Oldal 121 [121]
ABOUT A LETTER OF THE SOVIET BUDDHISTS
TO THE THIRTEENTH DALAI LAMA
Vladimir Uspensky
Saint Petersburg University, Saint Petersburg
Religion and Oppression after the Russian Revolution
The ideology and policy of the Soviet government and the Communist Party were
openly antireligious from the first days of the Russian Revolution of 1917. However,
it was the Russian Orthodox Church — the state church of the Russian Empire — which
was initially the main target of this repressive policy. At the same time, ethnic mi¬
norities were regarded as being oppressed by the Czarist regime and were enticed
by the new power into becoming supporters of the Revolution. Colonial peoples of
the East were regarded as natural allies of the proletarian Revolution. For this rea¬
son in the first years after the Revolution religions other than Orthodox Christianity
acquired new opportunities for growth. The major area in Russia where Buddhism
had already flourished was Eastern Siberia. Direct Soviet rule from Moscow was
established there only by 1923. The number of monasteries (datsans) founded by the
Buryat Mongols increased soon after the Revolution since the former restrictions of
the Czars ceased to exist. This is how the state of affairs was described in 1923 by
M.N. Yerbanov, the head of the Buryat Mongol Autonomous Republic:
“Tt seems to me that in no other autonomous republic or region do religious issues
have such actual importance and exercise such an influence upon the working
masses as in ours. This is easy to explain. However strange it may seem, in some
areas of the Far Eastern Autonomous Region between 12 to 17 per cent of the total
population are lamas who live in their monasteries (datsans) and are not involved
at all in working for a living being spongers who are fed entirely with what is
produced by the local population. They have methods of assessment of their own,
a peculiar taxation system which is, in fact, exercised in a compulsory way. In any
case we have to give serious consideration to Lamaism. [...] Religious problems
are of utmost importance to us and much depends upon their proper management.
We should approach carefully these issues since our Lamaism is linked not only to
Mongolia but to Tibet and the Dalai Lama.”
Tajny nacional’noj polimiki CK RKP: «Cjetvjertoje sovjestanije CK RKP s otvjetstvjennymi rabotni¬
kami nacional’nyh respublik i oblastjej v g. Moskvje 9-12 ijunja 1923 g.». Stjenografièjeskij otéjot.
Izdatjel’stvo Insan, Moskva 1992, pp. 182-183, 185.
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