The Heart of Unconditional Love
Page 15
After a while, introduce tonglen: offer the radiant blessing lights of loving-kindness to others with the sound of the mantra, as discussed; then joyfully receive their suffering and confusion in the form of smoke-like darkness with the strength to bear anything for them.
Alternatively, as taught in most tonglen practices, offer blessing lights to others with your out-breath to purify them, and lovingly receive their suffering with your inbreath.
Also, once you purify and transform all beings this way, you can receive loving-kindness in the form of waves of light from them with the sound of the sacred mantra. That becomes the blessings from the Universal Buddha.
Finally, think of and feel the oneness of all beings in loving-kindness and rest in that self-awareness without concepts—the Ultimate Buddha.
If you do tonglen with true loving-kindness from the heart, taking in others’ ills will not affect you negatively. Your unconditional love will dissolve and transform the negativities you take in. So rather than making you sad, ill, or afraid, this meditation will help you overcome fear, sadness, and negative emotions. It will generate amazing merits of strength, confidence, deep joy, and positive karma. And it will strengthen, refine, and perfect your own experience of loving-kindness.
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REBIRTH IN THE PURE LAND
ACCORDING TO BUDDHISM, at the time of death, your body will dissolve into the earth forever—but your mind, or consciousness, will survive and take rebirth somewhere. You may be born as a human being or any other kind of being in an infinite world system that is visible or invisible to us. Some will enjoy pleasant and peaceful lives; others will endure suffering and struggle, all depending on the person’s past habits and deeds (karma).
What Happens After Death
What happens after death depends on your karma and mental habits. Buddhism teaches that if you have generated wholesome mentalities such as peaceful, joyful, loving thoughts in this life and have served others with such qualities, then because of these positive mental habits and deeds, your mind will have a joyful and beneficial rebirth.
Otherwise, if you have saturated your mind in negative emotions like hatred, jealousy, attachment, and confusion, and have hurt others, then you will take rebirth in a world of endless suffering, fear, sadness, and pain, due to these past negative mental habits and deeds.
Buddhism also teaches that if you have accomplished high stages of meditation, such as the perfection of loving-kindness free from concepts, you could attain Buddhahood during your lifetime or while dying. If you attain Buddhahood, you will no longer have to take rebirth because of your karma or mental habits. Instead, you will be able to manifest multiple emanations (tulkus) in various forms to serve others solely out of loving-kindness and compassion.197
The Blissful Pure Land
Even if you haven’t yet attained Buddhahood, if you have accumulated a great amount of merits, you could take rebirth in a Buddha paradise such as the Blissful Pure Land of the Buddha of Infinite Light (Amitabha) and the Buddha of Loving-Kindness (Avalokiteshvara). The Blissful Pure Land is a peaceful and joyful world of light. After taking rebirth in such a pure land, you will advance uninterruptedly on your spiritual journey to attain Buddhahood within one lifetime.
Shakyamuni Buddha taught his followers to meditate on the following “four causes” of taking rebirth in the Blissful Pure Land. The Buddha said:
O Ananda, there are people who [1] think of the details of the Buddha [of Infinite Light and his Pure Land] again and again. [2] They create many, immeasurable merits. [3] They develop bodhichitta. [4] They dedicate their merits and make aspirations to take rebirth in the Blissful Pure Land. When they die . . . they will take rebirth in the universe of the Blissful Pure Land.198
THE FOUR CAUSES OF REBIRTH IN THE PURE LAND
1. Establish the mental habit of being in the Pure Land. Meditate on seeing all images as the images of the light of loving-kindness of the Buddhas, bodhisattvas, and the Blissful Pure Land. Meditate on hearing all sounds as the sounds of wisdom and unconditional love—OM MA-NI PAD-ME HUNG (or, using the name of Amitabha, om amitabha hri). Meditate on enjoying all feelings as the experience of unconditional love. This changes the orientation of our mental perception from being in this mundane world to being in the Pure Land.
If our mind has been trained in seeing the Buddha’s presence and feeling his qualities while we are alive, then all our experiences in the bardo—the transitional period between death and rebirth—will arise as the boundless visions of the radiant presence of the Buddha of Loving-Kindness and his Pure Land, as well as the feelings of total peace, joy, and loving-kindness. These experiences— wisdom and wisdom-light—are the inherent pure qualities of our mind that we awakened in our mindstream through meditation. Then our experience of rebirth, too, will become the continuation of the joyous experience of the Buddha’s qualities.
2. Accumulate merits to create the positive karma to be reborn in the Pure Land. One of the most traditional and comprehensive ways to accumulate merits is to practice the Sevenfold Devotional Practices:
Paying homage and making offerings
Purifying negative deeds
Rejoicing over all virtuous deeds
Praying for the Buddhas and teachers to live long
Praying that they give teachings to all
Dedicating all our merits to all as the cause of their peace, joy, enlightenment, and rebirth in the Pure Land
Especially pray to the Buddha of Loving-Kindness by singing the Six-Syllable Prayer with deep devotion. Then receive the blessing lights of the Buddha’s unconditional love, and enjoy and share them with all, over and over again. This generates the main seed of taking rebirth in the Pure Land.
3. Develop bodhichitta. Generate the aspiration that every mother-being take rebirth in the Pure Land and attain enlightenment. This fully opens and expands your spiritual potential to take birth in the Pure Land and attain enlightenment. This magnifies the power of your meditation and its effect, as you are working for infinite beings wholeheartedly.
4. Dedicate the merits. Dedicate your merits to all beings as the cause of their taking rebirth in the Pure Land for now and for ultimately attaining Buddhahood. Make aspirational prayers for the same. This ensures that the first three causes produce rebirth in the Pure Land.
OR SIMPLY PRAY FOR ALL TO GO TO THE PURE LAND
However, if you simply pray to the Buddha, singing OM MA-NI PAD-ME HUNG with strong devotion and heartfelt loving-kindness for all mother-beings to be born in the Pure Land and attain Buddhahood—that will cover all four causes.
Even if your meditation is not pure or strong enough to take rebirth in the Pure Land, praying with devotion to the Buddha of Loving-Kindness for all beings to be reborn in the Pure Land, will still help you secure a more peaceful and joyful death, journey through the bardo, and have a happier rebirth in a healthier world.
Also, if someone else is dying or dead, with thoughts of loving-kindness toward them and all beings, pray to the Buddha and his Pure Land with devotion and sing OM MA-NI PAD-ME HUNG. Think and feel that the dying or deceased person is also joining you in prayer with devotion from the heart. Visualize that the dying or dead person is receiving blessing lights, lights of loving-kindness from the Buddha. All the negative effects of their unhealthy karma, in the form of darkness, are fully purified. They fully transform into a wholesome person of blessing light of loving-kindness and take instant rebirth (called a “lotus birth”) in the Pure Land.199
So in meditation and daily life, think and feel repeatedly that you are in the Pure Land of the Buddha of Loving-Kindness. See every mother-being as enjoying the Pure Land. Make aspirations for them to be reborn there. Try to remember to pray and enjoy the Buddha’s presence and blessings at the time of death, and especially try to remember him after death. Then you will die peacefully and joyfully, as you will be going to your joyful home, the Pure Land, from which you will be able to serve others. When you leave, a world of peace a
nd joy, the Pure Land, will arise before you for you to take instant rebirth in.200
PART FOUR
THE PRACTICES IN BRIEF
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PRAYER TEXTS
THE FOLLOWING short esoteric meditation distills the essence of the practices we have been discussing. It is an important recitation liturgy and meditation formula on the Buddha of Loving-Kindness that was mystically revealed as a ter by Rigdzin Godem (1337–1408).
This chapter has three sections. The first section, “Preliminary Practices,” corresponding to the First Buddha Stage, includes going for refuge, developing bodhichitta, and a devotional prayer. The second section, “Main Meditation,” corresponds to the Second, Third, and Fourth Buddha Stages. The concluding section is “Dedication and Aspiration Prayers.” If you can, practice all three sections of this chapter in one sitting. However, if you don’t have enough time or are not ready, then you could practice the Preliminary Practices and the Dedication and Aspiration Prayers, focusing mainly on the devotional practices that center on the Six-Syllable Prayer.
Preliminary Practices
GOING FOR REFUGE IN THE THREE JEWELS
We start by going for refuge in the Three Jewels. We take refuge in the Buddha as the guide who leads us to the goal, Buddhahood. We take refuge in the Dharma as the path, including practices like devotion, loving-kindness, and the Six Perfections, in order to reach the goal. We take refuge in the realized Sangha, the religious community of fellow practitioners, as the support for our journey along the path of Dharma to reach the attainment of enlightenment.
Take refuge in the Three Jewels by reciting the following lines with devotion from the depth of your heart with total trust:
To the excellent Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha,
I go for refuge until the attainment of enlightenment.
By the merits of generosity and other virtues,
May we attain Buddhahood for the benefit of all the beings.
[Repeat three times.]
Note that in the third line above, the word “others” refers to the rest of the Six Perfections—that is, the merits of generosity, discipline, patience, diligence, contemplation, and wisdom.
DEVELOPING BODHICHITTA
You are now ready to develop bodhichitta through the four boundless attitudes—loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity—toward all.
May all beings enjoy happiness and the causes of happiness.
May all beings be free from suffering and the causes of suffering.
May all beings never be dissociated from the supreme happiness, free from suffering.
May all beings remain in boundless equanimity, free from both attachment to kin and hatred of foes.
[Repeat three times.]
PRAYER TO THE BUDDHA OF LOVING-KINDNESS
Visualize the Buddha of Loving-Kindness in the sky before you. Think about and feel his unconditional love. Bathe in his loving presence. Fully focusing your mind with devotion and trust in him from the depth of your heart, recite these five lines:
O Blessed One, Buddha of Great Loving-Kindness,
Your complexion is white, as you are unstained by any defect.
Your crown is adorned by the Fully Enlightened One [Amitabha Buddha].
Your eyes of loving-kindness watch over all beings.
O Buddha of Loving-Kindness—to you I pray.201
If you are going to focus on the main meditation, you can do so now without repeating the Six-Syllable Prayer here. Otherwise, sing the Six-Syllable Prayer over and over again, until the experience of the Buddha’s loving-kindness registers deep in your being:
OM MA-NI PAD-ME HUNG
If you can generate true loving-kindness in your heart through devotional prayer to the Buddha of Loving-Kindness, as the Outer Buddha meditation, you will make enormous merits, accomplish spiritual attainments, and be able to serve others greatly.
The Main Meditation
The main meditation embodies what is known in esoteric Buddhism as the development stage and the perfection stage. In essence, they are the trainings in the last three Buddha Stages—the Inner, Universal, and Ultimate Buddhas.
This meditation is the heart essence of the teachings of Sutra and Tantra. It is highly blessed, as it was taught and concealed by Guru Padmasambhava and discovered by Rigdzin Godem as a ter, or mystical revelation. It is warm with the blessed breaths of many Masters, as it has been practiced and transmitted to us through an uninterrupted chain of great adepts.
THE WISH-FULFILLING GEM: THE LITURGY OF THE BUDDHA OF LOVING-KINDNESS
The following is the translation of a brief sadhana, or esoteric liturgy, titled Thugje Chenpo’i Ngöntok Yidzin Norbu.202
Homage to Avalokiteshvara!
HRI! Through the meditation of instant recollection,
I visualize myself [as follows]:
In the emptiness state, on a lotus and moon seat, arises
A white lotus adorned with a hri syllable, which then transforms
Into the Lord of Loving-Kindness, Noble Avalokiteshvara.
His body is radiantly white with one face and four arms.
The palms of his first two hands are joined at his heart.
His second right hand holds a mala of precious crystal.
His second left hand holds a white lotus by the stem.
His face is smiling; his eyes are clear and his nose is high.
His dark bluish hair is swirled up in a bun [at the top of his head].
Above the crown of his head sits the Buddha of Infinite Light, as his Crown Lord.
At the heart of my visualized self
I imagine a blossoming white lotus with six petals. At its center
Is a hri syllable. On the six petals are the Six Syllables:
OM MA-NI PAD-ME HUNG.
Lights are projected from my body [as the Buddha].
All forms become divine forms, the union of emptiness and appearances—
The Great Loving-Kindness One, the King of the Noble Ones.
Lights project from the mantra [syllables at my heart], and all sounds such as the sounds of the elements
Become the sounds of mantra, the union of emptiness and sound.
Recollections and thoughts remain in the state of freedom from arising, abiding, and cessation.
Rest in the realization that transcends all thoughts, expressions, and designations.
By visualizing thus, I recite the Six Syllables, the esoteric mantra,
Hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, and hundreds of thousands of times—clearly.
OM MA-NI PAD-ME HUNG.
Occasionally, offer offerings, praise, and supplications. Dedicate virtuous deeds to the cause of enlightenment. The Wish-Fulfilling Gem: The Liturgy of the Buddha of Loving-Kindness is completed. Samaya. rgya rgya rgya. This text was discovered by Tulku Rigdzin Chenmo203 as a ter from the Western Copper Red Treasure Box. Thus, seeing oneself as indivisible from the body, speech, and mind of the Buddha of Loving-Kindness and contemplating in that state, recite the mantra of the Buddha of Loving-Kindness—OM MA-NI PAD-ME HUNG—hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions, tens of millions, a hundred million times and more.
Dedication and Aspiration Prayers
Between the recitations and meditations, and especially at the end of each meditation session, dedicate the merits accumulated through your prayers, meditations, and virtuous deeds to all mother-beings with great joy, as the cause of their having peace and happiness for now, and ultimately attaining enlightenment. With the dedicated merits as the seed, make heartfelt aspirations for all mother-beings by reciting the following prayers found in the Avatamsaka Sutra,204 the Bodhicharyavatara,205 and other sacred texts:
Just as the conqueror Manjushri realized [the truth]
And as Samantabhadra206 did—
For the purpose of following them,
I fully dedicate all these virtuous deeds.
The precious bodhichitta,
; If it has not yet arisen, may it arise [in all].
If it has arisen, may it never decay.
May it increase further and further.
As long as space remains,
As long as mother-beings remain,
May I remain [in this world] and
Pacify the suffering of mother-beings.
Those beings who are ill,
May they swiftly be healed from their sicknesses.