ÿþ<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> <head> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" /> <TITLE>The Mysterious Bon Religious Culture - TibetTravel.Org</TITLE> <meta name="description" content="Bon is the main aboriginal religion during the prehistoric civilization on Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, which was established in the fifth century B.C. by Shenrab Miwoche, the prince of Zhang-zhung kingdom in western Tibet. Around the first century A.D. "> <meta name="keywords" content="The Mysterious Bon Religious Culture "> <link href="http://www.tibettravel.org/tibettravel/css/list.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /> <link href="http://www.tibettravel.org/tibettravel/css/list_mod.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /> </head> <body> <div id="warrper"> <div id="header"> <div id="top"> <div id="left"><strong>Service Call:</strong>(+86)-28-85552138 <strong> Tibet Travel Service and Tibet Tour Operator</strong></div> <div id="right"> <a href="http://www.tibet-travel.net/" target="_blank" class="style63">Francais</a> | <a href="http://www.chinese-tours.com" target="_blank" class="style63">Japanese</a> | <a href="http://www.china-panda.com" target="_blank" class="white">Sichuan</a> | <a href="http://www.6trip.com" target="_blank" class="white">Yuannan</a> | <a href="http://www.57qh.com" target="_blank" class="white">Qinghai</a> </div> </div><!--/ top--> <div id="head_banner"> <div id="logo"></div> <div id="headPic"><a href="http://www.tibettravel.org"><img src="http://www.tibettravel.org/images/pic.jpg" alt="Tibettravel.Org new edition website" border="0" ></a></div> <div id="server"> <p class="STYLE10">24/7 SERVICE</p> <p>Tel: (+86)-28-85552138</p> <p>Email: <a href="mailto:inquiry@tibettravel.org" >inquiry@tibettravel.org</a></p> <p>Online Contact:<a href="skype:china3737?call"><img src="http://www.tibettravel.org/tibettravel/list/image/skype.png" alt="Call me!" width="45" height=20 border=0></a><a href="msnim:chat?contact=china3737@hotmail.com"><img height=20 alt="Call me!" src="http://www.tibettravel.org/tibettravel/list/image/msn.gif" border=0></a> <!--MSN conversation over --></p> </div><!--/ server--> </div><!--/ head_banner--> <div id="nav"> <ul> <li><a href="http://www.tibettravel.org/"><span>Home</span></a></li> <li><a href="/tibet-tour/"><span>Tibet Tours</span></a></li> <li><a href="/tibet-hotel/"><span>Tibet Hotels</span></a></li> <li><a href="/flights-to-tibet/"><span>Flights to Tibet</span></a></li> <li><a href="/tibet-train/"><span>Tibet Train</span></a></li> <li><a href="/tibet-travel-guide/"><span>Tibet Travel Guide</span></a></li> <li><a href="/tibettravel/list/list_2556_1.html" class="nav_red"><span>Group Tours</span></a></li> <li><a href="http://www.tibettravel.org/tibettravel/list/list_2044_1.html"><span>About Tibet</span></a></li> <li><a href="/tibettravel/Html/20063231201-1.html"><span>About Us</span></a></li> <li><a href="/tibettravel/feedback/" class="last"><span>Feedback</span></a></li> </ul> </div><!--/ nav--> </div><!--/ header--> <div id="main"> <div id="leftMain"> <div id="add"> <p><a href="http://www.tibettravel.org">Home</a><xoYu_CMS_CODE:NEWS:NEWS_TYPE> > <a href="../list/list_2526_1.Html">Recycle-bin</a> > <a href="../list/list_2527_1.Html">Recycle-bin</a></xoYu_CMS_CODE:NEWS:NEWS_TYPE></p> </div><!--/ add--> <div id="leftMainContent"> <h1 class="title">The Mysterious Bon Religious Culture </h1> <p class="atten"> <span></span> </p> <div class="txt"> <p>Bon is the main aboriginal religion during the prehistoric civilization on Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, which was established in the fifth century B.C. by Shenrab Miwoche, the prince of Zhang-zhung kingdom in western Tibet. Around the first century A.D. the religion began to spread eastward until fully distributed in Tsang region and Lhasa region. This marked its first zenith when it almost dominated the political, economic and cultural life in the early stage of the Tubo Kingdom. Bon advocated pantheism and believed that every thing has soul? The deities, the supernatural powers of mountains, rivers, lakes, seas, the sun, the moon, stars, wind, rain, thunder, lightening, birds and beast, etc. as many as one can enumerate, govern the birth, ageing, sickness, death, events and fortune of people, who could not predict and control their own destinies, Because people are believed to be created by the deities. Tsanpo, the ruler of the Tubo Kingdom, was regarded as the Son of the Heavenly Deity? who had been sent for ruling the human world and would return to the heaven along the heavenly ladder after death. Two deities, the War and the Life, who attach on the body of each person, decide his or her desting. A person, who losses protection from either deities, will leave the living world permanently. According to Bon doctrines, there are two worlds for a person, the living world and the after-death world, the latter is full of darkness and suffer. Therefore after the death of a person, people would hold an offering ritual to redeem his or her soul from the dark and suffer-ridden world and guide it to the heaven. Based on these concepts, hung-drung? the early sect of Bon developed a series of deity and devil system as well as the rituals for consecrating deities and driving devils, which are the cardinal contents of the four portals in the theories and activities of the famous Nine Ways of Bon. Specifically speaking, they are for fortune-telling, consecrating deities, driving devils, praying for happiness and avoiding form disaster to ensure a prosperous, rich and steady human world. There theories and activities not only brought an extensive and in-depth influence to the society of the time, but also were reflected in the prehistoric arts.</p> <p>The No.1 rock painting, discovered in Rimodong, Risum District, Rutog County in Nagri Prefecture, is the most typical one. The painting is 2.7 meters high, 1.4 meters wide and 12 meters away from above the ground, in a shape of irregular triangle. There is a horse on the right top. Lower on the left there is yak with long hairs on its back and belly and an up-rolling tail. Two persons are on the left sides of the yak. On of them wears a long gown and bears something on the back, with his right hand holding his waist, and the left hand holding a long pole; another one is riding on the back of a sheep, also with his right hand holding his waist, and the left hand holding a long pole. Between the two persons, there is a hung-drung lucky sign. Below the person, there are the Sun, the Moon, a genital of the male and a genital of the female from left to right in sequence. On the right of the yak, there is a bog fish, bowing in a circle, with its mouth touching its tail and with its belly hiding 10 small fish. On the left bottom of the big fish, there are four dancing people with bird s head or bird mask. There are three small fish on the top or bottom of the dancers. Between the dancers and fish, there is a trapezoid symbol. On the left bottom of the dancers, there are 10 jars of the same shape in a row: big opening, long neck, round belly and round bottom, with decoration of vertical rope patterns. On the left side of the jars, there are person, riding on sheep and stretching their arms and holding branches or feathers. The person on the left wears a feather on the head. On the bottom of the painting, there are 125 sheep in nine rows. From the layout of the painting, we can see two parts divided by a row of patterns of the Sun, Moon and genitals. From the Yung-drung lucky sign, the feather wearing man, who resembled an aimingat Bon shaman and, the scene of the offering ritual, we can infer that this painting has something to do with the aboriginal Bon religion, because sacrificing of yak, goat, sheep and deer to the deities, as the painting depicted, is one of the core events of the early Bon.</p> <p>In addition, the consecration was also the important event aiming at prosperousness of the community. The main role of the tsanpo s shaman is to hold the rituals for elimination disasters and bringing in happiness. According to a cliff inscription in Gongbo area, after Drigum Tsanpo was assassinated, Pude Gungyal. the then hire apparent and the next tsanpo, held a large-scale ritual, sacrificing a lot of animals prying for tabilizing the tribe? From the on, all generations of tsanpos had held consecrating rituals as major events. Besides, before military action, such rituals also were held to pray for victory. Descriptions for such kind of events can be frequently seen in the Epic&nbsp; The King Gesar. Thus we can see, the consecration events were held both for the life and production of the ordinary people and for the major state affairs and military event.</p> <p>In the seventh century A.D., Buddhism was introduced to Tubo Kingdom in a large scale. From then on the history has witnessed age-long conflicting between Bon and Buddhism. Though Bon lost its dominance in the middle eighth century, it was far from being eradicated. Buddhism won land-sliding victory and widely accepted by the Tubo society. However it has assimilated quite a lot canons and rites of Bon and passed them down till today. The theories and conventions of Bon have been represented by people of later generations.<br /> &nbsp;</p> </div> <div class="pagebreak">page:<strong><a href="../Html/200782910659-1.Html">[1]page</a>&nbsp;</strong></div> <div id="txtBottom"> <span>[<A href="javascript:doPrint()"> Printing</A>] [<A class=black href="javascript:window.close()">Closure</A>]</span> </div><!--/ txtBottom--> <div id="next" style="margin-left:20px;"> <div> <p> <span style="font-size:12px; font-weight:bold;">More Information Related to Recycle-bin</span></p> <ul> <xoYu_CMS_CODE:NEWS:NEWS_TOP><a title="Saga Yajiang Yajie Hotel" href="../Html/201042002039-1.Html">Saga Yajiang Yajie Hotel</a><p><a title="Saga Xingyue Guesthouse" href="../Html/201042001756-1.Html">Saga Xingyue Guesthouse</a><p><a title="Saga Hotel" href="../Html/201042001140-1.Html">Saga Hotel</a><p><a title="Temples Pinning down the Demoness" href="../Html/20103154952-1.Html">Temples Pinning down the Demoness</a><p><a title="Tibetan Monasteries " href="../Html/2010315445-1.Html">Tibetan Monasteries </a><p><a title="How to visit a monastery in Tibet" href="../Html/20103154241-1.Html">How to visit a monastery in Tibet</a><p><a title="Being a responsible tourist" href="../Html/20103153599-1.Html">Being a responsible tourist</a><p><a title="Road conditions in China Tibet" href="../Html/201031514123-1.Html">Road conditions in China Tibet</a><p><a title="How to reduce cost of Tibet Tour" href="../Html/20102615053-1.Html">How to reduce cost of Tibet Tour</a><p><a title="Kathmandu EBC Lhasa Tour" href="../Html/20091212343-1.Html">Kathmandu EBC Lhasa Tour</a><p><a title="Kathmandu to Lhasa Budget Tour (Drive in ¨C Fly out): " href="../Html/200912123126-1.Html">Kathmandu to Lhasa Budget Tour (Drive in ¨C Fly out): </a><p><a title="3 Days Lhasa-Shigatse-Dham-Nepali Border Transfer" href="../Html/200911112535-1.Html">3 Days Lhasa-Shigatse-Dham-Nepali Border Transfer</a><p><a title="SG001C Lhasa to Everest Base Camp 7 Days 6 nights Tour by Tourist Bus" href="../Html/200981822121-1.Html">SG001C Lhasa to Everest Base Camp 7 Days 6 nights Tour by Tourist Bus</a><p><a title="Namtso Lake Introduction" href="../Html/2009723193935-1.Html">Namtso Lake Introduction</a><p><a title="Lake Manasarovar Introduction" href="../Html/20097172453-1.Html">Lake Manasarovar Introduction</a><p><a title="Ngari Introduction" href="../Html/2009716223546-1.Html">Ngari Introduction</a><p><a title="Riwoche Monastery" href="../Html/2009714201932-1.Html">Riwoche Monastery</a><p><a title="Lhasa Jiangsu Ecological Garden Hotel" href="../Html/20096384958-1.Html">Lhasa Jiangsu Ecological Garden Hotel</a><p><a title="mount kailash" href="../Html/20095270518-1.Html">mount kailash</a><p><a title="Beijing-Tibet-Kathmandu Overland 10 days tour" href="../Html/20093212570-1.Html">Beijing-Tibet-Kathmandu Overland 10 days tour</a><p></xoYu_CMS_CODE:NEWS:NEWS_TOP></ul> </div> </div> </div> <!--/ leftMainContent--> </div><!--/ leftMain--> <div id="rightMain"> <div id="thisformdiv"> <form action=" http://www.tibettravel.org/tibettravel/order/order_save.asp" method="post" id="thisform" name="myform" onSubmit="return check()"> <fieldset> <legend>Want a Quick Answer?</legend> <p><label for="name" accesskey="9">Name:&nbsp;</label> <input type="text" id="name" name="Fullname" tabindex="1"></p> <p> <label for="email">Email:&nbsp;</label> <input type="text" id="email" name="Email"tabindex="2"></p> <p> <label for="request">Your Request</label> <input type="text" value="3" name="type1" style="display:none" /> <input type="text" value="Quick Book" name="title" style="display:none" /> <label> <textarea name="content" id="text1" rows="3" onBlur="if (value ==''){value='Question not answered? Ask here!'}" onFocus="if (value =='Question not answered? Ask here!'){value =''}" value="Question not answered? Ask here!"></textarea> </label> <br /> </p> <p><input type="submit" value="submit" id="subbot"/></p> </fieldset> </form> </div> <div class="comBox2"> <h3 class="comTitle">Our Featured Group Tours</h3><!--/ comTitle--> <div class="tour282"> <a href="http://www.tibettravel.org/tibettravel/list/list_2556_1.html"><img src="http://www.tibettravel.org/tibettravel/css/group-tour.jpg" alt="group tour" width="250" height="182" border="0" /></a> <p> Small Group Journeys are set date trips designed for travel with a small group, sharing the enjoyment,cost and expreience of the destinations. A 8 days Trip to Mt.Everest Base Camp or Overland to kathmandu from Lhasa only cost you 700USD. Tours dispatch weekly, do not miss the chance, <a href="http://www.tibettravel.org/tibettravel/list/list_2556_1.html">join in now! </a></div> </div> <div class="comBox2"> <h3 class="comTitle">Tibet Update</h3><!--/ comTitle--> <div class="tour282 make_list"> <xoYu_CMS_CODE:NEWS:NEWS_TOP>9-12-2011<a title="Tibet reports a record of high number of tourists this year " href="../Html/2011912185512-1.Html">Tibet reports a record of high number of tourists this year </a>9-6-2011<a title="Intangible Tibetan culture heritage exhibitions during Lhasa Shoton Festival " href="../Html/20119618519-1.Html">Intangible Tibetan culture heritage exhibitions during Lhasa Shoton Festival </a>9-5-2011<a title="Lhasa-Shigatse railway is under construction " href="../Html/20119518475-1.Html">Lhasa-Shigatse railway is under construction </a>9-4-2011<a title="Lhasa Shoton Festival 2011 Attracted Over 900 Thousand Tourists" href="../Html/20119421726-1.Html">Lhasa Shoton Festival 2011 Attracted Over 900 Thousand Tourists</a>9-1-2011<a title="More and better roads will be built in Tibet" href="../Html/201191205626-1.Html">More and better roads will be built in Tibet</a>8-31-2011<a title="Namtso Lake becomes a great tourist hit during Shoton Festival " href="../Html/2011831185944-1.Html">Namtso Lake becomes a great tourist hit during Shoton Festival </a>8-30-2011<a title="Lhasa is celebrating the grand Shoton Festival 2011 " href="../Html/201183018502-1.Html">Lhasa is celebrating the grand Shoton Festival 2011 </a>8-29-2011<a title="The 3nd Mt. Qomolangma Photo Exhibition Kicks off in Lhasa" href="../Html/20118291913-1.Html">The 3nd Mt. Qomolangma Photo Exhibition Kicks off in Lhasa</a>8-28-2011<a title="Various Activities Held in Tibet Museum During Shoton Festival" href="../Html/201182819645-1.Html">Various Activities Held in Tibet Museum During Shoton Festival</a>8-25-2011<a title=" Safe yogurt supply during Shoton Festival " href="../Html/201182519218-1.Html"> Safe yogurt supply during Shoton Festival </a></xoYu_CMS_CODE:NEWS:NEWS_TOP> </div> </div> <!--/ combox2--> </div><!--/ rightMain--> </div><!--/ main--> <div id="footnav"> <a href="/tibettravel/list/List_2005_1.Html">About Tibet</a><a href="/tibettravel/list/list_2009_1.Html">Tibet Travel Guide</a><a href="/tibet-tour/">Tibet Tour</a> <a href="/tibettravel/list/List_2014_1.Html">Tibet Photo</a><a href="/tibettravel/list/list_2267_1.Html">Nepal</a><a href="/tibettravel/Html/20063231201-1.html">About Us</a><a href="/tibettravel/html/2007414152212-1.Html">Contact Us</a> <a href="/tibettravel/html/200741414380-1.Html">How to Pay</a> <a href="http://www.tibettravel.org/links/links.html">Links</a></div> <!--/ footnav--> <div id="footer"> <img src="/images/visacard_88x31.gif" alt="we accept credit card payment" height="31" width="88"> <img src="/images/mastercard_88x31.gif" alt="we accept credit card payment" height="31" width="88"> <img src="/images/AE_88x31.gif" alt="we accept credit card payment" height="31" width="88"> <img src="/images/Diners_88x31.gif" alt="we accept credit card payment" height="31" width="88"> <img src="/images/JCB_88x31.gif" alt="we accept credit card payment" height="31" width="88"> <img src="/images/paypal_logo1.gif" alt="we accept PayPal payment" height="31" width="114"> <img src="/images/iata.gif" height="37" width="43" alt="we accept PayPal payment"> <img src="/images/cits-logo.gif" height="37" width="37" alt=""> <img src="/images/fit-logo.gif" height="37" width="37" alt=""> <p>Tibet Department of Sichuan China International Travel Service Co. Ltd ( L-SC-GJooool)</p> <p>Tel: (+86)-28-85552138 Fax: (+86)-28-85544588</p> <p>Copyright 2000-2009 All rights reserved ICP: 06013423 Tibet travel</p> </div><!--/ footer--> <script type="text/javascript"> var _gaq = _gaq || []; _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-23623607-1']); _gaq.push(['_trackPageview']); (function() { var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true; ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js'; var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s); })(); </script> <script type="text/javascript"> var _gaq = _gaq || []; _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-19982865-1']); _gaq.push(['_trackPageview']); (function() { var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true; ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js'; var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s); })(); </script> </div><!--/ warrper--> </body> </html><!--tibettravel.org --> <!--2002^ÿ2007 Copyright by www.tibettravel.org All Rights Reserved-->