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Clarifying Gendün Chöpel

13»

Comments

  • SileSile Veteran
    edited July 2012
    @Thao,

    The book is available now in two places:

    http://hk.plm.org.cn/e_book2011/xz-44017.pdf

    and

    https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gpxoc72n50wdl3t/tHptLtRFG-

    The first link is to a Chinese site, which often seems to have problems, so I'm also linking to a second copy (downloaded from the Chinese site), which is now in my Dropbox.
  • ThaoThao Veteran
    where is page 178.

    You know Sile people don't give sweets to 12 year olds and talk about romance unless they want something.
  • Maybe he was being ironic :D
  • SileSile Veteran
    edited July 2012
    where is page 178.

    You know Sile people don't give sweets to 12 year olds and talk about romance unless they want something.
    @Thao,

    The author makes it very clear in this paragraph that a woman's interest in romance progresses with her age. Her interest in romance, at age 12, is limited to sharing sweets and stories. It is not until age 26, in this paragraph, that the author first introduces the concept of full sex.

    Because this paragraph shows a progression of a woman's "romantic" activity and interest, we can see that, as full sex is not mentioned until age 26, 12 year olds are not considered interested in/ready for sex.

    When you see that on p. 158 he says a woman is not even physically ready for sex until age "16 or 18," it can be clearly seen that Gedun Chopel, again, does not think 12 year olds should have sex.

    No sex whatsover is advised for 12 year olds, either boy or girl. Gedun Chopel feels, for example, that boys are not fully ready until age 24, and shouldn't make a home until then.

    Incidentally, given the age range Gedun Chopel clearly mentions as the earliest possible age of sexual maturity for women (16 through 18 years of age), we can safely assume that in the paragraph where he warns about not hurting ones partner, ("...if it is not the time"), that he is most likely referring to a partner who is 16 or 17 years of age (possibly 18 for some), since this is the age range in which he feels women may be socially ready, but some not quite physically ready, for full sex.




  • ThaoThao Veteran
    interesting. when you read the art of love carefully and what trimondis have said carefully, they agree. you need to do this.
  • SileSile Veteran
    Hello again @Thao,

    I'm at the library now working with a couple of the original texts - also have Hopkins' edition in hand. Both the PDF I linked to above, and the physical copy in my hand now, show p. 178 as blank. Page 177 (the one containing "Stages") is the last page in the chapter "Types of Men and Women." The next chapter, "The Passionate Relationship," begins on 179. There are several blank pages throughout the book, in between chapters.
  • SileSile Veteran
    Unfortunately I have to leave pretty soon, and have a funeral tomorrow, so won't be able to transcribe any more of it until Thursday, unless I can find a digitized copy of the original online somewhere. I was sure hoping it would turn up in the Asian Classics Input Project, but no luck so far.
  • SileSile Veteran
    edited July 2012
    A snippet so far - for now I am using the convention of indicating compound words by avoiding spaces, in the italicized phonetic line (i.e. miyijikten instead of mi yi jik ten).

    འཁྲིག་པ་སྤངས་ ན་ མི་ཡི་འཇིག་རྟེན་ ཁམས། །
    'khrig pa spangsna mi yi 'jig rten khams
    trikpa pangna miyijikten kham
    If coupling was abandoned in the realm of humans

    སྐད་ཅིག་ཙམ་ ལ་ ངེས་པར་ སྟོང་ འགྱུར་ཞིང། །
    skad cig tsam la nges par stong 'gyur zhing
    kéchiktsam la ngépar tong gyurzhing
    It would surely become empty in an instant

    མི་ཡི་ སེམས་ཅན་མེད་ན་ དགེ་སློང་དང། །
    mi yi sems can med na dge slong dang
    mi yi semchen ména gélong dang
    And if there were no human beings

    སངས་རྒྱས་བསྟན་པ་ དེ་ལས་ ག་ལ་འོང། །
    Sangs rgyas bstan pa de las ga la 'ong
    sanggyétenpa délé galaong
    How could there be monks and the Buddha’s teachings?
  • ThaoThao Veteran
    12 year olds are used in the sexual rituals. And death rates among child brides are extremeley high, so I imagine that there have been a lot of deaths in monasteries among 12 year olds used by the lamas. do some research on child brides and you will see this is true.

    it is very clear when i read this book by chopel that he has taken information that he has learned as a monk and adapted it to a sex manual for couples.
  • VastmindVastmind Memphis, TN Veteran
    edited July 2012
    @Thao yes, young girls have been used world-wide and religion wide for 'religious' rituals. For mens' sexual benefit. So I agree with you there.
    I did'nt think that was the question.
    I also agree that after reading the copy posted, I came to the conclusion
    that Chopel learned from monks and made a sex manual for couples.
    I did'nt think that was the question.
    I thought the question was whether or not he said girls under 12 can be used
    for these purposes. Sex or ritual. No?
    I did'nt see that he did.
    Whats the exact question?
    Maybe we can save @Sile another trip. lolololol
  • SileSile Veteran
    Chopel actually criticizes, openly, the concept of celibacy. He said that in order to learn the arts of love, one has to give up ones vows and experience life oneself.

    It seems clear--and Hopkins gives an analysis of this--that he learned from experience among laypeople, as well as from the Kama Sutra. Definitely not from monks ;) The sex manual doesn't have anything to do with monasticism, except in the parts where Chopel is not-so-subtly criticizing the religious status quo.

  • VastmindVastmind Memphis, TN Veteran
    For the record, because I'm still confused about the question,
    I did'nt assume he learned the sex advice from Monks.
    I agreed he wrote a sex book. I agreed he has been taught by Monks.
    This might also apply to Hugh Heffner, for all I know.

    Oh, is that the question?
    Is it that some think he was "speaking" for/on behalf of Monks?
  • seeker242seeker242 Zen Florida, USA Veteran
    edited July 2012
    In addition he recommends feeding a twelve-year-old honey and sweets before ritual sexual intercourse (Chöpel, 1992, p. 177)."

    so where have they lied?

    I don't know. I read the version posted at the dropbox link and I did not see any recommendation of that sort in that book on page 177. Is there some other version that actually says this? In the version posted it says "to be given honey and sweets" but nothing about ritual sexual intercourse...

  • ThaoThao Veteran
    there are other tantra books that actually say to give the girl sweets to get her to have sex. this is directly from the tantra and so it eludes to it. remember that chopel was a tantric teacher. all he knows about sex came from the tantras. also if you notice, trimondis is not directly quoting chopel's work here, at least not this book. chopel was a monastic. everything he learned he learned at the monastery.

    but this thread really isn't what we think it is. it is actually a clouding of the issues, an attempt to discredit trimondis book because it is against tibetan buddhism.

    chopel was a drunkard, and what he has written is really disgusting. actually tibetan buddhism is disgusting for the reasons that young girls, boys, men, and women are raped. children are given over to the monastery to the lamas for these sex rituals. i can't tell you how many people i know who have been harmed by this.

    also it should be noted that the lamas want to absorb the energy of women to transform themselves in superhuman beings (siddhas). women are used by lamas. period. and then when they are finished with them they ask them to leave the monastery, and the tibetan men want nothing to do with them, not unless they become prostitutes.

    so the reason why you can't figure out the question is as i said, it is a smoke screen used to try to get people to believe that tibetan buddhism is okay.

    the sweets given to young girls is in many of the other tantras.

    the trimondis have spent years (probably) on this book in order to warn others of this teaching. people like benjamin walker and n.n. bhattacharyya whom chopel quotes from in his books are really dead set against tantra and say that it was first used by the lower class people, and that the buddhist and the hindus were against tantra, believing to be evil, which it is. they warned people against it and said that they should be shunned. but human nature, the way it is, practiced it anyway.

    For example, look at this comment by trimondis, well, a quote:

    The Kalachakra Tantra urges the yogi to render the mudra pliant with intoxicating liquor: “Wine is essential for the wisdom consort [prajna]. ... Any mudra at all, even those who are still not willing, can be procured with drink” (Grünwedel, Kalacakra III, p. 147). It is only a small step from this to the use of direct force. There are also texts, which advise “that if a woman refuses sexual union she must be forced to do so” (Bhattacharyya, 1982, p. 125).

    I have one of these books and yes it does say exactly this. i think if people can't believe the trimondis. i didn't at first. then they should read the books. 12 year old girls is something that the lamas seen to really like. maybe because they are virgins. but having sex with young girls, even those who are 9 years old, can harm them badly.

    if you carefully read the art of love you can see that it is tantric. it becomes obvious. also the references used are tantric in most part.

    while sile spends her time trying to justify her religion, i left tibetan buddhism when i learned what it was about, and then i began doing a lot of research. perhaps that is what happened with the trimondis. they were translating for the dalai lama, and perhaps, and i say perhaps, because i don't know, they were disgusted with what they read, and were quite outraged, and so wrote a book to warn others. this is what i have been doing myself, but i don't depend on the trimondis writings because tibetan buddhists love to disclaim what they are saying. yet, i posted information on here and was accused of getting it from the trimondis. go figure.



  • JasonJason God Emperor Arrakis Moderator
    This thread is getting ridiculous. Closed.
This discussion has been closed.