Thikse Gu-stor

Highlights

The Gu-stor tradition begins with a ceremony in which liquid offering is presented to invite the gods of the four quarters to witness the sacred dances and protect all living beings from the evil spirits. The resident lamas of the Thikse monastery, wearing masks of various divinities, which include the guardians of law or 'Dharmapalas', and patron divinities of the Geluk-pa monastic order, in closing of the 2-day festival ritually dismember with the help of ritual weapons a 'sacrificial figure' molded from dough is in a ceremony called Dao-Tulva ' that symbolizes the banishment of the enemies of the religion (as well as the assassination of the Tibetan apostate King Lang-dar-ma by a Buddhist monk during the mid 9th century), also referred to as the 'killing of the enemy.' Its pieces are then dispersed in the 4 cardinal directions. The last act of the monastic dance is the burning of an effigy symbolizing the stronger forces of evil (Stor-ma). Thikse, only 19 km from Leh, is perhaps the most visited monastery after Hemis, on account of its excellent maintenance and impressive Potala-like location, along the rising slopes of a hill, overlooking many picturesque villages strung along the Indus river. Founded about 550 years ago on the site of an earlier Kadam-pa establishment, today it is a major Geluk-pa monastery with about 100 Lamas on its rolls and several branch monasteries affiliated to it. The mystic dances here are considered to be among the most impressive in Ladakh.