The Taming of the Demons: Violence and Liberation in Tibetan Buddhism

by Jacob Dalton

The Taming of the Demons examines mythic and ritual themes of violence, demon taming, and blood sacrifice in Tibetan Buddhism. Taking as its starting point Tibet’s so-called age of fragmentation (842 to 986 C.E.), the book draws on previously unstudied manuscripts discovered in the “library cave” near Dunhuang, on the old Silk Road. These ancient documents, it argues, demonstrate how this purportedly inactive period in Tibetan history was in fact crucial to the Tibetan assimilation of Buddhism, and particularly to the spread of violent themes from tantric Buddhism into Tibet at the local and the popular levels. Having shed light on this “dark age” of Tibetan history, the second half of the book turns to how, from the late tenth century onward, the period came to play a vital symbolic role in Tibet, as a violent historical “other” against which the Tibetan Buddhist tradition defined itself.

Genres: Buddhism, History, Religion, Spirituality, Philosophy, Asia, Mythology

311 pages, Hardcover

First published June 28, 2011

About the author

Jacob Paul Dalton, Ph.D. (Buddhist Studies, University of Michigan, 2002; B.A., Marlboro College, 1993) is the first Khyentse Foundation Distinguished Professor of Tibetan Buddhism and South and Southeast Asian Studies Chair at the University of California at Berkeley. Previously, he was a professor at Yale University and a researcher at the British Library.

Dalton's research focuses on Nyingma religious history, tantric ritual, early Tibetan paleography, and the Dunhuang manuscripts.

Reviews

[Mesoscope · Rating 5 out of 5]

This impressive and fascinating book is an extremely important contribution to our understanding of Tibetan religious culture, practice, and history. To my knowledge, it provides the first book-length treatment of the vital topic of violent imagery in the Tibetan religious imagination, which is in itself extremely odd, given the centrality it occupies in iconography and practice.

It is perhaps a sign of our own ambivalence in treating this topic, and perhaps indicative of the delicacies and complexities of how Tibetan culture has been re-conceptualized in the west in past decades, with focus dwelling far more attentively on the philosophical sophistication of Tibetan tenets and the centrality of Tibetan emphasis on generating compassion, possibly tinged with embarrassment for previous generations' vision of "Lamaism" as a degenerate form of Buddhism contaminated with native shamanistic practices.

Dalton persuasively establishes that this same concern, that Tibetan tantric practice was overrun by non-Buddhist demonolatry, has been a key part of Tibet's own religious and social self-critique for over a thousand years, presenting at various points in Tibetan history an ideological justification for the suppression of marginal sects or legitimating various centralized monastic institutions, which were regarded as a civilizing power necessary to contain the wild, autochthonous indigenous tendency toward violent and bestial rites. Under this aegis, for example, the Tibetan monarch Yeshe Ö re-established a centralized Tibetan hegemony after the period of fragmentation known by many today as the Tibetan "dark age."

The mythological root of this pattern of violently ordering and pacifying powerful and diabolical energies ultimately lay in India. As a kind of ur-text, Dalton ably translates and excavates a long Dunhuang text describing the pacification of the diabolical being Rudra, a tantric master gone wrong, who becomes an antinomian and out-of-control agent of chaos and anomie. After being pacified by the superior powers of Herkua, Rudra is bound to serve the dharma.

This myth codified the basic structure of containment of violent forces on every level, which Dalton traces through the evolution of tantric pacification rites intended to subdue evil or to protect the country against hostile invaders, whether Mongol, English, or Chinese. At times viewed as a tool of vital importance, and at times viewed with suspicion as essentially a form of blood offering or human sacrifice, these practices and energies remain always at the margins of Tibetan culture.

Although Dalton does not bring it up, my mind was forcefully brought to the recent controversy over the propitiation of Dorje Shugden by the Gelukpas, which culminated in tragedy and murder in the Himalayan town of Dharamsala not long ago. I would refer the interested reader to George Dreyfus's account "The Shugden Affair" for a modern-day story illustrating the real-world consequences of the ambivalence of these practices, where one yogi's enlightened protector is another yogi's demon.

This book is a stunning and powerful contribution to the study of Tibetan religious culture, and Dalton is a welcome new voice in the academic literature. Dalton shows himself to be versatile and insightful on every level, whether historiographical, doctrinal, philological or psychological. The magisterial concluding section raises deep questions about violence which effectively link this fascinating study to vital concerns of our own times and minds, and brings his analysis well within the field of practical concern. This is an important book, and I will very much look forward to following Dalton's career with great interest.

[Yudron · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like this author's dissertation on a different topic a great deal. I was disappointed with this book.

As background, practitioners of Tibetan Buddhism often do intense visualization practices of themselves as Buddha wild and fierce Buddhas. These practices are called drakpo in Tibetan, which is usually translated as "wrathful." Here, wrathful does not mean that the Buddhas are angry. These are practice techniques for getting the attention of rough and wild people (myself included) who are attracted to that kind of imagery. There are various steps in doing these practices, and one step that is done by those who follow the traditional practice text is the drelwa, "liberation." For practitioners on the path, this means representing ignorance of enlightenment (duality) as symbolic effigy, such as a piece of meat, a cracker, or a sculpted piece of dough, stabbing it and transferring the so-called consciousness into a pure realm.

For unenlightened Dharma practitioners, this process is symbolically freeing up our own dualistic thoughts.

Sometimes, great lamas with great compassion and equanimity may do ceremonies like this using a symbolic object to liberate sentient beings who are causing harm. Then, it is like voodoo, but, instead of wishing pain and harm on the harm doer, such as a Hitler figure, the wish is for immediate enlightenment... which might indeed end his or her life. To say that is "violence" would mean believing one can actually kill someone from afar though magical means, an unusual belief for a scholar.

This wonderful young professor, however, found some obscure and ancient text that seemed to describe people doing a murdering ceremony where an actual person is killed, and one or two injunctions against such a practice. I am skeptical that this ceremony has actually ever been done, but, human beings being what they are, it might be possible. There were mass murderers in Tibet, such as Gonpo Namgyal, I am not naive.

I respect Dr. Dalton a great deal, and there obviously are some interesting references in the book! But, I feel he should have consulted lamas on this one. The use of the word "violence" for drakpo, instead of wrath, creates the impression that actual violence is being committed by the legions of genuine completely non-violent Buddhists who do these practices in hopes of gaining enlightenment and preventing harm to sentient beings. Is it violent to press down on a piece of dough to wish that ignorance be immediately liberated? I think not. That would be like finding some weird, errant, group of Catholics who eat human flesh at mass and conflating them with folks who take communion.

So, read it if you are interested in the topic, but talk to a real lama if you ahve questions about it.

[Christopher · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you are like me and utterly fascinated by the violent and monstrous tantric imagery of Himalayan Art and the themes of the regional legends, you can't afford to miss this book. It even has some of its primary sources translated and included as appendixes to the main text. It explains the historical and cultural context for mostly shamanic and only barely nominally Buddhist Tibet becoming the hotbet of Vajrayana Buddhism in its political dark ages, why that is, and the rule darker imagery and practices played in such a process.

The formatting of various vowels that are accented due to the languages cited as well as other editing issues on the electronic version are highly obnoxious though and I would recommend getting a physical copy instead if possible.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent exploration of the violent and disturbing past of Tibetan Tantric Buddhism. Though culturally sensitive, the reading remains honest.

The core interpretive text was the Subjugation of Rudra, but Jacob P. Dalton's text, The Taming of the Demons: Violence and Liberation in Tibetan Buddhism, goes far beyond this by placing the violence in historical context and allows the readers to understand revulsion at the extremes of Tantric Buddhism was not simply a manifestation of eurocentric xenophobia but was manifest by Tibetans as well.

Well balanced, culturally sensitive, and honest.

Recommended for readers interested in the history of Tibetan Buddhism, especially Tantric Buddhism.

Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars

[Marsha Altman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic book. Probably the best discussion of demonic and protective deities in Tibetan Buddhism and Bonpo, with some discussion of possible human sacrifice rituals originating in India and occurring during the "Dark Ages" of the 9th and 10th centuries. The book includes a good discussion on the development of Buddhism unique to Tibet during this period, and how the traditional "Dark Ages" might have been good for indigenous development. Dalton extensively translates 1000-year-old Tibetan ritual texts I have never seen in English before, including a full appendix on the Rudra myth. I feel like he could have spent more time on Guru Rinpoche, but as he pointed out, there really are a dearth of texts from Guru Rinpoche's time period to work from.

Not for beginners to Tibetan history or Buddhism.

[Sheri · Rating 4 out of 5]

The similarity between Rudra Subjugation Myth and the Blood Chapter in Kalika Purana was quite surprising. Despite the violent imagery in tantric buddhism, my understanding was human sacrifice was not really done in tantric buddhism. Even when violent language is used in the texts or rituals, this usually means something else. Towards the end of the book, the author finally convinced me that there were cases of human sacrifice in Tibet. I can only say that those who did sacrifices under the name of tantra were deluded. Unlike Hindu Tantra, Buddhist Tantra cannot condone sacrifices as it is against the very root of Mahayana ideals of Bodhichitta and compassion.

[GJ · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Taming of The Demons takes you on a run through a time when Buddhism was young in Tibet and funding had been cut for all monasteries, and tantra spread rapidly. Taking violence during the tantric "dark ages" as his leaping off point, the author pulls the rug out from many assumptions surrounding Tibetan religion. Dalton also provides a translation of The Subjugation of Rudra. Other never translated sources are found throughout, they come from famous Dunhuang "library cave". Page for page, his thoughts and translations are a pleasure to read.

[Anh Le · Rating 3 out of 5]

Review will come later. I'm generally quite ambivalent toward this work.