Why was Lamaism renamed to Tibetan Buddhism by scientists?
The Tibetans have never called there religion “lamaism” (and it has nothing to do with Tengrism or Turkic culture). Lamaism is a word invented by the Chinese (“lama jiao”) in the 18th century to make it look like another religion than Buddhism (“fo jiao”). The Westerners during the 19th century eagerly adopted the term “lamaism”, because they had the mistaken view that Tibetan Buddhism was a degenerated form of Buddhism, while they thought the Theravada Buddhism they found on Sri Lanka was the only pure or “original” Buddhism. The scholars of religion have discarded the term “lamaism” for two reasons: 1. They have realized it is an authentic form of Buddhism, and 2. They have realized that “lamaism” was used as a derogatory term, just as Islam was called “Muhammedanism” and Judaism “Mosaism”, neither of which were accepted terms by the adherents in question. Edit: Here’s a quote from the Dalai Lama himself. I guess he should know what they call and don’t call their own religion: “Some
