The Kalachakra Empowerment in Leh, Ladakh.
Photo: Manuel Bauer
His Holiness the fourteenth Dalai Lama, as Vajra Master, conducted his thirty third Kalachakra Initiation this month in Leh, Ladakh. He was accompanied and assisted in this by monks from Namgyal Monastery in Dharamshala and by other senior Lamas.
The ceremony, held from July 3 – 13, was conducted before an audience of devotees, estimated at 144,000. Among the 4,000 or so foreigners attending was noted United States actor, Buddhist and philanthropist, Richard Gere, who said that he was humbled to live at the same time as His Holiness and extraordinarily fortunate not only to know him but also to be able to listen to him.
The first three days of the ceremony involved rituals to prepare and consecrate the venue. These included the chanting of prayers, the preparation of the sand mandala and other rituals. Over the following three days His Holiness read and gave teachings from Nagarajuna’s “Precious Garland of the Middle Way” and “Letter to a Friend”. The discourses were given with the simplicity, clarity and humour which have become the hallmarks of his teachings.
On the seventh day, the sand mandala and preparatory rituals having been completed, His Holiness spent the morning participating in rituals. Then in the afternoon, to the low rumble of long horns and the clash of cymbals, twelve monks from Namgyal Monastery proceeded onto the stage. Elaborately garbed in silk brocade, and representing Dakinis, they performed the stately Offering Dance, accompanied in this by the deep resonant chanting of Namgyal Monastery’s Chant master.
His Holiness the Dalai Lama speaking during the final session of the actual empowerment.
Photo: Manuel Bauer
The final two days of the initiation involved the actual empowerments being conferred by His Holiness. These consisted of the seven empowerments according to the pattern of childhood and the four higher empowerments. His Holiness said that he visualised the empowerments being received not only by those present, but also by those who wished to attend but had been prevented from doing so by various obstacles.
Concluding the formal ceremonies on July 13 was a long-life empowerment, and a ceremony offering prayers for the long life of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
Leh is set high in the high, remote, beautiful and mountainous region of Ladakh. Known as the “Land of High Passes”, Ladakh is a largely Tibetan Buddhist region, and is a part of the state of Jammu and Kashmir in far north western India.
The Kalachakra Initiation or “Wheel of Time Empowerment” is a long, complex and multifaceted ceremony. As in all Vajrayana initiations, it empowers the disciple to undertake the practice. It is also something of an exception to the rule surrounding such empowerments in that it is both large and public. Considered by many masters the most advanced form of Vajrayana practice, it has long been associated with, and practised by, the Dalai Lamas, most notably the first, second, seventh, eighth and by His Holiness the fourteenth Dalai Lama.
The concept revolves around time and cycles, from the cycles of the universe and planets to the cycles of breathing in the human body, and teaches practices for working with the most subtle bodily energies on the path to enlightenment.
Traditionally, Kalachakra is presented as three cycles, external, internal and alternative. The external cycles are analogous to the macrocosm, the cycles of the universe. The internal relates to the microcosm, from human bodies down to the atom. The same laws govern both. These first two cycles deal with time as we know it. The third or alternative cycle which mimics the structures of the first two, consists of practices which enable the practitioner to surmount or overcome the first two and thus gain liberation from them.
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