Practice in the Vajrayana tradition includes mantra accumulation. The completion of a mantra accumulation is the recitation of one ’bum (100,000) for each syllable of the mantra. Most practitioners use a tenga (phreng ba, Skt. mala) for this practice, and inevitably it will need re-stringing occasionally.
Ngakma Nor’dzin was taught two beautiful and functional knots to use when restringing a tenga: the Mahakala knot and the Banana Leaf knot. She was taught these knots by Dharmendra of Hello Handicrafts in Kathmandu, Nepal.
The third and final video explaining and demonstrating the last stage of creating an amulet is now posted on YouTube. The final stage is weaving the threads across the wound bands of colour.
The first stage of creating a protection amulet is to bind the paper containing the image of the demon-dispelling scorpion. By following video two of the three videos, you will create a square with wound blocks of thread of the five colours, as shown in the illustration above. There are two blocks of green in the centre. The blocks of colour are made up of threads. The number of threads in a block of colour will depend on the size of your folded square, and the thickness of your thread. How to calculate this is explained in the second video.
In effect, this stage of the process creates the vertical warp threads across which the weft threads will be woven to create the finished design.
The finished design.
The third video will explain and demonstrate the woven cross threads to complete the design.
Creating amulets is a Tibetan Vajrayana ritual practice. Their purpose can be for healing or protection, or to help effectuate any beneficial intent. In the thangka painting above, Ngakpa Dawa Ngödrüp, who was a herbalist at the Aro Gar in Tibet in the 1900s, is shown wearing many amulets.
Ngakma Nor’dzin is producing a set of three videos explaining a method of creating a protection amulet. In the Aro gTer Lineage, amulets are woven in the five elemental colours: yellow/earth, white/water, red/fire, green/air, and blue/space. Some amulets only use two or three colours, but they will still be a combination taken from the five elemental colours.
The protection amulet in the tutorial will be woven as a single ‘sky’. This means one of each of the elemental colours in their order moving from earth to space. Green will be the focus in the centre, so the cycle of the five colours will be green, followed by blue, then yellow, white and finally red as the outer colour. The reason for placing green—the air element—in the centre, is that the Covid 19 pandemic has been causing people to experience anxiety, and this arrangement of the elements is a manifestation of an intent to reduce anxiety, the neurotic emotional response of the air element.
The outer design of the amulet is in fact the binding to contain and seal the intention of the hidden charm inside it. Ngakma Nor’dzin will be using the Tibetan woodblock print of the demon-destroying scorpion as the active ingredient on the folded paper, around which the threads are woven. The photograph below was taken of this amulet charm by Ngakma Nor’dzin in Bhutan, where it was on a personal shrine.
If you wish to follow the video tutorials, and join in with creating a protection amulet, you can download the demon-dispelling scorpion for printing using this link: scorpion image.
The image below shows a group of embroidery threads that are a good combination of colours.The white and yellow are both Anchor perle cotton, numbers 1 and 298. The red, green and blue are DMC perle cotton, numbers 666, 699 and 796.
The materials and equipment you will need to create a protection amulet are as follows:
a print-out of the demon-dispelling scorpion
a 30 cm ruler
a pencil
a pair of scissors
a skein of thread in each of the five colours
a long needle with a large eye and a blunt point
Please see the first video on Aro Ling Cardiff’s YouTube channel.
Aro Ling Cardiff has received a lot of interest in their amulet-weaving workshops, but not everyone is able to get to the centre. Ngakma Nor’dzin is therefore devising a distance-learning programme for this practice.
The first candidate lives in Singapore.
We will let you know when the programme is ready.
Contact us if you are interested in learning how to create an amulet, at aro.ling.cardiff@gmail.com and we will add you to our mailing list. There will be further workshops scheduled in 2015. Look out for them on the programme at aro-ling.org/cardiff.
Amulets are traditionally made to contain beneficial prayers, mantra, or medicine. They can be worn, hung in your home, and given to people to benefit yourself, others or the environment. There are many intricate and beautiful designs. In this workshop you will learn how to make a simple amulet to take home.
Ngakpa Nor’dzin will lead this session. She is an experienced practitioner of the crafts connected to Vajrayana practice, and explains the methods clearly and precisely. This workshop is suitable for children who will delight in making their own amulet.
The workshop starts at 10am on Saturday, May 24, 2014. All materials are provided. Adult £10.00/Child £3
For more information and to book a place please see Meetup
This is one of a series of Saturday morning sessions where you can sample a range of Vajrayana teachings and activities. These Saturday sampler sessions start at the beginning of May 2014 and run through till July. Each one runs from 10 a.m. to 12 noon. Supervised children welcome and most of the sessions are suitable for them to enjoy joining in. Do come along and find out about a variety of subjects. See our Meetup calendar for more information.
We also meet every Tuesday evening at 7pm for Meditation practice.
Aro Ling Cardiff
rear of 35 Merthyr Road (Chambers), Whitchurch, Cardiff CF14 1DB (map)
070 9201 0756 aro.ling.cardiff@gmail.com
