The lamp, in the Dharma, symbolizes wisdom—one lamp dispels a thousand years of darkness, one insight breaks ten thousand years of folly. Since the Buddha’s time, offering lamps has been a practice of gathering merit and illuminating the mind. For the dead in the bardo, the flame is a guiding star; for the living, the lamp is a prayer to dispel ignorance and grow clarity.

Nyingma holds many terma liturgies of lamp offering, with a thousand or ten thousand lamps as ornament, visualizing each flame becoming measureless light filling the ten directions. The lama lighting lamps on your behalf turns your intention into visible light.

• **Guiding the dead.** The flame is a focus of light for the wandering bardo consciousness, easing fear.
• **Dispelling darkness for the living.** The clarity dedicated through the lamp steadies the mind and grows lucidity.
• **Vast good connection.** One lamp dedicated to all beings is an equal, selfless generosity.

Online lamp offering follows the Nyingma tradition:

• **Consecrating and lighting.** The lama lights butter lamps in sequence before a pure maṇḍala, visualizing light filling all space.
• **Mantra and aspiration.** Reciting the lamp-deity’s mantra and aspiration, the lama voices wishes for the dead, the living, and creditors.
• **Universal dedication.** The wisdom the lamp symbolizes is dedicated to all beings, that they be free of suffering.
• **Record.** A practice record is provided after the ceremony as witness.

You need not be present—the lamp you lit stays lit for you.