Buddhism's growing pains

The Russian authorities have proclaimed Buddhism as one of the country' s four traditional religions, alongside Orthodox Christianity, Islam, and Judaism.

The first evidence of Buddhism's existence in the territory of what Russia is today dates back to the 8th century A.D. They are associated with the State of Bohai, which in 698-926 took up part of what are now Russia's Primorye and Territory and the Amur River area. In the territory of the Russian state Buddhism has existed since the early 17th century, when some Kalmyk tribes agreed to be subjects of the Russian czars.

During Mikhail Gorbachev's policy of perestroika quite a few Buddhist groups obtained registration under the aegis of the Central Buddhist Board of the USSR. Ruined monasteries began to be restored in Trans-Baikalia, Kalmykia and Tyva and new temples built. In St. Petersburg, a local monastery was returned to the Buddhist community and repaired.

In 1991 His Holiness the Dalai Lama for the first time openly visited Russia's Buddhist regions. His sermons gathered audiences of up to 30,000 worshipers.

These days in Russia there are over 200 Buddhist communities. Most of them are in the three Buddhist republics - Buryatia, Kalmykia and Tyva.

All of Russia's three Buddhist republics attach great importance to the revival of their traditional religion and the authorities furnish their support. However, as soon as the first temples were build, it turned out there are two few priests to go around.

The spiritual elite of the Buddhist ethnic groups - about 20,000 clerics - was wiped out during the Soviet era and could not be recreated overnight.

"Regrettably, there is no accord between the lamas of the new generation, because they lack proper spiritual education and upbringing. None of them is able to rise to the position of a unanimously recognized leader, capable of properly running Buddhist affairs in the new environment," says Buddhism of Russia magazine.

All spiritual leaders of the younger generation, unlike most of Buryatia's lamas of the past, are laymen. They have never taken any monastic vows and they have wives and children.

Representatives of different schools of Buddhism are at odds with each other. Their spiritual leaders say so outright.

"Honestly speaking, Buddhism as a religion is in a very favorable position. We have the degree of freedom we have never dreamed of," says the head of the traditional Buddhist Sangha of Russia, Pandito Hambo Lama Damba Ayusheev. "And what are the greatest hindrances? We ourselves by and large. We cannot understand each other, find a common language. Is their any sense in calling ourselves Buddhists at a time when we keep quarreling?"

"For instance, when we are told that in the datsan (Buddhist university) there should be only monks who preach the truth and live for the sake of some kind of their own 'pure Buddhism', we cannot go to this extreme. It would be not very appropriate to tell our Buryat people, who have their traditions, that the datsan will stay closed for a while, because we have no true monks for the time being," he said.