Buddhists in Space: China's female astronaut

Maxim Duncan, Reuters; MSNBC.com

View of Buddhism's First Heaven (catumajhrajika akasha deva loka) near Earth space ESA Christer Fuglesang at ISS STS 128 spacewalk (NASA handout 9-5-09/Reuters)

  

Female astronaut Liu Yang (Jason Lee/Reuters)

JIUQUAN (Reuters) - China is sending its first woman into outer space this weekend, prompting a surge of national pride as the rising power takes another step toward putting a space station in orbit within the decade. 

   

Liu Yang, a 33-year-old fighter pilot, will join two other astronauts aboard the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft when it lifts off from a remote Gobi Desert launch site on Saturday evening (6:37 pm Beijing time, 6:37 am ET).

   

They will attempt a crew-controlled docking for the first time with the uncrewed Tiangong 1 module, which was launched last September as part of China's exploratory preparations for a space lab. The module is now orbiting 213 miles (343 km) above Earth.

   

Rendezvous and docking exercises between the two vessels will be an important hurdle in China's efforts to acquire the technological and logistical skills needed to run a full space lab that can house astronauts for long stretches.

  

China's aspirations

Last October, China launched a robotic Shenzhou 8 module that successfully performed a remote-controlled docking with Tiangong 1 ("Heavenly Palace") in preparation for this month's crewed mission. Space program spokeswoman Wu Ping told reporters that Shenzhou 9 would make two dockings with Tiangong 1 -- the first by remote control, and the second under manual control. More

• VIDEO: Who is the first spacewoman?
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• China sending first woman in space

A Great Buddhist in Space

Daw Mya Tin, M.A., Dhammapada 219-220 (What-Buddha-Said.net)

While residing at Isipatana, the Buddha uttered these verses with reference to Nandiya, a rich man from Varanasi. After listening to the Buddha's discourse on the benefits of building monastic residences, he built the great monastery at Isipatana. The building was pinnacled and fully furnished. As soon as the monastery was offered to the Buddha, a corresponding "mansion" came up for him in Tavatimsa, deva space world.
   
One day, Great Moggallana visited that space world and saw the mansion. On his return from Tavatimsa, the Heaven of the Thirty-Three, Great Moggallana asked the Buddha:

"Venerable sir, for those who perform meritorious deeds, do they have mansions and other riches prepared in the deva realm even as they live in this world?" 

   

The Buddha replied: "Why do you ask? Have you yourself not seen the mansion and riches awaiting Nandiya in Tavatimsa? The devas await the coming of good and generous beings the way relatives await the return of one long absent. When good ones die, they are welcomed joyously in the abodes of the devas." Then he uttered these verses:

One who has long been absent then
returns home safely from a distance

is welcomed with joy by relatives,
friends, and well-wishers on returning. 

In the same way, one's good karma
will receive one who has done good
when going from this world to another,
as relatives receive a dear one returning.

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The Next Dalai Lama to be a Woman?

In 50 years of exile from Tibet, this self-professed “simple monk” has been the driving force behind the growing prominence of women in Tibetan exile society. He has even suggested that his next reincarnation could and should be a girl. “Woman is more compassionate and has more power to understand and feel the needs of others as compared to man,” he said at a press conference last November in Dharamsala, his exile home in northern India. That the Dalai Lama—believed by Tibetan Buddhists to be the 14th reincarnation of the Buddha of compassion—should return to the world as a woman is a radical notion that perturbs even open-minded Tibetans, men and women alike. And despite his wishes, the 15th reincarnation will very likely be a boy, just like all the prior ones.

In the film he also spoke admiringly about a milestone in Tibetan history known as Tibetan Women’s Uprising Day. On March 12, 1959—just days before he fled his homeland -- about 15,000 women spontaneously gathered in front of the Potala Palace in Lhasa in an unprecedented display of peaceful protest against China’s invasion of Tibet.

Those women were “heroines,” says the Dalai Lama in A Quiet Revolution. It was “as if they already knew the feminist movement!” He laughs gleefully as though he has told a hilarious joke. At the time, Tibet was closed to the outside world. To a Tibetan, Simone De Beauvoir and Betty Friedan might as well have been Martians.

James: I find it odd in a way that some Tibetan Buddhists who revere The Dalai Lama not only as their spiritual leader but also for being the very incarnation of the compassionate Bodhisattva Avalokitshevara (or Guan Yin) would disagree with him on this issue. How can he be wrong if you believe his very essence is to convey, show, teach and bring about compassion? He basically has a Phd in Compassion. I think he knows the subject better than most of us. Also, If we are all one then by not allowing women to potentially be a Dalai Lama is to deny a part of all of us.Besides, I have read several accounts where Avalokiteshvara is somewhat androgynous and has at least, a strong feminine side to him. In some cultures Avalokiteshvara is actually a woman in the form of Guan Yin. I don't see why it would be so controversial for the Dalai Lama to reincarnate as a woman if Avalokiteshvara is equal parts male and equal parts female. The Dalai Lama recognizes the deep compassion and nurturing instinct that many women have is essential in a world that grows more and more cold, harsh, mean and uncaring. And I can't think of a better way for the Dalai Lama to teach everyone about the equality of all people than by being reincarnated as a woman.

~Peace to all beings~

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