Vesak Day 2024 is fast approaching and the Maha Tare Team is delighted to have in store for all Dharma friends, a fantastic series of opportunities for one to create positive conditions for oneself in this life as well as those to come, as we embark on a meaningful twelve (12) day event leading up to Vesak Day. Here is what is in store!
OPENING CEREMONY & CONSTRUCTION OF THE TARA SAND MANDALA
– Sat, 11 May 2024, 9am-10am
During the Opening Ceremony, our kind and learned teacher Geshe Lama Konchok & our compliment of tantric monks will unveil the large thangka of our Lord Shakyamuni Buddha, during which the preliminary rites for the construction of the Tara Sand Mandala will also be administered.
It is a Vesak Day tradition at our Centre for our kind and learned teacher, Geshe Lama Konchok, to lead a team of highly qualified tantric monks from Geshe la’s alumni (Gyudmed Tantric College) in constructing a multi-coloured sand mandala dedicated to a particular deity.
This year, the sand mandala that will be constructed is one dedicated to the Green Tara, whose enlightened activities include the swift granting of wishes to the devoted and protecting them from harm, befitting of her reputation as the Swift Protectress.
A sand mandala is a three dimensional representation of the deity’s celestial abode, and its construction is an exercise in geometric precision which will begin on Saturday, 11 May 2024 at 9am and will be accompanied by a daily Tara Puja.
Come join us to witness how sacred geometry is applied by our learned members of the Sangha, and you are all welcome to ask questions and learn more!
GRAND THOUSAND OFFERINGS RITUALS （Chi：千供法会）
Grand Thousand Offerings Rituals are unique in that they involve a lot of preparation and also many elaborate offerings that are offered to the deity to whom that Ritual is dedicated. On the occasion of Vesak Day 2024, where merits of any virtuous activities, including prayers and offerings, will be multiplied manifold, our kind and learned teacher, Geshe Lama Konchok, will lead the following Grand Thousand Offerings Rituals. We invite your active participation.
Tara Grand Thousand Offerings Ritual (Chi: 度母千供法会）
– Saturday, 11 May 2024, 2pm-5pm
Tara (Chi:度母） is a bodhisattva known as the Swift Protectress. It is believed that Tara emanated from the tears of Chenresig (Guanyin), and compassion is Her main motivation in coming swiftly to aid whoever calls Her name. She is equally efficacious in protecting sentient beings from illnesses of all types, and creating positive conditions for success in one’s careers. This ritual, also known as the Grand Drolma Tongchoe, aims to achieve precisely this for all the devoted.
Namgyalma Grand Thousand Offerings Ritual （Chi：尊胜佛母千供法会）
– Sunday, 12 May 2024, 2pm-5pm
Also known as the Grand Namgyal Tongchoe, this ritual entails making of a offerings to one of the three (3) long-life deities, Namgyalma (Chi: 尊胜佛母, Skt: Ushnisha Vijaya). Her practice is especially effective and powerful in removing obstacles and cleanses negative karmas that hinder good health and long life. She is also particularly powerful in pacifying negativities, past negative karma, removing obscurations, as well as fulfilling good wishes. The sutras also speak of how Her mantra has immense benefit – it is said to be so powerful that anybody who hears it will never again be reborn in the lower realms.
Amitabha Buddha Grand Thousand Offering Ritual （Chi：阿弥陀佛千供法会）
– Sunday, 19 June 2024, 2pm-5pm
As with everything else that comes about from conditioned existence, we will all, one day, depart this world, and most would have heard of the Western Paradise (西方极乐世界), where many of the Buddhist faith hope to be reborn in. The Amitabha Buddha Grand Thousand Offering Ritual is calculated to imbue the devoted with the necessary karmic connection and seeds to be born in the Western Paradise over which Amitabha Buddha presides, from where beings born there miraculously will enjoy the most conducive environment to attain enlightenment, and is accordingly is a very important ritual this Vesak Day.
Medicine Buddha Grand Thousand Offering Ritual （Chi：药师佛千供法会）
– Wednesday, 22 May 2024, 2pm-5pm
On the afternoon of Vesak Day itself, Wednesday, 22 May 2024, Geshe la will lead this ritual also known as the Sangye Menla Tongchod. Whilst not apparent to the uninitiated, the merits of any practice associated with Medicine Buddha is not only effective in curing diseases (both of the body and of the mind), but also helpful in generating the causes and conditions for fulfilment of one’s wishes. It is particularly auspicious for this Thousand Offering Ritual to be performed on Vesak Day itself, as it was similarly done last year.
OTHER BESPOKE RITUALS & PUJAS （Chi：其他重要的法会）
A whole series of other Rituals & Pujas are in store this over this 12 day Vesak Day celebration period, which we hope will benefit all of you, with a focus on (a) generating conditions for wealth (both spiritual and material) such as the White Mahakala, Yellow Dzhambala and Vaishravana Pujas, (b) for the elimination of obstacles and negativities such as the Ritual of Four Hundred, the Yamantaka Self Initiation & Empowerment, the Sitatapatra Ritual Cake Casting and the Vajrayogini Fire Puja, as well as (c) those for sowing the seeds of enlightenment in our paths out of samsara, such as the Heart Sutra Recitation.
WHITE MAHAKALA PUJA （Chi：白大黑天法会）
– Saturday, 11 May 2023, 7pm-9pm
This Puja is associated with White Mahakala, who is actually one of the wealth deities whose powers associated with wealth actually stem from the compassion of Chenresig or Guanyin, which sees to it that those short of wealth are given the opportunity to create the karmic seeds and meet the right conditions for wealth to be bestowed when accompanied by the appropriate positive motivations when receiving these blessings.
YELLOW DZHAMBALA PUJA （Chi：财神法会）
– Saturday, 12 May 2023, 7pm-9pm
Dzhambala is the name common to the 5 wealth deities in Buddhism, whose commitment to the Buddha was to assist sentient beings who venerate them, in creating auspicious conditions for the ripening of wealth-bringing karma. The propitiation of the Dzhambalas is believed to aid the devoted in obtaining both spiritual and material wealth, the former being more important.
Whilst Buddhism teaches renunciation of worldly and material things, the practices associated with the generation of wealth, even material wealth, is not inconsistent with that teaching. This is explained by the fact that everyone, even monasteries, require material wealth or funding in order to function well. It is not wealth or even the enjoyment thereof that is a problem; it is the attachment to it that is the problem. The action to create the positive conditions for wealth is actually generosity – the first of the six perfections of the Bodhisattva.
VAISHRAVANA (NAMTOSE) PUJA（Chi：财宝天王法会）
– Sunday, 19th May 2024, 7pm-9pm
Vaishravana, also known as Namtose in Tibetan and Píshāméntiān (毗沙門天) or 财宝天王 in Chinese, is significant wealth deity in the Mahayana Buddhist pantheon. He is one of the Four Heavenly Kings who are protectors of the Dharma, guarding the four directions of Mount Meru. Vaishravana resides in the northern quadrant of the topmost tier of the lower half of Mount Meru, and is one of the most powerful wealth deities with ability to bring about the right conditions for ripening of karmic seeds that are the cause for wealth.
THE RITUAL OF FOUR HUNDRED (GYABSHI CHOGA)(Chi:四百供法会）
– Friday, 17 May 2024, 7pm-9pm
It is believed that as humans transiting samsara, many of us would have been born in other realms before, apart from the human realm, and it is also natural that in view of our imperfections, we almost certainly come into this life, and into this world, with karmic debts. This is where the importance of pacification of karmic debtors, whose sole purpose is to seek retribution, comes into play.
One of the remedies to the above phenomenon is “The Ritual of Four Hundred”, popularly known as Gyabshi Choga in Tibetan. It is a powerful extermination ritual based on Buddha Shakyamuni’s subdual of the four classes of evils (mara)—non-human spirits, death, afflictive thoughts and emotions, and a psycho-physical basis of a Karmic being—through His wisdom and compassion.
In an extensive systematised form, the ritual makes use of 100 set each of four religious items—sacred statuettes (satchaya), butter lamps (mar-mey), food offerings (torma), and dough figurines (lü). These four sets represent enlightened beings, pure offerings, ritual cakes, and ransom effigies.
The “Ritual of Four Hundred” will involve the ritualist lamas undertaking a series of activities in order to assist the devoted, namely refuge-taking, bodhicitta cultivation, meditation on emptiness, visualisation of deities, extending of food offerings or Tormas to enlightened beings, seeking of blessings, visualisation of the classes of evil spirits, granting of Torma, sending off of ransom effigies, expunging of all evil spirits, and chanting of prayers to usher in auspicious conditions.
There is no better a time than the Vesak Day period to participate in this Ritual.
YAMANTAKA SELF-INITIATION & EMPOWERMENT (Chi：大威德金刚灌顶法会）
– Saturday, 18 May 2024, 2pm-5pm
It is widely known that Yamantaka (or Vajrabhiarava) is the wrathful manifestation of the Bodhisattva of Wisdom, Lord Manjushri. Yamantaka is one of the most powerful deities in the Tibetan Buddhist pantheon of deities. In spite of His wrathful appearance, the essence that He embodies is the wisdom that realises emptiness and ultimate compassion.
This Ritual associated with Yamantaka, also known as Jigje Dak-Jug, will involve our ritualist lamas entering into self-initiation (into the aspect of the deity) and empowerment, and their engagement in meditation and incantations that are intended to exterminate all negative influences including spirit harm (if any) that may affect the devoted. All are invited to participate and to witness the power of this tantric ritual.
HEART SUTRA RECITATION (Chi：心经念诵）
– Saturday, 18 May 2024, 7pm-9pm
The Heart Sutra is one of the most profound Mahayana Sutras which is a powerful way to create the conditions for having a direct realisation of emptiness – the teaching to the effect that all phenomena that we witness is this world is but empty of inherent existence, another way of saying that all that happens (or is observed by the sentient beings to happen), whether by way of occurrences, experiences and beyond, come about as a result of past causes when the conditions for the ripening of such causes, are present. Through this understanding, we sentient beings are then led to get closer to the absolute truth, as a precursor to exiting the wheel of samsara. It is therefore a wonderful opportunity to become acquainted with this powerful teaching.
SITATAPATRA RITUAL CAKE CASTING (DUK-GAR TOR-GYA) (Chi: 大白伞盖佛母朵玛供养)
– Tuesday, 21 May 2024, 7pm-9pm
The White Umbrella Deity (Skt: Sitatapatra, Tib: Duk-gar) is a semi-wrathful tantric Buddhist deity whose practice is most efficacious in amongst other things, dispelling of unseen negative forces and obstacles that afflict one’s life. The ritual involving the casting of ritual cakes (tormas) in this ritual associated with the White Umbrella Deity which is aimed at generating protecting oneself and one’s loved ones from malicious and unseen forces, and bringing peace and harmony to the home.
VAJRAYOGINI FIRE PUJA (Chi: 金刚瑜伽母火供)
– Wednesday, 22 May 2024 (Vesak Day)， 7pm – 8pm
On the evening of Vesak Day, prior to a ceremony known as Refuge Taking whereby those wishing to become Buddhists to take refuge in the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, Geshe Lama Konchok will lead the Vajrayogini Fire Puja, which is an immensely powerful purification ritual aimed at purifying aeons of past negative karma. It is believed that the merits of such rituals on Vesak Day itself will be multiplied manifold and is a befitting time to perform this Ritual, to rid one of negative karma that stands in the way of our success (both spiritual and worldly), and to be suitably prepared for the Refuge Taking Ceremony.
REFUGE CEREMONY – TAKING REFGUE IN THE TRIPLE GEM (Chi: 皈依佛门仪式)
– Wednesday, 22 May 2024 (Vesak Day)， 8pm – 9pm
At the close of Vesak Day, our kind teacher Geshe Lama Konchok will invite all who wish to become Buddhists to partake in an important ceremony, that of taking refuge in the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. Whilst it is a ceremony which is often well attended by those prospective new Buddhists as well as those already practising, Geshe Konchok takes pains to emphasise that whether one is a Buddhist or not is not dependant upon whether one has gone through the rigmarole of any given ritual, but whether in one’s heart, one regards the Triple Gem as the one and only path towards well-being and cessation of suffering. During this ceremony, whoever wishes to adopt the Buddhist path will be given a Dharma name by Geshe Konchok, and for those with the right karmic connections and motivations, this will be the beginning of a wonderful path out of samsara, with lights along your way!
CLOSING CEREMONY & MANDALA DISSOLUTION
– Thursday, 23 May 2024, 9am-10am
On this final morning, the day after Vesak Day, the painstakingly constructed Tara Sand Mandala will be dissolved as part of the closing ceremony. The dissolution of the mandala is an exercise in, amongst other things, reminding one about the impermanence of all conditioned phenomena. Whatever that comes about as an effect following past causes, will always have the characteristics of arising, subsisting and thereafter passing away, only to come about again through reincarnation of the consciousness in realms corresponding to the net karmic bank of that consciousness’ karmic bank. That same phenomenon is meditated upon and experienced when the mandala is dissolved, and the sand collected and distributed to the devoted, as it is believed to contain the immense blessings of the tantric rituals associated with it. The residual sand is then brought to the sea where it will be released into the waters, carrying those blessings to the rest of the world.