Download Introduction to Tibetan “Literature”

Buddhism and
Literature in
South Asia
Week 7:
Modern Buddhist
Biographies: the
14th Dalai Lama’s
Autobiography
Overview of Syllabus
Week 1: Introduction to Buddhist Literature, Jātaka
Tales
Week 2: Indian Buddhist Sūtra Literature
Week 3: Life story of the Buddha in Indian poetry
Week 4: Indian Buddhist Poetry and Drama
Week 5: Tibetan Buddhist Inspirational poetry
Week 6: Buddhist Biography and Hagiography in
Tibet
Week 7: Modern Buddhist Biographies: the 14th
Dalai Lama’s Autobiography
Week 8: Buddhist-inspired fiction in the 20th
century
History of Reincarnation lineages in
Tibet
• The concept of ‘incarnation’ (Sanskrit:
nirmanakaya, Tibetan: tulku) dates to early
Mahayana Buddhism
• The concept of a particular person being the
‘reincarnation’ of another in the sense particular
to Buddhism is uniquely Tibetan and relatively
late, emerging in the 14th century
• Over time, this doctrine of reincarnation of
lamas became pervasive in Tibetan Buddhism
and has become one of its distinctive features
The first reincarnation lineages in
Tibet
• According to Tibetan tradition, the first recognized
reincarnation lineage is that of the Karma-pa
hierarchs. Dusum Khyenpa (12th century) is known
as the first in this lineage. The first ‘incarnation’ in
this lineage was the second hierarch: Karma Pakshi
(13th century)
• However the first time someone is described in
documents as a reincarnation of another is the 3rd
Karmapa hierarch, Rangjung Dorje (1284-1338).
The biography of this hierarch contains a direct
reference to “rebirth” and includes a prediction
identifying where it would occur!
• As we will see, the Dalai lama reincarnation lineage
came later…..
Tibetan tulku-s and reincarnation
• The tulku system is an extension of the logic of
the Buddhist understanding of karma and
rebirth and the Mahayana system of spiritual
development.
• According to Buddhist doctrine, every sentient
being is reborn over and over again in a
beginningless cycle, and so from this point of
view every creature is a reincarnation.
• Most, however, are unaware of this, and few
people remember their past lives. The reason for
this can be found in the process of death, in
which the coarser levels of consciousness drop
away, resulting in the eradication of the
personality of one’s past life.
Tibetan tulku-s and reincarnation
• Sometimes, however, the process of forgetting past
lives is incomplete, particularly if one’s past life
contained particularly powerful events that left
deep imprints.
• According to Tibetan Buddhism, however, through
meditative training it is possible to gain access to
deeply buried memories of past lives and become
consciously aware of them.
• This ability is considered to be common among
advanced meditators, people who have learned to
access subtle levels of mind. Such people are said to
be able to perceive the events of their past lives.
• At higher levels of realization, it is thought that
people can even develop the ability consciously to
choose a rebirth, rather than simply being
helplessly drawn into it.
Tibetan tulku-s and reincarnation
• The logic of the tulku system is based on these
ideas: all sentient beings are constantly
reincarnating, and some exceptional beings are
pursuing the path to awakening, motivated by
compassion and working for the benefit of
others.
• Since it is possible in principle to determine
one’s past births, it stands to reason that some
beings will continually reincarnate themselves
in a distinguishable lineage in a particular place
for a particular group of people.
• Among Tibetans, such people are called tulkus,
and they are greatly revered because Tibetans
believe that their rebirths are motivated by
compassion.
Testing for Tibetan tulku-s
• Tibetan Buddhism has developed elaborate
systems for detecting and testing
candidates in order to ensure that the
person recognized as a tulku is actually the
reincarnation of a previous teacher.
• The most rigorous of these tests are those
used to find a new Dalai Lama. Since he is
regarded as the greatest of all Tibetan
incarnate lamas and is the temporal and
spiritual leader of Tibet, it is extremely
important that the right person be found,
and a number of fail-safe devices have been
developed in order to ensure this.
But this begs the question of what is a
Dalai Lama and how did this
specific reincarnation system
develop…
There are four main lineages of
Tibetan Buddhism
• Nyingma
• Sakya (11th century)
• Kagyu (11th-12th cetury) – Associated
with Tilopa, Naropa, and Milarepa
• Geluk (15th century) – Associated with
Tsongkhapa and became the lineage in
which the ‘Dalai Lama’ system took
hold
Gelukpa ascent to power in Tibet
• During the 15th century, Tsong Khapa
(1357–1419), founded a new school, which
came to be known as Gelukpa, or “System
of Virtue.”
• Tsong Khapa himself had little interest in
politics, and his early successors followed
his example.
• As time went on, however, their influence
grew, with the result that they eventually
came out on top of the power hierarchy.
Gelukpa ascent to power in Tibet
• This new order won the respect of the older
schools, mostly because of its strict
observance of monastic discipline, its
strong emphasis on study and
meditation, and its disinterest in
political involvements.
• This began to change half a century later
during the lifetime of Gendun Gyatso,
reincarnation of Tsongkhapa’s main
disciple who became known as the 2nd
Dalai Lama!
Gelukpa ascent to power in Tibet
• With its high standards of discipline and
scholarship, The Gelukpa began to attract
the active resentment of some of the older
orders, which often suffered in comparison.
• Gendun Gyatso’s growing prestige and the
high regard in which his school was held
caused the Karmapa (Kagyu) hierarchs
and their lay patrons to move against him,
with the result that for most of his life he
was not able to live in the Gelukpa
monasteries around Lhasa. So he traveled,
earning disciples and admirers along the
way.
Contacts with the Mongols: the next
incarnation
• The next incarnation of the Dalai Lama
(who became the 3rd) was Sonam Gyatso
(1543–1588), who was born into a
prominent family with ties to the Sakyapas
and the Pakmodrupas
• In 1578 he accepted an invitation to visit
Altan Khan, chief of the Tumed Mongols.
• This event was to have wide-ranging
repercussions, and it marked a
transition of Geluk from an order that
avoided politics to a ruling Theocracy.
Contacts with the Mongols: the next
incarnation
• Although they no longer controlled
China, the Mongols were still a powerful
military force, despite their continual
tribal conflicts.
• There had been no supreme leader to
match the power of Chinggis or Qubilai,
but Altan was the most influential of the
Mongol chieftains of his day.
The First ‘Dalai Lama-s’
• When the lama Sonam Gyatso and the
Altan khan met, the latter conferred the
title of Ta le, or “Ocean,” on Sonam
Gyatso, implying that he was an
“Ocean of Wisdom.”
• Thus he and his successors (and,
retrospectively, his predecessors Gendun
Druba and Gendun Gyatso) came to be
known as the “Dalai Lamas.”
Gelukpa ties with the Mongols
Strengthened
• Sonam Gyatso had great success in converting the
Mongols to Buddhism. He influenced Altan to ban
blood sacrifices and the worship of ancestral
images.
• Because of his missionary activity, many Mongols
became adherents of the Gelukpa order.
• The relationship between the Gelukpas and the
Mongols was further strengthened after his death
in 1588, when his reincarnation was discovered in
the person of a great-grandson of Altan Khan, who
received the ordination name Yonden Gyatso (1589–
1617).
• This in turn solidified the political ties
between the powerful khans and the Gelukpa
lamas.
“The Great Fifth” Dalai lama
• The fifth Dalai Lama, Ngawang Losang Gyatso
(1617–1682), popularly referred to as “The Great
Fifth,” was the most dynamic and influential of the
early Dalai Lamas.
• He was a great teacher, an accomplished tantric
yogi, and a prodigious writer. His literary output
surpasses the combined total of all the other Dalai
Lamas.
• In addition to his scholastic achievements, he
proved to be an able statesman, and he united the
three provinces of Tibet (the Central, South, and
West) for the first time since the assassination of
King Lang Darma in the mid-ninth century.
“The Great Fifth” Dalai lama
• In 1642, with the help of his Mongol benefactors,
the Fifth Dalai Lama consolidated power and
became the first Dalai Lama to rule Tibet.
• Conflict between the king of Tsang (Central
Southern Tibet) and the Mongols began early on,
and it reached a crisis point in 1621 when a large
Mongol army entered Tibet with the stated
intention of protecting the Gelukpas.
• A battle was avoided through the intervention of
the Panchen Lama and some other prominent
religious figures, but the seeds of conflict had been
sown.
• A series of battles followed, and by 1640 the
Gelukpas, with the help of the Mongols, proved
victorious, thus establishing the rulership of the
Dalai Lamas over Tibet
Fast-forward to the 20th century:
Death of 13th Dalai Lama
• With the death of the thirteenth Dalai Lama in
1933, Tibet entered an interregnum period.
• This occurred at an inopportune time, because a
• combination of Chinese manipulation of foreign
powers and Tibetan insularity had isolated the
country from the outside world.
• In his attempts to enlist foreign allies, the
thirteenth Dalai Lama discovered that Tibet
had no friends in the international community
and lacked the military resources to repel a
determined foreign invasion.
Fast-forward to the 20th century:
Death of 13th Dalai Lama
• In a famous statement shortly before his
death, he warned his people of imminent
danger from foreign invasion and predicted
that unless Tibet adopted his
modernization policies the country would
be overrun, its people killed or enslaved,
and its religion destroyed.
• Despite his personal authority, however,
after his death the reforms were mostly
scuttled, and Tibet returned to its policy of
deeply conservative isolationism.
Reting Rinpoche Ascends to Power
• In January of 1934, Reting Rinpoche Jambel Yeshe
was selected to be regent during the interregnum
period.
• The monastic leaders in Lhasa had insisted that the
regent be a tulku, an incarnate lama .
• When the leading candidates withdrew their names
from consideration, the choice fell to Reting
Rinpoche, who at the time was only twenty-four
years old.
• Although he was a widely respected tulku, he had
little experience in a role of political leadership.
• Unfortunately for the stability of the country, he
proved to be corrupt and heavy-handed in his rule.
Reting Rinpoche Ascends to Power
• At the beginning of his reign his authority was
limited, but within a few years he gained supreme
power in Tibetan politics.
• After consolidating his position, Reting Rinpoche
began toopenly flout the conventions of monastic
behavior, and his personal letters indicate that
despite being a monk he engaged in affairs with
women.
• In addition, he is reported to have spent money
lavishly and recklessly, and his monastery made
huge profits as a result of the special trading
advantages he granted it.
• These factors, along with widespread reports of his
corruption, fueled popular resentment toward his
regime.
The Testing Procedure for a tulku
• There are many degrees of tulkus, from the
great incarnations like the Dalai Lamas, the
Panchen Lamas, and the Gyelwa Karmapas, to
minor figures who are associated with a
particular area or with a monastery.
• The degree of care given to the testing
procedure varies accordingly.
• For minor incarnations, the choice is sometimes
made after a perfunctory search and often
motivated by political considerations.
• For major tulkus, however, a great deal of care
is taken to ensure the accuracy of the process
The Testing Procedure for a tulku
• Some lamas make the process of finding a successor
relatively easy: the Gyelwa Karmapas, for instance,
traditionally write instructions to their followers
concerning where they will be reborn, often including such
information as family name, details of one or more parents,
and time of birth.
• Their disciples open the letter at a prearranged time after
the Karmapa’s death, follow the master’s instructions, and
according to tradition the predictions are always ‘accurate’.
• Most lamas, however, do not make it so easy for their
disciples.
• In the case of the Dalai Lamas, when one is about to die, he
will commonly make general predictions about his rebirth,
but these must be supplemented by further tests in
order to insure that the correct incarnation is
located
Signs for Identifying a Dalai Lama
• When the thirteenth Dalai Lama foresaw his death, he
predicted that he would take rebirth in the eastern part of
Tibet.
• After he passed away in 1933, this prediction was
corroborated by a number of unusual signs, all pointing
toward the east.
• One of the most striking of these occurred when an
attendant looked into the sealed chamber that held the
remains of the thirteenth Dalai Lama and found that the
head of the corpse was turned toward the east, rather than
south, the position in which it had originally been placed.
After it was returned to the original position, it again was
found facing toward the east after a few days.
• The state oracles gave signs that the incarnation was to be
found in the east, and a large fungus began to grow on the
eastern part of a pillar of the Potala. Another sign was the
appearance of rainbows and auspiciously shaped cloud
formations in the sky, all of them pointing toward the east.
Search for the fourteenth dalai lama
• The beginning of the search was marked by a trip by
Reting Rinpoche to the lake Hlamo Latso, a lake well
known as a source of visions, and at which a vision had
previously aided in the discovery of the thirteenth Dalai
Lama.
• Reting Rinpoche and other high-ranking lamas journeyed
there in hopes of a similar vision.
• As Reting Rinpoche approached the lake, he saw on its
surface the Tibetan letters a, ka, and ma.
• Then a three-tiered monastery appeared, followed by the
sight of a road leading from the monastery toward the east
and passing by a house near a small hill. The house had
turquoise-colored tiles around the roof, and a brown and
white dog was in the yard. Reting Rinpoche also saw a
young boy standing in the yard.
The Search: the Beginnings
• After Reting Rinpoche returned to Lhasa, search parties
were sent toward eastern Tibet, since it seemed clear that
this was the area where the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation
was to be found.
• One party traveled to the province of Amdo, to the area of
Kumbum, where they saw a monastery that closely
resembled the vision in the lake.
• The members of the party began to inquire about children
who had been born recently in the area and examined some
likely candidates.
• After testing several young boys, it was determined that
none was the new Dalai Lama, but the search party then
decided to test a boy in Taktse and two other candidates
recommended by the seventh Panchen Lama.
The Search: undercover and Takse- bound
• Kutsang Rinpoche, a member of the search party, went to
examine the boy from Taktse with a government official named
Losang Tsewang and two attendants.
• They were concerned that the presence of a high-ranking lama
and government dignitaries might cause people to try to sell
them on a particular candidate, and so they hid their true
intentions and disguised themselves as merchants on business.
• Kutsang Rinpoche dressed as a servant, and Losang Tsewang
pretended to be the leader of the party.
• As they approached the village of Taktse,…their hopes continued
to rise when they saw a small dwelling that matched the
description of the house in Reting Rinpoche’s vision. As they
approached the entrance, a brown and white dog began to bark
at them, and the woman of the house came out to see what had
caused the commotion. Losang Tsewang asked her if he could use
her facilities to make some tea, and she showed him into the
house.
• As Kutsang Rinpoche walked into the courtyard, he noticed that
the roof had turquoise tiles like the ones that Reting Rinpoche
had seen in his vision and that the house matched his description
in other aspects.
The Search: Beads and Lamas
• Kutsang Rinpoche entered the kitchen and began making tea. As
he was waiting for water to boil, a two-year-old boy walked up to
him, sat in his lap, and began to play with the prayer beads
around the disguised lama’s neck. These beads had belonged to
the thirteenth Dalai Lama.
• The young boy, named Hlamo Dondrup, then told Kutsang
Rinpoche that the beads were his, and Kutsang Rinpoche offered
to give them to the child if he could guess the lama’s true
identity. The boy said, “You are a lama of Sera,” which was true.
The boy then correctly identified Losang Tsewang. This was
remarkable, since he had never been outside of his small village,
and the two were dressed as merchants.
• Hlamo Dondrup then announced that the other two attendants
were from Sera Monastery, which was also correct. The members
of the delegation still did not tell the parents the true purpose of
their visit, and after spending the night in the house they left.
• As they were preparing to go, the boy came to see them and
asked that they take him with them. He was so insistent that
they finally had to console him by telling him that they would
return later.
Kundun,
1997
Directed by
Martin Scorsese
My land and My
People, 1962
Freedom in Exile,
1990
Biography and Autobiography in
Tibet
• Biography - Namthar (rnam thar,
“liberation” [story])
• Autobiography - Rangnam (rang gi
rnam thar, “self-liberation [story]”
Some features of namthar/rangnam
• The presentation of the subject of a
Rangnam can range from self-deprecatory
to self-aggrandizing
• Namthar and Rangnam can range from
‘biographical’ to hagiographical in content.
• Prose, or often mix of verse and prose
• Linguistic register? Often composed in a
‘colloquial’ literary style; range of
honorifics from formal to informal
Why does autobiography as a genre seem
incongruous with the tenets of Buddhism?
“For what is autobiography if not a celebration of
just the self—oneself—along with that self’s
own history, actions, development, virtues,
failings?”
“…one of the crucial features which characterizes
a text as autobiography proper [in the Western
context] is the degree of the sense of individual
selfhood that the author displays.”
Gyatso, Autobiography in Tibetan Religious Literature, 466, 468.
What are some of the characteristics
you’ve noticed of the Dalai Lama’s
autobiography?
Does it seem to fit in with the genre
of ‘rangnam’ as you understand it?
The Future of reincarnation lineages
in Tibet?
• Recall that between the 17th century and 1959, the
Dalai Lamas – a lineage of religious leaders of the
Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism – were both the
religious and political leaders of Tibet and headed
the Lhasa-based Tibetan Government.
• This intertwining of political and spiritual
legitimacy formed a central part of Tibetan politics,
with the government being constituted of a diarchy
of equivalent ecclesiastical and secular offices at
every level of administration.
• Even in exile, both religion and the figure of the
Dalai Lama continue to be central unifying
elements for Tibetan nationalism and play key roles
in a number of aspects of exile politics.
Contemporary problems with the
reincarnation lineages
• However, though providing a powerful uniting force for the
Tibetan nation and earning Tibetans moral legitimacy in
international politics this interweaving of religion and
politics has been neither unproblematic nor uncontested.
• Not only has the reliance on Buddhist reincarnation to
determine leadership succession been a source of political
vulnerability, but there are critiques voiced by some
young exiles that the influence of Buddhism on
politics has led to Tibetans being reluctant to
engage with political decision making and assume
leadership positions
See additional posted reading:
“The geopolitics of Buddhist reincarnation:
contested futures of Tibetan leadership” by Fiona McConnell,
2012
The beginnings of a Tibetan “separation
of church and state”
• In light of such critiques, and arguably to also reflect
Western ideals of secular democracy back to a Western
dominated international audience, the Dalai Lama has
spearheaded a process of dismantling the traditional
theocratic system.
• The governmental ecclesiastical offices were abolished in
the early years of exile, the monasteries lost their
traditional roles as local administrators and, most
importantly, the Dalai Lama has pushed through a series
of democratic reforms.
• This democratisation of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile
(TGiE) has recently been advanced by a decision by the
Dalai Lama that both separates ‘church and state’ at the
highest level of government and marks a significant
transition in Tibetan politics.
• On 14 March 2011, the Dalai Lama announced that
he was retiring from political life and would transfer
his political authority to elected leaders.
Stepping down from political power
• In standing down as both head of state and head of
government – though retaining his role as spiritual
leader – the Dalai Lama thus voluntarily
relinquished an almost 400-year-old tradition
of power.
• This decision raises issues that speak directly to
the relationship between secular ‘modernity’ and
religious ‘tradition’, and questions of where
legitimacy lies and how it is constituted.
• Recall that since the fourteenth century, all
lineages of Tibetan Buddhism have used
reincarnation as the method of succession for high
lamas.
• Given the centrality of reincarnation to Tibetan
leadership and thus the legitimacy of the Tibetan
polity, it has long been a political as well as
religious practice
Chinese government and the
recognition of reincarnations
• Even the discovery of the current, 14th, Dalai
Lama in 1937 was not without political
interference. the Tibetan Government
asserted its independence by declaring its
candidate to be the 14th Dalai Lama before he
reached the capital, thereby thwarting Chinese
Government claims that they had to be present
to approve the selection
• With China securing authority over Tibet in
1959, it has ‘attempted to take over the role of
legitimate patron of religion’, thereby seeking to
‘intervene directly in religious matters in order
to shape Tibetan Buddhism to suit its political
requirements.’
Recognition(s) of the Panchen Lama
• To date, the most overt intervention of the atheist Chinese
state into Tibetan Buddhist practices has been the dispute
over the reincarnation of the 10th Panchen Lama.
• The second most important incarnation in the Gelug school
of Tibetan Buddhism, the Panchen Lama and the Dalai
Lama have traditionally played a role in recognising each
other’s reincarnation.
• As Tibetan scholar Tsering Shakya notes, the death of the
10th Panchen Lama in 1989 ‘left China without a credible
figurehead in Tibet at a time when . . . the Chinese were
facing a serious . . . Challenge to their rule by Tibetan
nationalists’ and, as a pre-emptive block to the Dalai
Lama’s involvement in the identification of a successor,
‘Premier Li Peng announced that outsiders would not be
allowed to “meddle in the selection procedure”’
Recognition(s) of the Panchen Lama
• May 1995 the Dalai Lama announced the recognition of six-yearold Gedun Chokyi Nyima from Nagchu, north-west Tibet, as the
11th Panchen Lama.
• Interpreting this announcement as a direct challenge to their
authority, the Chinese Government denounced the Dalai Lama’s
decision as ‘illegal and a political plot by the Dalai clique to split
the Motherland’ and rejected his choice .
• Gedun Chokyi Nyima was detained by Chinese security
forces soon after his recognition and has not been seen
since.
• In November 1995, the Chinese authorities appointed their own
11th Panchen Lama, Gyaltsen Norbu. The son of Communist
Party members, Gyaltsen Norbu was selected through a draw
from a ‘golden urn’, a ceremony established in the eighteenth
century by the Qing Emperor and that had been used to select
the 11th and 12th Dalai Lamas.
• In Chinese eyes, this ‘artefact of Manchu imperial power’
therefore demonstrated that ‘final authority in Tibet had always
rested in Beijing’ and was a symbolic claim of sovereignty over
Tibet, albeit at the expense of their candidate lacking legitimacy
in the eyes of Tibetans
Chinese governmental responses
• The gulf created between the Chinese and exile Tibetan
authorities over the former’s appointment of their own Panchen
Lama was further reinforced by Beijing’s issuing of ‘State Order
No. 5: Management Measures for the Reincarnation of
Living Buddhas in Tibetan Buddhism’ in 2007.
• The order declares that only the Chinese Government can
recognise the reincarnation of a lama, including the Dalai Lama,
and that all such individuals must be reborn within China.
• Further solidifying the seemingly counter-intuitive link between
Buddhist reincarnation and the integrity of the modern, atheist
Chinese state, Article 2 of the order states that ‘Reincarnating
living Buddhas should respect and protect the principles of the
unification of the state . . . [and] shall not be interfered with or be
under the dominion of any foreign organization or individual’
(State Administration of Religious Affairs 2007, n.p.).
• Order No. 5 was formally repudiated by exiled Tibetan Buddhist
leaders shortly after it was issued, and the Dalai Lama’s
statement stepping down in September 2011 is a further
rebuttal.
The importance of the 2011 declaration
• The 14th Dalai Lama’s declaration clearly spells out that
only the Dalai Lama and, in his absence, the ‘Gaden
Phodrang Trust’ – the ‘Dalai Lama’s Institution’
constituted after His Holiness’s transfer of authority to
TGiE – will have ‘sole legitimate authority’ for managing
the Dalai Lama’s lineage and the succession process
• His Holiness both explicitly excludes the People’s Republic
of China from intervening in the succession of the 14th
Dalai Lama and uses his authority to delineate the future
course of Tibetan Buddhism and, in turn, the Tibetan
nation.
• The Dalai Lama’s statement thus sets out the
reincarnation process as rooted in Buddhist traditions, but
it also demonstrates the agency of the Tibetan (spiritual)
leader to employ these religious rituals in response to
contemporary conditions.
The future of the Dalai lama lineage
• The 14th Dalai Lama’s statement indicates that, for the
first time in six centuries, the Dalai Lama’s successor will
likely be an ‘emanation’ (sprul ba), rather than a
reincarnation (sprul sku), with the former being when a
manifestation takes place without the source passing away.
• The strategic advantage of this change to succession means
that the next Dalai Lama will probably be identified before
the current Dalai Lama passes away, will likely be an
adult rather than a child, and will be identified outside of
Tibet.
• In thereby shifting the temporal and spatial parameters of
his succession, the problematic interim period between
Dalai Lamas when Tibet has historically suffered political
instability is avoided, and legitimate authority for
overseeing the process is placed firmly in Tibetan hands.
Overview of Syllabus
Week 1: Introduction to Buddhist Literature, Jātaka Tales
Week 2: Indian Buddhist Sūtra Literature
Week 3: Life story of the Buddha in Indian poetry
Week 4: Indian Buddhist Poetry and Drama
Week 5: Tibetan Buddhist Inspirational poetry
Week 6: Buddhist Biography and Hagiography in Tibet
Week 7: Modern Buddhist Biographies: the 14th Dalai Lama’s
Autobiography
Last week (bring snacks!!)
Monday March 16th, 1pm-3:30pm (Classroom 30)
Week 8: Buddhist-inspired fiction in the 20th century
Thorugh Herman Hesse’s famous novel, Siddhartha