Lce-sgom-pa (summarized translation by Yael Bentor)
The text translated here is an exposition of the Buddhist Tantric path written in Tibet in about the twelfth or thirteenth century. According to the testimony of the text itself, its author relies (specifically in the section on the completion process) on the authority of Naropa. The excerpt is from the first part of the sixth chapter entitled ‘The Teaching of the Practice of the Mantra Path.” It’s easy to note similarities of the current exposition with the Tantra vs classic Advaita debate and Kashmiri Shaivite approach to Tantra.
The Buddhist Great Vehicle (Mahāyāna) is said to comprise two paths, the path of the sūtra and the path of the Tantra, also called the Perfection of Wisdom and the Mantra path, respectively. The path of the sūtra was taught by the Buddha for people who are only slightly afflicted by desire and who are able to renounce the world. This seems rather tongue-in-cheek since it is obvious that most people are greatly afflicted by desire and are not able to renounce the world. It is precisely for this great majority that the Mantra path was taught.
There are three methods for overcoming suffering in samsāra, which results from the emotions afflicting all unenlightened beings. These three methods reflect the three paths within the Great Vehicle – the sūtra, tantra and mantra, and Great Seal. The sūtra path of the Perfection of Wisdom is the classical method of Mahāyāna, based for the most part, on the Bodhisattva ideal and the notion of emptiness. The Tantra path is further divided into two – the common Tantric method which is the path of purifying the mind in stages, and the path of the Great Seal or Mahāmudrā, which, in contrast, is an instantaneous practice. Mahāmudrā is the pinnacle of all mantra path practices, yet at the same time superior to it. In the path of the sūtra, the afflicting emotions are regarded as adversaries to be conquered with some countermeasure. The afflicting emotion of desire may be overcome through non-attraction, aversion through loving-kindness, and ignorance through a correct understanding of Buddhist views. The Tantra path, on the other hand, employs a homeopathic approach – a remedy of a type similar to the affliction is applied. This method is stated in a famous verse from the Hevajra Tantra (2.2.52): “By passion, beings are bound and by that very passion they are released.” Other examples are a thorn stuck in one’s finger, which may be removed by another thorn, or an Indian washerman who removes the dirt from cloth by dirt itself. The remedies of the corresponding type employed in the Mantra path are not the actual afflicting emotions. Ordinary desire is cured not by ordinary desire but by sublime desire – the desire that has been transformed. Hence, in the Mantra path as well, the ordinary afflicting emotions are in fact renounced.
How are one’s afflicting emotions transformed? This occurs as part of the practice in which meditators transform themselves into enlightened beings, and their world into the celestial mansion of the maṇḍala in which they abide. With such transformation, their enjoyment of objects of desire is said to be like that of enlightened beings who are making offerings to enlightened beings. In this case, both offerer and recipient are said to experience perfect enjoyment untainted by any trace of affliction, such as attachment, miserliness, or jealousy. They realize that all offerings that appear as forms, sounds, tastes, and so on, are in actuality non-dual enlightened wisdom and emptiness. As such, they function as objects of the senses that no longer induce ordinary clinging, but rather immaculate bliss. In other words, offerings made on the path to enlightenment serve to transform ordinary attitudes with respect to offerings into a blissful mind that realizes their true nature. One example of this occurs in the generation process, wherein practitioners who have been transformed into enlightened beings express their gratitude to these enlightened beings. Since the practitioners are no longer distinguished from the enlightened beings, they generate from themselves another maṇḍala of enlightened beings in the same way that one butter lamp lights another, without the first losing any of its light. In making the offerings to the enlightened beings emanated from themselves, practitioners worship these enlightened beings, express their gratitude to them, and accumulate merit on the level of conventional truth. At the same time, at the level of the highest truth, they meditate on the true nature of the recipients of these offerings as an illusion, empty of inherent existence. After making their offerings, the recipients of the offerings merge back into the offerer indistinguishably, like water into water. On the basis of this visualization, the practitioners meditate on all offerings, offerers, and objects of offering as an empty illusion. They realize that all appearances arise as the role-playing of enlightened wisdom. The empty and unobstructed nature of everything enables them to dissolve one enlightened being into another. Such is precisely the true nature of things dissolving in the true nature of things.
What is the method for overcoming afflicting emotions according to the Mahāmudrā? Here the meditators do not neutralize them with counteractive antidotes (like the sūtra path), nor do they apply remedies of a similar type (like the mantra path), but rather realize that they are the result of their own conceptualization. The workings of the mind cause objects of desire to appear in the way they appear, and bring about the afflicting emotions that grasp them. An example of the existence of afflicting emotions is the appearance of water in the desert that arises from an optical illusion. Once the beholders comprehend the phenomenon of a mirage, they understand the true nature of water in the middle of a desert, and their former mistaken perception, which holds to the existence of this water, ceases. Because no antidote is applied in this case, the afflicting emotions are said to be released or liberated by themselves.
This classification of the Great Vehicle into three paths in their cure for the afflicting emotions is not meant so much to illustrate historical developments within Buddhism as to serve as a didactic means for presenting the different approaches and clarifying their unique features. The classification of the three paths as gradual stages, ranging from the inferior to the superior, allows the presentation of newer developments – such as the paths of Mantrayāna and the Mahāmudrā – as both belonging to the Mahāyāna and surpassing it. This presentation is modeled after the older method of the Mahāyāna itself. There are three vehicles for the path in Buddhism in general – those of the śrāvakas, the Pratyēkabuddhas, and the Bodhisattvas – while adding that only the last of these is capable of leading to Buddhahood itself. The two others were taught for people with lesser capacities, as skillful means for gradually leading them into the Mahāyāna of the Bodhisattvas. Similarly, the paths of Mantrayāna and the Mahāmudrā are part of the Mahāyāna, yet are reserved for practitioners with the highest capacities.
Before practitioners embark on Tantric practices that lead to liberation, they must receive initiation from their gurus. This initiation is called ripening initiation since it activates the disciples’ capacities to engage in the practice. In receiving initiation, the disciples gain the first inner experience of the meditation, such as seeing themselves as enlightened beings. When both guru and disciple are worthy, the disciple shares in the meditation of his or her guru. They also share in the meditation of the entire lineage of teachers, who have achieved direct experience in that meditation. The two essential roles of the initiation are: cleansing the disciples’ impurities and endowing them with efficacy. The first is said to purify the disciples’ entire being – expressed in terms of their body, speech, and mind – by removing obstacles that prevent access to the practice, such as habitual tendencies. Each of the inner experiences in the initiation is represented by external symbolic ritual action. The purification is symbolized by the vase initiation.
The second role of initiation is to endow the disciple with the ability to perform the practice. The literal meaning of the Tibetan word for initiation is empowerment. It empowers disciples with the spiritual powers of the entire lineage of gurus, rendering them appropriate recipients for the practice. The initiation generally consists of four parts, each empowering the disciples with the capacity to engage in a successive practice on the path. First, the vase initiation transforms disciples into vessels suitable for the generation process in which they transform themselves into enlightened beings. Second, the secret initiation renders the disciples suitable vessels for engaging in the practice of the subtle body, composed of chakras, nāḍīs and prāṇas. This practice is based on the practitioner’s own body, in contrast with the following initiation, which relies on another’s body. This is the initiation of enlightened wisdom (jnāna) with a consort (prajnā) that consists of Karmamudrā practice and turns the disciple into a suitable vessel for engaging in meditation on bliss together with a consort. The fourth initiation, which is non-conceptual, empowers the disciples to practice Mahāmudrā.
The Tantric system is generally divided into four cycles. In the lowest of these, that of Action (Kriyā Tantra), only the first initiation, the vase empowerment, is conferred, whereas the fourth one, the Highest Yoga (Anuttara Yoga Tantra), all four initiations are conferred. In the second cycle, that of Performance (Charyā Tantra), and in cycles beyond it, the five initiations of knowledge are conferred. These five initiations transform one’s five afflicting emotions and five aggregates into the five enlightened wisdoms and the five Tathāgatas of the maṇḍala. The water initiation puts out the fire of hatred, actualizes the mirrorlike enlightened wisdom, and transforms the aggregate of form into Vairōcana. The crown initiation destroys the mountain of pride, actualizes the wisdom of equanimity, and transforms the aggregate of feeling into Ratnasambhava. The vajra initiation overcomes the poison of desire, actualizes the aggregate of perception into Amitābha. The bell initiation releases the chains of jealousy, actualizes the enlightened wisdom of accomplishments, and transforms the aggregate of conditionings into Amōghasiddhi. The name initiation dispels the darkness of ignorance, actualizes the enlightened wisdom of the nature of reality, and transforms the aggregate of consciousness into Akṣōbhya.
In the third Tantric cycle, that of Yoga Tantra, the initiation that authorizes the disciples to become teachers or gurus is also conferred. The complete set of initiations conferred in the cycles of the Highest Yoga Tantra enables its recipients to engage in the two main practices – the generation and completion processes. The initiations are of varying degrees of complexity. The effect of the initiation is explained in terms of the disciple’s basis, path and fruit. The basis is the disciple’s ground state before receiving initiation. The initiation purifies the basic condition of the disciples’ body, speech, and mind. In terms of the path, the four initiations endow disciples with the ability to engage in the four practices on the path to enlightenment (the generation process, the practice of the subtle body, the meditation on bliss that relies on a consort, and the Mahāmudrā). The fruit of these practices is an awakened or enlightened being, a Buddha endowed with the four bodies – the emanation body (nirmāṇakāya), the enjoyment body (sambhōgakāya), the dharma embodiment (dharmakāya) and the embodiment of the essential nature (svābhāvikakāya).
The practices begin with the generation process. The generation process is so called because, by means of visualization, practitioners generate themselves as chosen enlightened beings at the center of a maṇḍala. Regardless of the visualization technique, this meditation is a progressive and gradual process, in contrast to the instantaneous practice of the Mahāmudrā. The first purpose of this practice is the purification of ordinary conceptual thoughts. Since classical Buddhism, conceptual modes of thinking have been counted among the core roots of samsāra. Things do not exist in the way they appear to the ordinary mental apparatus. By means of the generation process, ordinary perception of the world and its contents – all its inhabitants – dissolves away and is replaced with the maṇḍala and the enlightened beings inhabiting it. Through such practice, one conceptualization is replaced with another – though the latter conceptualization is somewhat more true since it is in this form that actual reality appears to enlightened beings. However, the shift from one conceptualization to another demonstrates both the relative nature of each and the workings of the human mind in creating such conceptualizations. The nature of mental construction is more apparent with regard to the maṇḍala than with regard to the external world, and this serves to illuminate the dreamlike nature of ordinary reality as well. Eventually, both conceptualizations will dissolve.
The generation process aids not only in recognizing conceptualization as conceptualization but also in utilizing the power of practitioners’ minds to transform and recreate their reality. The control achieved over the visualization of themselves as enlightened beings at the center of the maṇḍala can also be employed for manipulating ordinary reality that has been replaced by this visualization. Once the nature of the workings of the mind is realized, one can, by knowing their true nature, create whatever appearances one wishes. Hence, one can truly transform the ordinary world into that of the divine manḍala, while comprehending the true nature of this new reality.
The second purpose of the generation process is the actual engagement in the meditations of tranquil abiding (śamatā) and penetrative insight (vipaśyana). These two are the paradigmatic meditations of classical Buddhism that the Tantra, being both unable and unwilling to discard, appropriates. The Tantra path maintains that its practice not only fulfills both of these meditations but also supersedes them. Tranquil abiding can be attained through one-pointed concentration on the visualized enlightened being, while penetrative insight can be accomplished by understanding the true nature of this enlightened being as a dreamlike illusion, empty of intrinsic existence. This is in addition to the other attainments of the generation practice.
The third purpose of the generation process is to prepare a basis for the completion process. The fourth purpose is to attain the form body (rūpakāya) of the Buddha. The three or four bodies or embodiments of the Buddha are divided into the form bodies and the dharma embodiment. Whereas the completion process is said to accomplish the latter, the generation process with its visualization of oneself in the form of a chosen enlightened being is considered to effect the realization of the form body.
In addition to the completion process performed in the cycle of the Anuttarayoga Tantra alone, there is yet another practice by the same name that is performed at the conclusion of the generation process in the various Tantric cycles. These two completion processes should not be confused. There are three types of completion processes that belong to the generation process. The first is sealing with the four seals (the seals of union, dharma, action, and the great seal), which effects the realization of the meditator as an enlightened being whose true essence is non-dual emptiness. The second completion process within the generation process is a meditation on the enlightened being as an illusion. Here, a meditation on the form of the enlightened wisdom with all its intricate details, as well as the practitioner’s identification with this form, is infused with a meditation on its illusory empty nature. The purpose of the generation process is not to replace practitioner’s fixations on their ordinary existence and their ordinary world with yet another fixation on themselves as enlightened beings in a wonderful celestial maṇḍala. Therefore, the generation process is not complete without this meditation on those enlightened beings as intangible – a rainbow in the sky, having the nature of light, empty of intrinsic nature, yet another conceptualization of the mind.
This is also the purpose of the third completion process within the generation process, in which the visualization of oneself as an enlightened being at the center of a maṇḍala is gathered back at the end of the meditative session and dissolved into emptiness. Everything that has been created out of the expanse of emptiness dissolves back into this primordial state. This dissolution serves to demonstrate the true nature of the visualization – an empty illusion – and to prevent attachment to the reality created through the generation itself. In Anuttara Yoga Tantra, the emphasis is often shifted from these three forms of completion to the completion process per se.
The essence of this completion process is enlightened wisdom characterized by three qualities – bliss, clarity, and non-conceptuality. The discussion is again arranged in terms of the basis, path, and fruit of the completion process. The true mode of being of the bodily aspect at the disciple’s basis (prior to embarking on the path) is the subtle body that consists of channels, energies, and the pure elements of the white and red drops. Whereas the coarse white and red drops (rakta and śvēta bindus) received from the father and mother respectively – drops that together produce one’s physical body – lead to rebirth in samsāra, the pure white and red drops lead into the spiritual birth of the mind of enlightenment. The true mode of being of the mental aspect at the basis is a great bliss that is primordially empty, devoid of essence, and lacking in any mental construct. By realizing the true mode of being of their bodies, practitioners come to know the crucial points of the meditation; and by realizing the true mode of being of their minds, they come to know the crucial nature of the meaning that they should meditate upon. With the realization of these two true modes of being, they proceed to the path of the completion process, which consists of the three practices into which they are initiated through the three higher empowerments. The first of these is the practice in reliance on one’s own body that, according to our text, consists of the six yogas.