Offering Bsang / Incense Offering

[DharmaSpace]

Between offering Bsang and offering black tea or even doing kawang which type is more effective at clearing obstacles?

Or these three activities remove different types of obstacles?

Coz for what I know all three activities point at removal of obstacles. If someone can share that would be beautiful

[Helena]

Personally, I do all three every single day in addition to the 35 Confessional Buddhas.

From my perspective, we need all the purification and clearing of obstacles as much as possible. My Guru always say that if we can do more, always do more. After all, we do have accumulated lifetimes of bad karma and we need all the merit we can get hold of. WE are not that priviledged as to have special express pass that allows us to cut the long queques to the state of Enlightenment. We are not that highly attained either. So, if we can do more, there is really no harm in doing more. Only great benefits and merits.
 

[dsiluvu]

There is really no end to purifying our negative karma unless we have reached Enlightenment... so yes I agree with Helena.

However if you are always in a rush and on the go...you can still do serkym offering... just get a drink, order from perhaps the restaurant/cafe you are in and do a short serkym offering prayer. Even if you are flying you can do this although may the stewardess will look at you funny for not drinking your beer hehe...

Incense is a wonderful offering and would also purify/cleanse an area from negative energies and incense is also quite easy to bring when you travel or easily obtained... the only part that's a bit of a hassle is finding an incense burner or carrying one...but not impossible, just be creative!

So if you are wondering which one is best, there really isn't one, both are required and good, perhaps which is convenient for you at that time. And if something really bad happened to you, but you are not hurt i.e. got in to an accident, just think of it as purification and rejoice it is all coming out now, better then later.

[nagaseeker]

 dear roberto , hate history....... a lot !  , but somehow i manage to read through all , LOL ~  thanks for the info

dsiluvu , i love to make incense offering to protector every morning , not only want to "purify/cleanse an area from negative energies" . it makes me feel 'safe' after burning the incense , and i love the scent very much  ( i'm not a smoker  !  ) some times i will offer more than 500 grms of incense powder , normal incense burner are really impossible for me    ~ i have a huge flowerpot with some sand in it and i still need to clean the after burned ash every week ,

[Roberto]

Another incense lover among us. I bet you love camp fires, also.

Seriously though. Interesting history no? A prayer composed by a teacher who took a wife, instructed by his guru. Then if you read up Trijang Rinpoche's biography also available for download here on this site, you will read how they offered Bsang to Dorje Shugden constantly during the escape from Tibet by HHDL and entourage.

Must really work:)

[jessicajameson]

Between offering Bsang and offering black tea or even doing kawang which type is more effective at clearing obstacles?

Or these three activities remove different types of obstacles?

Coz for what I know all three activities point at removal of obstacles. If someone can share that would be beautiful

Hey DharmaSpace,

I really don't know - but this is my personal opinion: I feel that they're all really different, but yet for the same reason.

Bsang offering is burning incense, that's a smell-sensory offering. Offering black tea is an offering of liquid form, we're offering delicious hot tea to our protectors. Doing kawang, it's using the form of speech, our speech.

They all use different forms of offerings to generate merits which in turn helps us clear our obstacles.

Like what Roberto, Helena, dsiluvu and many more have expressed (of which I agree!).... THE MORE THE BETTER! Perhaps one after the other? :p

[triesa]

Thank you Roberto for sharing this information.

I have been doing Bsang for almost a year, I just insert the prayer and incense offering in my daily Sadhana before my dedication. Occasionally I would also do the Bsang separately.......

It is a great practice to remind one's committment and help to clear our obstacles.

[DSFriend]

There are special ingredients to be mixed in when making bsang offerings...if i am not mistaken, these are called the white ingredients :
milk, oats, yogurt, honey, rice, brown sugar

[Rihanna]

Thank you for sharing this biography, Roberto. I'm curious though that the Ganden throneholder Ngawang Norbu advised him to take a wife. I thought that the Gelugpa tradition required celibacy? And when people criticised him, surely he was only following his teacher's instructions so why would people criticise him? Surely they should bring it up with Ngawang Norbu, who being the head of the Gelugpas is surely well respected and perhaps beyond question?

I just thought this was an unusual circumstance (or is this a common practice in the Gelug school?) - completely unrelated to bsang of course but bear with me!

Dear Wisdom Being,

You are right! Celibacy is the rule of monastics in the Gaden tradition but certain very highly attained Lamas have incarnated within the Gelug tradition such as Serkong Dorje Chang. Some of these Lamas are firstly, very highly attained and they had been a lay practitioners and practiced certain Tantric practices involving having a consort. Such practices are normally reserved for those highly attained Lamas to further their realizations. Serkong Dorje Chang, who was Marpa, Milarepa's Guru from a previous lifetime. Hence, he was able to derive very powerful realisations quicker through this Tantric path. Hence, through his clairvoyance, Trichen Ngawang Norbu had advised him to take up a consort - an advice he wouldn't have advised anyone else.

Just to add to this; this is also the reason why Dorje Shugden appears as a fully ordained monk (look at his robes on his images). it symbolises that practice of pure moral discipline is essential to attain enlightenment.

[nagaseeker]

There are special ingredients to be mixed in when making bsang offerings...if i am not mistaken, these are called the white ingredients :
milk, oats, yogurt, honey, rice, brown sugar

  , yah , i read this from some where else ,  something like 3 white  + 3 red .... forgot .  haven try this but i bet it does'n smell good ~.Anyway it should have some meaning/purpose behind it. i might try it 1 day.