Editing Dalai Lama (section)

=== Origins in myth and legend ===
Since the 11th century, it has been widely believed in Central Asian Buddhist countries that [[Avalokiteśvara]], the [[bodhisattva]] of compassion, has a special relationship with the people of Tibet and intervenes in their fate by incarnating as benevolent rulers and teachers such as the Dalai Lamas.<ref>{{cite book |author = Thubten Jinpa |title = The Book of Kadam |publisher = Wisdom Publications |isbn = 978-0-86171-441-4 |chapter-url = http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam/introduction |chapter = Introduction |quote = Available textual evidence points strongly toward the 11th and 12th centuries as the period during which the full myth of Avalokiteśvara's special destiny with Tibet was established. During this era, the belief that this compassionate spirit intervenes in the fate of the Tibetan people by manifesting as benevolent rulers and teachers took firm root |date = 15 July 2008 |access-date = 29 May 2015 |archive-date = 29 May 2015 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20150529174226/http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam/introduction |url-status = live }}</ref> ''The Book of Kadam'',<ref>{{cite book|author1=Thubten Jinpa|title=The Book of Kadam|publisher=Wisdom Publications|isbn=978-0-86171-441-4|url=http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam|date=15 July 2008|access-date=29 May 2015|archive-date=29 May 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150529174200/http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>Mullin 2001, p. 39.</ref> the main text of the [[Kadampa]] school from which the [[1st Dalai Lama]] hailed, is said to have laid the foundation for the Tibetans' later identification of the Dalai Lamas as incarnations of Avalokiteśvara.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Thubten Jinpa|title=The Book of Kadam|publisher=Wisdom Publications|isbn=978-0-86171-441-4|chapter-url=http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam/introduction|chapter=Introduction|quote=Perhaps the most important legacy of the book, at least for the Tibetan people as a whole, is that it laid the foundation for the later identification of Avalokiteśvara with the lineage of the Dalai Lama|date=4 July 2008|access-date=29 May 2015|archive-date=29 May 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150529174226/http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam/introduction|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author1=Tuttle, Gray|author2=Schaeffer, Curtis R.|title=The Tibetan History Reader|date=2013|publisher=Columbia University Press|isbn=978-0-231-51354-8|page=335|quote=In Atiśa's telling, Dromtön was not only Avalokiteśvara but also a reincarnation of former Buddhist monks, laypeople, commoners, and kings. Furthermore, these reincarnations were all incarnations of that very same being, Avalokiteśvara. Van der Kuijp takes us on a tour of literary history, showing that the narrative attributed to Atiśa became a major source for both incarnation and reincarnation ideology for centuries to come." From: "The Dalai Lamas and the Origins of Reincarnate Lamas. Leonard W. J. van der Kuijp"}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author1=Thubten Jinpa|title=The Book of Kadam|publisher=Wisdom Publications|isbn=978-0-86171-441-4|chapter-url=http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam/introduction|chapter=Introduction|quote='The Book' gives ample evidence of the existence of an ancient, mythological Tibetan narrative placing the Dalai Lamas as incarnations of Dromtönpa, of his predecessors and of [[Avalokiteshvara]]|date=15 July 2008|access-date=29 May 2015|archive-date=29 May 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150529174226/http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam/introduction|url-status=live}}</ref> It traces the legend of the bodhisattva's incarnations as [[List of rulers of Tibet|early Tibetan kings and emperors]] such as [[Songtsen Gampo]] and later as [[Dromtönpa]] (1004–1064).<ref>{{cite book |author=Thubten Jinpa |title=The Book of Kadam |publisher=Wisdom Publications |isbn=978-0-86171-441-4 |chapter-url=http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam/introduction |chapter=Introduction |quote=For the Tibetans, the mythic narrative that began with Avalokiteśvara's embodiment in the form of Songtsen Gampo in the seventh century—or even earlier with the mythohistorical figures of the first king of Tibet, Nyatri Tsenpo (traditionally calculated to have lived around the fifth century B.C.E.), and Lha Thothori Nyentsen (ca. third-century c.e.), during whose reign some sacred Buddhist scriptures are believed to have arrived in Tibet... continued with Dromtönpa in the eleventh century |date=15 July 2008 |access-date=29 May 2015 |archive-date=29 May 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150529174226/http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam/introduction |url-status=live }}</ref> This lineage has been extrapolated by Tibetans up to and including the Dalai Lamas.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Thubten Jinpa|title=The Book of Kadam|publisher=Wisdom Publications|isbn=978-0-86171-441-4|chapter-url=http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam/introduction|chapter=Introduction|quote=For the Tibetans, the mythic narrative... continues today in the person of His Holiness Tenzin Gyatso, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama|date=15 July 2008|access-date=29 May 2015|archive-date=29 May 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150529174226/http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/book-kadam/introduction|url-status=live}}</ref>

Thus, according to such sources, an informal line of succession of the present Dalai Lamas as incarnations of [[Avalokiteśvara]] stretches back much further than the 1st Dalai Lama, [[Gendun Drub]]; as many as sixty persons are enumerated as earlier incarnations of Avalokiteśvara and predecessors in the same lineage leading up to Gendun Drub. These earlier incarnations include a mythology of 36 Indian personalities, ten [[List of rulers of Tibet|early Tibetan kings and emperors]] all said to be previous incarnations of Dromtönpa, and fourteen further Nepalese and Tibetan yogis and sages.<ref>Stein (1972), p. 138–139|quote=the Dalai Lama is ... a link in the chain that starts in history and leads back through legend to a deity in mythical times. The First Dalai Lama, Gedün-trup (1391–1474), was already the 51st incarnation; the teacher Dromtön, Atiśa's disciple (eleventh century), the 45th; whilst with the 26th, one Gesar king of India, and the 27th, a hare, we are in pure legend</ref> In fact, according to the "Birth to Exile" article on the 14th Dalai Lama's website, he is "the seventy-fourth in a lineage that can be traced back to a Brahmin boy who lived in the time of Buddha Shakyamuni."<ref>{{cite web|title=The Dalai Lama – Birth to Exile|url=http://www.dalailama.com/biography/from-birth-to-exile|website=His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet|publisher=Office of the Dalai Lama|access-date=28 October 2015|quote=Thus His Holiness is also believed to be a manifestation of Chenrezig, in fact the seventy-fourth in a lineage that can be traced back to a Brahmin boy who lived in the time of Buddha Shakyamuni|archive-date=7 March 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170307105420/http://www.dalailama.com/biography/from-birth-to-exile|url-status=live}}</ref>