35 upvotes, 1 direct replies (showing 1)
View submission: Do you believe in the relics?
There's a story in the Tibetan tradition of a trader who would regularly travel to India.
Every time he went, his dear old mother asked him to bring a relic of the Buddha for her to venerate. He never did, and on his umpteenth trip back home the trader started to feel a bit guilty about it. He looked around and saw a dog's tooth lying by the road. He quickly wrapped in some of the precious brocade he was trading and, back home in the valley, presented it to his overjoyed mother.
The old lady put the tooth on her shrine and from that day on it was the support for all her offerings, prostrations and praises. Over time, she became a very solid practitioner, and the tooth seemed to start radiating lights and, as relics often do, started to produce *ringsel* or *sarira*, little crystals like what is often found in the ashes of saints.
Point being that it's really much, much more important if our faith in the Refuge is genuine than if the relic is "authentic". With genuine faith, actually everything around us may become a representation of awakening that bestows blessings on our body, speech and mind.
And it's not just a story (I mean, it probably is, but things like this actually happen). I know somebody who really has genuine, heartfelt faith in the Refuge, with a simplicity my thinky constitution can't even begin to approach. Ringsel started appearing on their shrine out of thin air.
As some points.
Comment by ShineAtom at 04/02/2025 at 10:37 UTC
7 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I have always loved this story. Also the story of Ben of Kongpo who asked the Jowo Rinpoche statue in Lasa to take care of his boots while he looked around the temple, ate the offerings made to the deity and asked Jowo to visit him next year which, spoiler alert, he did. It's a long story but shows the power of faith.
Both these stories are in Patrul Rinpoche's Words of My Perfect Teacher in the section on faith and taking refuge for anyone who wants to read them.