tibetan art – NAMKHA

In the past few days, Tibetan Buddhist monks have been busy creating a huge namkha as part of the Tibetan New Year rituals.

Losar time, 29th day of 12th Tibetan month

Gutor is an important event that closely precedes Losar, the Tibetan New Year. I witnessed this ritual twice in Namdroling. The monks work for several days preparing for this elaborate ritual. Some prepare tormas, some practice lama dances and others prepare the namkha. The offering items are arranged in the temple and empowered by chanting and visualization practice by hundreds of monks lined up sitting in the temple. Two days before Losar, the main item, gegtor, a huge torma made of flour, is ceremoniously taken out of the temple and ushered by the monks to a nearby field outside the monastery wall. (See more photos of this on my other blog here). There, the ceremony continues with more chanting and lama dances. In the end, the offerings are thrown away or burnt. The energies of the old year thus considered cleaned away and the spirits appeased, the Losar festivities are free to begin.

Namkha are thread cross constructions made with coloured strings. They are part of a display called dö [mdos], which includes namkha and other symbolic representations.

Gutor has been the same every year for centuries. Like any Tibetan Buddhist practice, it closely follows a prescribed step-by-step procedure written in ancient Buddhist texts called terma and no deviation is favoured. Creativity is bound by the sacred limits of the revered scriptures. The procedure for constructing of the “gutor” namkha, for example, is described in the Ratna Lingpa terma and is part of the Lü (Naga) offering ritual. The Lü are important beings to be on good terms with.

The namkha is constructed specifically as an offering to the Lü for prosperity and fortune in the coming New Year.

The shapes, colour-sequences and the whole procedure follow the description in the treasure text of Ratna Lingpa from 14th century.

This is a fine example of a namkha thread cross of the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, and we are fortunate to be able to see these rare photos courtesy to my dear friend, Lama Tsultrim Palyul of Namdroling monastery, who supervised the construction of this particular namkha at the Palyul Centre in the Phillipines for Gutor this year (2019). The photos are used with his kind permission.

February 3, 2019February 4, 2019 by Zuzana Čerňáková Categories: Blog, TibetanTags: ancient tibet, buddhist namkha, gutor, losar rituals, losar traditions, mdos, namkha in tibetan buddhism, ratna lingpa terma, thread cross, tibetan art, tibetan buddhism, tibetan ritual, tibetan thread cross, tibetan woven cross, woven cross Leave a comment

With the new lunar month my workshop is busyagain after a two-week break, which was spent getting the Saga Dawa namkhas to their owners and my other projects. Several namkhas were distributed around Prague, three were posted to Germany and two to France. It was deeply moving to receive the powerful responses and I’m strongly encouraged to continue this extremely meaningful work. In fact, I’ve made a commitment to care for my namkhas for life. Whoever has such karma as to receive a namkha from me is entitled to a lifelong service and I’ll be empowering their namkha regularly. I bow to them: though they have requested tge namkha for their own benefit, in fact they are also supporting this precious, potent practice and create a lot of good karma to benefit the world, as well. I’m forever their servant.

I have three namkhas planned for this month, so as to ease down after last month’s Saga Dawa namkha retreat, when I made 9. I start with cleaning the rods with a damp cloth. Then I measure each of the one-metre beechwood rods and cut them to size. Each 1m rod (6mm diameter) is enough for one 35cm namkha. Grooves are sown to allow for the joints. Them all the rough edges are filed smooth. With practice, it takes about an hour to prepare one namkha frame.

The frame segments are then cleansed by Tibetan incense smoke. Then it’s time for meditation before I mark the central joint with the seed syllable of one of the Five Elements and start weaving. The namkha is woven with a special kind of mind engrossed in meditation, supported by mantra recitation. I follow exactly the method taught by the Tibetan master Chögyal Namkhai Norbu.