Shugden and the New Kadampa Tradition: Fear of Ghosts

GUEST POST by Carol McQuire

Fear of ghosts

I’ve been thinking lately that the problem with ‘Shugden’ is that he makes people frightened. And people are frightened of the New Kadampa Tradition (NKT). In the UK people are frightened of ‘talking up’ about their experiences. People fear the ‘injustice’ and ‘lies’ of the NKT. But that’s the myth and that’s our main function – by ‘talking’ we can stop the fear. There is no need to fear the truth. And what is the truth? The truth is that the NKT ‘harass’ for their ‘Shugden’ with exaggeration and hype, with the deceptive techniques of a bad politician. And they are unkind. Institutionally unkind. We have the data.

And the reality? ‘Shugden’ will destroy the NKT! Catch 22 – they need him, they depend on him, but their need will destroy them.

I’ll explain.

In 2012 in Manchester, His Holiness the Dalai Lama was joking about the Chinese practising Shugden: it’s ‘their problem’, he said, as he’s ‘warned them’. And he laughed and laughed. We need to laugh and laugh. The NKT have been warned too!

The NKT wears the ‘Emperor’s New Clothes’ of being ‘pure Dharma’ – it’s a hoax. A mirage. Their ‘Shugden’ has stopped them looking beyond their own noses …

In a superb twist, ‘Shugden’ will destroy the NKT because the NKT aren’t giving ‘pure Dharma’ at all – it’s all contaminated with the ‘business model’, the franchise, the ‘worldly success’ that Shugden is well known for in the Tibetan world. What is the ‘heart’ of Tibetan Buddhism and the ‘lineage’? It’s the warmth and wisdom of the teacher. But there is no teacher at the heart of the NKT. He left them years ago. This is why they scream so loudly, so that he might hear. The taboo. He can’t and won’t hear them. But His Holiness does. How ironic!

Their ‘Shugden’ will destroy them, all by himself, using precisely what attracted them to him – ‘worldly’ desires – the ‘quick’ path to ‘bliss’ – the grand and ‘special’ tradition that expands and expands, limitlessly. The more the Shugdens demon-strate (joyfully!), the more they ‘grasp’ at him. The more they ‘grasp’, the more their own ‘Shugden’ will eat them up. It’s the opposite to a ‘true path’. You can see them getting more and more extreme, and weakening – watch the last few ISC videos. All tangled up by Shugden. Lost logic.

We need to understand and remember this. The NKT Shugden followers who ‘protect’ him will be ruined by him.

I quote from Tenzin’s blog:

In Music Delighting an Ocean of Protectors,

‘About the violence Shugden brings to other sentient beings Trijang Rinpoche states’ (p. 121–122):

“Furthermore, whether they were lords of Tibet, great lamas who held the political power of the throne, lamas and tulkus, great or small, with illustrious lines of incarnation, holy beings rich in scriptural and realized qualities, high lords of vast lands and works, those haughty with pride of family lineage, dominion and wealth, any who hypocritically claimed to be followers of Protector Manjusri Tsongkhapa’s Teachings while remaining unsatisfied with Je Lama’s precious Teachings of Sutra and Tantra which, in terms of view, meditation, and action, need not crave more from any other tradition, and, instead, mixed, polluted, or confused them with other modes of view and practice, whether lay or ordained, regardless of status, there have been many who have met with unpleasant wrathful punishments, such as being punished by authorities, litigation and legal disputes, untimely death, and so forth. Such swift, decisive signs appear to direct perception. Here praise is offered to that manifestation as a great wrathful protector who raises the Yellow Hat Teachings to the heights of the heavens.”

Tenzin states: “This mundane harmful spirit is, according to Trijang Rinpoche, an emanation of Manjushri who emanated for the special purpose (p. 9) of protecting the purity of Tsongkhapa’s tradition” …

Let’s ‘translate’ this writing by Trijang Rinpoche, making it relevant to the current situation:

Furthermore, whether they were lords of the international world, great lamas who influenced the political power of governments, lamas and tulkus, great or small, with illustrious lines of incarnation, holy beings rich in scriptural and realized qualities, high lords of vast lands and works, those haughty with pride of family lineage, property and wealth, any who hypocritically claimed to be followers of Protector Manjusri Tsongkhapa’s Teachings while remaining unsatisfied with Je Lama’s precious Teachings of Sutra and Tantra which, in terms of view, meditation, and action, need not crave more from any other tradition, and, instead, edited, ignored or confused them with other modes of view and practice, such as business and real estate, whether lay or ordained, regardless of status, there have been many who have met with unpleasant wrathful punishments, such as being punished by authorities, litigation and legal disputes, untimely death, and so forth. Such swift, decisive signs appear to direct perception. Here praise is offered to that manifestation as a great wrathful protector who raises the Yellow Hat Teachings to the heights of the heavens.

That’s what Trijang got wrong – ultimately it’s not the ‘others’ that get harmed – it’s the narrow minded Shugden fanatics that get destroyed by him. They ‘lose’ what they most crave – their teacher. Shugden blindness ignores Je Tsongkhapa’s non sectarian legacy, his intellectual breadth and ignores his kindness. NKT ‘Shugden’ practitioners aren’t actually allowed access to Je Tsongkhapa’s works – if they encountered the real magic of Je Tsongkhapa’s writings the NKT ‘illusion’ would start to unravel.

We need to ‘see’ this clearly – the NKT have done nothing except create problems for themselves; hundreds of ‘survivors’, hundreds of people who have suffered and suffer, while His Holiness the Dalai Lama is stronger than ever, solid in his practice and his wisdom, confident in his compassion. The weight of karma will fall upon the NKT in the guise of the ‘Shugden’ they follow; empty of compassion, a false prophet for the age of commerce, doomed to fail. It’s just a case of when – remember, he’s only a ghost. An annoying, noisy ghost!

Remember to laugh, they have been warned!

Carol McQuire, New Kadampa Survivors

2Comments

Add yours

1

Pierre on November 13, 2014 at 6:54 pm

very good. especially this one “That’s what Trijang got wrong …” 🙂
2

jigmeyeshe on December 16, 2014 at 3:09 am

ON TELLING NKT STORIES

You know why many people don’t tell their NKT stories? Because they are ashamed of their part in them. ‘Collusion’, it’s called. The NKT slides you into doing things that are against your own ethics and you don’t quite realise at the time because it’s covered in justifications like ‘for the Guru’, ‘for all sentient beings’, ‘to promote the pure Dharma’, to ‘protect Shugden’, ‘to keep the centre harmonious’ and so on. You are specialising in showing your ‘good intentions’ so you don’t think that could go wrong.

In fact, ironically, the worse a group is, and the more skilful it is in ‘drawing people in’, the less likely you are to hear about it for a long time because of this ‘collusion’. People who have never got involved with this kind of manipulative group don’t realise. It’s like saying, “Oh, he’s so charming! Nice, middle class men like him don’t hit their wives, do they?” Yes, they do. The NKT does a lot of psychological damage. The NKT’s like the ‘charming’ abusive husband who deliberately makes you lose your temper beyond what you thought ever possible and then turns on you as the one who’s ‘doing it wrong’! You are faced with your own worst emotions and the NKT is ‘spiritual’ and ‘Buddhist’, isn’t it? It takes a while to disentangle what’s going on.

In the NKT you aren’t pushed to be ‘angry’, you’re pushed to ‘give’ too much, literally or ethically. You are pushed to go just beyond the ethically ‘clean’. Only just. You can’t quite tell when it first happens. You often don’t quite realise at what point you crossed that boundary and ‘compromised’ yourself and once you are on the ‘other side’ of your own ethical boundary in ways you can’t accept, you will probably prefer just to leave the NKT quietly and ‘forget’ about it and have the occasional reunion with people who went through the same ‘colluding’ experience and also quietly ignore any activists, hoping the spotlight won’t ever go onto your part of the story. Those people who compromised the most, who left behind the most, who gave the most, are still there in the NKT. They crossed so many boundaries that they won’t ever leave. They can’t; the psychological distress and internal conflict would be too deep to withstand. I’m not talking about the oligarchy – the powerhouse ones – I’m talking about people lower down the power structure who keep it going.

The ex NKT people who can sooner talk openly are the squeaky clean ones, and that’s only if they overcome their confusion and shock at being misled. As you may tell, I’m not ‘squeaky clean’ but I’ve forgiven myself for my negative tendencies that were so beautifully ‘brought out’ by my NKT ‘responsibilities’, just enough to make a start ‘telling my story’. The other problem is ‘confidentiality’. I’m still not sure enough of how much I want to or can say about other people. The last five years, helping to run the survivor’s group, have, for me, been like being a priest listening to confessionals in which all the accusations of suffering are caused by the same organisation and I can say nothing because those aren’t my stories. People ‘confess’ other people’s crimes; they ‘confess’ the shame of these things happening to them and not feeling they can do anything about it except expose a fragment and then try to forget. I am tired of that weight of ‘listening’. So many stories have the same beginning and the same ending: good intentions, used too much. Of course, the NKT appear to deny most things, even when evidence to the contrary is in front of them. But this situation won’t last forever.

The NKT is a ‘sacrificial’ group, hiding their obsession with reputation disguised as ‘not destroying other’s faith’ and ‘practising contentment’. You’ve got to be ‘happy’ or you’ll be ‘asked’ to leave. Right? So we leave. And we stay quiet. For our own good. We think it means we can ‘recover’ better. But perhaps it’s just the fear they create still manipulating us. Since when did we fear telling the truth? Especially if we took vows not to lie. We don’t seem to trust in karma as much as some Tibetans I know. His Holiness is one example. We don’t understand that, do we? He spells it out – doing these practices (Shugden) has consequences. Running the NKT as they do – ignoring people for the ‘higher’ cause – will have consequences.

What worries you? It’s that ‘fear of exposure’ the NKT gets you with – if there’s nothing you fear, they can’t harm you. The NKT fears exposure too. So they are determined that we be as quiet as possible. I have seen sophisticated, educated people fall for the NKT hype. I have seen them wrecked when they realise how their best intentions have been used, when they realise the deep hypocrisy. I have seen people who were hardly involved with the group crumble at the thought of the NKT ‘ruining’ them or something in their lives. That is the silencing.

What have you got to hide?

December 11th 2014

Carol McQuire

	tenpel on Karmapa Agrees to Multimillion…
	Stardust on Whitewashing, Dishonesty &…
	tenpel on Whitewashing, Dishonesty &…
	anonymous on Whitewashing, Dishonesty &…
	Alan J.W. on Whitewashing, Dishonesty &…
	tenpel on Karmapa Agrees to Multimillion…
	anonymous on Whitewashing, Dishonesty &…
	Tim on Whitewashing, Dishonesty &…

Fear of ghosts

Rate this:

Share this:

Like this:

Related