Comments on Buddhism for Vampires

non-human bones

caveofthesun — Sat, 19 May 2012 11:20:30 +0000

Thanks.

I will try and see, I do not have a human teacher, guess my path is pretty different,
however, it is not a good way, for me, to buy such important items, they must be "found" as the way it came to me, is part of its power (emotions etc evoked). I had charnel ground initiation and have therefore an assortment of bones, but none a complete femur. Species is not important to me, as all beings are related, and I have learned loads from non-humans. Time to get my lazy self back into a charnel ground and find a femur.

Thanks again.

Great article - maybe interested in a reprint

Nicholas Breeze Wood — Fri, 18 May 2012 16:54:47 +0000

I'm the editor of Sacred Hoop Magazine - a magazine about shamanism - but we include the earthier end of Tibetan Buddhism too. I took refuge with Ngak’chang Rinpoche, stayed with him privately several times in his house in Cardiff (he taught me thangka painting) and he's a subscriber to Sacred Hoop

I've been thinking of writing an article about human bone use in Tibetan Buddhism for some time - I'm in the middle of writing a book on Central Asian Buddhist and shamanic ritual objects - ritual objects are my main focus of shamanism, and thought an article in Sacred Hoop would be good to have and I have a fair few human bone objects in my own collection for practice and also I buy and sell objects via my gallery www.3worlds.co.uk

I really loved your article - it was so funny (and accurate).

Would it be possible to have reprint permission for it to appear in Sacred Hoop.. we cant pay but we'll produce it so it looks great - we're full colour and pride ourselves in our visual presentation.

I hope to hear from you

Blessings

Nick

Animal bone kanglings

David Chapman — Fri, 18 May 2012 15:20:46 +0000

Unfortunately, I don't really know anything about animal bone kanglings. I assume that any species (with a large enough leg) would work in terms of making a sound. As far as religious function goes—check with your teacher!

(If you don't have a teacher—you'll have to take a guess and try it out, I suppose...)

bones?

caveofthesun — Fri, 18 May 2012 14:31:07 +0000

Thank you so much for this great tutorial!!

Could I use any species femur? For my type of practice human is not essential.

Thanks

Sky Serpent — Tue, 15 May 2012 08:21:16 +0000

Thank you for this text. I will have to make/repurpose my own kangling in future, and this will be useful reference material.

Snot

David Chapman — Tue, 15 May 2012 03:53:51 +0000

Natural ingredients are usually best!

No plans to do a kapala page... This one was a ridiculous amount of work!

It was fun, and I'm glad some readers have enjoyed it, but I think I'll prioritize material that has a larger potential audience!

It looks shiny, but it'snot

Dharmadhatu — Mon, 14 May 2012 23:51:53 +0000

Didn't expect to see this here. What a great idea! While I opted for pig's blood because it was much easier to find than the super-authentic substances you mentioned in the article, I think the leather on your Kangling is far superior to the leather on mine. I purchased the femur from Ngakma Shardröl, and when I received it, it was pretty clean already. During the sanding, I was getting a some dust in my nose, so I decided to wet the surface of the bone with some snotty spit. The mostly white-ish bone became a lovely, sickly yellow with reddish undertones in the little crevices. In some places, it almost looks like the bone has been infused with oil. This process does not appear to have damaged the bone, and I have used the same technique on some bone I bought for cemetery ornaments. The spit was used with 1200 sandpaper, and while the bone has an almost mirror finish, the natural biological features are still intact.

Do you think you'll do a Kapala page next?

Cheers!

This post is really

Sherab Dorje — Mon, 14 May 2012 21:04:42 +0000

This post is really disgusting.

I was once told that if we had no Kangling we could use our own bare hand as a Kangling, since we would be blowing through bone anyway. I own a wooden Kangling, it's way more confortable to my own fears :)

I thought those tourist kangling's where made of plastic, they seem so artificial.

Better to build your own. Great job. The whole process is really disgusting :)

All the best,

Sherab Dorje

Thank you!

David Chapman — Mon, 14 May 2012 17:54:11 +0000

Ah, interesting about the smooth walls. I'll have to check that next time I'm at a retreat where there are many kanglings to compare.

Thank you very much for the fake-aging photo! I have added it to the page. I'd forgotten about the knife-marks; I think your explanation is certainly correct.

David

Fantastic - even though my

Shezer — Mon, 14 May 2012 17:05:08 +0000

Fantastic - even though my kangling is just a touristy one that has been minimally improved I have a huge affection for it. In fact recently in Aro Ling we've been looking at chod and kanglings. I'll have to direct the class to this page for more gloriously gruesome details.