The Dalai Lama is one of the world’s most revered religious leaders… but that hasn’t prevented four holders of the office from dying in mysterious circumstances. This week’s Smithsonian essay takes a close look at the short lives and mysterious ends of the Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh and Twelfth Dalai Lamas, all of whom expired in [...]
Archive for the ‘Religion’ Category
Murder in the Potala
Posted: 10 April 2012 in C19th, China, Crime, Historians and historiography, Religion, Tibet2
The mystery of the five wounds
Posted: 19 November 2011 in Britain, C13th, C16th, C19th, C20th, Germany, Hoaxes and frauds, Italy, Medical, ReligionOn September 14, 1224, a Saturday, Francis of Assisi—noted ascetic and holy man, future saint—was preparing to enter the second month of a retreat with a few close companions on Monte La Verna, overlooking the River Arno in Tuscany. Francis had spent the previous few weeks in prolonged contemplation of the suffering Jesus Christ on [...]
The war seemed a very long way away to the citizens of Broken Hill that January 1. It was the height of the southern summer, and the Australian silver-mining town baked in the outback desert heat, 720 miles from Sydney and half a world away from the mud and blood of the Western Front. The [...]
