Magical Tattoos?

              In Thai Buddhist tradition, merit is everything. Earning merit is easy enough to do, be a good person, donate to the temples you visit, get a magical mystical tattoo? What? In my opinion the absolute coolest way to earn merit in Buddhism is through the pilgrimage to a temple, offerings to the monks and temple itself, and finally, having a Sak Yant Master bless you with a new magical tattoo.

              As one of the oldest art forms in the world, tattoos are an intimate connection between the sitter and the artist. Skin being the only canvas that bleeds adds an extra layer of difficulty to the process. Since receiving a sak yant is said to be incredibly painful, the sitter must meditate throughout the entire process on a yantra that their sak yant master gives them. This makes receiving a sak yant a mental pilgrimage on its own, garnering more merit for the sitter.

I theorize that getting a sak yant is two pilgrimages, one to the temple that has a sak yant master, and the second pilgrimage is totally mental while the believer receives their tattoo. This second pilgrimage can be compared to the mental pilgrimage that believers go on when they mentally traverse a mandala. There are layers of difficulty to reaching nirvana just like the tattooing process, the first part is easier, you speak with a sak yant master, then the more difficult part when you are tattooed, and finally the relief when the master smears your protective tattoo in gold leaf and blows weecha onto it, metaphorically arriving at nirvana, there is no more pain.

Sak yant can be broken into two words – sak to tap, and yant, short for yantra, or an instrument of thought. The sak yant master literally taps the sak yant into the skin of the sitter dot by dot. A master can be three types of people, a monk, an arjan, or a reusi, they are trained to get to know their canvas, and write out and then consequently scramble up a yantra to make into your tattoo based on what you need in your life. They scramble the yantras so that no one can go back and undo the blessing that they bestow. After using either a bamboo or steel rod to give the tattoo, the master puts gold leaf over the tattoo and blows his weecha – stored up karma, onto the tattoo as a final blessing. There are a variety of temples across Thailand, Laos, Thailand, and Cambodia that specialize in various specialized sak yants for different types of protection and merit, giving believers multiple possible pilgrimages for merit.

Although merit seekers must beware, many tattoo shops in Asia and America offer what appear to be sak yants, but they are not. They are westernized unalom tattoos that do not give merit or carry a blessing. Any tattoo not given by one of the three types of sak yant master is not a sak yant at all. These tattoos are not imbued with weecha or blessed. They are insulting to true Buddhist believers and sak yant masters. The placement of the sak yant is also indicative of its authenticity. Sak yant masters typi cally only place sak yants on the back. They can overlap and become jumbled over time, but they are never placed on lower arms, hands, lower legs, or feet.

If you are ready to hop on a plane to Thailand and find a temple for your sak yant, be prepared ahead of time and know what the temple expects of its guests. Keep in mind that some monks will not tattoo women. Do lots of research and be a citizen of the world, not just a confused tourist looking for a cool souvenir.

Carney, Scott. 2007. “Thai Tattoo Tradition Draws Worldwide Devotees.” NPR. NPR. November 13,    2007. https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16235581

"Devotees fall under spell of magical tattoos at annual Thai festival." EFE World News Service,              March 19, 2016. General OneFile (accessed April 07, 2019).                                                     http://link.galegroup.com.ezproxy3.lhl.uab.edu/apps/doc/A446727355/ITOFu=birm97026&sid=ITO F&xid=5ee68abb.

Gluckman, Ron. "Baring Southeast Asia's Sacred Tattoos; Ron Gluckman Reviews

"Sacred Skin" by Tom Vater and Aroon Thaewchatturat and Sacred Tattoos of Thailand" by Joe Cummings." Wall Street Journal (Online) (New York, N.Y.), 2011.