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Buddhism and State in Seventeenth- Century Tibet: Cosmology and Theology in the Works of Sangyé Gyatso

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Buddhism and State in Seventeenth- Century Tibet: Cosmology and Theology in the Works of Sangyé Gyatso Buddhism and State in Seventeenth- Century Tibet: Cosmology and Theology in the Works of Sangyé Gyatso The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:40050144 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA Buddhism and State in Seventeenth-Century Tibet: Cosmology and Theology in the Works of Sangyé Gyatso A dissertation presented by Ian MacCormack to The Committee on the Study of Religion in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the subject of The Study of Religion Harvard University Cambridge, Massachusetts May 1, 2018 © 2018 Ian MacCormack All rights reserved. Janet Gyatso Ian MacCormack Buddhism and State in Seventeenth-Century Tibet: Cosmology and Theology in the Works of Sangyé Gyatso Abstract This dissertation studies works of the Desi Sangyé Gyatso (1653–1705), a prolific and influential Tibetan statesman. Its main sources are texts by Sangyé Gyatso and, to a lesser extent, by the fifth Dalai Lama, Ngawang Losang Gyatso (1617–82). The Dalai Lama was the highest authority of the Ganden Phodrang government, founded in 1642. Sangyé Gyatso was his lieutenant and took control upon the latter’s death. During his tenure as ruler, Sangyé Gyatso made major intellectual and practical contributions to this Tibetan Buddhist state. He wrote at length about the ruler’s authority and the goals of the state. His ideas developed in close conversation with Buddhist texts, concepts, and practices, leading to novel reformulations of well-traveled ideas, while also informing court practices, rituals, and architecture. Though famous as a politician, Sangyé Gyatso’s thinking about Buddhism and state has received less attention in scholarship. This project sheds light on several of his texts, both in the interest of fostering further study and to suggest alternative possibilities for thinking about religion and politics, beyond exposing the mechanisms of power. Over six chapters, this dissertation highlights three major productions of Sangyé Gyatso’s rule: a model for public speaking, a holiday to commemorate the Dalai Lama, and a new palace built in Lhasa. It argues for the direct participation of cosmological and theological discourses and their related practices in the work of situating, articulating, and realizing a Buddhist state. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgments ............................................................................................................ vi Technical Note .................................................................................................................. ix Chapter One. Buddhism and state as a study of cosmo-moral order ......................... 1 Topic and overall approach ....................................................................................................1 Two approaches to studying Buddhism and state ..................................................................3 Chapter summaries...............................................................................................................12 Critical reflections 1: Studying Sangyé Gyatso ...................................................................15 Critical reflections 2: Studying a Tibetan Buddhist state.....................................................23 Critical reflections 3: Studying religion and politics ...........................................................32 Sangyé Gyatso on the true and the indirect .........................................................................38 Chapter Two. Celebrating the world: speechmaking and perfection ........................ 52 Introduction ..........................................................................................................................52 Beyond persuasion: Sangyé Gyatso as an orator .................................................................56 Orality and text: the ethics of speaking................................................................................67 How to frame a speech .........................................................................................................71 Contents and legitimation ....................................................................................................78 The “Standard” speech: a comparison .................................................................................83 Merit and dispensation .........................................................................................................90 Conclusion: dispensation and Buddhist rule ........................................................................97 Chapter Three. How to purify a dead god: theory and design of the Great Worship Assembly ........................................................................................................................ 108 The problem of Buddhist kingship ....................................................................................108 Overview of the Great Worship Assembly ........................................................................ 113 General purpose and design ............................................................................................... 118 Past approaches to Tibetan Buddhist ceremonial ...............................................................121 Overview of the text and the procession ............................................................................123 Theoretical foundations of the Great Worship Assembly ..................................................127 1. Divinity ......................................................................................................................127 iv 2. Afterkarma .................................................................................................................138 3. Worship ......................................................................................................................148 The Procession: design and implications ...........................................................................154 Conclusion .........................................................................................................................161 Chapter Four. Making sense of the Potala Palace ..................................................... 163 Palace as symbol ................................................................................................................163 Between bricks and words: Potala in scholarship ..............................................................172 Marpori and Potala in history ............................................................................................179 Kagyü interest in Marpori ..................................................................................................192 The Statue and the Marpori palace ....................................................................................199 Chapter Five. The White Palace as imagined, built, and used ................................ 210 Introduction ........................................................................................................................210 The Imagined palace ..........................................................................................................213 Organization of the White Palace ......................................................................................223 An Enthronement ceremony in the White Palace ..............................................................243 Conclusion: the natural and the constructed ......................................................................254 Chapter Six. The Red Palace and the World's Unique Ornament ........................... 260 Introduction ........................................................................................................................260 Out with the old, in with the new .......................................................................................265 Kālacakra as model ............................................................................................................272 Rooms of the Red Palace ...................................................................................................287 Conclusion: The Unique Ornament ...................................................................................303 Appendix: Schedule of the Great Worship Assembly (April 1694) and design of the concluding procession ................................................................................................... 309 1. Schedule of events at the inaugural Great Worship Assembly ......................................309 2. Design of the procession (ser phreng) ...........................................................................313 Bibliography .................................................................................................................. 337 v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First of all, most of all, I convey my very deep and heartfelt gratitude to, and admiration for, the professors who are responsible for my education. They have challenged me, stuck up for me, and inspired me. They have also, each in their own way, shown the deep pleasure that can come from learning. They
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