Simon Wickham-Smith
The Ongoing Sixth Dalai Lama Project
The Sixth Dalai lama. A Short Biography.
Tshangyang Gyatso, the sixth Dalai Lama, was born in Mön on March 1st 1683 and (probably) died on his way to China, at Kunganor, on November 14th 1706. During his short life he attracted great controversy, both within and without the monastic establishment: not only was he the spiritual and secular ruler of Tibet, but he was also a rake and a drinker, a poet and a lover, a friend to the people and a source of endless frustration to those who would keep him in check.
His predecessor, the Great Fifth Lobzang Gyatso, died during the building of the Potala in Lhasa. His Regent, Sanjé Gyatso, who may also have been his son, kept his death a secret, contriving elaborate plots - such as long retreats and monkish impersonators - to keep the truth from leaking out. In 1685, the Regent came upon the young child and pronounced himself satisfied that this was the reincarnation of his dead master.
Rather than reveal the identity of the new Dalai Lama, however, the Regent kept the boy a virtual prisoner, at first in Mön at his parents’ house, then subsequently at Tsona and finally at Nakartse, where in 1697 he was finally recognised officially and given novice ordination, assuming the name Tshangyang Gyatso.
From an early age, it seems as though the Dalai Lama wasn’t exactly suited to the job, not at least in the way that his five predecessors had been. Maybe it was due to being kept hidden for fifteen years but, despite being intellectually apt and contemplatively inclined, Tshangyang Gyatso preferred archery and spending time with his friends (both male and female) to study and spending time in prayer. Indeed, when it came for him to receive full ordination from his teacher the Panchen Lama, he refused and, what’s more, gave back his novice vows. When pressed to reconsider, he threatened suicide.
So, no less Dalai Lama for not being a monk, he returned to his former pleasures. Since he had been in Lhasa, he had composed poems in a popular style - love lyrics, expressing the frustration he felt with his situation and the love (often unrequited, often too betrayed) for aristocratic ladies and market-girls alike. Both before and after hie disrobed, he used to go down to Shol, a village behind the Potala, and hang out until the early hours, drinking and singing and chatting up the local women - the rooves of certain houses in Shol were painted yellow to honor their famous guest. He would personally serve visitors to the Potala, giving them food and tea, making them feel at ease in his presence.
All these breaks from the norm set him against the establishment and, particularly, against his Regent. With Sanjé Gyatso, he had a remarkable relationship, not unlike many sons and fathers (which rôles, to all intents and purposes, they played). In the poems, there is clearly as much love and respect as frustration and annoyance shown to the Regent; from what we know of the intensely brilliant and complex character of the Regent, he too had similar feelings.
Outside the Potala, the Regent had reached an alliance with the Dzungars. The Dzungars were hostile to the Manchus and it was with the Manchu emperor K’ang Hsi that the Qosot’s leader Lozang Qan had himself forged an alliance. Twice the Regent tried to kill the Lozang Qan; twice he failed. The Qan seized the initiative and defeated the Regent in battle, beheading him in the process. The threat to Manchu supremecy was now restricted to the Dalai Lama himself.
The Qan now began to accuse Tshangyang Gyatso, not only of being a dissolute and ineffective ruler, but also of being a heretical practitioner allied to the Nyingmapa, or anciemt, sect of Tibetan Buddhism. We don’t know how seriously K’ang Hsi took these charges, but he nevertheless decided that it was time to do away with the problematic young man.
On June 11th 1706, the Qan had Tshangyang Gyatso removed from the Potala and taken to the Lhaku gardens just outside Lhasa. Sixteen days later, it was declared that the Dalai Lama was deposed and had been ordered to Peking for a meeting with the Emperor. As troops tried to take him away from Lhaku, they were met by huge resistance by both monks and laypeople and, recapturing him, the monks spirited him away to Drepung monastery.
On June 29th, Lozang Qan’s artillery opened fire on Drepung. The Dalai Lama decided to act and, quickly penning his final poem to an unknown lady in Shol, he walked out of the monastery and gave himself up. Many of the monks ran to his defense and were killed. He was then taken off towards Peking and, supposedly, died on the journey.
Chinese and Tibetan accounts say he fell ill and died, while others report that he was murdered. Still others suggest that he in fact lived on. There were sightings of him at the installation of the seventh Dalai Lama some years later and there is a text claiming to be the “secret history” of Tshangyang Gyatso, by a Mongolian author, Nomunqan, but which most scholars consider a forgery.
On hearing of the sixth Dalai Lama’s demise, the Manchu court replied, ”The false Dalai Lama, who had been sent under escort by Ha-Zan, came to fall ill outside the pass of Hsi-ning, and died there of disease. the false Dalai Lama’s behavior was perverse and disorderly. Since he has now died on the way, of disease, we ought to abandon the corpse. The Emperor approves of this proposal.” (Zahiruddin Ahmad Sino-Tibetan Relations in the Seventeenth Century Serie Orientale Roma 40 [Roma: Institute Italiano Per Il medio Ed Estremo Oriente, 1970], p332)
