Open Thread: Offering Chant

Lama Gyurme One of these days I will get around to replying to some of the comments that do need a response. Now though is time for an open thread. Say what’s on your mind.

Talking of minds, here’s a recent discovery. During my recent visit to the East coast, a friend in Philadelphia introduced me to Lama Gyurme’s Buddhist chants. Lama Gyurme is a Buddhist monk born in Bhutan in 1948.

At the age of nine, he became a permanent resident of the monastery where he received Buddhist teachings, completed by an initiation to traditional arts, including music.

At the age of 20, he followed his first spiritual retreat of three years, three months and three days, necessary to the formation of Lama, at the monastery of Sonada in India of which the director is Kalu Rinpoche. During this retreat, he was given the title of “Oumze” — master of music — by Kalu Rinpoche.

Lama Gyurme has been living in Paris since 1974. His collaborator in Paris is Jean-Philippe Rykiel. Rykiel is blind since birth (though he was not born blind.) I like his arrangements. His lightweight keyboard accompaniment is a perfect counterpoint to Gyurme’s heavy voice. The chants are of course soothing — Buddhist chants always are. But it’s more than that. To me it appears that the voice conveys a realization that is attained after years of meditation on the nature of the universe, and its defining characteristics of impermanence and change.

Here, listen to this song called “Offering Chant” from the CD “Rain of Blessings.” Close your eyes and if possible put on a set of headphones (if your audio is not being routed through a reasonable sound system.)

The words of the Offering Chant are

All forms appearing in the vast three thousand worlds
I offer as the supreme mudra of body
Please grant the siddhi of unchanging form
All sound, and sources of sound, appearing in the vast three thousand worlds
I offer as the supreme mudra of speech
Please grant the siddhi of unimpeded speech
All the mind’s discursive thought in the vast three thousand worlds
I offer as the supreme mudra of mind
Please grant the siddhi of undeluded mind
All happiness and suffering in the vast three thousand worlds
I offer as the mudra of auspiciousness
May all the sky be pervaded by great bliss
If suffering, I bear the suffering of all beings
May the ocean of samsara’s suffering dry up

The words are from another YouTube video of the same song.

Here’s a brief promotional video of Rykiel and Gyurme.

Well, that’s it for now. Leave me a comment, or email me what’s on your mind.

Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.

Author: Atanu Dey

Economist.

13 thoughts on “Open Thread: Offering Chant”

  1. Hi Atanu,

    I’ve been a regular reader of your blog, although I rarely post comments. Reading the latest post of yours is almost routine for me. I’ve been inspired by several of your posts and they have had quite an impact on me. I’ve shared the link to this blog with several friends.

    Do keep posting as frequently as you can. The almost daily dose of ‘Atanu’ has become a part of my life now 🙂

    Aniket.

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  5. The “Offering Chant” is wonderful . I’m going to try to find the other songs in the CD as well .

    I’ve started leaving comments on this blog only recently .
    Great work , and hopefully some of the future leaders of the country are reading this blog and taking ideas from it ; specially the economics-based logic .

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  6. It is sad. Buddhism that went to Tibet was from the Swat valley in origin. If one cares to google Swat one can see what has become of the 1500 monasteries that once existed there! Guru Rinpoche as the Tibetans call him is Padmasambha, the Indian prince who spread Buddhism to Tibet. Now the connection with India is severed with respect to Buddhism due to tragic events in Indian history; however some of its Swat form is seen in a Tibetan context as the Tibetans preserved and copied a great deal of the writings as well as the art that the Indian converts to Buddhism taught them (thanka paintings, they still paint in the same way today, as taught by Kashmiri converts to Buddhism)…As for Kashmir, another home of Tantric Buddhism, Buddhism has been virtually eradicated from there, some remnants survive in Leh…
    Looking at India today, it makes one sad to think it was once a place of light and learning and people in the region looked up to India; today India is content to imitate mostly…and that happens when a civilization loses sense of what once made it the home of civilization…

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  9. Shriman I dont know what to make regarding your opinion.
    According to blog metrics of popularity you have done fairly well on the indian blogosphere, and thats the only reason I have read your blog for around 7 years or so.

    And now for why I find you quite amusing.
    You do claim to be for freedom of speech yet had written to a response on your blog post regarding Grahm Staines murder that Mr Staines was asking for it because of his speech.
    You did retract it, but It reveals more about how you think.
    It would have been less revealing had it was a verbal blurt, but it was a written response to some one. It took some effort to type it and prior to that think of a response.

    You have dismissed your citizenship as a “piece of paper”,
    I find that quite repugnant.

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