Beijing: The 11th Panchen Lama, who is being
projected by China as the successor to the exiled Dalai Lama,
led the tonsuring ceremony of a 4-year-old Tibetan boy chosen
as the sixth `Living Buddha`, officials said on Monday.
The Lama, Bainqen Erdini Qoigyijabu, tonsured Losang
Doje, the reincarnation of the fifth Living Buddha Dezhub, in
the Tibetan capital Lhasa yesterday according to Buddhist
rituals, officials in southwest China`s Tibet Autonomous
Region said.
The tonsure ceremony was held at the Jokhang Temple in
Lhasa following a lot-drawing ceremony that selected the boy
with the secular name as the sixth Living Buddha Dezhub.
Before the tonsure ceremony, Losang Jigme, Tibet`s top
official in-charge of religious affairs, read out the regional
government`s approval of the reincarnation, the state-run
Xinhua news agency reported from Lhasa.
Bainqen Erdini Qoigyijabu, the Chinese Government-
appointed 11th Panchen Lama, who is also vice president of the
Buddhist Association of China, then cut a lock of the boy`s
hair and gave him the religious name Dezhub Jamyang Sherab
Palden.
The 20-year-old Panchen Lama himself was chosen in a
similar fashion 15 years ago. The Panchen Lama is regarded as
second-in-command in Tibetan Buddhism after the Dalai Lama,
who is the political and spiritual head.
Tibetan officials in the past have defended the
appointment of 11th Panchen Lama, who is now being projected
by China as a successor to the 14th Dalai Lama to take over as
the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism.
The Panchen Lama, who lives mostly in Beijing, had made
his political "debut" by addressing for the first time a
congregation recently at Tashilhunpo Monastery in Tibet.
PTI
