By Anthony Radford
AN ancient and rarely-seen ceremony heralded the next step in the building of the Great Buddhist Stupa at Myers Flat yesterday. Australia’s most senior Tibetan Lama, Khensur Kangyur Rinpoche, buried four treasure vases on the site of the Stupa which, when completed, will be the biggest in the western world.
The vases were offered by the office of His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, the world’s most senior Tibetan Lama.
Director of the Great Stupa project, Ian Green, said the vases were placed on the four compass points that correspond to the Stupa’s main alignment.
“This ceremony is the single most important event to have happened with Great Stupa to date,” he said.
“Once the vases are laid we can commence construction.” The Great Stupa of Universal Compassion is being built at the Atisha Centre, on the former site of Sandhurst Town.
It is the same size and design as the Great Stupa of Gyantse that was built in Tibet in the 15th century.
Once built, it will be 50 metres square at its base and 50 metres high. The word `Stupa’ is Sanskrit for `to heap’ and refers to the mound-like shape of the earliest Stupas.
Stupas were first built in pre-Buddhist times as burial mounds over the graves of Asian kings.
