by James K. Wellman Jr., UW associate professor of American religion and chair of the comparative religion program in the Jackson School of International Studies

The visit of the Dalai Lama to Seattle has struck me as both full of innocence and naivete. Many have commented on the power of his message of compassion. They have been drawn to it primarily because it is a spiritual way and not a religion. It is a quintessential Northwestern distinction, one can be spiritual but not religious. The implication is that spirituality is good and kind, and religion is perverse and corrupt. This strikes me as innocent and naive. 

The Dalai Lama from all that I know is a very good man, compassionate and kind, but he is a distinctively religious and political figure. That is, he embodies a metaphysical tradition that is more than 2,500 years old, representing a philosophy of relating to a power that is bigger than the self and group, representing a tradition of belief, practice and ritual. In the Western academic study of religion this is a religion. As for politics, the Dalai Lama represents the interests and concerns of a people; he heads a government; he speaks about the need for autonomy for a people; he asks for China to be kind. What else is this than a political act, seeking to influence interests, protecting a people from incursion by another political power?

Religion and politics, from my research, can never be separated. They are always tangled together; think of the Christian Right in recent American politics; think of the Religious Left in the campaigns of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton; think of any number of examples in various forms of political religion in the Islamic, Hindu, and Buddhist worlds. Religion creates, establishes and mobilizes individuals and groups to seek influence, and it often does so with enormous power--for good and ill. Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Baptist preacher who helped to move a nation to civil rights for African Americans; Bishop Desmond Tutu, an Anglican bishop, helped reconcile the nation of South Africa following apartheid. Religion, whether one likes it or not, plays a huge role in politics.

The Dalai Lama appears to be a spiritual and compassionate man, but he has importance because he has political power. The two go hand in hand. Not to see this seems to me innocent and naive. 

"Make no mistake about the Dalai Lama," by James K. Wellman, UW associate professor of American religion, chair of comparative religion program in the Jackson School of International Studies, posted Monday, April 14, 2008, to blogs.uwnews.org. UW news blogs is a service of uwnews.org, the University of Washington Office of News and Information.