Dalai Lama Three Commitments and Interfaith

His Holiness the Dalai Lama has three main commitments, which guide his actions in the world. The first commitment is to exemplifying and encouraging humanistic, secular ethics—simply being a good human being. The second commitment is to interfaith dialogue and religious harmony. The third commitment is to the preservation and celebration of Tibetan culture. A considerable portion of the Dalai Lama’s work in the world is related to the second commitment. The Dalai Lama has forged alliances with other high profile religious leaders like the Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and regularly participates in interfaith forums, conferences, and events around the world.
Before His Holiness was a household word, he had already been demonstrating his commitment to interfaith dialogue. As early as 1968, the Dalai Lama met with prominent Christian philosopher and Trappist monk Thomas Merton. The Dalai Lama and Merton share in common their personal commitments to their own faiths and traditions, while also developing interest in and caring for the different worldviews and beliefs of other cultures and religions. Merton was in fact criticized for his interfaith philosophy (Martin 1). Although a considerable portion of interfaith dialogue is about finding similarities and common grounds, the Dalai Lama does not strive at all for a unified, blended faith, and nor did Merton. On the contrary, the Dalai Lama’s third commitment shows that he instead seeks for an interfaith dialogue that never dilutes the central tenets of any tradition. The Dalai Lama refers to the “value of difference,” and the importance of honoring points of departure as much as intersections of unified thought (The Good Heart 16). Ultimately, the goal of the second commitment is to foster harmony amid diversity and to showcase the universal—and secular—ethical tenets of respect and compassion.
During the 1994 John Main Seminar in London, which comprises the text The Good Heart, the Dalai Lama made clear his commitment to religious plurality. The Dalai Lama had first met John Main in 1980, also at an interfaith event. As readers learn in The Good Heart, John Main was as extraordinary a Christian monk as Merton. Moreover, Main, Merton, and the Dalai Lama all practiced meditation—something that is typically not associated with Christianity. Yet when the Dalai Lama and John Main met, they practiced together, sitting in silence to embody the ineffable understanding of harmony, unity, and compassion. No one was trying to convert another, or even to persuade. The dialogue was both spoken and unspoken in meditation, revealing common grounds and the importance for building bridges between disparate people, cultures, and societies.
The Dalai Lama’s approach to interfaith dialogue reveals a profound and admirable sense of humility, which reflects his first commitment to ethical comportment, compassion, and secular ethics. When the Dalai Lama meets with Christian leaders the likes of Merton, Main, and Tutu, he does so not to teach Buddhism but to listen. As a result, the Dalai Lama offered profound insight into the Christian gospels that not only help non-Christians better understand one of the world’s most powerful religious institutions, but also help Christians to better understand and contextualize their own faith. In a similar display of humble and deep respect, the Archbishop Desmond Tutu—like Merton—had visited the Dalai Lama in the Tibetan residence in exile in Dharamsala. The unity between these important political and spiritual leaders led to decades of partnership. The Dalai Lama’s work with Archbishop Desmond Tutu also exemplifies the authenticity of the Dalai Lama’s commitments because of the deep and visible friendship that has sprouted between the two leaders. As it is described in The Book of Joy, the friendship between the Dalai Lama and the Archbishop is genuine and meaningful, going far beyond a working relationship or a diplomatic link undertaken for political expediency.
It would seem that the Dalai Lama’s second and third commitments could conflict with the first, but in his teachings, the Tibetan leaders shows how secular ethics coincide with a respect for faith and tradition. In a time when both Western Europe and North America are shifting away from religious faith and more toward a secular ethic, the message of the Dalai Lama becomes increasingly important within the context of global peace and harmony. Interfaith dialogue is not about promoting religion at all, but about education, awareness, and critical thinking—all of which the Dalai Lama feels strongly about and discusses in his teachings. In Beyond Religion, the Dalai Lama discusses his first commitment while simultaneously demonstrating the significance of the other two. In Beyond Religion, the Dalai Lama argues that neither science nor religion ensures ethical behavior. Organized religion is not without corruption, and science has an agenda that is not necessarily inclusive of values like compassion.
Because the Dalai Lama places secular ethics above the rituals and doctrines of individual religions, even Buddhism, his commitment to religious dialogue is political and pragmatic. However, the second commitment is also philosophically congruent with His Holiness’s teachings on compassion. The Dalai Lama also pursues a path of religious plurality through interfaith dialogue in the interests of cultural literacy. By holding interfaith conferences like the one on the gospels at the John Main Seminar, and promoting interfaith dialogue with Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Dalai Lama helps to dispel myths and misunderstandings about religion in general, and about specific faiths like Christianity. As Martin points out, the “power of personal contact” helps to bridge differences, encouraging all people of whatever faith or background to learn from other people (1). From Thomas Merton, the Dalai Lama learned the “real meaning of the word Christian,” (“The Dalai Lama and Thomas Merton” 1). Since that meeting, the Dalai Lama finds compassion as the common ground between Buddhism and Christianity.
Without sacrificing their own faiths, the Dalai Lama, Thomas Merton, Desmond Tutu, and other religious leaders have been able to reach a symbolic and socially significant common ground. Too often, the political and social functions of religion override their impact on personal development and ethical comportment. The Dalai Lama uses the principle of interfaith dialogue to distill religions to their essential truths related to improving the human condition in some way. Whiskey, brandy, and vodka are all different spirits, but alcohol is what gives all spirits their strength and potency. Likewise, each religion can remain distinct, even when their practitioners are cognizant of the core similarities between them. Focusing on action and ethics, the Dalai Lama essentially shows that any religion is empty without the cultivation of ethical practice. To be a good person—the Dalai Lama’s first commitment—is the only goal of any religion. Part of being a good person is learning and growing, being willing to listen to other people and to allow different points of view to enrich our own understanding of the universe and the human condition. The knowledge gained form interfaith conversations also needs to be put into practice through right action, whether on the global stage as world leaders or in smaller daily interactions with friends, family, or strangers.
Interfaith dialogue is also about releasing the need to be right. The Dalai Lama prefers the Buddhist philosophy, worldview, and epistemology, and Desmond Tutu prefers that of Christianity. Yet neither leader claims their faith is superior to the other’s faith, or to any other religion. The practice of compassion and secular ethics requires humility and the willingness to listen and learn, without falling prey to the temptation towards moral relativism. All religions are of equal value in that they have the potential to stimulate spiritual inquiry. The Dalai Lama, Thomas Merton, John Main, and Desmond Tutu all physically embody all three of the Dalai Lama’s commitments within the context of interfaith dialogue. These are leaders whose presence and actions in the world demonstrate their dedication to being good people themselves and inspiring rightful action among those who listen to them, and who they teach. They are not evangelists or preachers in spite of their religious titles and tutelage. The interfaith concept is the highest form of spiritual attainment, transforming the wisdom of insight into servant leadership.
Although the Dalai Lama did not start interfaith dialogue, the Tibetan leader deserves credit for bringing interfaith discourse into a new era. Because Tibetan Buddhism has far more elements of rationality embedded in its teachings than Christianity does, and is atheistic, the Dalai Lama has been able to effectively fuse science and religion in ways Christian leaders might have struggled to do within the language of their own faith and tradition. In The Book of Joy and Beyond Religion especially, the Dalai Lama shows how science and religion go hand in hand, the former being able to offer verifiable truths and empirical evidence and the latter enabling human beings to provide meaning and context. Religious pursuits should not be empty expressions of blind faith, but genuine, evidence-based practices that lead to experiences of joy, healing, and compassion. Both Christianity and Buddhism have long traditions of using dialogue as a means of education and personal development. Therefore, the Dalai Lama’s interfaith dialogues offer natural extensions of age-old traditions that promote the advancement of human consciousness and global civilization.



Works Cited

“The Dalai Lama and Thomas Merton.” The Thomas Merton Center at Bellarmine University. Retrieved online: http://merton.org/DalaiLama/
His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Beyond Religion. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2011.
His Holiness the Dalai Lama. The Good Heart. Boston: Wisdom, 1998.
His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. The Book of Joy. New York: Avery, 2016.
Martin, James. “What the Dalai Lama Learned From Thomas Merton.” America Magazine. May 25, 2010. Retrieved online: https://www.americamagazine.org/content/all-things/what-dalai-lama-learned-thomas-merton
“Three Main Commitments,” (2017). Retrieved online: https://www.dalailama.com/the-dalai-lama/biography-and-daily-life/three-main-commitments