Land of Pure Vision: The Sacred Geography of Tibet and the Himalaya

Gallery Three: Networks

59 Opposite: Pilgrim, Drak Yerpa, Tibet, 2010. The places that appear in a sacred geography of Tibet and the Himalaya do not exist in isolation but rather are interwoven within a spatial grid of pilgrimage routes, ceremonial grounds, scriptural transmissions, and trailside markers, all made cohesive by religious practice. On a purely cosmological level, such connectivity may be perceived as a divine energy flowing across a landscape and through the heart of a person. This may be the case, for example, for Buddhists who view the plateau of Tibet as a pure land of enlightenment offering personal salvation from the endless cycles of karmic rebirth. It may apply to Hindus traveling to the four sources of the Ganges River, for whom the flow of the river is a fluid manifestation of divinity. A mythological equivalent might recount the peregrinations of a famous shaman or saint whose meditations and arcane teachings created holy spots that are ritually interlaced by pilgrimage. The transmission of sacred teachings at centers of religious study and beyond to a wider populace further circulates liturgical knowledge and sacred observation. For people who practice an everyday kind of religion, the sacred places are most routinely connected by ritual and spiritual travel. This might entail visiting a neighborhood shrine or embarking on a once-in-a-lifetime expedition to a remote sanctuary. The distance matters not. Pilgrims follow a prescribed route, circumambulatory in nature, and are required to complete specified rituals at designated stopovers. Such spiritual travelers in Tibet and the Himalaya often endure lengthy journeys, frequently by foot and across rugged terrain—a stereotypical pilgrimage, but it also is common for them to travel in vehicles and to lodge in comfortable accommodations. In any event, the pilgrims provide a tangible—and humane— reminder of how faith and geography combine to produce networks of religious circulation. To think about Tibet and the Himalaya in this way suggests a shared worldview among many of its residents—a kind of mental mandala cast across the region that compresses an entire cosmology onto the Earth’s surface. Adepts of arcane Buddhist and Hindu scriptures are keen to discern such an ephemeral cartography and to locate within it the rootedness of genius loci. A pilgrim passing through a sanctified landscape moves among its sacred features, distinguishing metaphysical boundaries in the landscape, and consciously registers the gravitas of a sacred place. Pilgrims, in fact, by their very act of movement, become a connective tissue in the spiritual networks that compose a sacred geography. A pilgrimage thus is simultaneously a topology of the human spirit, an invocation, a journey of purification and merit, and the affirmation of a sacred ecology that binds faith to nature and both to a spatial ontology that resides deep within a religious reckoning of the natural world. Gallery Three Networks 60 Mani stone, Tibet (Sichuan, China), 2006. 61 Pilgrim, Uttarkashi, India, 2004. 62 Ceremonial ground, Gosainkunda, Nepal, 2008. 63 Prayer flags, Tibet (Yunnan, China), 2006. 64 Sadhu, Nepal, 2004. 65 Sadhu, Nepal, 2008. 66 Gochen Monastery, Palyul Valley, Tibet (Sichuan, China), 2006. 67 Pelkor Chode Monastery, Gyantse, Tibet, 2010. 69 Minstrels, Phuntsholing Valley, Tibet, 2010. 70 Pilgrim, Tibet (Sichuan, China), 2006. 71 Pilgrim, Tibet (Sichuan, China), 2006. 72 Roadside restaurant, Damxung County, Tibet, 2010. 73 Hot springs, Yangpachen, Tibet, 2010. 74 Rickshaw puller, Lumbini, Nepal, 2008. 75 Ashram resident, Rishikesh, India, 2004. 76 Cairn, Laurebina Pass, Nepal, 2008. 77 Map of the Sacred Road, Yunnan, China, 2006. ...