Chotrul Düchen (Day of Miracles) · Chotrul Duchen

Culture of origin: Buddhist · Cultural

Holiday sources: Buddhism

Chotrul Düchen, also the Butter Lamp Festival, is one of the four Tibetan Buddhist festivals that commemorate events in the Buddha's life. The fifteen days before it, the Miracle Month, recall the wonders the Buddha showed at Shravasti to deepen his disciples' devotion. Believers make lamps, traditionally of coloured yak butter and now usually of vegetable ghee, in the shapes of deities, lamas, flowers and auspicious symbols, and set up displays in homes and public places, some as large as a building; the effects of good and bad actions are held to be multiplied ten million times on the day.