Question asked by Kevin
Halo pastor, may i know if i need to renew the water offering the next day after doing one day of retreat or i just add few drops of water in the bowl? Do i need to renew the serkym every session in the day? And may i know where can i learn the mudras of offering in the torma offering part? Can i copy and change the protector and serkym part to dorje shugden in the prayer text for tsongkhapa retreat and print it out? (others remain the same). Thank you..
Hi Kevin,
Thanks for your questions.
1. For water offerings, make them before the first retreat session of the day. During subsequent sessions, add a couple of drops to each bowl to “refresh” them for that particular session. At the end of the day, after you last session has finished, clear all the water and turn your bowls upside down. This is just like if you were clearing the water offerings from your altar normally. Then the next day, before you start your 1st session of the day, make new water offerings. So in short, you need to make new water offerings daily, and only add a couple of drops to the bowls if you are doing additional sessions in the day, then clear at the end of the day.
2. If you are doing the serkym prayer during every session, then you need to offer fresh serkym during each session. This is different from the water offerings, where you only to add a couple of drops of water for each session. The serkym should be made fresh every session that you do the prayer.
3. For the torma offering mudra, the simple version is to hold your hands next to each other with palms facing up, as if you are holding a plate from underneath. Your hands should be held at least above your heart level. When you you finish each torma offering mantra, click with your right hand, using your thumb and middle finger. Bring your hands back into the torma offering mudra and continue reciting. Again when you finish reciting the torma offering click your fingers using your right hand again.
4. Yes, you change the protector section of the retreat (including serkym) to the Dorje Shugden instead of the Setrap one. Everything else should remain exactly the same.
I hope this helps.