songzhanlin monastery

main cities of yunnan: dali , dehong , jinghong , kunming , lijiang , ninglang , shangri-la , tengchong , yuanyang


         north of town at the end of the valley lies songzanlin temple , yunnan's largest monastery belonging to the gelugpa (yellow hat) sect. founded in 1679 during the rule of the great fifth dalai lama, under whose rule tibetan buddhism reached its height of power, the temple complex was built on a hillside to resemble lhasa's potala, albeit on a much smaller scale.


        once several thousand monks inhabited the living quarters around the temple, acting as true rulers over zhongdian, eclipsing the power of the chinese magistrate. the monks kept close guard over everything that could in any way challenge their authority and while they allowed the lucrative caravan trade, they did not want any foreigners to explore their land. h.r. davies, surveying yunnan for the british at the end of the 19th was certainly not welcomed here:


        chung-tien [zhongdian], or che-tang [jiankang] to give the place its correct tibetan name, is a town of the t'ing class, and there is a chinese official of that rank here. but he has no real authority. the rulers of the country are to be found in the large monastery which is situated a little further along the plain on the road to a-tun-tzu. here there are said to be 3,300 lamas. the taxation of the laymen to support the ecclesiastics is very heavy, and many families are leaving the district.


        everyone in chung-tien, including the chinese chih-t'ing is completely under the thumb of the lamas. i tried to hire a mule or two to ease my animals, but found it impossible to do so. the mule owners were quite willing, but they said that on their return they would certainly be beaten by the lamas for venturing to assist a foreigner. the chung-tien lamas seem to be a truculent lot. their demeanour when i passed the monastery the next day was certainly not friendly.


        the lama's rule ended when the communists took over. during the 1950s when tibet rose up, the monastery suffered the first heavy damage. the cultural revolution a decade later than saw it shelled and razed to the ground. the red guards disolved the religious community, forced the monks into work and banned all religious practises. but with the return of religious freedom in the late 1970s have monks have returned to the monastery, even though reconstruction of the temples had to wait until the 1990s.

 

 

 

 

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last updated: february 12, 2007

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