Chapter 47 - Critical Days

We felt confident that if we were allowed to work without disturbance or interference from outside for a long enough time (but not less than three or four months) we could bring back a complete and authentic record of almost all the important frescoes. But at the same time we were only too conscious of the fact that our activities would sooner or later arouse the suspicion of the provincial authorities or of simple-minded people, who could not understand the reason for our prolonged stay in the desolate ruins of a deserted city or the nature of our work, and who therefore might fear that we were agents of a foreign power (China in particular) or that we were engaged in some sort of black magic or treasure-hunting. The ancient monuments of Tibet were always regarded as the repositories of secret forces, on which the safety and prosperity of the country depended. Nobody was worried if they decayed and fell to pieces --this was the natural way of all things -- as long as those powers were not disturbed or revealed to those who might utilise them for their own purposes.

The first inkling of trouble came to us in the second week of our stay at Tsaparang with the arrival of a nun, who -- as we soon found out -- was a member of the household of the provincial governor, the Dzongpön of Tsaparang, who, however, had his permanent residence in Shangsha, several days journey away from Tsaparang, which he visited only once or twice a year on his official tour of inspection and tax-collection. A modest building, not far from our cave-like dwelling, served him as temporary headquarters during his brief visits. It was here that the nun had put up, and this invested her with some sort of prestige and authority.

She surprised us while we were at work in one of the temples. She had come there in the company of a Trapa, who was in charge of the Chamba Lhakhang (the Temple of Maitréya) a short distance below the ruined city. The nun began to question us in a somewhat haughty manner, which made us suspect that she had probably been sent out to Tsaparang to spy on us and to report to the Dzongpön about our activities. We tried to explain to her the nature of our work, but she did not seem to understand its purpose and finally declared that if we tried to continue with it, she would see to it that we would no longer be supplied with water and fuel (in the form of brush-wood), which until now had been fetched daily from the valley by Wangdu. This would have meant die end of our stay in Tsaparang! We showed her the authorisation from the Lhasa Government, which allowed us to work and to study in the temples and monasteries of Rinchen Zangpo without let and hindrance and without any time-limit, but we could see that even this did not allay her suspicions. How did we get such an exceptional authorisation? And who knew whether the document was genuine?

At this moment my thoughts turned to Tomo Géshé. Who else could come to our rescue but the Guru who had set me on the path that had led us to Tsaparang and whose name had opened so many doors to us and removed so many obstacles! It was in my capacity of being a personal Chela of Tomo Géshé Rimpoché that I had applied to the Lhasa authorities for permission to work at Tsaparang. Though I did not expect that a simple nun in this remote corner of Tibet would have heard of Tomo Géshé, I mentioned that he was our Guru and that we both had been staying at Dungkar Gompa only last year.

When she heard this, her whole attitude changed and she explained: `I myself come from Dungkar and Tomo Géshé Rimpoché is my Tsawai Lama! How wonderful!'

Now the ice was broken, and when we mentioned the names of various inmates of Dungkar Gompa, whom she too knew, personal contact was finally established and we invited her to come to our quarters at Wangdus cave, where we showed her the photographs which Li had taken at Dungkar. Now that she could convince herself with her own eyes of the truth of our words, no doubts remained, and when I showed her Tomo Géshé's seal underneath the little image, which I had received from him and which I always carried with me, she reverently bowed down to receive the Guru's blessings.

This incident was a timely warning, as it had shown us how precarious our situation was. We therefore continued our work with an even greater sense of urgency than before, and took greater precautions to keep our activities as secret as possible. Fortunately, it happened very rarely that travellers passed through Tsaparang, as it was off the main caravan route, which ran along the other side of the valley of the LanchenKhambab. But whenever it happened, we could either hear or see the people, before they were able to climb up to our temples, and in the meantime we could pack away our working materials and devote ourselves to other studies, which rendered us less conspicuous.

We had experienced similar difficulties in Gyantse. Though the Labrangtse (the administrator of the monastic town) had given us permission to study, to sketch, and to take photographs in the temples and monasteries under his jurisdiction, he was greatly afraid of the reactions of the common people, who might regard the tracing of frescoes as sacrilegious, because one could not avoid putting one's hand upon the faces of Buddhas and other sacred personages while tracing them. A Buddha-image (or that of a great saint or a Bodhisattva), whether in the form of a painting or of a statue, becomes an object of veneration from the moment the eyes are opened (by inserting the pupils) with appropriate mantras, by which the image becomes imbued with life and spiritual significance.

Tibetans are particularly careful where sanctuaries of powerful tutelary deities are concerned. They look upon them like modern nations would look upon a nuclear power-plant, on which the security and strength of the country may depend and from which outsiders are kept away, for their own security as well as for that of the nation, and they try to keep these installations secret. To Tibetans, likewise, certain sanctuaries of their powerful protectors are of similar importance, and they are hidden from the eyes and guarded from the interference of those who are neither initiated nor engaged in their service, because the powers invoked in these sanctuaries demand a very precise ritual and knowledge of Sādhanā, so that any disregard or ignorance in this direction might bring about calamities.

As an example, I may mention an experience we had during our stay at Tholing, the greatest and historically most important monastery of Western Tibet, founded by Rinchen Zangpo under the patronage of the Kings of Gugé. It was the venue of the famous religious council in A.D. 1050, on which occasion Atīśa was received by the aged founder Not far from the monastery of Tholing, there is a hill with the ruins of the ancient castles of the Kings of Gugé the conveners of the great council. Even in its present state the hill looks very impressive with its remnants of palaces and temples, towers and battlements, standing against the monumental mass of a table mountain in the background.

When we expressed our intention to visit this place, the Abbot of Tholing assured us that there was nothing worth seeing, since all the palaces and temples had been thoroughly destroyed and that neither frescoes nor statues had survived. He was so emphatic about it that we could not help feeling that for some reason or other he wanted to prevent us from going there. Nevertheless, we decided to make a day's excursion to the hill, if only for the purpose of sketching and taking photos of the picturesque surroundings.

The abbot was right in so far as we found no traces of ancient frescoes among the ruined buildings. But on the highest point of the hill we found a tall building perfectly intact and with a big Tibetan padlock hanging from the closed entrance. Naturally, we were intrigued to know what the building contained and why the abbot had hidden its existence from us. Its red colour and its shape suggested a temple, and the fact that it was locked proved that it was still in use, but not open to the public.

It was not difficult to climb on to the roof from one of the adjacent walls, and as the skylight was only closed from the outside with wooden shutters, without being locked, we could open them and look inside. We almost jumped backward, because we found ourselves face to face with a gigantic, many-headed monster, whose lowest head was that of a black bull. There were other ferocious faces protruding on both sides of the bulls head. Between its horns, at eye-level with us, a red demoniacal face stared at us; however, on the very top of this frightful pyramid of heads appeared the peaceful countenance of Man̄juśrī, the Dhyāni-Bodhisattva of transcendental knowledge.

The gigantic figure with which we were confronted was that of the most powerful and dreaded Yidam Yamāntaka, the Slayer of Death. The meaning of this fantastic figure is as profound as it is awe-inspiring. The God of Death (yama) is represented in his terrible form as a bull-headed deity, while in reality, he is none other than the merciful Avalokiteśvara who, in the stern form of the Lord and Judge of the Dead, holds the Mirror of Truth before deluded human beings, purifies them through the sufferings of purgatory, and finally leads them back to the path of liberation. Man̄juśrī, however, embodies the transcendental knowledge that death is ultimately illusion and that those who identify themselves with the ultimate reality, the plenum-void (śūnyatā) of their inner centre, overcome death and are liberated from the chains of saṁsāra, the rounds of rebirths in the six realms of delusion.

According to a popular legend, a saintly hermit, who had been meditating for a lifetime in a lonely cave, was about to attain complete liberation, when some robbers entered his cave with a stolen bull and killed it by severing its head, without being aware of the hermits presence. When they discovered that the latter had been a witness of their deed, they killed him too by cutting off his head. But they had not counted on the supernatural power which he had acquired during his life-long penance. Hardly had they severed the head of the hermit when the latter rose, joined the bull's head to his body and thus transformed himself into the ferocious form of Yama. Deprived from reaching the highest aim of his penance and seized by an insatiable fury, he cut off the heads of the robbers, hung them round his neck as a garland and roamed through the world as a death-bringing demon, until he was vanquished by Man̄juśrī in the form of yamāntaka, 'the Ender of Death'.

From a deeper point of view, yamāntaka represents the double nature of man, who shares his physical nature, his instincts, drives, and passions with the animals, and his spiritual nature with the divine forces of the universe. As a physical being he is mortal, as a spiritual being he is immortal. If his intellect is combined with his animal nature, demonic forces are born, while the intellect guided by his spiritual nature produces divine qualities. yamāntaka combines in himself the animal, the demon, and the god, the primordial power of life in its aspects of creation and destruction, and the faculty of knowledge which ripens into the liberating wisdom.

We had never seen such a monumental figure of yamāntaka, nor had there been an opportunity to photograph even a smaller statue of this kind, because generally it is too dark in the sanctuaries of the Fearful deities and, moreover, women are not supposed to enter them. Li, therefore, took this rare opportunity to take a photograph of the Yidam's heads, that protruded beyond the lower roof of the temple on which we stood.

`What a pity that I cannot get the whole figure', lamented Li, when we climbed down from the roof, `Let us have a look at the lock!'

Well, she had a good look at it and decided that it could be opened with a little prodding. I tried to dissuade her, but before I could explain my reasons, she succeeded with her little penknife and resolutely entered the temple.

`There is nobody about', she countered. We are miles away from any inhabited place, and there is no living soul in these ruins.

We stood for a few moments in awed silence before the gigantic black figure of yamāntaka, whose blackness is the colour of death and whose penis is erect, because procreation and death are inextricably bound up with each other. It is for this reason that Yama, the Lord of Death, holds the Wheel of Life in his claws. But while contemplating this tremendous conception of super-human reality -- beyond the realm of beauty or ugliness -- I could not suppress a feeling of danger at the back of my mind.

`Take your photo, and let us get out quickly', I urged. 'One never knows whether somebody is not lurking round the corner. We might have been followed, and I do not like to think of what might happen to us if we were found here'.

Li saw the point, and after having taken a quick exposure we hurried out of the temple, snapped the lock, and walked down the lane by which we had come. Hardly had we turned the corner of the temple when we almost collided with the Abbot of Tholing, who apparently had been informed of our excursion and had followed us, accompanied by a servant. We greeted him with a somewhat exuberant joy and our joy was not at all false, because we realised the danger we had escaped by a hairs breadth!

Had we been only one minute later I doubt whether we would have ever been allowed to proceed to Tsaparang. After the encounter with the nun we continued our work undisturbed for about two weeks, happy that the danger had passed. Our happiness, however, came to a sudden end one evening, when returning from our work. We heard the sound of a drum coming from the valley, and the sound came nearer and nearer, as if a procession was slowly moving up the hill. Immediately we felt that new troubles were ahead and that our solitude would be broken. Indeed, soon we saw armed horsemen riding up from the foot of the hill, and Wangdu informed us that the Dzongpön of Tsaparang had arrived.

The following day instead of working in the temples, we called upon the Dzongpön and explained the purpose of our stay in Tsaparang and the nature of our work. The Dzongpön listened politely, but did not seem to be convinced, and when we showed him our official papers, he told us that he could not take the responsibility of allowing us to work in the temples, unless he had received confirmation from Lhasa that the seals and signatures were genuine. When we asked how long it would take to send a messenger to Lhasa, he replied that it would take about two months to reach Lhasa and that an answer might take four to five months altogether. By that time our provisions would be exhausted and there was very little chance to replenish them locally

-- except for raw wheat, which we had to grind ourselves for our daily chapātis! Yet I kept up a stiff front and told the Dzongpön that we had no objection to a verification of our papers and that we would not mind waiting for an answer here in Tsaparang, while pursuing our studies.

Thereupon he tried to make out that we were only entitled to work in the temples and monasteries founded by Rinchen Zangpo and that the temples of Tsaparang were not founded by him, but only those of Tholing, where we might go and work.

I could now see that for some reason he wanted to prevent us from staying at Tsaparang, and I was at a loss how to prove that the Lhakhangs here were indeed founded by Rinchen Zangpo.

'But', I said, 'I myself have read in ancient Tibetan books that these temples are mentioned among those built by Rinchen Zangpo'.

`Which book, for instance?' he demanded.

I realised the trap and knew that unless I could cite an authority big enough to be known and recognised by him, I would not be able to impress him. I, therefore, did not mention the History of the Kings of Gugé but rather had a blind shot: You will find the reference in your greatest historian's book The Blue Records (Dep-ther sNgon-po) by gZon-nud Pal-ldan.

This obviously impressed him and convinced him that I was not unfamiliar with Tibetan literature. At any rate, he was not able to refute my contention; and feeling himself on uncertain ground, he preferred to drop the matter, saying that he would let us know his decision later.

Before taking our leave, I casually enquired whether it was possible to reach the summit of the Tsaparang rock on which the ruins of the royal palaces were situated, since we had not been able to discover any trace of a path or staircase leading there. The Dzongpön immediately assured us that the rock had become inaccessible on account of rock-falls which had completely obliterated the path that formerly led up to the summit. Besides this, he added, there was nothing but empty walls left of the palaces.

The memory of Tholing was only too fresh in my mind, and I was sure that he was keen to conceal the truth from us. I, therefore, did not show any further interest and merely remarked that it might have been pleasant to admire the view from there. Thus we dropped the matter and took our leave.

We returned to our hovel disheartened and depressed, because we felt that the Dzongpön was bent on preventing us from staying and working here. Now only a miracle could save us. Unable to do anything, we were so worried that we could hardly close our eyes during the night. Neither our money nor our provisions would enable us to wait all through the winter for an answer from Lhasa, especially as we had to consider the long and arduous journey back to India through unknown and probably difficult territory. We spent hours in silent meditation, feeling that only the intervention of higher powers could help us.

And indeed, they did help us! The next morning, instead of receiving orders to quit Tsaparang, as we had feared, the Dzongpön himself called on us, accompanied by servants with gifts of food, and explained that the nun, who had met us some time ago, had spoken to him and convinced him that we were genuine Nangpas ('Insiders', i.e. followers of the Buddha) and personal disciples of Tomo Géshé Rimpoché whom he himself regarded as one of the greatest Lamas of Tibet and as his personal Guru. He felt sorry to have distrusted us, but now that he knew that we and he were 'Gurubhais', he would permit us to continue our work, provided we could finish it within about a month, so that we could leave in time before the passes to India would be closed because he would not like to take the responsibility of having us stranded here during a long and hard winter.

Though it seemed to us unlikely that we would be able to complete our work in so short a time, we promised to do our best, hoping that according to the usual vague Tibetan time-conceptions, the month could be slightly stretched. The main thing was to keep the Dzongpön in a good mood, though actually he had no right to set a time-limit to our work. Once he had left, he probably would forget about us, and if not, we might try to get another time-extension, even if it was only a week or a few days.

Fortunately the Dzongpön, after having provided us with another Lamyig for our return to India, left two days later. When taking leave, he expressed the hope of meeting us at Shipki, a village at the foot of the pass leading to India, where he would stay for some time at the end of the next month. We wished him a good journey and happily returned to our work, which had been interrupted for so many days.