The Dalai Lama, spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism, won his first Grammy this Sunday in the best audiobook category for his project Meditations: The Reflections Of His Holiness The Dalai Lama (Meditations: Reflections of His Holiness the Dalai Lama). Tenzin Gyatso, 90, thus marks a milestone by becoming the first Dalai Lama to win an award from the National Recording Academy of the United States.
The highest spiritual authority of this religion was competing for this award, which was awarded during the Grammy pre-gala, with Elvis, Rocky & Me: The Carol Connors Storyde Kathy Garver; Into The Uncut Grass, by Trevor Noah; Lovely One: A Memoir Ketanji, by Brown Jackson, and You Know It’s True: The Real Story Of Milli Vanilli, by Fab Morvan.
At a press conference on Monday in Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian assured that the Dalai Lama “is not a purely religious figure,” but rather “a political exile” who has been involved for decades in “separatist activities against China under the pretext of religion.” In this context, Beijing expressed its “firm opposition” to this type of awards being used, in the words of the spokesperson, “as a tool for political maneuvers against China.”
His nomination followed in the footsteps of musical artist Lama Tashi, who in 2006, with his candidacy for Tibetan Master Chants, He became the first Tibetan monk to receive a nomination for music’s most prestigious awards.
At nine decades old, the Dalai Lama still lives in the city of Dharamshala, in northern India, after more than 65 years in exile due to China’s control of Tibet. The leader of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism was proclaimed in 1940, at the age of five, as the incarnation of the thirteenth lama and in 1989 he won the Nobel Peace Prize.