2. gTum-rngam. gTum-rngam refers to a musical dance performed by the man who secure the souls of the dead. It is performed by 13 men, who wear big black hats and black robes with an apron whose waist is decorated with human eyes and mouths. The dance symbolizes the dismemberment with sharp knives of the demons sent under guard of Dur-Khord-bdag-po and entering the world of Buddha.

3. Srin-po. The dance is performed by 20men in red, wearing vicious masks, and the swallow the pieces of the body which was dismembered by gTum—rngam. This represents the dead people’s last charity for hungry ghosts, exemplifies the Buddhist spirit of charity.

The musical instruments accompanying the dance s are Dung-chen (long trumpets), cymbals, rGya-gling(Tibetan-style suona horns), rkang-gling (thigh-bone trumpets, or ghost-call trumpets), conch-shell trumpets,bells, hand-drums(made of human skulls) and others.

Generally speaking, Tibetan Buddhism has a large and complicated system of Buddha. Music and dances play an important part. Musical dances are often singing in loud voices and dancing violently.

Human beings fear death and tend to recoil from it. However, no one can escape from death, so the doctrines and music of Tibetan Buddhism have produced and developed on the basis of the understanding of death and death education, and the securing of dead spirit. To some extent, only those who ‘see emptiness, have compassion’ can obtain real pleasure in death.

Bibliography:

1.Padmasambhava(author), xu huasheng(translator),1995. The Tibetan book of the dead. Religious culture press.

2.Sogyal rinpoche(author), Zheng zhenhuang(translator), 1999. The Tibetan book of lving and dying. Chinese social science press.

3.Tshe-ring, 1999 Tibetan Buddhism. Ethnicity press.

4.Zhou wangyin and Wang chao, 1999. Tibetan primary religious. Sichuan remin press.

5.Li jicheng, 1986. Lama monasteries---the world of Buddha. Sichuan renmin press.

[1] 中阴：人从死到生之间的时间，为七七四十九天。

[2] 莲华生着 徐进夫译：《西藏度亡经》宗教文化出版社1995年出版，第9页。

[3] 藏传佛教教义认为万事万物都在因果轮回之中，不能改变。

[4] 藏传佛教认为，由于“我执”，人们会有消极的情绪，那是因为他们对真相的无知，从而陷入生死轮回。

[5]Tibetan Buddhism divides life into three bardos: the bardo of dying, the bardo of dharmata and the bardo of rebirth.

[6]Originally, this was an ancient Indian work and was translated in English under the title the Tibetan book of the death.

[7]A Buddhist term means that all things in the world are the result of causes and cannot persist without change.

[8]Buddhism believes that human beings have negative emotions because of self-grasping, which results from their ignorance of the truth.

作者简介：

嘉雍群培，中央民族大学音乐学院教授。