མོ Mo is the Tibetan word for divination. For centuries, Tibetans have asked a lama to “do a mo” before a journey, a marriage, a medical treatment or any decision that matters, and the answer is read from dice, the beads of a rosary, or other simple means.
A Mo is not a game of chance in the eyes of those who use it. The diviner first settles the mind, takes refuge, and calls on a deity of wisdom, then asks one clear question and throws. The answer is understood to come not from the dice but from that wisdom, reflected in how they fall. That is why the question is asked once, and the first answer is the one that counts.
There are many kinds of Mo. Some count the beads of a mala between the two hands; some roll balls of dough, each holding a written answer, in a bowl; some throw ordinary dice and read the numbers. The Mo in this app is the dice divination of Manjushri, the bodhisattva of wisdom, in the form set down by the nineteenth-century master Jamgön Mipham.
The die of this Mo has no numbers. Each of its six faces carries one syllable of Manjushri’s mantra, the short prayer recited before every throw:
ༀ་ཨ་ར་པ་ཙ་ན་དྷཱི། OM A RA PA TSA NA DHI
A, RA, PA, TSA and NA are the first five letters of the Arapacana, an alphabet of the Gandhari language that some Mahayana sutras use as a meditation, with each letter opening onto a teaching: A, for instance, onto the insight that nothing has ever truly come into being. DHI is Manjushri’s seed syllable, the sound of wisdom itself. Modern readers usually give each syllable an element:
The die is thrown twice (or two dice once, read in order). Six possible first syllables and six possible second ones give 36 combinations, and each one is a named divination: from A A, The Stainless Sky, to DHI DHI, The Jeweled Banner of Victory. Read the table by the first throw (row) and the second (column):
Twenty-eight of the thirty-six are auspicious, and seven of them carry the names of the eight auspicious symbols of Tibetan Buddhism: the parasol, the golden fish, the lotus, the conch, the endless knot, the wheel and the victory banner, with a vase of nectar and a jeweled vessel standing in for the treasure vase. Four of the eight difficult ones are named for the four maras, the classic obstacles on the Buddhist path: death, the afflicting emotions, the body and its frailties, and the distractions of pleasure.
Mipham’s text gives each divination a short image and then answers for the areas of life people usually ask about: the family and home, one’s aims, friends and wealth, enemies, guests, illness, harmful spirits, spiritual practice, lost things, whether someone will come or a task be done, and everything else. Most answers end with a recommended practice, such as a prayer, an offering or saving the lives of animals, to strengthen a good sign or turn a bad one.
Jamgön Ju Mipham Gyatso (1846–1912) was one of the great scholars of the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism, from Kham in eastern Tibet, and a leading figure of the Rimé, or non-sectarian, movement. He wrote on philosophy and meditation, but also on medicine, astrology, poetry, art and crafts. His Mo manual, which presents itself as drawing on the Kalachakra Tantra and the tradition of Manjushri, became one of the most widely used divination books in Tibet and, through its English translation, outside it.
The six syllables, the way they combine, and the names and order of the 36 divinations follow Mipham’s Mo, and the omens follow the general sense of each divination. The meanings, the answers by question, the advice and the suggested practices were written for this app in plain modern English, and no translation is reproduced. The areas of life are adapted for modern questions: harmful spirits are left out, and journeys are read together with guests. For a Mo that matters, Tibetans would ask a lama, and the full manual has much more to say than a few lines.
Choose what your question is about and, if you like, write it down. Recite the mantra (click the speaker to hear it), then throw the die twice. Each throw picks one of the six faces at random, with equal chances, and the pair gives the divination. The app shows its omen, its meaning, the answer for your kind of question, a line of advice and a practice. Treat the answer as a mirror for your own judgment rather than a verdict.