The great prayer festival is known as “Monlam Chenmo” in Tibetan. This typical Buddhist festival falls in the 4th – 11th day of the 1st lunar month. The festival was established by the great master Tsongkhapa in 1409, the founder of Gelugpa Sect of Tibetan Buddhism to commemorate and in honour of Buddha Shakyamuni.
The festival will be held In Lhasa, Thousands of monks from Drepung, Sera and Ganden gather for chanting prayers and performing religious rituals at the Jokhang Temple in Lhasa. The lamas debate Buddhist scriptures in the temple and ask questions of high-level lamas and debate with them, as well as performing various religious rituals.
An offering carefully crafted from butter and over 10m-high was put in the Jokhang Temple, where most of the monks from the monasteries around Lhasa would gather and hold the ‘Monlam Chenmo’ or ‘Great Prayer Festival’. Many hundreds of thousands of local Tibetans, perhaps more than a million streamed into Lhasa for these celebrations to pay homage and get blessings.
