Archive for the ‘bone smuggling’ tag
Human Bone Smuggling … no comments
Police uncover human bone smuggling racket:
By Bappa Majumdar Tue Jun 19, 7:13 AM ET
KOLKATA, India (Reuters) – Indian police have discovered a stash of hundreds of human skulls and thigh bones and arrested a gang for allegedly smuggling them to the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan for use in Buddhist monasteries.
“During interrogation they confessed that the hollow human thigh bones were in great demand in monasteries and were used as blow-horns, and the skulls as vessels to drink from at religious ceremonies,” investigating officer Ravinder Nalwa said on Tuesday.
It was the second cache of bones found in eastern India since April and police now believe the region could be the centre of a much broader trade in human bones. They suspect some bones may even have ended up as far away as Thailand and Japan.
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Buddhist monks in India said human thigh bones and skulls were used by followers of a Tibetan school of Buddhism.
“But one or two bones would last a lifetime, so a racket this huge might have links to other countries,” said Bhikkhu Bodhipala, chief priest of the Mahabodhi temple in Bodh Gaya.
Questions People Ask Me: Bones 4 comments
A new virtual friend of mine who happens to be a writer has the opportunity to explore Buddhism in China and Tibet this summer and wrote to ask me if I knew anything about the practice of using human bones in Tibetan Buddhism … Like, is it an official practice, or is it just an odd occurance, to give up your bones for ceremonial use after your body is dead?
I don’t know. But that doesn’t mean anything …
Some of Tibetan Buddhism is made up of science, a lot of it is made up from experience and observation, and some of Tibetan Buddhism is made up of superstition and ritual. Some of that superstition and ritual may only be made up to relieve an occasional streak of boredom. And, they don’t like to waste things. So just because I don’t personally know anything about it doesn’t mean that a Buddhist in China hasn’t designated his cranium to hold alms at the local gompa.
Maybe someone reading this knows more than I do? Anything at all?
Ed.Note: Changed the word suspicion to superstition.