Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Introduction
- 1 The Impact of the Thirteenth Dalai Lama’s Sojourn in Mongolia Arousing the National Consciousness of Tibetan Buddhists from 1904 to 1908
- 2 The Modern and Traditional Diplomacy of the Thirteenth Dalai Lama During His Sojourn in Khalkha and Qinghai (1904–1907)
- 3 Friendship and Antagonism: Tibetans and Money in Early Twentieth-Century Mongolia
- 4 The Tibet-Mongolia Political Interface in the First Half of the Twentieth Century: Data from Russian Archives
- 5 A Study of three Tibetan letters attributed to Dorzhiev held by the St. Petersburg Branch of the Archive of the Russian: Academy of Sciences
- 6 Russian Archival Documents on the Revitalization of Buddhism Among the Kalmyks in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries
- 7 Buddhist Devotion to the Russian Tsar: The Bicultural Environment of the Don Kalmyk Sangha and Russian Orthodox Church in the 1830s
- 8 Russian Tsar as Cakravartin: A Buryat Lama’s View of the Coronation of Nicholas II
- 9 The Struggle between Tradition and Modernity in the Early Twentieth Century of the Tibetan Buddhist World: A case study of the Seventh lCang-skya’s activities from 1912–1957
- Index
- Miscellaneous Endmatter
8 - Russian Tsar as Cakravartin: A Buryat Lama’s View of the Coronation of Nicholas II
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 27 April 2022
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Introduction
- 1 The Impact of the Thirteenth Dalai Lama’s Sojourn in Mongolia Arousing the National Consciousness of Tibetan Buddhists from 1904 to 1908
- 2 The Modern and Traditional Diplomacy of the Thirteenth Dalai Lama During His Sojourn in Khalkha and Qinghai (1904–1907)
- 3 Friendship and Antagonism: Tibetans and Money in Early Twentieth-Century Mongolia
- 4 The Tibet-Mongolia Political Interface in the First Half of the Twentieth Century: Data from Russian Archives
- 5 A Study of three Tibetan letters attributed to Dorzhiev held by the St. Petersburg Branch of the Archive of the Russian: Academy of Sciences
- 6 Russian Archival Documents on the Revitalization of Buddhism Among the Kalmyks in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries
- 7 Buddhist Devotion to the Russian Tsar: The Bicultural Environment of the Don Kalmyk Sangha and Russian Orthodox Church in the 1830s
- 8 Russian Tsar as Cakravartin: A Buryat Lama’s View of the Coronation of Nicholas II
- 9 The Struggle between Tradition and Modernity in the Early Twentieth Century of the Tibetan Buddhist World: A case study of the Seventh lCang-skya’s activities from 1912–1957
- Index
- Miscellaneous Endmatter
Summary
Abstract
Based on Russian archival documents and hitherto poorly known primary sources, Nikolay Tsyrempilov's paper is a study of the Buryat Buddhist perception and interpretation of the Russian emperors’ enthronement ceremonies. Buryat Buddhist hierarchs were among the many Central Asian elites invited to the coronation of Tsar Nicholas II in 1896. The paper argues that the Buddhists did not simply share their Orthodox counterparts’ understanding of the ceremony, but also gave new meaning to it within the frames of their own religious worldview and Buddhist conceptions of kingship. In this understanding, Moscow and St. Petersburg became Pure Lands made holy thanks to the presence of an enlightened deity, the Tsar.
Keywords: Coronation, Tsar Nicholas II, Buryat Buddhists, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Pure Lands
The enthronement ceremony of the Russian tsar was a key channel for the monarchy to convey an idealized image of the ruler and the empire to his subjects. In his widely known work on the subject, Richard Wortman demonstrates how the concept of Russia's supreme authority evolved from the image of a lofty ruler far removed from the masses, to one of a lord bound to his people by unbreakable spiritual ties. Elsewhere, Wortman just as convincingly shows how the position of the empire's non-Russian peoples changed alongside these symbolic transformations. While non-Russians had long remained undifferentiated from the general masses of subjects, by the mid-nineteenth century they came to occupy a specific place among them. The rulers of the empire gradually came to realize that the diversity of its subjects bore vivid witness to its greatness. These metamorphoses can be observed in the peculiarities of ceremonial practice; in plans and scenarios for ceremonial events; in coronation proclamations; and in descriptions published in newspapers, magazines, and anthologies.
The enthronement ritual was about more than a powerful elite reflecting on its own power. The sparkle and grandeur of the ceremonial activities, public illuminations and entertainments, fireworks, theatrical productions, and excursions that accompanied the ritual were all designed to impress delegates from all the regions and peripheries of the Russian Empire, who were each charged with returning to their home region and spreading the myth of the superiority and unrivaled greatness of the Russian monarch.
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- The Early 20th Century Resurgence of the Tibetan Buddhist WorldStudies in Central Asian Buddhism, pp. 203 - 228Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2022