Part 23 (1/2)
”Do you ever expect to become a saint?” I asked him.
”Yes, I hope so, but it takes five hundred transmigrations of an uncontaminated soul before one can be one.”
Then, as if waking to a sudden thought, he seized my hand impulsively and spread my fingers open. Having done this, he muttered two or three words of surprise. His face became serious, even solemn, and he treated me with strange obsequiousness. Rus.h.i.+ng out of the temple, he went to inform the other Lamas of his discovery, whatever it was. They crowded round him, and from their words and gestures it was easy to see that they were bewildered.
When I left the company of the strange idols and came into the courtyard, every Lama wished to examine and touch my hand, and the sudden change in their behaviour was to me a source of great curiosity, until I learnt the real cause of it some weeks later.
CHAPTER XLVII
The Jong Pen's statements regarding me--Sects of Lamas--Lamaseries--Government allowance--Ignorance of the crowds--How Lamas are recruited--Lamas, novices, and menials--Dances and hypnotism--Infallibility--Celibacy and vice--Sculptors--Prayer-wheels and revolving instruments--Nunneries--Human bones for eating vessels and musical instruments--Blood-drinking.
BEFORE I left the monastery, the Lamas, who had now become more or less accustomed to me, asked me many questions regarding India and concerning medicine. These seemed to be subjects of great interest to them. They also questioned me as to whether I had heard that a young sahib had crossed over the frontier with a large army, which the Jong Pen of Taklakot had defeated, beheading the sahib and the princ.i.p.al members of the expedition.
I professed to be ignorant of these facts, and so I really was, though I naturally felt much amused at the casual way in which the Jong Pen of Taklakot had disposed of the bearskin before he had even caught the bear himself. The Lamas took me for a Hindoo doctor, owing to the colour of my face, which was sunburnt and had long remained unwashed, and they thought that I was on a pilgrimage of circ.u.mambulation round the Mansarowar Lake.
They appeared anxious to know whether illnesses were cured by occult sciences in India, or by medicines only. I, who, on the other hand, was more interested in getting information than in giving it, turned the conversation on the Lamas themselves.
Of course I knew that there are sects of red, yellow, white and black Lamas, the red ones being the older and more numerous throughout the country; next to them come the yellow Lamas, the _Gelupkas_, equally powerful in political and religious matters, but not quite so numerous; and, lastly, the white Lamas and the black Lamas, the _Julinba_, who are the craftsmen in the monasteries, working at painting, printing, pottery and ornamentation, besides attending on the other Lamas and making themselves useful all round in the capacities of cooks, shepherds, water-carriers, writers, and last, but not least, executioners. The lamaseries are usually very rich, for the Tibetans are a deeply devout race, and the Lamas are not backward in learning how to extort money from the ignorant wors.h.i.+ppers under pretences of all kinds. Besides attending to their religious functions, the Lamas are traders at large, carrying on a smart money-lending business, and charging a very high interest, which falls due every month. If this should remain unpaid, all the property of the borrower is confiscated, and if this prove insufficient to repay the loan the debtor himself becomes a slave to the monastery. It is evident, from the well-fed countenances of the Lamas, that, notwithstanding their occasional bodily privations, they as a rule do not allow themselves to suffer in any way, and no doubt can be entertained as to their leading a smooth and comfortable existence of comparative luxury--a condition which frequently degenerates into vice and depravity.
The larger lamaseries receive a yearly Government allowance, and considerable sums are collected from the oblations of the faithful, while other moneys are obtained by all sorts of devices which, in any country less religious than Tibet, would be considered hardly honourable and often even altogether criminal. To any one acquainted with Tibet, it is a well-known fact that, except in the larger towns, nearly all people besides brigands and Lamas are absolutely poor, while the monks themselves and their agents live and prosper on the fat of the land. The ma.s.ses are maintained in complete ignorance, and seldom is a layman found who can write or even read. Thus everything has to go through the Lamas'
hands before it can be sanctioned.
[Ill.u.s.tration: TUCKER VILLAGE AND GOMBA]
The lamaseries and the Lamas, and the land and property belonging to them, are absolutely free from all taxes and dues, and each Lama or novice is supported for life by an allowance of _tsamba_, bricks of tea, and salt. They are recruited from all ranks, and whether honest folks or murderers, thieves or swindlers, all are eagerly welcomed on joining the brotherhood. One or two male members of each family in Tibet take monastic orders, and by these means the monks obtain a great hold over each house- or tent-hold. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that in Tibet half the male population are Lamas.
In each monastery are found Lamas, Chibbis, and a lower grade of ignorant and depraved Lamas, slaves, as it were, of the higher order. They dress, and have clean-shaven heads like their superiors, and do all the handiwork of the monastery; but they are mere servants, and take no direct, active part in the politics of the Lama Government. The Chibbis are novices. They enter the lamasery when very young, and remain students for many years. They are constantly under the teaching and supervision of the older ones, and confession is practised from inferior to superior.
After undergoing, successfully, several examinations they become effective Lamas, which word translated means ”high priest.” These Chibbis take minor parts in the strange religious ceremonies in which the Lamas, disguised in skins and ghastly masks, sing and dance with extraordinary contortions to the accompaniment of weird music made by bells, horns, flutes, cymbals and drums.
Each large monastery has at its head a Grand Lama, not to be confounded with the Dalai Lama of Lha.s.sa, who is believed, or rather supposed, to have an immortal soul transmigrating successively from one body into another.
The Lamas eat, drink and sleep together in the monastery, with the exception of the Grand Lama, who has a room to himself. For one moon in every twelve they observe a strict seclusion, which they devote to praying, and during which time they are not allowed to speak. They fast for twenty-four hours at a time, with only water and b.u.t.ter-tea, eating on fast-days sufficient food only to remain alive, and depriving themselves of everything else, including snuff and spitting, the two most common habits among Tibetan men.
The Lamas have great pretensions to infallibility, and on account of this they claim, and obtain, the veneration of the people, by whom they are supported, fed and clothed. I found them, as a rule, very intelligent, but inhuman, barbarously cruel and dishonourable, and this was not my own experience alone: I heard the same from the overridden natives, who wish for nothing better than a chance to shake off their yoke.
Availing themselves of the absolute ignorance in which they succeed in keeping the people, the Lamas practise to a great extent occult arts, by which they profess to cure illnesses, discover murders and thefts, stop rivers from flowing, and bring storms about at a moment's notice.
Certain exorcisms, they say, drive away the evil spirits that cause disease. It is certain that the Lamas are adepts at hypnotic experiments, by which means they contrive to let the subjects under their influence see many things and objects that are not there in reality. To this power are due the frequent reports of apparitions of Buddha, seen generally by single individuals, and the visions of demons, the accounts of which alone terrify the simple-minded folk, and cause them to pay all their spare cash in donations to the monastery.
Mesmerism plays an important part in their weird dances, during which extraordinary contortions are performed, and strange positions a.s.sumed, the body of the dancer being eventually reduced to a cataleptic state, in which it remains for a great length of time.
The Lamas swear to celibacy when they enter a lamasery; but they do not always keep these vows, and they are besides addicted to the most disgusting of all vices in its very worst forms, which accounts for the repulsive appearance of far-gone depravity so common among the middle-aged Lamas.
All the larger lamaseries support one or more Lama sculptors, who travel all over the district, and go to the most inaccessible spots to carve on rocks, stones, or pieces of horn, the everlasting inscription, ”_Omne mani padme hun_,” which one sees all over the country. Unseen, I once succeeded, after much difficulty and discomfort, in carrying away two of these very heavy inscribed stones, which are still in my possession, and of which reproductions are here given.
Weird and picturesque places, such as the highest points on mountain pa.s.ses, gigantic boulders, rocks near the sources of rivers, or any spot where a _mani_ wall exists, are the places most generally selected by these artists to engrave the magic formula alluding to the reincarnation of Buddha from a lotus flower.