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“When performing offerings, you can offer to the merit field not only those offerings you have made at the altar and those mentally transformed, but also you can offer all the beautiful flowers, lakes, parks, the sun and moon—all the beautiful things, which are your own karmic appearance, the various sense objects you see in your view,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaches in The Preliminary Practice of Altar Set-up and Water Bowl Offerings. “You can think of all of those. When you offer light, you need not necessarily think of only the one or two butter-lamps you have lit, but however many lights you have on in your room. The clearer and brighter the light is, the better the offering. If it dispels more darkness the effect is greater. The external effect is greater so the inner effect of dispelling ignorance and developing wisdom is greater.”
“When I travel, especially when I stay in hotels, I think it is a waste to not use all the lights! Especially if the place is cold it helps in keeping warm! Anyway, one has to pay for however many days one stays, so this is a way to make great business in accumulating inconceivable merit for much temporal and ultimate happiness! You can offer as many lights as you can see in the rooms.
“Make offerings to every single holy object and every actual living bodhisattva and buddha in the ten directions. That also includes the many holy objects such as pictures and statues found in every practitioner’s room. Firstly, making one offering to one buddha has unbelievable merit. And secondly, as I explained before, the internal phenomenon of karma is much more expandable in comparison to external things. I have given the example of how from one small bodhi tree seed thousands of branches and thousands of thousands of seeds come, but that is nothing compared to how karma expands. So each time you make an offering of even one tiny flower, or one incense stick, think that you are making an offering to every single holy object and actual living holy beings in all ten directions.”
The practice of offering 100,000 water bowls is one of nine preliminary practices or “ngöndros” performed in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. The preliminary practices are designed to accumulate merit and purify negativities in order to quickly generate realizations on the path. They are also done in preparation for longer tantric retreats. The nine preliminaries are to do 100,000 repetitions related to the following practices: prostrations, mandala offerings, guru yoga, Vajrasattva, Damtsig Dorje, Dorje Khadro, tsa-tsas, water bowl offerings, and refuge.
Print copies of the booklet are available through the Foundation Store until December 31, when the store goes digital-only:
https://shop.fpmt.org/The-Preliminary-Practice-of-Altar-Set-up-Water-Bowl-Offerings-_p_339.html
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.
Image from rigpawiki.org
Lhabab Duchen, one of the four great holy days of the Buddhist calendar, takes place this year on November 19.
Lhabab Duchen celebrates Guru Shakyamuni Buddha’s return to Earth from the God Realm of the Thirty-Three after teaching Dharma for several months to the gods, including his mother, Mayadevi, who had died a week after Buddha’s birth and been reborn there. As a merit multiplying day, the karmic results of actions done on this day are multiplied 100 million times. This amazing result is sourced by Lama Zopa Rinpoche to the vinaya text Treasure of Quotations and Logic.
Specific advice from Lama Zopa Rinpoche for practices to do on merit multiplying days can be found on FPMT.org, including advice to recite the Sutra for Remembering the Three Jewels. (Advice for merit multiplying days can also be found in French.) If you choose to recite the Sutra of Golden Light on this special day, you might like to report your recitations using the facility on FPMT.org, which you can find on the Sutra of Golden Light reporting page.
Please keep in mind that according to the late Kyabje Choden Rinpoche, one of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s gurus, the observation of auspicious days should be according to the date in India, not the date in one’s home country. Therefore, when Lama Zopa Rinpoche is not in India, Rinpoche celebrates merit multiplying days and other auspicious dates according to the time in India.
On merit multiplying days, the FPMT Puja Fund sponsors, on behalf of the entire FPMT, 6,000 monks at Sera Lachi; 3,400 monks at Ganden Lachi; 4,200 monks at Drepung Lachi; 650 monks at Gyurme Tantric College; and 600 monks at Gyuto Tantric College to perform various prayers and pujas. These prayers are dedicated to all FPMT centers, projects, and services; all students, volunteers, and those who offer service in FPMT; and to all beings in general. Offerings are also made to all of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s gurus and to sangha in FPMT international sangha communities. On Lhabab Duchen specifically, the FPMT Puja Fund additionally sponsors 400 nuns at Kopan Nunnery and 370 monks at Kopan Monastery to perform Drugchuma (64 offerings to Kalarupa), Medicine Buddha puja, and Zangcho Monlam (King of Prayers).
Special thanks to the Liberation Prison Project for preparing a Tibetan calendar with information on holy days and other important dates for avoiding or engaging in various activities.
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.
First thangka from a series of fifteen depicting the life of Lama Tsongkhapa, from “Cittamani Rosary Spreading the Buddha’s Teachings”
Lama Tsongkhapa Day, or Ganden Ngamchoe, is a celebration of the anniversary of Lama Tsongkhapa’s parinirvana. It is celebrated on the 25th day of the 10th month of the Tibetan calendar. This year, Lama Tsongkhapa Day falls on December 21 and is the 600th anniversary.
To honor the anniversary, the Geluk International Foundation, on December 30, 2018, proclaimed 2019 to be the International Year of Tsongkhapa.
In response to the proclamation, Lama Zopa Rinpoche is strongly encouraging FPMT centers, projects, and services to arrange Lama Tsongkhapa Day celebrations tailored to their communities and resources. To support this request, Lama Zopa Rinpoche has compiled various prayers authored by Lama Tsongkhapa or written in his honor.
FPMT center, projects, and services may use this webpage, which captures Rinpoche’s complete advice, to plan their events. Individual students unable to attend FPMT center events can use the same resources to celebrate individually.
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.
Sanghata Sutra
The Sanghata Sutra is a Mahayana sutra containing stories illustrating the power of the bodhisattva wish and the power of past and present actions to produce expansive results. Imbued with the blessings of Shakyamuni Buddha’s prayer, recitation of this sutra produces a great mass of positive karma that can quickly ripen, even in this life. Print copies of the sutra are available through the Foundation Store until December 31, when the store goes digital-only.
“Probably I don’t need to tell you what the text says about how much merit you collect each time you hear this sutra,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche remarks. “Each time you hear it, how much merit do you collect? First of all, one buddha has completed the merit of wisdom and the merit of virtue—there is nothing more to collect … and then how many buddhas? The number of buddhas equaling the number of sands of grain in the Ganga River times twelve. And these sand grains are not ordinary grains of sand. It is explained in the teachings, in the great enlightened Phabongkha Rinpoche’s notes, that these grains are made of extremely subtle atoms. There are seven kinds of subtle atoms, water atoms, earth atoms, and so forth. These sand grains are much, much finer than what we usually think.
“In addition to that, when it comes to talking about the benefits of bodhichitta, or the benefits of the Arya Sanghata Sutra, the Ganga does not refer to the Indian River Ganges. It refers to the Pacific Ocean. Now, that many numbers of buddhas times twelve. The merit of just one set of buddhas equaling the number of sand grains in the River Ganga, even just one set—how much merit that is … is beyond words, unimaginable. Even just the merit that one buddha has collected is beyond words. So, now, beyond that, the merit that you collect every time you hear the Arya Sanghata Sutra is equal to twelve times the merit of the number of buddhas as there are sand grains in the River Ganga.
“So, that is just by hearing it. This means that anyone hearing it—animals, frogs, birds, so no question about pets like your beautiful cat, your darling cat, even spirits—collects that much merit. Can you imagine? It is like an impossible thing in the life that happens. When those animals, your cat and other animals, hear you recite Buddha’s teachings, it definitely makes them to receive higher rebirth and to meet Dharma.
“The very minute you hear it, the five uninterrupted negative karmas—the extremely heavy negative karmas that right after death, immediately without interruption of another life, you get born into hell; you get reborn in the lowest hot hell, which has the heaviest suffering of the lower realms, of which the life span lasts for one intermediate eon—those get completely purified. This happens even for the sentient beings who hear the sutra, the minute they hear the sutra. …”
Find the Sanghta Sutra in the Foundation Store:
https://shop.fpmt.org/Sanghata-Sutra-English-_p_603.html
Learn more about the Sanghata Sutra on FPMT.org:
https://fpmt.org/education/prayers-and-practice-materials/sutras/
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche reorganized many of the prayers based on his current way of doing them and, in particular, added an extensive explanation of the visualizations to be done while taking refuge. Drawn from Phabongkha Rinpoche’s Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand, for each of the objects of refuge—Guru, Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha—there are visualizations for purifying negative karma, increasing qualities, and coming under the guidance of that object of refuge.
Subtitled “How to Meditate on the Graduated Path to Enlightenment,” the practices contained in this booklet prepare the mind for lamrim meditation by purifying negative karma and collecting extensive merit—the two main causes for attaining realizations.
This practice can also be used as a basis for engaging in the preliminary practices of accumulating 100,000 prostrations, mandala offerings, and so forth.
Find A Daily Meditation on Shakyamuni Buddha in the Foundation Store:
https://shop.fpmt.org/A-Daily-Meditation-on-Shakyamuni-Buddha_p_78.html
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Amitabha Buddhist Centre, Singapore, September 2018. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
In October 2018, Lama Zopa Rinpoche gave the oral transmission of the Mantra from “The Sutra of Great Liberation” to students at Amitabha Buddhist Centre, the FPMT center in Singapore.
“I want to give one mantra from the Liberation Sutra [Sutra of Great Liberation]. It is most unbelievably precious. By just hearing it or reciting it one time, your life always goes toward enlightenment. The Sutra of Great Liberation itself has most unbelievable benefit. So in the future, we should get the oral transmission of that text.
“I received the oral transmission of the mantra from Kyabje Khyongla Rato Rinpoche, a very high lama from Drepung Loseling. For the motivation, think, ‘The purpose of my life is not just to achieve happiness for myself but to free the numberless kind mother sentient beings from the oceans of samsaric sufferings and bring them to peerless happiness, the state of enlightenment. For that, I must achieve buddhahood. Therefore, I’m going to take this oral transmission of the mantra.’
“By hearing this mantra with devotion or even if you recite it only one time a day, you will never be reborn as a hell being, hungry ghost, or animal until you achieve enlightenment. This was said by the unbetraying Victorious One.”
Listen to Lama Zopa Rinpoche recite the Mantra from “The Sutra of Great Liberation,” with additional commentary:
https://youtu.be/uSmXF0iMhPM
Find the Mantra from “The Sutra of Great Liberation” and other mantras on FPMT.org:
https://fpmt.org/education/prayers-and-practice-materials/mantras/
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche displaying ‘The Secret Advanced Practices of Vajrayogini’, Institut Vajra Yogini, Marzens, France, May 2019. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
FPMT Education Services released The Secret Advanced Practices of Vajrayogini, the fourth and final volume of FPMT’s series of Vajrayogini practice manuals, in May 2019. As with the previous volumes—which include the sadhanas, the fire offering, and the self-initiation ritual—all of the works contained in this fourth volume were composed by the great Vajrayogini master, Kyabje Phabongkha Dechen Nyingpo. Lama Zopa Rinpoche was offered a copy of the text during the May-June 2019 Vajrayogini retreat at Institut Vajra Yogini, France.
This volume is an important milestone in the modern-day transmission of this cycle of teachings in the Gelug tradition. For the first time, all of the indispensable materials needed to engage in the Vajrayogini great retreat and its subsequent practices have been translated into English. These materials include not only the retreat manual, which presents the instructions on the various practices, but also all the essential ritual texts.
The profound practices in this volume are intended for experienced practitioners of Vajrayogini Naro Khechari in the Gelug lineage and should be engaged in under the direct guidance of a qualified Vajrayana teacher.
This practice is restricted to only those with the appropriate tantric empowerment. If you are unsure whether you are qualified or not, please email us at education@fpmt.org. By purchasing this text, you confirm you have received the appropriate empowerment.
Note: For customers in Europe or Asia, order print copies directly from Institut Vajra Yogini in France (shoptfpmt@fpmt.org) in order save on shipping costs!
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.
The Medicine Buddha Ritual Set for Pujas, available from the Foundation Store
The Medicine Buddha Ritual Set for Pujas allows students to better fulfill Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s advice regarding how to perform Medicine Buddha pujas, taught as being powerful rituals for success and to benefit the dying, sick, and dead. The Foundation Store is now offering these sets nearly at cost.
The set includes one printed copy of the Medicine Buddha Sutra in Tibetan from the Buddhist Digital Resource Center, pecha style; one printed copy of the Medicine Buddha mandala, a visual representation of Medicine Buddha’s purified environment; and a wrapping cloth representing the Five Dhyani Buddhas, designed by Kopan Monastery. (To encourage practice of the puja, the Medicine Buddha puja text itself—Medicine Buddha: The Wish-Fulfilling Jewel—is an optional add-on.)
The Medicine Buddha Sutra, or Sutra of the Extensive Qualities of the Previous Vaidurya Light Prayers of the Bhagavan Medicine Guru, recounts the twelve aspirational prayers made by Medicine Buddha in his past lives that came to fruition through the force of his enlightenment. The sutra also recounts the great benefits of Medicine Buddha practice, such as those of reciting and hearing his name.
“The Medicine Buddha encompasses all the buddhas,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaches in Benefits of Medicine Buddha Mantra and Practice, available on FPMT.org. “This means that when we practice the seven-limb prayer and make offerings with the seven limbs, we receive the same merit as we would if we had made offerings to all the buddhas. Similarly, when we recite the mantra of Medicine Buddha, we collect unbelievable merit just as when we offer the seven-limb practice to Medicine Buddha.”
Find news and advice related to Medicine Buddha on FPMT.org:
https://fpmt.org/tag/medicine-buddha/
Find other Dharma items to support your Medicine Buddha practice through the Foundation Store:
https://shop.fpmt.org/search.asp?keyword=Medicine+Buddha&search=
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche in front of prayer flags, Tso Pema Lake, India, February 2016. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
Students can find over a dozen prayer flags in the Foundation Store, most offered at cost!
Find these and other prayer flags in the Foundation Store:
- Gyaltsen Tsemoi Phugen (Wind Horse) Prayer Flag, designed by Lama Zopa Rinpoche to protect from harm, fear, contagious disease, and fire, and give victory over wars, disputes, fighting, and danger.
- Tendil Nyersel Prayer Flag, recommended by Rangjung Neljorma Khadro Namsel Drolma (Khadro-la) for Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s health. The flags feature an emanation of Guru Rinpoche (Padmasambhava) considered beneficial for Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s health, various prayers and mantras chosen by Rinpoche, and the supernatural animals of the cardinal directions.
- Prayer Flag to Avert War, the special prayer on this prayer flag was written by the great yogi Thangtong Gyalpo when a war broke out between the Sakya clan and their surrounding neighbors. Due to the power of reciting the prayer, the war was averted.
- Eight Powerful Mantras Prayer Flags, these eight powerful mantras are the most powerful means to remove all obstacles to spiritual and material success. The Kadampa stupa in the middle of the prayer flag symbolizes removing obstacles to the spreading of the Dharma teachings.
Find over a dozen prayer flags at cost in the Foundation Store:
https://shop.fpmt.org/Prayer-Flags_c_159.html
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.
Liberation Cards for a Dying Person in English
Students can find dozens of printed Dharma cards and posters in the Foundation Store, most offered at cost!
Find these and other cards and posters in the Foundation Store:
- His Holiness the Dalai Lama Card
- His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama with Lama Zopa Rinpoche Card
- Buddha’s Teachings on Our Lives Card, created by Lama Zopa Rinpoche
- Flower Offering Card, created by Lama Zopa Rinpoche
- Liberation Card for a Dying Person, Chinese and English
- Shakyamuni Buddha Poster
- Nyung Nä Merit Field Poster
- White Tara Poster
Nyung nä merit field from a thangka painting by Peter Iseli
Find dozens of Dharma cards and posters at cost in the Foundation Store:
https://shop.fpmt.org/Hardcopy_c_529.html
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche teaching at Vajrayogini retreat, Institut Vajra Yogini, May 2019. Photo by Tsanka Petkova.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche frequently encourages students to study and practice Lama Chopa (Guru Puja), written by Panchen Losang Chokyi Gyaltsen in the 17th century and often combined with the preliminary practice of Jorcho. FPMT makes a variety of Lama Chopa Jorcho materials available including the text itself, long and short commentaries on the practice by Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and audio recordings to help students learn the practice’s traditional tunes.
During a 2018 retreat in Bendigo, Australia, Lama Zopa Rinpoche taught: “ … Panchen Losang Chokyi Gyaltsen checked all the guru yogas, what made the great Indian yogis—Saraha, Tilopa, Naropa, Marpa, Milarepa, etc.—and the four sects’ great enlightened beings—Chokyi Dorje, Gyalwa Ensapa, etc.—achieve enlightenment in a brief lifetime during degenerate times. He checked all the guru yogas that they practiced and put them together here in Lama Chopa. He put them together after checking them all. At the end of Lama Chopa is lamrim, the whole path to enlightenment; the essence of lamrim is there. There is lojong to transform the mind from an ordinary mind into the path of enlightenment. (Actually, the whole lamrim is lojong, but there is a particular part called ‘lojong’ that comes at the end.) By thinking of their benefits, you look at all the undesirable things as positive, using them in the path to achieve enlightenment quickly. It is all there in Lama Chopa. It is complete. Kyabje Phabongkha Rinpoche says, ‘Every day, if you get to practice Lama Chopa, then you are able to practice the condensed vital points of sutra and tantra, the complete path.’ …”
Watch “Lama Chopa Leaves a Very Special Imprint of the Whole Path in Your Mind” on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/LoNgzDKC_8w
Find more Lama Chopa materials in the Foundation Store:
https://shop.fpmt.org/search.asp?keyword=lama+chopa&search=
Find Guru Puja is the Heart Practice, a new multimedia series based on teachings given by Lama Zopa Rinpoche at the 2009 Light of the Path retreat, through the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive:
https://www.lamayeshe.com/article/lywa-multimedia-guru-puja-heart-practice
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.
Please dedicate for auspiciousness that this is His Holiness returning to Tibet
In January 2019, Lama Zopa Rinpoche instructed students to begin replacing His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s long life prayer that begins with “GANG RII RA WÄ” with a new long life prayer. The new prayer, which begins with “JIG TEN KHAM DIR,” was finalized by Rinpoche in May 2019 during the Vajrayogini retreat at Institut Vajra Yogini in France.
“I told the Kopan Monastery umdze (chant leader) that he must do this one,” Rinpoche shared. “His Holiness is now known in the whole world. That is mentioned in the prayer. Before he was only known in Tibet, but now the whole world. I told the umdze he should recite this all the time now instead of ‘GANG RII RA WÄ.’ Do you understand? Anyone being the umdze, even a mouse being the umdze, even the birds, should recite this new prayer. …”
Prayer for the Long Life of His Holiness the Dalai Lama
༄༅། །འཇིག་རྟེན་ཁམས་འདིར་ཕན་བདེ་མ་ལུས་པ། །
གང་ལས་འབྱུང་བའི་བསམ་འཕེལ་ཡིད་བཞིན་ནོར། །
བཀའ་དྲིན་མཚུངས་མེད་བསྟན་འཛིན་རྒྱ་མཚོ་ལ། །
གསོལ་བ་འདེབས་སོ་ཐུགས་བཞེད་ལྷུན་འགྲུབ་ཤོག །
JIG TEN KHAM DIR PHÄN DE MA LÜ PA
The wish-granting Wish-Fulfilling Jewel,
GANG LÄ JUNG WÄI SAM PHEL YI ZHIN NOR
Source of every single benefit and happiness in this world,
KA DRIN TSHUNG ME TÄN DZIN GYA TSHO LA
To the incomparably kind Tenzin Gyatso, I beseech:
SÖL WA DEB SO THUG ZHE LHÜN DRUB SHOG
May all your holy wishes be spontaneously fulfilled.
The tune of “JIG TEN KHAM DIR” accords with tune for “TONG NYI NYING JE.” In order to learn the tune, students can listen to these recordings.
The tune for “JIG TEN KHAM DIR” can be found on FPMT.org:
https://fpmt.org/edu-news/new-long-life-prayer-for-his-holiness-the-dalai-lama
Prayers for His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Tibet can be found in the Foundation Store and on FPMT.org.
Through comprehensive study programs, practice materials, and training seminars, FPMT Education nourishes the development of compassion, wisdom, kindness, and true happiness in individuals of all ages.