The mainreligion in Tibet has beenBuddhism since its introduction in the 8th century CE. As of 2022[update] the historical region of Tibet (the areas inhabited by ethnicTibetans) mostly comprises theTibet Autonomous Region (TAR) ofChina and partly the Chinese provinces ofQinghai,Sichuan,Gansu, andYunnan. Before the arrival of Buddhism, the main religion among Tibetans was an indigenousshamanic[3]andanimistic[4]religion,Bon, which would later influence the formation ofTibetan Buddhism and still attracts the allegiance of a sizeable minority of Tibetans.
According to estimates from the International Religious Freedom Report of 2012, mostTibetans (who comprise 91% of the population of the Tibet Autonomous Region) are associated with Tibetan Buddhism, while a minority of 400,000 people (12.5% of the total population of the TAR) profess the native Bon religion. Other groups in Tibet practise folk religions which share the image ofConfucius (Tibetan:Kongtse Trulgyi Gyalpo) withChinese folk religion, though in a different light.[5][6] The statistics do not cover the government-sponsoredatheist[7]proportion of the Tibetan population. According to some reports, the government of China has been promoting the Bon religion, linking it withConfucianism.[8][9]
Khyungpori Tsedruk Bon Monastery in the Tibet Autonomous Region.
Bön, the indigenousanimist andshamanic belief system of Tibet, revolves around the worship ofnature and claims to predate Buddhism.[10]
According to Bon religious texts: three Bon scriptures –mdo 'dus,gzer mig, andgzi brjid – relate the mythos ofTonpa Shenrab Miwoche.[11] The Bonpos regard the first two asgter ma rediscovered around the eleventh century and the last asnyan brgyud (oral transmission) dictated by Loden Nyingpo, who lived in the fourteenth century. In the fourteenth century, Loden Nyingpo revealed a terma known asThe Brilliance (Wylie:gzi brjid), which contained the story of Tonpa Shenrab.[12] He was not the first Bonpo tertön, but his terma became one of the definitive scriptures of Bon religion. It states that Shenrab established the Bon religion while searching for a horse stolen by a demon. Tradition also tells that he was born in the land of Tagzig Olmo Lung Ring (considered an axis mundi) which is traditionally identified as Mount Yung-drung Gu-tzeg ("Edifice of Nine Sauwastikas"), possibly Mount Kailash, in western Tibet.[13] Due to the sacredness of Tagzig Olmo Lungting and Mount Kailash, the Bonpo regard both the swastika and the number nine as auspicious and as of great significance.[14]
Tonpa Shenrab Miwoche visitedKongpo and found people whose practice involved spiritual appeasement with animal sacrifice.[15] He taught them to substitute offerings with symbolic animal forms made from barley flour. He only taught according to the student's capability with lower shamanic vehicles to prepare; until with prayer, diligence, devotion and application they could incarnate to achieve sutra, tantra and Dzogchen.[16]
Bon teachings feature Nine Vehicles, which are pathway-teaching categories with distinct characteristics, views, practices and results. Medicine, astrology, and divination are in the lower vehicles; then sutra and tantra, with Dzogchen great perfection being the highest.[17] Traditionally, the Nine Vehicles are taught in three versions: as Central, Northern and Southern treasures. The Central treasure is closest to Nyingma Nine Yānas teaching and the Northern treasure is lost. Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche elaborated the Southern treasure withshamanism.[18]
View ofJokhang, one of the most important monasteries of Tibet.Interior ofGanden Monastery.Yak butter candles in front of theShakyamuni Buddha, they are supposed to be some of the finest examples in the world. At Baiju Monastery,Gyangtse.
Religion is extremely important to the Tibetans and has a strong influence over all aspects of their lives.[19] Bön is the ancient religion of Tibet, but nowadays the major influence is Tibetan Buddhism, a distinctive form ofMahayana andVajrayana, which was introduced into Tibet from the Sanskrit Buddhist tradition of northern India.[20] Tibetan Buddhism is practiced not only in Tibet but also inMongolia (During theYuan Dynasty, the Mongol rulers of the Yuan Dynasty made Tibetan Buddhism the state religion and from there it spread to the Mongolian region.[21]), parts of northern India, theBuryat Republic, theTuva Republic, and in theRepublic of Kalmykia and some other parts of China.
Tibetan Buddhism has four main traditions (the suffixpa is comparable to "er" in English):
Gelug(pa),Way of Virtue, also known casually asYellow Hat, whose spiritual head is theGanden Tripa and whose temporal head is theDalai Lama.[22] Successive Dalai Lamas ruled Tibet from the mid-17th to mid-20th centuries. This order was founded in the 14th to 15th centuries byJe Tsongkhapa, based on the foundations of theKadampa tradition. Tsongkhapa was renowned for both his scholasticism and his virtue. The Dalai Lama belongs to the Gelugpa school, and is regarded as the embodiment of the Bodhisattva of Compassion.[23]
Kagyu(pa),Oral Lineage. This contains one major subsect and one minor subsect. The first, the Dagpo Kagyu, encompasses those Kagyu schools that trace back toGampopa. In turn, the Dagpo Kagyu consists of four major sub-sects: theKarma Kagyu, headed by aKarmapa, the Tsalpa Kagyu, the Barom Kagyu, and Pagtru Kagyu. The once-obscureShangpa Kagyu, which was famously represented by the 20th-century teacherKalu Rinpoche, traces its history back to the Indian master Niguma, sister of Kagyu lineage holderNaropa. This is an oral tradition which is very much concerned with the experiential dimension of meditation. Its most famous exponent was Milarepa, an 11th-century mystic.[24]
Nyingma(pa),The Ancient Ones. This is the oldest, the original order founded byPadmasambhava. Both the Nyingma and Kagyu maintained and developed instructions on the nature of mind, and on meditations cultivating recognition of that nature, known as themind teachings of Tibet.[25]
Sakya(pa),Grey Earth, headed by theSakya Trizin, founded by Khon Konchog Gyalpo, a disciple of the great translator Drokmi Lotsawa.Sakya Pandita 1182–1251 CE was the great-grandson of Khon Konchog Gyalpo. This school emphasizes scholarship.[26]
Most of theHan Chinese who reside in Tibet practice their nativeChinese folk religion. There is aGuandi Temple of Lhasa (拉萨关帝庙) where the Chinese god of warGuandi is identified with the cross-ethnic Chinese, Tibetan, Mongol and Manchu deityGesar. The temple is built according to both Chinese and Tibetan architecture. It was first erected in 1792 under theQing dynasty and renovated around 2013 after decades of disrepair.[27][28][29][30]
There is a Tibetan folk religious sect inAmdo County named the "Heroes of Ling", which was founded in 1981 by a Tibetan called Sonam Phuntsog, who claimed to be an incarnation of the legendary heroGesar,[33] which was later banned as a disruptive and "splittist" sect.[34]
The first Christians documented to have reached Tibet were theNestorians, of whom various remains and inscriptions have been found in Tibet. They were also present at the imperial camp ofMöngke Khan at Shira Ordo, where they debated in 1256 withKarma Pakshi (1204/6-83), head of theKarma Kagyu order.[43][44] Desideri, who reached Lhasa in 1716, encountered Armenian and Russian merchants.[45]
Roman CatholicJesuits andCapuchins arrived from Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries. Portuguese missionaries Jesuit FatherAntónio de Andrade and Brother Manuel Marques first reached thekingdom of Guge inwestern Tibet in 1624 and was welcomed by the royal family who allowed them to build a church later on.[46][47] By 1627, there were about a hundred local converts in the Guge kingdom.[48] Later on, Christianity was introduced toRudok,Ladakh and Tsang and was welcomed by the ruler of theTsang kingdom, where Andrade and his fellows established a Jesuit outpost at Shigatse in 1626.[49]
In 1661 another Jesuit,Johann Grueber, crossed Tibet fromSining to Lhasa (where he spent a month), before heading on to Nepal.[50] He was followed by others who built achurch in Lhasa.Italian Jesuit missionary Fr.Ippolito Desideri (1716–1721) gained a particularly deep knowledge of Tibetan culture, language and Buddhism. In his many extant writings in theClassical Tibetanliterary language, Fr. Desideri sought to demolish those foundations ofTibetan Buddhism, especially the doctrines ofreincarnation andemptiness, that prevented Tibetan belief in theChristian God and conversion to theCatholic Church in Tibet. Fr. Desideri also deftly used conventions fromTibetan literature and passages from thedharma andvinaya to defend his thesis. Fr. Desideri was joined by Capuchins in 1707–1711, 1716–1733 and 1741–1745,[51] Christianity was used by some Tibetan monarchs and their courts and theKarmapa sect lamas to counterbalance the influence of theGelugpa sect in the 17th century until in 1745 when all the missionaries were expelled at the lama's insistence.[52][53][54][55][56][57]
During the1905 Tibetan Rebellion Tibetan Buddhist monks attacked, tortured and murdered French Catholic missionaries including Fr.André Soulié and massacred ethnic Tibetan Catholics,[60] including both recent converts and those whose ancestors converted to Catholicism.[61][62]
^Min Junqing.The Present Situation and Characteristics of Contemporary Islam in China. JISMOR, 8.2010 Islam by province, page 29. Data from: Yang Zongde,Study on Current Muslim Population in China, Jinan Muslim, 2, 2010.
^International Religious Freedom Report 2012 by the US government. p. 20: «Most ethnic Tibetans practice Tibetan Buddhism, although a sizeable minority practices Bon, an indigenous religion, and very small minorities practice Islam, Catholicism, or Protestantism. Some scholars estimate that there are as many as 400,000 Bon followers across the Tibetan Plateau. Scholars also estimate that there are up to 5,000 ethnic Tibetan Muslims and 700 ethnic Tibetan Catholics in the TAR.»
^"China announces 'civilizing' atheism drive in Tibet". BBC. 12 January 1999. Retrieved7 November 2022.The Chinese Communist Party has launched a three-year drive to promote atheism in the Buddhist region of Tibet, saying it is the key to economic progress and a weapon against separatism as typified by the exiled Tibetan leader, the Dalai Lama.
^Rinpoche, Y.L.T.N.; Ermakov, D.; Ermakova, C. (2016).The Four Wheels of Bšn. Public series A. Foundation for the Preservation of Yungdrung Bön.ISBN978-1-5262-0035-8. Retrieved2024-03-14.
^The Heroes of Ling: The Elimination of a Tibetan Sect. Bod sjongs 'phrin deb 1982. Translation first published on:Background Papers on Tibet – September 1992, part 2, London: Tibet Information Network, 1992, pp. 30–33.
^房, 建昌 (1988)."西藏的回族及其清真寺考略——兼论伊斯兰教在西藏的传播及其影响" [A Study of Hui Muslims and Mosques in Tibet—Discussing the Spread and Impact of Islam in Tibet].西藏研究 (in Chinese) (4):102–114. Retrieved2025-08-03.
^Graham Sanderg, The Exploration of Tibet: History and Particulars (Delhi: Cosmo Publications, 1973), pp. 23–26; Thomas Holdich, Tibet, The Mysterious (London:Alston Rivers, 1906), p. 70.
^Sir Edward Maclagan, The Jesuits and The Great Mogul (London: Burns, Oates & Washbourne Ltd., 1932), pp. 344–345.
^Lettera del P. Alano Dos Anjos al Provinciale di Goa, 10 Novembre 1627, quoted from Wu Kunming, Zaoqi Chuanjiaoshi jin Zang Huodongshi (Beijing: Zhongguo Zangxue chubanshe, 1992), p. 163.
^Extensively using Italian and Portuguese archival materials, Wu's work gives a detailed account of Cacella's activities in Tsang. See Zaoqi Chuanjiaoshi jin Zang Huodongshi, esp. chapter 5.
^Narratives of the Mission of George Bogle to Tibet, and of the Journey of Thomas Manning to Lhasa, pp. 295–302. Clements R. Markham. (1876). Reprint Cosmo Publications, New Delhi. 1989.
^Lettera del P. Antonio de Andrade. Giovanni de Oliveira. Alano Dos Anjos al Provinciale di Goa, 29 Agosto, 1627, quoted from Wu, Zaoqi Chuanjiaoshi jin Zang Huodongshi, p. 196; Maclagan, The Jesuits and The Great Mogul, pp. 347–348.
^Cornelius Wessels, Early Jesuit Travellers in Central Asia, 1603–1721 (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1924), pp. 80–85.
^Maclagan, The Jesuits and The Great Mogul, pp. 349–352;Filippo De Filippi ed., An Account of Tibet, pp. 13–17.
^Relação da Missão do Reino de Uçangue Cabeça dos do Potente, Escrita pello P. João Cabral da Comp. de Jesu. fol. 1, quoted from Wu, Zaoqi Chuanjiaoshi jin Zang Huodongshi, pp. 294–297; Wang Yonghong, "Luelun Tianzhujiao zai Xizang di Zaoqi Huodong", Xizang Yanjiu, 1989, No. 3, pp. 62–63.
^Filoni, Cardinal Fernando (May 1, 2013)."Missionary Audacity – the Mission to Tibet".Marist Messenger National Catholic Monthly. Translated by Brian Quin sm (from “Missions Etrangeres de Paris” No 478, December 2012. Marist Messenger. Retrieved24 April 2014.
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