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This introductory chapter sets out the three central questions addressed by the present study: How did the political role of the trülku position develop? What was its nature in various circumstances? And how did the Emperor of China try to influence this role? At the heart of this history is the relationship between the Dalai Lamas (or their regents) and the Emperor of China. Examining the political aspects of the trülku position is crucial to understanding Tibet's past and present situation. It is also essential to understanding the Qing as an Inner Asian empire, the fate of the Mongols, and the current problems in Sino-Tibetan relations. The remainder of the chapter discusses the basic sources used in the study; the rise of Tibetan culture; and the Buddhist theory and practice underlying the political role of trülkus.

This chapter traces the historical development of the trülku position. The social position of the trülku in the form we know today did not arise at one specific point, but rather developed gradually over time. Although it is generally accepted that all of its essential components had already been taken from various Mahāyāna doctrines during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries and then combined to form one homogeneous trülku concept, it was not until the seventeenth century that the position finally embraced all of the religious, social, and political functions that are associated with it today.

This chapter discusses the rise of the Tibetan trülku as head of society in the seventeenth century. Drawing on the concept of the “union of religion and politics,” the clerical elite further developed the idea of the “two systems” (luknyi), and the distinction between the religious and the secular spheres became more and more blurred. Charismatic Buddhist hierarchs and their followers used historical precedent to legitimize the political rule of Buddhist clerics. Because the lamas who exercised secular power were now also trülku, emanations of transcendent bodhisattvas or buddhas, the “ union of religion and politics” from the seventeenth to the twentieth century can be classified as a kind of sacred kingship.

This chapter discusses how the emperor increasingly used to the social role of the trülku for his own political agenda. It details the how important control of the Geluk school of Tibetan Buddhism was in the Inner Asian power play between the Chinese emperor and the Tibetan regent; the regent's efforts to resist the emperor's pressure and to persevere with his own agenda, even at the beginning of the eighteenth century; the reincarnation of the Sixth Dalai Lama; the establishment of Qing control over eastern Tibet; Tibet's civil war; and the exile of the Dalai Lama in eastern Tibet for six year beginning in 1728.