Red Sandalwood has been valued for centuries for the qualities it possesses for carving, medical, and spiritual purposes. Spiritual uses of red sandalwood include removing negativity, increasing opportunities and bringing success. It is often burned during rituals for protection, healing & exorcism and used for purification and spirituality.
It is used to make a paste to decorate icons and religious tools and then distribute it to devotees, who use it to mark their foreheads, neck and chest. Buddhists sometimes consider it akin to the lotus, and use it to transform desire and maintain alertness during meditation. They also use it as a popular offering to the Buddha.
In its powdered form, Sandalwood provides all of the same desired effects but perhaps with a greater ease of use. Powdered, it is often much easier to use in creating a mixed into a paste to mark icons and the body during rituals of religious devotion .