Jonathan Savage discusses message from Dalai Lama

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Dalai Lama. First of all, you had me there,
says He's going to have a reincarnated successor. Do we
have any idea what this reincarnated successor was in the
previous life?

Speaker 2 (00:11):
Well, no, Well he will be the Dala Lama in
a previous life. That's the whole point. He will die
and he will be reincarnated, and his successor will be chosen,
says the Dalai Lama, by no one other than his office,
by the trust he set up. And this is actually
a diplomatic dispute because China, the Chinese government, says it

(00:31):
has the right to choose the next spiritual leader of
Tibetan Buddhists. It's a strange international diplomatic dispute. It involves reincarnation,
Buddhism and part of China that wants many of their
want to be free.

Speaker 1 (00:47):
I don't know much about the Buddhist world. I do
know that Jesus Christ is not a part of it.
But this reincarnation thing has got me a bit baffled here.
So saying the Dali Lama when he dies, that he's
coming back as something else and he'll be the successor or.

(01:08):
That the successor is going to be a reincarnated somebody
else I'm not really following.

Speaker 2 (01:15):
Then this is a tradition dating back six hundred years
since the first Dalai Lama, and Tibetan Buddhists believe that
their spiritual leaders are reincarnated, and there will be a
job for a group of Buddhist monks to find the
child born with the soul of the Dala Lama, identify
that child, and proclaim him the new Dala Lama. That

(01:38):
is what happened to the one we have at the moment.
When he was two years old, a search party of
Buddhist officials recognized him as the reincarnation of the thirteen
previous Dala Lamas, and before he was even turned four
years old, he was enthroned in this role as the
most important spiritual leader of the people of Tibet. It

(01:59):
has been the only life he has known. He is
the most recognizable figure in his religion and also a
symbol of peace and a political symbol for Tibetans who
want to reclaim their homeland from China.

Speaker 1 (02:11):
Okay, so once again, the Dali Lama is a reincarnated
human being, and I'm guessing that they figured that this
Dali Lama that they zone in on was somebody not
as qualified or as good of a human being as
they liked, but he did such a good job in
his previous life. He was moved up the ranks, if

(02:34):
you will, in his new life. And that's how do
they hone in on the new Dalai Lama? What are
they looking for? Do they have, you know, sitting with
their fingers pressed to their thumbs and pray? Do they
How do you select a child to be the dali Lama?

Speaker 2 (02:50):
Yeah, the idea is the Dalai Lama has one soul,
one spirit, and that solar spirit passes from one human
being and then is reborn and another human being. So
there's been fourteen diala lamas, but they've actually only been
one soul between them. That soul will be passed on
and re reborn in a baby. And these Buddhist officials
they recognize this Dala Lama after they say receiving visions,

(03:14):
after receiving guidance and getting together and one way or
another deciding that this two year old boy as he
was then was the spiritual successor who held the soul
of all the thirteen previous Dala lamas.

Speaker 1 (03:30):
So bizarre to me. So do Buddhists believe that you're
on a constant cycle of reincarnation or is there an
afterlife that at some point there is no more coming
back and you just drift off in a Buddha in heaven.

Speaker 2 (03:44):
Yeah, Reincarnation is a key part of the Buddhist religion.
They believe that your consciousness continues after you die. You're
born into a new form of existence, and the type
of birth that you have depends on how good you
were your actions in the previous life. That's where the

(04:04):
word karma comes from. Karma is a Buddhist term. So
you know, you could They say you could be reborn
as a human or as an animal, but also as
a god or a demigod or some other form.

Speaker 1 (04:17):
Right right, I'm not sure I want to come back
to this again. I think one run is good.

Speaker 2 (04:21):
Run, Jane. It's a bit different role we normally talk about,
isn't it very strange?

Speaker 1 (04:27):
Well, listen, buddy, I hope you have a great weekend.
I don't. I know you're not celebrating the fourth of July,
but what do people in London do on our fourth
of July? I mean, we kind of left England and
came this way. So what's their perspective of this weekend?
Is it just another weekend.

Speaker 2 (04:43):
Yeah, we just go to work and we look at
the look enviously across the Atlantic at all you people
having a great time and kind of wish we had
probably a similar kind of day for ourselves. But no,
we will all just be hard at work doing our jobs.
But then, you know, some of us, we might go
and have a little hot dog or something in the
evening just to remind us of you guys across the pond.

Speaker 1 (05:04):
There you go, Well, I'll have a pint for you, Jonathan.
Have a good weekend, but it thank you

Speaker 2 (05:08):
Have a good one.