Offering

Lauren Ehrmann

The Tibetan Mongolian Buddhist Cultural Center in Bloomington, Indiana, is a Tibetan monastery and cultural center located in the center of the Midwest. In the 5 years I have lived in Bloomington, I often visit the TMBCC to walk its extensive grounds, visit its stupas and temples, and admire its many statues of the buddha. Ever since my first visit, I have been fascinated by the touching, funny, and just plain weird objects that are left at the feet (and on the arms, and balanced on the heads) of these statues as offerings.

What is it about statues of divine figures that prompt us to give what we can of ourselves, no matter how strange? Why leave our change and earrings and pill bottles and buttons at the feet of the buddha? What can we possibly hope for from the divine in exchange for trifles?

As an art historian, I have devoted a lot of thought and many, many words to beautifully crafted divine offerings. It seems futile to offer a physical object to a divine being, and yet obsessively, insistently, beautifully, we have done so throughout history. Even in the absence of belief, we still feel the impulse to offer. I love the strange accumulation of objects at the TMBCC for showing that deeply human impulse in its purest form.