I received a request to attend a Buddhism blessing ceremony in honor of Buddhas birthday. In Sikhism such an event is known as gurpurab. The birth of Budda and gurpurab of Third Guru Amar Das are commemorated just two days apart. Knowing that First Guru Nanak visited Tibetan Buddhist monasteries in his travels, and that relations have always been congenial between Sikhs and Buddhists, I went along. Among those present I met a devout Jewish man. As it turned out we happened to be quite an eclectic interfaith group in attendance.
Buddha Birthday Blessing Ceremony
Photo © [S Khalsa]
Two lamas conducted the ceremony. I went to take a closer look at the altar and spied a photograph of a lama and the Dalai Lama, flowers, trays of cookies, containers of milk and wine, and dishes of a powdery substance which appeared to be ash. As a bowl of incense burned with fragrant bark and leaves, Lama Karten Rinpoche sprinkled these substances on the ground while reciting prayers. I thought about how no Sikh service or ceremony is complete without food fed to worshipers in the form of langar. Rinpoche blew a conch shell. It's deep resonance reminded me of the many references in Gurbani to anhad, the unstruck sound which has been likened to the blowing of a conch shell, the ringing of a bell, and sounding of a drum, all instruments played by the lamas during the ceremony. I looked on as the group recited pages from a prayerbook. Studying the Tibetan script on the prayer sheets which had been handed out, I found it not unlike Gurmukhi in that the characters seemed easily recognizable and decipherable.
Sikh At Buddha Birthday Blessing
Photo © [S Khalsa]
At the close of the ceremony many of the people present went to ask Rinpoche for his blessing. I thought about the parallels, similarities and differences in our two ways of worship while sitting beside a fish pond beneath fluttering Tibetan prayer flags. A companion showed me prayer flags with his name inscribed upon them by the lama Rinpoche who had blessed and given them to him.
Seeing the prayer flags brought to mind a verse in the Sikh morning nitnem written long ago by Guru Nanak:
"Ik doo jeebhau lakh hoeh lakh hoveh lakh vees ||
Make my one tongue, one hundred thousand, and multiply them, by twenty times, one hundred thousand.
Lakh lakh gaerraa aakheehe aek naam jag dees ||
With each of these tongues, one hundred thousand times, multiplied, by one hundred thousand times again, Let me be blessed to repeat the ONE Holy Name WAHEGURU, Ruler of my inner world." SGGS||7
I thought, "O Waheguru ji please make my tongue your prayer flag written with your name and let it ever flutter in the wind of Pavan Guru."
"Pavan guroo paanee pitaa maataa dharath mehat ||
Air is the Guru, Water is the Father, and Earth is the Great Mother of all." SGGS||8
Happy Birthday