THE NAMELESS RELIGION: AN OVERVIEW OF BON SHAMANISM

Copyright 1995 Eileen Kernaghan

...there has always existed a vast and somewhat amorphous body of popular beliefs in Tibet, including beliefs in various techniques of divination, the cult of local deities (connected, above all, with certain mountains) and conceptions of the soul....although it is, to a large extent, sanctioned by and integrated into both religions (Buddhism and organized Bon) an appropriate term for it is the one coined by Rolf A. Stein, "the nameless religion". (Kvaerne 1987: 278)

For Tibetan Buddhists, the typical representative of the old Bon shamanist tradition is the pawo or nyen-jomo medium. From nineteenth century Himalayan traveller Alexandra David-Neel comes this eyewitness account of the pawo at work.

The pawo begins chanting, accompanying himself with a little drum or bell. He dances, first slowly, then faster and faster, and, finally, trembles convulsively. A being of another world, god, demon or spirit of a dead person, has taken possession of him. In a kind of frenzy he utters broken sentences, which are supposed to convey that which the invisible being wishes to communicate....(1931:36-37)

Madame David-Neel adds that what the departed soul usually communicates is a long list of sufferings and misfortunes in the next world. Often the spirit of the dead person cries out that he or she has been taken captive by a demon, and pleads to be set free. At this point another practitioner, the Bon sorcerer, steps in. He enters a trance, and his "double" sets out on a long, arduous journey to the dwelling place of the demon. The bystanders see the shaman struggling, panting and screaming, and know that he is wrestling with the demon in his attempts to free the captive spirit. (1931:37-38)

These intermediaries with the spirit world (who may be either male or female) are unconnected with the "White Bon" monasteries. They are inheritors of the earliest, unorganized Bon beliefs that prevailed in Tibet before the arrival of Buddhism. (Eliade 1964: 432)

The indigenous peoples of pre-Buddhist Tibet believed in divine heroes, many of them identified with sacred mountains (bTsan- po or Mighty Ones), a host of local "gods of the soil" or "gods of the place" who lived in rocks, and serpent-gods who lived in streams and springs. Whenever men built houses or tilled the soil, they risked offending these local spirits, who demanded propitiation for the use of their habitats. Otherwise, people would fall ill and die.

The priests who invoked and made offerings to these spirits were known as Bon (probably meaning Invoker) and gShen (Sacrificer). The religion itself was not called Bon, but simply "sacred conventions" or "the pattern of heaven and earth. "Later Tibetan writers as well as some western scholars have referred to this early religion as Bon, but the word never seems to appear with any other meaning but `priest' in really early Tibetan literature. Later on the term `Bon' came to be applied to the new religious developments, which incorporated some old beliefs and a very great deal of Buddhism...." (Snellgrove and Richardson 1968: 59)

Sacrificial killing played an important part in the indigenous culture of Tibet. The bodies of later pre-Buddhist kings, who were regarded as mortal rather than divine, were buried in elaborate tombs, while their souls were dispatched to the land of bliss with complex funeral rites that might go on for several years. As late as 800 A.D. chosen companions of the king were buried with him, so that they could go with him into the next world. Lesser mortals were accompanied by a sacrificed animal -- a yak, horse or sheep. (Kvaerne 1987:277) In Tibet, those Bon practitioners who conformed to Buddhist teachings by giving only "white" offerings became known as "White Bon". Those who continued to make animal sacrifices ("red offerings") were called Black Bon.

By the 14th Century the Bon-pos were fully organized as a special kind of Buddhism, though with certain differences. Unlike the Buddhists, whose teachings came from India, the Bons claimed that their faith originated in western Tibet (Shang-Shung or Zan-zun) and before that, from the land of sTag- gzigs (possibly pre-Muslim Persia) They honoured as their founder a legendary figure called gShen-rab.

In this article we are concerned not with the latter-day formalized Bon faith, but with the older animist-shamanist religion of Tibet -- the "nameless religion" -- whose practitioners, unbound by formal codes and doctrines, are in direct communication with the spirit world. According to Hoffman (1961) this same form of shamanism was once practised throughout inner Asia, including Siberia, Turkestan, Mongolia and China. In some isolated Himalayan valleys, it has survived in scarcely altered form to the present day.

Snellgrove and Richardson, in A Cultural History of Tibet, observe that pre-Buddhist religion in Tibet seemed to be entirely concerned with the affairs of this life. "Its purpose is to discover, usually by means of sortilege or astrological calculation, the causes of human ailments and misfortunes, and then to prescribe a suitable cure." The shaman, either through trance or divination, identifies the hostile god or demon that is causing the problem, then effects a cure by offering up a ransom. Sometimes the troublesome spirit was conjured into a device of crossed sticks and coloured threads (still used by Tibetans, and familiar to westerners as a "gods-eye") which trapped him like a bird in a cage. The demon was given his offerings, then thrown away. (1968:55)

Essential to these rites was a lengthy recitation, by the invoking (bon) priest, of ancient myths which described the origin, nature and function of various gods and demons, in order to invoke their aid.

Snellgrove and Richardson tell us that "Similar rituals with exactly similar recitations of ancient myths survive to this day this day among peoples of old Tibetan stock who penetrated the Himalayas in pre-Buddhist times and have since escaped the impact of later Tibetan Buddhist culture. Thus from a Nepalese people like the Gurungs we can probably even nowadays gain some impression of the working of such rituals in early Tibet." (1968: 57)

Anthropologist Stan Royal Mumford lived from 1981 to 1983 among the Gurung villagers of Gyasumdo, in the Nepal Himalayas. His research goal was to study the interaction of Tibetan Buddhist culture with co-existing non-Buddhist shamanism. In his introduction to Himalayan Dialogue he writes:


Present day Tibetan oracles (lha-pa) do not represent this older (pre-Buddhist) tradition, nor do the Bon-po, the non- Lamaist Tibetan sect that has been largely reformed. These are regarded as highly `Buddhist', since they also prohibit the `black' tradition of blood sacrifice that was defeated by the great lamas in Tibetan history. In Gyasumdo, however, the older pre-Buddhist shamanist tradition is still carried on by the Gurungs. (1989:6)
The Gurung nobility -- the Ghale clan -- claim to have come from Tibet centuries earlier. The Gurungs retain the pre- Buddhist Tibetan image of divine kingship, and believe that the ancestors of their nobility orginated in the upper world. (1989:8)

There are two types of shamanic practitioner: the Ghyabre, who performs funeral rites and delivers the soul to the land of the dead; and the Paju, who specializes in rites concerned with the earth and the underworld, including the expulsion of demons. Both Gurungs and the local Tibetans refer to the local Paju shaman, in Mumford's words "a virtuoso sacrificer", as `Black Bon'. The Ghyabre shaman, on the other hand, sees himself as becoming a "white Bon"-- even though he too performs animal sacrifices. (1989:32)) Keith Dowman, the translator of Lady Yeshe Tsogyel's autobiography, suggests that the shamans of Nepal and Mongolia were exiled from Tibet over this issue of animal sacrifice. (1984:114)

According to legends related to Mumford by Paju shamans, both Pajus and lamas in ancient times had extraordinary magical powers (among them corpse-raising and the ability to create landslides) which they made a habit of stealing from one another; and they competed in magical contests like the legendary competition between Milarepa and the Bon-po magician on Mount Kailas. The Gurung villagers assured Mumford that while the lamas have lost these powers, the shamans still possess them, though in diminished form. (1989:55-56)

The Gurung shamans and the Tibetans who have migrated into Gyasumdo share a belief in earth spirits, demons (bdud) and clan guardian deities (btsan). Like their Siberian counterparts, the Gurung shamans conduct a ritual hunt and sacrifice animals as an offering to the spirits; and they function as a channel of communication with the spirit world. (Mumford 1989:8)

Reinhard Greve of the University of Hamburg has made a study of the Thakali peoples of Northwest Nepal, whose language is closely related to that of the Gurungs. Officially Buddhists, the Thin-Syangtan-Chimtan- Thakali people are still dominated by the lamaist Ningmapa and Ngor-po sects, as well as by the reformed "White Bon". At the same time they keep alive the old shamanist-animist tradition, as practised by the dhom or aya-lama. At the time of Greve's study there were six surviving aya-lama practising in two Thakali villages. They trace their tradition back to Naro-bon- chung, the mythical hero of the Black Bon, who fought and lost a magical duel with the Buddhist saint Padmasambhava. (Greve 1984:157) The duty of the aya-lama is to worship and make offerings to the gods of the upper, middle and lower worlds; to provide protection against disaster; and to perform rituals for the fields. In his role as healer, he acts as intercessor between the sick person and the gods. (Direct healing rituals, on the other hand, are performed by itinerant Indo-Nepalese practitioners, the Jhakri.) (1984:160)

The approximately half million Tamangs living in the Himalayas in the region of the Kathmandu Valley form Nepal's largest ethnic group. They speak a Tibeto-Burmese language and, like the Gurung and Thakali, practise a form of pre-Buddhist Tibetan shamanism. The Tamangs have two distinct kinds of religious practitioner: lamas, who officiate at funerals and other ceremonies; and shamans (bombo) who are specialists in ritual healing. (Peters 1987:161)

Another Tibeto-Burmese tribe in Nepal, the Magar, has very similar shamanist traditions. "Among the Magar the elements of classical shamanism find their clearest expression in Nepal. With their main duties as shamans, they perform the ecstatic soul journey as well as the ritual birth of a new shaman on the top of the world tree." (Greve 1984:163)

Thus the rama shamans of the Magar, the Paju of the Gurung, the aya-lama of the Thakali, and the Tamang bombo belong to a common tradition of trans-Himalayan shamanism which has close parallels with classic North and Central Asiatic shamanism. (Greve 1984:160-161) As we will see, it is a tradition which has both strongly influenced, and in turn been influenced by, Tibetan Buddhist culture.

Just as Buddhism has replaced earlier animist beliefs in Tibet, the spread of Islam has overshadowed indigenous shamanist practises in the Indian Himalayas. M.H. Sidky observes that "Under Muslim hegemony ancient local deities have either been forgotten, or else reduced to the ranks of mountain spirits. Only in the most secluded valleys of Gilgit, Chitral and Hunza were the old gods still remembered and their altars adorned with sacrificial offerings of juniper boughs and goat's blood." (1994, 71-72).

Visitors to nineteenth and early twentieth century Gilgit and Hunza described their encounters with the bitan (or danyal in the Gilgit language) who practised a form of ecstatic religion closely related to the Bon shamanism of Tibet. The bitan drank goat's blood, breathed juniper smoke, and entered a trance state which enabled them to speak with mountain spirits called pari. (Sidky 1994:72)

The pari inhabit the high peaks and alpine meadows, regarded by the Hunza people as sacred places. Sidkey tells us, "Night and day, the Hunzakut affirm, one can hear [the voices of the pari] in the howling of the wind, the roar of mountain streams, the thundering echoes of falling rocks, and the creaking of the juniper trees. " (1994:73)

The pari are beautiful, but far from benevolent. Careless shepherds who allow their flocks to wander into the mountains or damage the alpine meadows are liable to be stricken with altitude sickness, or even swept away by avalanches. If offended, the pari may blight crops, injure livestock, steal children from the villages. Yet at the same time -- if they are correctly propitiated -- they will bestow good luck and prosperity. This propitiation is the responsibility of the bitan -- the shaman who communicates with the pari for the benefit of the whole community.

The Hunza shaman's mortal enemies are the shape-shifting spirits called shiatus or bilas, who lie in wait in graveyards and abandoned places, sometimes hiding inside boulders. Hordes of these demonic spirits may group together to attack the bitan, who must pray to his guardian spirits for protection. Or they may take the shape of a pari in order to trick an inexperienced bitan,, whom they then devour. (Sidky 1994:73 ff)

In these Himalayan mountain spirits -- the tall, golden-haired pari who often appear as birds, and the demonic shiatus -- there is an unmistakable echo of the fairy-like peries and hideous deevs of Persian myth, as well as the shape-shifting good and evil djinns of the Arab world.

In traditional Hunza society, the bitan, as oracles and channels of communication with the spirit world, were consulted during all important state events. And there were other aspects to their political role: "During their trances bitan would sometimes offer supernatural support for public grievances and alleviate the anxieties of the people. For example, in the name of the pari they might voice objections to state taxes, or challenge the improprieties of members of the upper class; these were issues that ordinary Hunzakut could not directly express for fear of being punished. In this manner, oracular sessions provided an institutionalized outlet for built- up social tensions." (Sidky 1994:79-80)

After the British invasion of Hunza in 1891, the reigning Mir took his mandate not from the pari, but from the British government in India. No longer playing an important role in state affairs, the bitan continued to serve their communities as soothsayers and healers. Around the turn of the last century, Islamic authorities forced the Mir to outlaw shamanism, though by 1934 soothsayers and healers were once again in evidence. Sidky says, "Since the completion of the Karakoram Highway in 1982 and the opening of the area to foreign tourists in 1986, a number of self-professed bitan have appeared who earn hefty fees by putting on bogus bitan shows for tourists. The Hunzakut themselves, often with a chuckle, refer to these mock soothsayers as `half- bitan' or `funny bitan'. In the eyes of Bitan Ibrahim [Sidky's informant] such people are charlatans worthy only of contempt." Today, Sidky adds, there are no more than three or four practitioners recognized by the Hunzakut as genuine bitan. (1994: 94)


There is more on this if you go to the following link:

http://home.portal.ca/~lonewolf/shaman.htm

Interesting

thanks. great post. It would take forever to find something like that otherwise.