Lama Tsongkhapa’s Stone Mandala set!

[Namdrol]

Lama Tsongkhapa had offered 1,080,000 mandalas during his retreat, this is said to be the stone Mandala set that he used, look at the grooves that was made on the stone after 1 million offerings!

[kris]

Wow! These are really something auspicious even to see! Can anyone confirm they are real? I tried to google them but can't seem to find the source of these images...

[Vajraprotector]

Amazing! I read that the retreat was advised by Manjushri himself !

During Tsongkhapa's first extensive retreat done together with Lama Umapa, Tsongkhapa felt he still did not have a proper understanding of Madhyamaka and Guhyasamaja. Manjushri advised that he does a very long retreat and then would understand the notes he had taken from his instructions.

Thus, after teaching a short while, Tsongkhapa entered a four-year retreat with eight close disciples at Olka Cholung (‘Ol-kha chos-lung). They did thirty-five sets of 100,000 prostrations, one each to the thirty-five confession Buddhas, and eighteen sets of 100,000 mandala offerings, with many Yamantaka self-initiations and study of The Avatamsaka Sutra (mDo phal-cher) for bodhisattva deeds. They had a vision of Maitreya afterwards.
 
After the retreat, Tsongkhapa and his disciples restored a great Maitreya statue in Lhasa, which was the first of his four major deeds. They then went into retreat for five more months.

[kris]

I was told that Lama Tsongkhapa could not afford to buy the mandala set and he end up using stones to make mandala offerings. During mandala offerings, we are supposed to use our inner part of the hand to rub against the base of the mandala while reciting mantras. Since the stones are very rough and Lama Tsongkhapa did more than a million of mandala offerings, His hand were all torn and bruised..

This story of Lama Tsongkhapa making mandala offering really inspired me, that's why I share with all of you.

[lotus1]

Thank you for sharing. It is a great blessing to see the stone Mandala set that used by Lama Tsongkhapa. The story of Lama Tsongkhapa torn his hands after doing 1 millions mandala is so inspiring!
When we offer mandala, we offer up the most precious jewels and things that we have to the three jewels. Offerings mandala is a great way to help us accumulate merits. With the merits, it will support us in our spiritual journey as merits and wisdom are two important factors for us to gain our enlightenment.

[diamond girl]

Thanks for sharing these pictures. I would love to see them one day. Could you let me know where these items are now? Are they at Gaden Monastery in Tibet or in a museum?

I also have a general Buddhist question – does it necessarily mean that the more physical suffering one endures, the more purification is achieved? I ask this because in certain catholic beliefs, they wear hair shirts and do self-flagellation as forms of purification. Would this be similar in the Buddhist context? I always thought of Buddhism as the middle way, since Lord Buddha Shakyamuni spent six years in extreme abstinence and realized that it was not the way to achieve enlightenment and that there should be moderation. Doing 1 million stone mandala offerings and tearing up his arm does not sound moderate to me though yet it did bring Tsongkhapa to enlightenment.  I have also read about Milarepa’s life which is another legend of extremism. Is such extreme measures necessary for enlightenment?

[WisdomBeing]

Diamond girl brings up a point I have often contemplated. Are we able to achieve any level of attainments without physical hardship as per the examples she has stated? There are obviously Buddhist schools which focus on meditation and while I presume that all Buddhist traditions would teach that enlightenment can only be achieved by the clearing of our negative karma and the accumulation of merit, would the clearing of negative karma be achieved without extreme physical discomfort? Or is the level of physical discomfort related to the speed of clearing the negative karma?

For example, we have the preliminary practices including 100,000 prostrations, and mandala offerings, guru yoga, water offerings etc. Now, these 100,000 prostrations would be allocated according to one’s convenience, eg if you are working, then you would just do them maybe two sessions a day. But you would have a goal to achieve and you would know when you have completed the 100,000 but if you were building houses a la Milarepa, you would have no idea how many houses you would have to build. Though I guess you would achieve mind transformation and develop extreme Guru devotion if you would just let go of waiting for the tribulations to end.

Anyway, since this Vajrayana tradition is the turbo charged path, I presume that there is a lot of physical hardship involved. Can people who are on this path share their experiences?

[lotus1]

Good points to ponder upon. From my opinion, I would think that it is not so much on the more physical suffering one endures, the more purification is achieved. I would think that it is all depends on the motivations when doing the action. For us, we might think that it is physical sufferings doing 1 million stone mandala offerings until his arm was torn but to Lama Tsongkhapa, he may not feel it is sufferings at all. His mind is just focusing on the offerings to the Buddha and I think whether he was using a stone mandala or a pearl or beans mandala, whether his hand was torn or not, he would still receive the same amount of merits as his motivation is very pure.

Another points I am looking at from the angle or the Four Noble Truths – sufferings, the cause of sufferings, the cessation of suffering and the path to overcome sufferings. To a certain extend, we would need to experience sufferings, discomfort and pains that arise from our three poisons (though it may be physically pains). When we truly experience the pains of being in samsara, then only we would truly want to find the way to be free from the pains and sufferings. 

[samayakeeper]

I think purification covers the body, speech and mind. I have not engaged in a long closed-door spiritual retreat like those past and present great adepts who have gone on and achieved high spiritual attainments but I think such a retreat involves great endurance and challenge for the body, speech and mind.

I do not think Lama Tsongkhapa purposely inflicted himself physically but I think His mental concentration was so focused that He did not see his skin and flesh being torn as the only means of purification. Maybe to Lama Tsongkhapa his body and flesh was just a vehicle for Him to learn and practice to achieve His goal, Full Enlightenment.

I think pain is pain, whether of the body or mind.

[vajratruth]

Amazing! I read that the retreat was advised by Manjushri himself !

During Tsongkhapa's first extensive retreat done together with Lama Umapa, Tsongkhapa felt he still did not have a proper understanding of Madhyamaka and Guhyasamaja. Manjushri advised that he does a very long retreat and then would understand the notes he had taken from his instructions.

Thank you for such a wonderful post.

The importance of this practice is reflected in the fact that the great Lama Tsongkhapa himself undertook it to such an extensive degree, especially when you consider that Tsongkhapa had already attained enlightenment many aeons before that, as prophesized by Lord Shakyamuni. Pabongka Rinpoche said that even though Lama Tsongkhapa was already highly attained, he still practiced the prerequisites of purification and merit accumulation to set a good example.

According to Dromtompa, Lama Atisha himself never goes past a single day without practicing the mandala offering, which is symbolic of offering the entire universe of prosperity to the Buddha. Therefore every single possible offering we can make to the Buddhas is contained within the mandala offering, making it one of the best way of generating merits.

It is advised that we should use precious stones for the mandala offering but that Lama Tsongkhapa's mandala set was basically just stones also shows that the sincerity by which we make such offerings and the visualizations that accompany the practice is more important that what the mandala set consists of. This understanding extends to all practices including water offerings.

[Ensapa]

Lama Tsongkhapa's humility and effort are both extremely important qualities that are so rare in people. It is really incredible how Lama Tsongkhapa did not use expensive items such as a silver mandala set for his Dharma practice but he used a stone one instead. To use stone for a mandala set would make it very heavy and most people would just give up halfway...but he managed to do 1,080,000 sets!

[Dondrup Shugden]

It is such a blessing to view the sacred items of Je Tsongkapa.  Please have a look and be blessed.

[grandmapele]

If it really is THE stone mandala set used by Lama Tsongkhapa for the mandala offering, it is very auspicious to even look at it. Even the modern mandala set can get heavy as we do the offering, imagine how heavy the stone mandala can get!

So, the visualizations and prayers are the more important aspects of the offering, as even with stone mandala and stone offering, but with over a million offerings, the attainments and merits are tremendous.

[jamyang_sonam]

thank you for sharing this auspicious photo for us, Lama Tsongkhapa perseverance and diligent in His retreat is admirable. the dent on the stone shows Lama Tsongkhapa takes his practice seriously and it has lead him to gain attainments.

thank you again