(By Tsem Rinpoche)

Dear students and friends,

I would like to share with you a talk about wealth vases which I gave a few years ago. It was recently transcribed. Wealth vases are very auspicious to have. They are powerful in attracting energies of wealth and increase… and are especially effective if you want to increase both inner and outer wealth. Inner wealth relates to the wealth of spiritual attainments and outer wealth relates to material wealth, financial support etc.

Wealth vases are very powerful and effective because of the way they are made. These vases are specially made by monks from the monasteries. They contain energies of the wealth deity Dzambala, and precious items such as relics from high Lamas, holy items, precious stones, an image of a wealth deity, the five natural elements and mantras.

Kechara Paradise (KP) carries them and the KP staff shared that many people love to invite wealth vases back to their homes and offices… some even invite two!

What I’ve described above is just a small description about wealth vases, do watch the video before for more explanation about wealth vases.

Tsem Rinpoche

Wealth Vases – Transcript

A teaching by Tsem Rinpoche

Transcribed by JW
Proofread by Lily and Yee Ling

I’m going to give a short talk on wealth vases because everybody will be interested in that and I’ll give a more extensive one, when I, very soon because our center wants to make a wealth vase and a wealth cabinet, and what’s that about? So I’m going to talk about it more but I’m going to talk about a little bit for the write-up and then from the next talk you guys can extend. So when we have talks on the wealth vase and the wealth cabinet, all the writers, please be there.

Wealth vases. India, the home of Buddhism, Lord Buddha, the birthplace, is very lush, is very big and it hits many climates, and it’s…you know, north and south of the equator. It’s very vast. It’s filled with very, very interesting environments and a spectacular array of natural jewels, you know like mountains in the north and lakes and deserts and forests and it’s very rich. So everything natural, minerals and jewels and whatever you want and wood and…and spices, you can get from India and India to people in the east in the past, still is, is like a jewel or the pearl of the orient, and then China was the same thing on the other side but India is the focus here because it is the birth of where Lord Buddha decided to take rebirth in this world.

So therefore, everything you want to offer to the Buddhas, everything you want to construct temples, everything you need, you know, and then there is so many rich merchants in India and during Buddha’s time so many wealthy merchants because India had so much! It’s just everything you can sell. You know, everything and anything and everything was just… it’s like China you know, everything you have and the forests are rich, the animals, the fauna, the flowers, the spices, the herbs, the minerals, the gold, the jewels, whatever you want. So to make offerings or to create temples or to get sponsors or anything you want in India, it was very, very easy and India is a very spiritual nation, very, very spiritual. That is why all wonderful religions of the world coexist in India so well because they respect each other so well. They have deep rooted in religion. They’re born from it. They live in it and die in it and that’s Indians and Indians have influenced the east and now the west with their spiritualism.

And Tibetan Buddhism is not Tibetan Buddhism. Tibetan Buddhism comes from India. It’s Indian Buddhism. So therefore, when the great Indian panditas, p-a-n-d-i-t-a-s, pandits, or those are scholars, and meditation masters were invited to Tibet, Tibet was seen as a barren, harsh, freezing cold. You know, very, very far away, barbaric, backward country and at that time, it was. It was, I mean people did not bathe. Some people did not bathe their whole lifetime. There are people in Tibet now that don’t bathe their whole life. Their whole life can you believe that? Some parts of Tibet once a year they bathe. In fact I have a monk in my house I used to tease him because he used to take a bath once every 2 weeks you know, towards the end of 2 weeks with respect he was a little…I wish the 2 weeks were there, up already you know, and anyways, so I joke at one time I said “You know, don’t you think you’re…” because in his part of Tibet I know they bathe once a year so I thought I’d be a little bitchy this way, because he’s an older monk so I don’t want to be really rude you know, I know there are people I’m nice to too.

Anyways, I said “Ehh, Gen Nyima” that’s his name, you know, “Don’t you think you’re bathing a little too much, every two weeks?” He said, “Yeah actually, in my part of Tibet they bathe once a year!” and I was like (Rinpoche rolls his eyes) and I didn’t know until he told me I was like “Yeah, you are bathing a lot” He said “You know I am washing all my merits away.” So then we have to use another tactic…like…I don’t know. Anyways, it’s like that.

So for the Indians who are cultured, mannered, scholastic, advanced, art, science, music, dance, everything and anything, Indians, to them when they look at the Tibetans they’re like “No thank you” and then when the Tibetans looked at the Indians, they were like, I’m not kidding, they’re in awe. To this day, to this day, Tibetans still call India “Phagpe Ge Yue”.  Yue means place, Phagpa or Phagpe means what, the land of the Aryas, the land of the Aryas. Aryas means people who are advanced and out of samsara. Tibetans till this day call India, Phagpe Ge Yue. When Kensur Rinpoche gives teachings, he always refers to India as Phag Yue, means the land of the Aryas.

Everything, even our, everything, a lot of it came from India and then our country is influenced by India, very much by China, very much by Mongolia. In our country there is a short term saying, the best food comes from China, the upper class in Tibet, all culinary skills came from China, the way of eating, the bowls, the chopsticks, the sitting because Tibetans they don’t even use their hands, they just eat, you know. So all this came from China which was another incredibly advanced nation for us where we looked to…that way we’re like “Ohh”, we look at that way we’re like “Ohh”, we look at ourselves and go “Oh.” And yes, Mongolia, China has the best food, Mongolia has the best clothes. Tibetan clothes is based on Mongolian royalty and then the best religion, India. So this is…this is what we were surrounded by, all right?

You…hoo…, I want to go to my room, I have that book, Buddhism book and then you open up there is the dak—lady in Tara posture and Vajrayogini posture, do you remember that? Okay, on my desk there is 4-5 picture book, bring it all here make it easy. You know Seng Piow? Oh. Oh good, I’m glad somebody’s alert. Just to sidetrack a little bit, I found this beautiful picture for Kandarohi. These are beautiful, beautiful Nepalese girls in Tara posture doing rituals, sitting as posture as Tara. Beautiful Nepali girls in the form of Vajrayogini, in Indra Kacho, another form of Vajrayogini. Look at that. I know where Zahir is going after this. He is going to run to Nepal to the costume shop, “I’m getting the exact same outfit for Halloween!” Isn’t that fabulous? Look at that, aren’t they beautiful? Yeah. We can look at these after you put it there, all right? You can take a lookie-lookie after. Aren’t you excited? And it’s a dance. (Rinpoche gasps)

So when the masters came to Tibet, getting sponsors was not very easy because you know Tibetans didn’t have money and they bartered with yak meat, dried cheese, you know, dung, you know yogurts and milk, that was their wealth – animals, yaks and you know, that’s all they had and then to teach them the Dharma they’re like “Oh” I mean, they’re nomads, you know, and…and it’s very difficult and to build things, to get things, everything was so difficult. So the system of offerings that developed in Tibet was very unique of Tibet for a barren country at that time. You had to travel for miles to get water and then the forests, yes there were forests, but it was not like the forests in India. You know, 9 months  out of the year you can forget about forests, you go in there either you’ll be kidnapped by the Yeti or you die in the snow. Those are not very easy you know where it’s opposite.

So the great masters of India who had plenty of sponsors, plenty of resources and materials to build temples, to materials for monks and food and necessities and whatever they need for the Dharma to grow was very easy in India, but it was not like that in Tibet. So when the Tibetan…when the Indian masters came to Tibet, they just took one look and out of their great compassion they stayed. They stayed because for us, we go to some place that is not fun we “See you later!” and the one great master that stayed was Lama Atisha, Dipamkara Srijana Atisha. You just call him Atisha it’s good enough, all right?

Atisha was a great, great master from Bodhgaya Monastery, from Bodhgaya itself and he had received permission from the abbot at the request of the king of the Tibet, Yeshe Od, O-D, Yeshe Od, that’s how they spell it and Yeshe is Y-E-S-H-E, King Gyalwa Yeshe Od means King Yeshe Od, Emperor Yeshe Od and he was requested to come to Tibet, to make a long story short because there’s a big story about that and when he came to Tibet, things were very difficult. You know, getting resources, getting water and you know camping out in tents and sponsors and materials to build statues and knowledge. It was so difficult. So Lama Atisha was so kind. He prayed to his goddess Tara and he invoked upon her and he asked her for help. And Tara, the great goddess Tara manifested the Yidam, manifested, this Yidam manifested to Atisha daily all the time and spoke to him directly, back and forth as we speak to each other. She was his tutelary deity. She was his mother. She was his Guru. She was his guide. She was everything to him. She was his Buddha and he became one with her. So in any case, she, through her beautiful divine inspiration, he developed the wealth vase and what the wealth vase is, is drawing upon the 5 elemental energies that are available on this planet which is the basis and the source of all materials physical, which money, wealth, jewels, everything is made of it. If you break all material things up, it’s actually those 5 what….what do I call that, components, elements, the 5 elements, exactly.

And so, they contain the 5 elements and they contain the mantra, the image, offerings of that particular deity and they contain special ingredients such as high lamas’ robes and monks’ clothes or special blessed holy items like sand and tree barks or whatever or dirt from Bodhgaya, or relics from high lamas such as His Holiness the Dalai Lama, His Holiness the Panchen Lama, His Holiness Trijang Dorje Chang, Kyabje Zong Rinpoche etcetera, and then these elemental items. Now we’ll use Dzambala as an example. There are 5 main forms of Dzambala –  red, white, yellow, green and blue and they represent the 5 elements. They represent the 5 Dhyani Buddhas. They represent the 5 aggregates transformed into enlightened energy.

So the 5 types of Dzambalas are combined and their images, and their mantras, and their mandalas are formed inside the wealth vase, along with representations of the 5 elements of the planet and wealth of the planet. So little bits of pearl, little bits of gold, little bits of silver, of mercury, different jewelries, rubies, whatever you can afford, sapphires and put it inside and then these are contained. These are done by monks who have finished the Yamantaka retreat, received Yamantaka, have done the retreat and have kept up the practice of Yamantaka every single day in order to dispel negative energy, and have received, preferably, have received the Dzambala initiation and Dzambala practice and then they go and get the ingredients, clean, free of impurities and from sources that are not from robbery or prostitution or killing and murder and then they bring it together and they have a puja. In the puja they set up beautiful offerings, tormas, food items. They set up beautiful water. They set up beautiful flowers and incense and light and music and then they chant the holy verses invoking upon Dzambala’s energy and asking Dzambala to enter these items and then Dzambala enters these holy items and then after that puja’s done then they put these items into a wealth vase in specific directions according to the different Dzambalas, like a mandala. So the whole wealth vase contains the mandala, the living energy of Lord Dzambala.

Then it is with mantra and ritual, sealed so when you do this you don’t talk, you don’t “Hey you know, how’s your dog, you know my dog isn’t eating too well so I gave him chicken soup instead”, you know you don’t just keep talking, you recite mantras Om Dzambala Zalendraye Soha and you do meditation.  You do meditations. You are Dzambala and your environment is Dzambala and your mantra and your sound is Dzambala, and you’re doing this that whoever touches and sees and has anything to do with these vases, even the word poverty is eliminated and may they gain compassion, and then you seal these up with 5 colors, and when it’s sealed with 5 colors it represents the 5 elements sealed in and then again the…the vases are put on to an altar. You invite holy monks, high lamas who will again do the ritual to seal and invoke the energy of Lama Dzambala and to directly go inside and this one the energy is specifically to increase knowledge, wisdom, patience, effort, increase generosity.

So this wealth vase, people will own it, people who perpetuate, people who pray, people who keep it well, this wealth vase will help you to gain the inner jewels and then on the outer level when you keep the wealth vase and you do the proper rituals and prayers, it will help you to overcome obstacles, to work, to finances, to money, to jobs, opportunity, education, growth, life, sickness, premature death. So for families, it’s wonderful, for people, individuals, wonderful, for factories.

And so these wealth vases were made and combined, why? For a very barren, hard to get resources country, that they needed money and resources and people to grow, it’s very practical. And in Tibet it was very hard. The Lama Atisha developed these great wealth vases for us, this great Indian Guru, and from then the wealth vases flourished in Tibet and then they were made specifically for the Dharma and the monasteries because monasteries were very difficult. Monks were not allowed to work in the fields, why? Cannot kill insects and animals. Monks are not allowed to do trading. Monks are not allowed to do business so there was no income for monks, and then Tibet didn’t have this consciousness of making offerings to monks at that time because Buddhism is new. So there was no generous sponsors like in India where they will take care of the monks. The monks themselves cannot work. They put them in a very precarious situation of survival but Lama Atisha put these beautiful wealth vases in which attracted necessary help, energy, money, sponsors, resources, and it made the monasteries grow.

Every single Tibetan monastery, every single one, will have a wealth vase or two in their monastery, and wealth vases can be White Dzambala, Yellow Dzambala, Four Faced Mahakala, White Mahakala. It can be Tara wealth vases. It goes on and on. There are many, many types and they originally stem from Lama Atisha. So when they’re put inside and then we make a wealth vase cabinet which I will not talk about today because it won’t affect you guys right now, We’ll make a wealth vase cabinet and the offerings, I’ll talk about another time. You’ll love it. You guys are gonna love it. You’re gonna say “Oh my god! I want my own little wealth vase closet.” You’re gonna love it; they bring incredible health, wealth and what you need. They really fulfill wishes, it’s not, I’ll tell you this personally it’s not a joke.

Many, many years ago, 6-7 years ago, when I was having tremendous financial problems, difficulties and obstacles and stuff, I went to see the oracle and the oracle told me directly, make a wealth vase and make a wealth cabinet and what you wish for will come true. Sure enough, sure enough, my god, and at that time I was living on 500 rupees a month and I was starving. You should see pictures of me when I first came to Malaysia. I look skinnier than Tashi. Tashi would look fat next to me and it wasn’t because I was, you know it’s like metabolism, I wasn’t getting any food. I didn’t have any food. I lived for years with no sponsors; I live for years in the monasteries starving, before I became a Rinpoche, many years. I literally every single day I ate tsampa which is Tibetan barley flour and I mixed it with tea if I can afford to buy it and just eat that and the leftovers I gave to birds and then some I make a few to offer to the deities at my altar. I literally starved to death. You know I had very little money, very, very little but I didn’t mind because I didn’t go to India for money.

I lived life for many, many years and travelling back and all that was very big….when there was teachings from His Holiness getting the money together to travel to north India it was very far, it was a huge obstacle. I’m not complaining and I’m not bragging. It’s just a fact and so when I put the wealth vase in, I see tremendous difference, tremendous and not only was I able to get sponsorship and help for myself, I was able to get sponsorship and help for the local hospital, 2 hospitals; Tibetan and western. For the local government there, I was able to help with the local Indians. I was able to help with the schools. I was able to help 3 schools. I was able to help building schools. I was able to help in the monastery itself and I was…I myself was the cause of sponsorship for over 350 monks, every month 500 rupees would come to me for per monk. So every month I’ll offer 500 rupees to very poor monks and tuberculosis. I was a very big sponsor for tuberculosis, monks who had tuberculosis and they couldn’t afford the medicine. I had to sponsor that. I’ve found sponsors for that and after the wealth vase, all these things grew.

So what I saw was, my Dharma grew because of it. I was able to do more for others. The wealth vases do work if we treasure them. They’re not ordinary and the wealth vases that we have in Kechara Paradise are not commercial. They’re not arbitrarily ordered in Nepal by a bunch of people I’ve never seen or heard.  Those wealth vases, the vase itself was ordered from Taiwan because they had that already. It was beautiful and I ordered it. I had to find sponsorship for that and the ingredients themselves I myself gathered together with Chia and a few other people, and I myself spent weeks and weeks wrapping and preparing each one, because we made about 500. After it was wrapped and prepared and then sealed, I had to seal each one with mantras and prayers, my Guru Kensur Rinpoche was in town, His Eminence Kensur Rinpoche at that time was in his mid 70s, came to my house in Singapore, I was staying in Singapore, and I had pictures of this, it’s beautiful and we laid it out and Rinpoche did 1 full day of Dzambala pujas to energize those vases.

So those vases, small and big, doesn’t matter. I made 2 sizes, why? Some people’s houses are smaller in Singapore. They’re exactly the same thing. Those vases I made and I put together and I sealed and wrapped and blessed, more importantly by Kensur Rinpoche, one of the greatest living Buddhist masters of this century, and so I, and they were originally raised for what? They were left there to be raised, to be used for raising funds for the debate hall that was being built in the monastery, which is they’re still asking me for funds on that because I had a very big debate hall that it is being made in the monastery and they don’t have enough money, they sent me a letter recently for help.

Anyway those vases were made to raise funds for that and so I’ve donated them to DMT and I told them that, what did I say? 25% of the profits goes to DMT for its upkeep, and then the 75% what? Yes, for Kensur Rinpoche? No for the monastery, for the monastery. So I’ve already donated all those up and I plan on making more wealth vases in the future of different protectors and different deities in the monasteries and I will have great monks doing it. Great. So those wealth vases can be bought by individuals to be kept in our house but they are not to be touched with our bare hand. They should be touched with a khata or clean cloth and they should be kept in a base, with the glass covering over it. They can be kept in our office. They can be kept in our rooms, on our shrine. They can be kept in the living room. They can be kept anywhere and you can make offerings in front of them because they have the energy, the properties and the power of the 5 Dzambalas in them, 5 Dzambalas. And so it will be better even if we make a wealth vase for, wealth cabinet for them, but we are not able to do that in all our houses, difficult. So I’m going to make one at the center where we can have our combined resources to do it in the future.

In any case, maintenance of them is very simple. Keep them in a clean place. You can move them anytime you want. You can place them however you like. You can place them anywhere you like, anywhere but the toilet and they’re very powerful,. They’re very blessed and they’re the collective energies of Dzambala, all right? Any questions about vases, and Dzambala vases, any questions please.

Isn’t that fabulous? How do you feel about that, Kandarohi? A small one or a big one? Well, pick one, quick. You want the big one, right? Yes, they have bigger Dzambalas inside. He’s right. Oh you’re tricking me again. Okay, an easier question for Kandarohi is what haven’t you reserved in the Dharma stores, that would be easier, right? Yes. They make great gifts, imagine, your best friend’s birthday, a Dzambala vase and I’m not kidding, they’re very precious. They’re very precious because they’re not commercial. I am so sorry to say this some places that create it commercially, they are not. They were made by me. They were made by Kensur Rinpoche. They were blessed by him,  oh fabulous.

So what we need to do is please keep a note down, Jenny, is I need you to pass, I need you to pass the picture of Kensur Rinpoche in front of them, blessing it. We can keep that in the shop nearby, why? It’s not show off to sell. It is to show people that it is genuine so people feel happier.  A high lama like that blessed it. Isn’t that fabulous? Don’t forget, we got to get that from my picture collection. I might have that on my documents, you can ask Seng Piow, you know under high lama pictures or it might be in my picture pile so you can have Tashi to look for it. Good luck.

Someone asked a question…

Well, depends on how many you make because okay, the ones we took about a month, took about a month. It was a lot of work and in India, it is even nicer because they go to the shops and they buy little copper vases like that, and they paint it white and they paint the different insignias on it and it’s…I mean…it’s a little crude and rough but it just has a nice feeling and then I was thinking, 500 wealth vases, I paint, I was thinking “Ohhh, I ain’t the reincarnation of Andy Warhol here, forget it” so I ordered from Taiwan, it was ready made I’m like thank you very much! It was all painted and done so it look quite nice but if we order from the monasteries, they will paint it up to be quite nice, I was thinking I want to get more. Imagine Tara wealth vases? Oh god, grabby-grabby time! Zahir will be camping outside the day before KP opens, “I’m in line first!” couldn’t you see it? And then we’ll make like 21 Tara vases and there will only be 1 White Tara vase, everything else will be green. Yes. And Kandarohi will be like, she’ll be…she’ll be looking for ways to bribe Wan to get that one White Tara Wealth vase. You know how greedy these Indian people are! Oh my good—even if they’re born in Bahrain. Just kidding. Very spiritual person. Any questions about wealth vases? That should be enough for your little write-up. Good, good, we’re moving along fine, getting a lot of information.

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