| Philosophy and Religion / The twenty-eight categories of yogic precepts. |
Gampopa (Dvagpo-Lharje)
XXVIII. The Ten Great Joyful Realizations
(1) It is a great joy to realize that the mind of all sentient beings is inseparable from the All-Mind.1
(2) It is a great joy to realize that the Fundamental Reality is qualityless.2
(3) It is a great joy to realize that in the infinite, thought-transcending Knowledge of Reality all saṃsāric differentiations are non-existent.3
(4) It is a great joy to realize that in the state of primordial [or uncreated] mind there existeth no disturbing thought-process.
(5) It is a great joy to realize that in the Dharma-Kāya, wherein mind and matter are inseparable, there existeth neither any holder of theories nor any support of theories.4
(6) It is a great joy to realize that in the self-emanated, compassionate Sambhoga-Kāya there existeth no birth, death, transition, or any change.5
(7) It is a great joy to realize that in the self-emanated, divine Nirmāṇa-Kāya there existeth no feeling of duality.6
(8) It is a great joy to realize that in the Dharma-Chakra there existeth no support for the soul doctrine.7
(9) It is a great joy to realize that in the Divine, Boundless Compassion [of the Bodhisattvas] there existeth neither any shortcomings nor any showing of partiality.
(10) It is a great joy to realize that the Path to Freedom which all the Buddhas have trodden is ever-existent, ever un-changed, and ever open to those who are ready to enter upon it.
These are The Ten Great Joyful Realizations.
[The Conclusion]
Herein, above, is contained the essence of the immaculate words of the Great Gurus, who were endowed with Divine Wisdom; and of the Goddess Tārā and other divinities. Among these Great Teachers were the glorious Dīpaṃkara,8 the spiritual father and his successors, who were divinely appointed for the spreading of the Doctrine in this Northern Land of Snow; and the Gracious gurus of the Kahdampa School.
There were also that King of Yogins, Milarepa, to whom was bequeathed the learning of the Sage Marpa of Lhobrak and others; and the illustrious Saints, Naropa and Maitripa, of the noble land of India, whose splendour equaled that of the Sun and Moon; and the disciples of all these.
Here endeth The Supreme Path, the Rosary of Precious Gems.
[The Colophon]
This treatise was put into manuscript form by Digom Sonam Rinchen,9 who possessed through knowledge of the teachings of the Kahdampas and Chagchenpas.10
It is commonly believed that the Great Guru Gampopa, [otherwise known as Dvagpo-Lharge], compiled this work, and that he handed it on with his injunction: ‘I entreat those devotees of generations yet unborn, who will honour my memory and regret not having met me in person, to study this, The Supreme Path, the Rosary of Precious gems, and, also The precious Ornament of Liberation, along with other religious treatises. The result will be equivalent to that of an actual meeting with me myself.
May this book radiate divine virtue; and may it prove to be auspicious.
Mangalam11
Footnotes
1. Or the Dharma-Kāya, the 'Divine Body of Truth', viewed as the All-Mind.
2. Qualities are purely saṃsāric, i.e. of the phenomenal universe. To the Fundamental Reality, to the Thatness, no characteristics can be applied. In It all saṃsāric, things, all qualities, all conditions, all dualities, merge in transcendent at-one-ness.
3. In the Knowledge (or Realization) of Reality all partial or relative truths are recognized as parts of the One Truth, and no differentiations such as lead to the establishing of opposing religions and sects, each perhaps pragmatically in possession of some partial truth, is possible.
4. To the truth-seeker, whether in the realm of physical or of spiritual science, theories are essential; but once any truth, or fact, has been ascertained, all theories concerning it are useless. Accordingly, in the Dharma-Kāya, or State of the Fundamental Truth, no theory is necessary or conceivable; it is the State of Perfect Enlightenment, of the Buddhas in Nirvāṇa.
5. The Sambhoga-Kāya, or 'Divine Body of Perfect Endowment', symbolizes the state of spiritual communion in which all Bodhisattvas exist when not incarnate on Earth, similar to that implied by the communion of saints. Like the Dharma-Kāya, of which it is the self-emanated primary reflex, the Sambhoga-Kāya is a state wherein birth, death, transitions, and change are transcended.
6. The Nirmāṇa-Kāya, or 'Divine Body of Incarnation', the secondary reflex of the Dharma-Kāya, is the Body, or Spiritual State, in which abide all Great Teachers, or Bodhisattvas, incarnate on earth. The Dharma-Kāya, being beyond the realm of saṃsāric sense perceptions, cannot be sensuously perceived. Hence the mind of the yogin when realizing It ceases to exist as finite mind, as something apart from It.
In other words, in the state of transcendent samādhic ecstasy wherein the Dharma-Kāya is realized, finite mind attains to at-one-ment with its Source, the Dharma-Kāya. Likewise, in the state of the Nirmāṇa-Kāya, the Divine and the Sentient, Mind and Matter, Noumena and Phenomena, and all the dualities, blend in at-one-ment. And this the Bodhisattva, when in the fleshly body, intuitively feels; he knows that neither he himself, nor any sensuous or objective thing, has a separate or independent existence apart from the Dharma-Kāya.
For a more detailed exposition of this fundamental Mahāyānic doctrine of the 'Three Divine Bodies' (Skt. Tri-Kāya) the student is referred to The Tibetan Book of the Dead.
7. The truths proclaimed by the Buddha are symbolized by the Dharma-Chakra (the 'Wheel of Truth') which He set in motion when He first preached the truths to his disciples, in the Deer Park, near Benares. In the time of the Enlightened One, and long before then, the animistic belief in a permanent ego, or self, in an unchanging soul (Skt. ātmā), i.e. in personal immortality, was as widespread in India and the Far East as it is in Europe and America now. He denied the validity of this doctrine; and nowhere in the Buddhist Scriptures, or Dharma, of either Southern or Northern Buddhism, is there any support for it.
8. Dīpaṃkara[Śrījñāna], as given in our text, is the Indian name of Atiśa, the first of the Great Reformers of Lāmaism, who was born in Bengal, of the royal family of Gaur, in A.D. 980, and arrived in Tibet in 1038. Having been a professor of philosophy in the Vikramaśilā Monastery, of Magadha, he brought with him to Tibet much fresh learning, chiefly relating to Yoga and Tantricism. His chief work, as a reformer, was by enforcing celibacy and a higher priestly morality. Atiśa associated himself with the sect called the Kahdampas, or 'Those Bound by the Ordinances'.
Three hundred and fifty years later, under the second of the Great Reformers, Tsongkhapa, a territorial title meaning 'Native of the Onion Country', the district of his birth, in Amdo Province, in North-East Tibet near the Chinese frontier, the Kahdampas became the Gelugpas, or 'Followers of the Virtuous Order', who now constitute the Established Church of Tibet.
9. Text: Hbri-sgom Bsod-nams Rin-chen (pronounced Di-gom So-nam Rin-chen), meaning, 'Meditating One of Precious Merit, of the Cave of the Cow-Yak'.
10. These are the followers of the yogic teachings contained in the Chag-chen Philosophy.
11. The Tibetan-Sanskrit of the text, literally meaning, 'Blessing' or 'Happiness'; or, in reference to this Book, 'May blessing be upon it'.
YOU MAY ALSO LIKE
