When Donald Trump dodged an assassin’s bullet meant to end his life for good last month, it set off a chain of national and dinner table conversations on luck that could be heard around the world and beyond. Has anyone ever been this lucky? For almost a decade, we’ve watched Donald Trump, a fascinating and wildly entertaining former US president who is gunning for an- other term this year, trip and totter on the edges of one slippery political mountain after another. And yet just when it seemed like he was losing his footing, now he was going down, now he was done, surely this is it, he, somehow, to the utter bafflement and dismay of his opponents and the joy of millions of his supporters, walks away almost unscathed.
If you’ve been following the US presidential elections as I have, you’d know what I mean. As far as I am concerned, Donald Trump is the single luckiest man, politician or not, who ever lived on the planet. He laughs in the face of danger.
But Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Norbu Rinpoche, the Bhutanese lama and filmmaker, who is, by his own admission, a devoted consumer of US elections, doesn’t think Trump’s charmed political life or his aura of invincibility has anything to do with Lady Luck or providence. It is the play of karma, he says, as usual with a mystical and an amused twinkle in his eyes. So in this interview, which began in the caves of the Tiger’s Nest Taktsang in Paro recently where the lama was heading a drupchen puja and ended with a ride in his beloved Hindustan Ambassador white car several days later in the valley, Khyentse Rinpoche talks about karma and Donald Trump and why karma is not black and white as we imagine it to be.
Nothing can bring him down. Not his misogyny, his racism, his callousness, his disregard for rule of law. Nor the many lawsuits or the criminal convictions against him, two of which includes rape and insurrection.
Not even a bullet can take him down! Rinpoche, as a Buddhist lama, what do you make of Donald Trump and his godly luck? I am glad you asked. I’ve come across this kind of questions and discussions many times. I hear things like, “How come bad guys always sleep well? And good guys don’t?” Before I answer them, we need to know what is “good” and what is “bad”.
According to Buddhism, good and bad are highly subjective. Not only are they subjective from an individual being’s view, but also from a collective’s point of view. What is defined as good in the West may not necessarily be good in the East.
What is defined as good by the Christians may not necessarily be agreed by the Buddhists. Even in places where people live, be it in the mountains or deserts, the definition of good and bad, beneficial and harmful, differ vastly. The West is obsessed with bad and good, axis of evil and all of that.
For the Buddhist all of that is very subjective. So how do Buddhists de- fine good and bad? Anything— any kind of thoughts or actions— that takes you or brings you closer to the truth, truths like life is impermanent, that things are illusionary in nature, that nothing gives us 100% satisfaction, Buddhist will say is good. Anything that disrupts and takes you away from the truth, the Buddhist will say is bad.
We seem to use the terms bad karma and good karma so casually and simplistically these days, but it’s not that simple. It’s, in fact, quite complex. It’s also vital to know that the law of karma is not ultimate— it’s relative.
In Buddhism you can’t talk about karma without talking about shunyata (emptiness). It’s like the rainbow. Rainbows are beautiful and orderly but at the same time it’s an illusion.
So, coming back to your question, we don’t really know if Donald Trump is lucky? As I mentioned earlier that for Buddhists not knowing the truth is being unlucky. Donald Trump, who seems to be obsessed with power, obviously doesn’t know the truth be- cause that power that he seeks is going to end up giving him many sleepless nights, more anxieties, more animosities, etc. It’s going to corrupt him and make himself and those around him suffer.
So from the Buddhist perspective, Donald Trump is very unlucky. He’s unlucky that he is not behind bars, he’s un- lucky that he escaped the assassin’s bullet. He’s unlucky not only for himself, family and friends but also for his nation and, perhaps, the world.
It’s also possible that having him is the collective bad karma of the Americans and the US as a nation. And since the US is the dictator of the world, chances are that it’s also the collective bad karma of the world. But then again, Donald Trump could end up making America so weak and dysfunctional that it could turn out to be the collective good karma of the rest of the world, that will perhaps then have a chance to breathe, maybe get spared from “regime changes” and sanctions.
During the Covid pandemic the US sanctions in places like Cuba and Iran led to horrific situations where mothers were forced to choose between the Covid vaccine and milk for their babies. Also from the point of view of those innocent Ukrainians, Syrians and Palestinians, was Biden’s presidency really a good thing? Truth be told, there were more wars during Biden’s time than any other world leaders’ in recent memory. Is karma the law of cause and effect? Yes.
Simply speaking, karma is cause and conditions put together and if there are no obstacles there is a definite result that come out of it. But this is a very simplistic way of under- standing karma. In depth study of it is, of course, much more complex than that.
Many times we are not aware or even interested to dig deeper into the functions of cause and conditions and how they effect us. We are aware only of the superficial ones. Let’s say you plant 10 marigolds from the same marigold flower seeds.
Even though the seeds came from the same flower, it’s unlikely that the en- tire 10 marigold flowers will turn out exactly the same as the other. Because for each seed to germinate and flower, it will have its own myriad cause and conditions. For many Americans, the genesis of Ukraine and Gaza wars were the events that un- folded on February 24, 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine, and on October 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel.
But if you are really sober about it, it’s simply not true. Both wars are the outcome of centuries old cause and conditions. You said karma is an illusion.
If it is, then why is it so potent? One would think that because karma is an illusion one need not worry about it? This is why I said karma is a complex subject. As long as you don’t know it’s an illusion, then it’s a delusion. And this delusion is what brings about all the problems.
It leads to all kinds of negative thoughts, actions and stupidities. And when I say this your readers may immediately think about the most obvious kinds there are like stealing, lying, slander- ing, etc. But negative thoughts and actions, including stupidity, don’t always manifest in the most gross and blatant manner.
I have a friend in India who is a UC Berkeley graduate. He prides himself in being very openminded. But the moment I say something even remotely close to like Buddhism in India was not only destroyed by the Muslims but the Hindus also have a big hand in it, he would get all worked up.
He would not hear of it. He would get so emotional to a point where sometimes we wouldn’t speak to each other for months. Many who claim to have been educated in these so- called ivy leagues are like that unfortunately.
On certain is- sues, they are totally blind. One would think they’d, at least, be critical. But this is really a good example of how karma works.
Many times being obsessed with certain views can make one more destructive, more negative and more stupid. Buddhists also say there is no such thing as an accident or predestined, or Lady Luck, and that every- thing is based on karma. Concepts such as predestined and free will are Western concepts.
Karma is neither predestined nor is it free will. If one understands the illusionary nature of karma, then there’s no burden of thinking in terms of predestined or free will. If one orders a cup of coffee in a dream, more likely you will get a cup of coffee.
That doesn’t make dream coffee real coffee. What is the role of merit in karma then? Merit I suppose is a positive word for good karma. In places like Bhutan, for instance, people do many things that are regarded meritorious such as hoisting prayer flags, lighting butter lamps, burning incenses, doing pujas and so on.
As I pointed out, for Buddhists, however, good karma or meritoriousness is an act that should directly or indirectly lead one to the understanding of the truth. But of course people abuse this too. If you do a puja or hoist a prayer flag in order to win a court case which leads to suffering and pain for the other party, then, strictly from the Buddhist point of view, it is not considered good karma.
Lastly Rinpoche, will Donald Trump win the US elections this year? No. Ha ha ha! Contributed by Kencho Wangdi (Bonz). He is the former editor of Kuensel.
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