The abbot of Tashilhunpo became the second personage in the ecclesiastical and political hierarchy.  The head of it was the prelate commonly known as the Grand Lama and resident at Lhasa.  Geden-dub,[951] the nephew of Tsong-kha-pa, is reckoned by common consent as the first Grand Lama (though he seems not to have borne the title) and the first incarnation of Avalokita as head of the Tibetan Church.[952] The Emperor Ch’eng Hua (1365-1488) who had occasion to fight on the borders of Tibet confirmed the position of these two sees as superior to the eight previously recognized and gave the occupants a patent and seal.  From this time they bore the title of rGyal-po or king.

It was about this time that the theory of successive incarnations[953] which is characteristic of Lamaism was developed and defined.  At least two ideas are combined in it.  The first is that divine persons appear in human form.  This is common in Asia from India to Japan, especially among the peoples who have accepted some form of Hindu religion.  The second is that in a school, sect or church there is real continuity of life.  In the unreformed sects of Tibet this was accomplished by the simple principle of heredity so that celibacy, though undeniably correct, seemed to snap the thread.  But it was reunited by the theory that a great teacher is reborn in the successive occupants of his chair.  Thus the historian Taranatha is supposed to be reborn in the hierarchs of Urga.  But frequently the hereditary soul is identified with a Buddha or Bodhisattva, as in the great incarnations of Lhasa and Tashilhunpo.  This dogma has obvious advantages.  It imparts to a Lamaist see a dignity which the papacy cannot rival but it is to the advantage of the Curia rather than of the Pope for the incarnate deity of necessity succeeds to his high office as an infant, is in the hands of regents and not unfrequently dies when about twenty years of age.  These incarnations are not confined to the great sees of Tibet.  The heads of most large monasteries in Mongolia claim to be living Buddhas and even in Peking there are said to be six.

The second Grand Lama[954] enjoyed a long reign, and set the hierarchy in good order, for he distinguished strictly clerical posts, filled by incarnations, from administrative posts.  He was summoned to Peking by the Emperor, but declined to go and the somewhat imperative embassy sent to invite him was roughly handled.  His successor, the third Grand Lama bSod-nams,[955] although less noticed by historians than the fifth, perhaps did more solid work for the holy see of Lhasa than any other of his line for he obtained, or at least received, the allegiance of the Mongols who since the time of Khubilai had woefully backslidden from the true faith.