wall, we saw a Tourist Office minibus decanting some dozen wide-eyed visitors outside the Chine Lama’s house. Pasang then asked me if I too would like to meet him; but I declined with thanks.
The Bodhanath Tibetan monastery was built about thirty years ago and now houses some forty monks and lamas, ranging in age from a charming sixty-five-year-old Rimpoche to several Incarnate Lamas of eight or nine, who when we arrived were happily scampering around the courtyard in their long, ragged maroon robes. I visited the temple first, with some excitement, being conscious that it was the nearest I’m ever likely to get to a genuine Tibetan temple of the traditional style. And indeed it was as genuinely Tibetan as could be – filthy and magnificent and untidy and awe-inspiring, with gross, ferocious effigies of gods and goddesses lurking in the gloom, swathed in ceremonial white scarves and presiding over the hundreds of tormas and wispily luminous butterlamps that had been laid before them. The monks’ praying-seats lined the aisle in front of the ‘High Altar’, facing each other. Some had incongruous tins labelled Farex Baby Food or Andrews’ Liver Salts beside them, containing roasted flour for making that tsampa on which the monks somehow survive during their long chantings from the scriptures – and when there are a hundred and eight thick tomes to be chanted aloud quite a lot of flour must be required.
Each member of this community has his own cell, and from the temple Pasang and I were conducted to the Rimpoche’s quarters – a tiny cupboard of a room, some ten feet by four, with a plank bed, one thin blanket and a miniature shrine where eleven butter-lamps burned before a picture of the Lord Buddha. Here we each consumed five cups of heavily buttered tea – a smiling young lama stood beside us throughout with poised kettle – and reluctantly ate the damp but very expensive Indian biscuits which, despite this monastery’s evident poverty, were produced from a tin trunk under the bed.
Here one soon sensed a concentration of all that is best in Tibetan Buddhism – simple, ardent piety, cheerful courage, gentleness, instinctive courtesy and a quick sense of fun. Then, as we talked with the Rimpoche and the four other lamas who had squeezed into his cell, I became painfully aware that now I was glimpsing part of the last act in the drama of a
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