By RICHARD C. DUJARDIN
Journal Staff Writer

 PROVIDENCE - The two Tibetan Buddhist monks knew they did not have a great deal of time.

After all, it typically takes weeks to create a mandala (a sacred diagram based on circles and squares that can act as a focal point for meditation) as complex as the one they were building in Providence College's Slavin Hall.

But this time their mission was to complete a brightly-colored sand "cosmogram" in only five days — so as to give people a chance to see the completed work today and tomorrow — before they went about destroying it.

The Venerable Tenzin Deshek, whose parents fled from Tibet to India when he was 2, and the Venerable Tenzin Thutop, born in India of Tibetan parents, have been at Providence College this week at the invitation of Ann W. Norton, professor of art history and director of PC's Asian studies program.

The mandala, made from marble that the monks pulverize themselves, is viewed as something far more than a mere piece of Tibetan art.

For these Tibetan Buddhists, the sand lotus flower in the center signals that this is the actual home of Avaolokiteshvara — "the Lord who looks down with compassion" — for whom the mandala is named.

And so, too, other decorations signify the presence of four other deities: the lords of love, understanding, wisdom and pure generosity.

The monks explained Wednesday that the mandala was a spritual work as much as it was a physical one.

Having built the entire mandala in their mind's eye even before beginning the project, based on images memorized in childhood, they would now contemplate the qualities of each deity as they went about their work.

But in a sense the most important task would come at the end, when, at 3:30 p.m. tomorrow, Deshek, 39, and Thutop, 32, would start taking it all apart.

If all goes according to plan, they will pluck the deities from the sand circle and sweep the rest into containers, to be carried to the Providence River downtown.

There, as a sign of blessing for all those using the river and a sign of letting go, the monks plan to deposit the colored sand into the river near the Superior Court building on South Main Street at the start of a limited WaterFire at 5:54 p.m.

Does it hurt to see the work that you have devoted so much care to be destroyed, someone asked.

Thutop laughed.

"Tibetan Buddhism has one concept," he said. "It has taught us that things are impermanent. So it is not too much a problem for us.

"The concept is ground very strong into our mind since we were a young age. When we see something, we know that it is transitory. It is the natural process."

Not that all mandalas are destroyed so quickly.

Deshek noted that there is a mandala in Japan that was made in 1984, which was afterward sprayed with a substance to make it hard. It is still on display.

At the time, he explained, the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism, was present and gave his okay.

Both monks, who live a celibate life, have been living for the last 18 months at the Namgyal Monastery in Ithaca, N.Y., a branch of the Dalai Lama's main monastery in exile in Daharmshala, India. Studying to become a monk typically takes 13 years.

"I became a monk when I was 14 years old. At the time, my parents selected me. I think it was a good choice for me," said Deshek.

Thutop, selected when he was 13, said he thought it was a good choice, too. He explained that monks do have some element of choice. "If you like to quit, it's okay, but you have to go to your teacher to ask permission."

In making the mandalas, the monks use both a chokbu, a conical device with a hole at the tip, to drop the sand onto the surface, and a shinga, a wooden scraper useful in pushing sand into straight lines.

Have their mandalas ever been the victim of an accident? Not really, though it's been known to happen, they said.

"One time in Los Angeles, the monks did a really big mandala, and there was a crowd of people who jumped on it," said Thutop. "Some of my friends told me it was a real mess."

Though the mandalas are two-dimensional, Tibetans believe that the mandalas can actually be viewed as the ground plan for a three-dimensional palace inhabited by living deities.

For most of history, mandalas could only be made in Tibetan monasteries, but 20 years ago, the Dalai Lama, the Tibetans' political and spiritual leader, told his monks that it was permissible to make them in places that could be viewed by the public — as a way of advancing the message of the world's 130,000 Tibetan refugees.

It is estimated that more than 1.2 million Tibetans died as a result of the Chinese occupation of Tibet, which began with the 1949 invastion and the destruction of 6,000 monasteries. Since then, thousands of Tibetans have been imprisoned and tortured for their political and religious beliefs.

In size, Tibet was a vast nation, with an area roughly equal to all of Western Europe, most of it on a plateau above 14,000 feet.

Americans have long been sensitive to the story of Tibet.

Some believe this is because of Tibet's association with the mythical Shangri La, which became part of the American consciousness after the publication of the book Lost Horizon. Orville Schell, a China expert and dean of the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California at Berkeley, says that when China's leader met with President Clinton he asked, "Why do you Americans care so much about Lamism?"

The Chinese, meanwhile, have been mystified by American sympathy with Tibetans. "The Chinese fail to realize that when they invaded Tibet, they were marching into our dreams," Schell said.

For Deshek and Thutop, the Chinese occupation affects more than their dreams.

"Sure, of course, we want to return to Tibet. That is our one goal," said Thutop. "I don't know if it will be in my lifetime. But I am optimistic."

The creation of Tibetan mandala is part of a month-long celebration of the arts and cultural heritage of Tibet being hosted during October by Providence College.

Today's event is a talk and slide presentation on the mandalas at 11 a.m. by Ann W. Norton of the Asian studies program, Room 112 at the Slavin Center.

The dismantling ceremony, which will last about a half-hour, will take place tomorrow at 3:30 p.m. in Room 120, but can also be viewed in an adjoining room via closed-circuit television. The ceremony at the river, near the courthouse, takes place at 5:54 p.m.