Another important part of a full monk’s equipment in Tibet is the Prayer-bell (called Drilbu) employed at the performance of daily religious ceremonies, and rung to accompany the repetition and chanting of prayers, or to fill up the intervals of worship. It often has half a Dorje as a handle, or the handle is ornamented with various mystical symbols carved on it. The object of ringing bells during worship is to call the attention of the beings who are worshipped, or to keep off evil spirits by combining noise with the waving of the Dorje in the handle.
The bell here represented was brought by me from Dārjīling.
The bells used in Burma are described at [p. 526].
Other religious implements used by novices and lay-brethren, as well as by full monks, are prayer-wheels, prayer-cylinders, rosaries, amulets (see [p. 358]), drums (see [p. 385]), and the Phurbu or Phur-pa (pp. [351], [352]).
As to the daily religious services and ceremonies performed by Monks in Tibet and Mongolia, these, of course, are far more ritualistic than in southern Buddhist countries. It has already been explained (at pp. [202], [225]) that certain abstract essences or mystical forms of the Buddha, called Dhyāni-Buddhas, were imagined to exist, and these had their concrete energizing vice-gerents called Bodhi-sattvas—beings who received adoration as if they were actually gods. In Tibet the Bodhi-sattva Avalokiteṡvara, and the canonized reformer Tsong Khapa, and other supposed saints, became prominent objects of religious worship. Then, in process of time, a complicated ceremonial was developed, which, as we shall see ([p. 338]), has much in common with the ritual of Roman Catholic Christianity.
The language employed in the religious services of the Lāmistic Hierarchy, whether in Tibet, Mongolia, or in the Lāma monasteries of China and Manchuria, is Tibetan. In fact, Tibetan is to the Lāmistic Church what Latin is to the Romish. It is the sole orthodox language of religion and religious ceremonial.
According to Koeppen, only one Mongolian Lāma-monastery (and that established at Peking) has the right to perform religious services in Mongolian instead of in Tibetan[143].
Dr. Edkins, however, states that there is a temple (called Fa-hai-si) near the hunting-park, in which the Manchu language is employed instead of Tibetan. (Chinese Buddhism, p. 406.)
Without doubt the acquisition of some knowledge of the Tibetan language is incumbent on every Lāma. Nevertheless, few, except in Tibet, really understand it. They simply repeat the usual prayers and formularies mechanically[144].