On the 16th, a grand annual sweet drew initiation ceremony came to a close at the Tibetan Medicine Hospital. The ceremony lasted roughly ten days, with more than 20 highly respected Tibetan medicine experts and more than 20 apprentices helping complete the ceremony.

Photo shows the initiation ceremony

In the 10th century, famous Tibetan medicine expert,  Yuthok Sarma Yonten Gonpo created the Tibetan medicine sweet drew initiation ceremony, in order to promote Tibetan medicine culture and to enhance the efficiency of Tibetan medicine. He then passed the heritage onto his apprentice, Sumdo Yeshe. In 2013 the sweet drew initiation ceremony was included in the fourth batch of intangible cultural heritages of theTibet Autonomous Region.

On the 16th , as smoke soared up from the teaching base of the Tibetan Medicine and Caculation School, 78-year-old Lobsang Yeni, one of the masters in charge of holding the scriptures, was sitting in the middle with one hand holding the scriptures and the other holding a musical instrument, while loudly chanting the scriptures.

During the ceremony a colorful rope can be seen hanging from the heads of each of the Tibetan medicine experts. Lhapa Tsering, director of Tibetan Medicine and Caculation School Preparation Center, said that this is a “Songta” rope. “Songta” is a colorful wool rope that hangs from every Thangka and artifact, and also connects to the medicine library, workshops and other places. In order to achieve the goal of enhancing medicine efficiency, the ceremony must go on for 24 hours.

Photo shows the Initiation Ceremony

Lhapa Tsering said the whole process for Tibetan medicine preparation should follow strict operational procedures and quality requirements from collecting, processing, compatibility, producing and other processes. In particular, everyone involved in pharmaceuticals must be charitable and kind..

Tibetan medicine attaches great importance to the principle of combined pharmacotherapy and psychotherapy and initiation from Tibetan medicine is similar to psychotherapy recognized in modern medicine. It provides enchantment for all Tibetan medicine raw materials, processing places, preparation products and others in Tibetan hospital processing centers by using precise and natural, complex and well-organized methods of blessing, like reminders, appreciation, worship, chanting, blessing and so on. It is a means of blessing all prepared Tibetan medicines to make them more effective, safe and stable.

50-year-old Sonam Ngodrup is one of the representative inheritors of the Tibetan medicine sweet drew initiation ceremony and he has taken part in the ceremony from 1987 until now. He said that Tibetans are paying more and more attention to protection and inheritance of Tibetan medicine’s sweet drew initiation ceremony, and tradition for the whole ceremony has continuously been standardized and regulated. This has played an important role in the ceremony’s protection and inheritance.