by Ian Baker
buddha field (sangs rgyas zhing khams) Pure realm or Buddhist paradise inhabited by bodhisattvas. Refers also to a “field” of experience in which one’s true nature becomes vividly apparent. As stated in a Buddhist scripture: “They arise from one’s own mind and have infinite form.”
buddhahood (sangs rgyas) Perfect and complete enlightenment, in which one dwells neither in samsara nor nirvana; the state of having eradicated all obscurations and being endowed with the wisdom of seeing the nature of things as they are and with the wisdom of perceiving all that exists.
buddha-nature (bde gshegs snying po; Skt: tathagatagarbha) The potential for enlightenment or enlightened nature that is inherently present in each sentient being; the essence of mind—distinct from discursive thought—within which all thoughts arise.
central channel (kun ’dar ma, dbu ma; Skt: Avadhūti) The principal channel of subtle energy which runs from the base of the spine to the crown of the head. When psychic energy or wind (rlung; Skt: prana) circulates through the central channel, the yogi recognizes the mind’s fundamental nature of clear light.
chakra (’khor; Skt: cakra) Wheel or junction of subtle energy channels within the body often referred to poetically as “lotuses.” The five principal chakras are located at the crown of the head, the throat, the heart, the navel, and the perineum.
chang Intoxicating beverage made from fermented barley or other grain.
channel (rtsa) Channels, winds, and essences (rtsa, rlung, thig le) are the components of the subtle vajra body. The body’s vital forces (thig le) circulate through three principal energy channels which, in the deluded state, are related to the three poisons: ignorance, attachment, and aversion; in the wisdom state they are related to the three kayas, or dimensions of light, energy, and form. See also Nadi.
charnel ground (dur khrod) A site where bodies are left to decompose or to be eaten by wild animals. Frequented by ghosts and spirits, a charnel ground is considered an optimal environment for advanced practitioners to develop their realization.
chulen (bcud len; Skt: rasayana) Literally, “essence-extract.” An advanced practice based on sustaining the body with essences of medicinal plants, minerals, and elemental energy in order to purify the body, heighten concentration, and remove dependency on ordinary, material food.
cirque A bowl-shaped depression in the headwaters of drainage areas formed by the accumulation of ice and its erosive action on the underlying bedrock.
clear light (‘od gsal; Skt: prabhasvara) The essential nature of mind which is undefinable yet characterized as being of the nature of emptiness and luminosity. It appears when the body’s vital energies have been brought into the central channel and may be related to photons emitted by DNA. Recalling what Wordsworth called “internal brightness,” the mind’s fundamental nature of clear light is the subtle basis for all other mental activity.
compassion (snying rje, thugs rje; Skt: karuna) A key principle of Mahayana Buddhism, describing the motivation and action of a bodhisattva. In the context of Dzogchen, one of the three aspects: essence, nature, and compassion. Compassion here has a much deeper meaning than selfless kindness and the wish to alleviate the suffering of others. It is the natural expression of the indivisibility of emptiness and luminosity.
consciousness In a Buddhist context, consciousness refers to luminous ( gsal ba) awareness (rig pa) which, free of any intrinsic content, knows or apprehends the objects appearing to it.
cyclic existence (Skt: samsara) The cycle of death and rebirth characterized by suffering and dissatisfaction arising from ignorance of the true nature of reality.
daka (dpa ’bo) Male counterpart of dakinis; enlightened male practitioner of Tantric Buddhism.
dakini (mkha’ ’gro ma) Literally, “one who goes in the sky.” Spiritual beings who fulfill enlightened activities and intentions; female Tantric deities who protect and serve the Buddhist doctrine and practitioners. Also refers to enlightened female practitioners of Tantric Buddhism as well as nodal energies within the subtle channels. Representing the fertile open space out of which the play of samsara and nirvana arises, dakinis are tricky and playful. They inspire the union of skillful means and penetrating awareness and represent the inspirational impulses of consciousness that lead to understanding and wisdom.
dalai lama A title signifying ocean of wisdom, given to a line of incarnations beginning with the Tibetan master dGe ’dun grub in the fourteenth century. The Dalai Lamas are regarded as earthly incarnations of Avalokiteshvara, the Bodhisattva of Great Compassion.
danang (dag snang) Pure perception, or literally “seeing inside”; denotes a sacred outlook arising from the experience of the phenomenal world as a pure expanse of emptiness and luminosity; often associated with the vision of landscape by Tantric lamas during dream, meditation, or other altered states of consciousness; from a Buddhist standpoint, seeing things as they actually are.
deity ( yidam) In Tibetan Buddhism, deities represent the true nature of one’s own mind. On a relative level they embody varying expressions of wisdom and compassion through which the practitioner attains liberation.
delusion (Skt: klesha) The three principal delusions are ignorance, aversion, and attachment. The destruction of these and their instincts bestows nirvana.
dharma (chos) The teaching of the Buddha; the true nature of phenomena and mental events.
dharmakaya (chos sku) The realm of truth; the mental or unmanifest aspect of the three kayas, devoid of constructs. The body of enlightened qualities.
dorje (Skt: vajra) Literally, “diamond” or “thunderbolt,” but generally refers to a ritual implement used in Tantric rites to symbolize compassion and skillful means as well as the indestructible adamantine nature of enlightened mind.
dorje pagmo (Skt: Vajravarahi) Literally, “Adamantine Sow.” Female Tantric deity embodying the practitioner’s enlightened nature. Her sow head ornament represents the transformation of ignorance into pristine awareness. “Queen” of all dakinis.
dualistic vision (gnyis ’dzin) Experience structured as perceiver and object perceived.
dzo A yak-cow hybrid, bred for their greater milk production. The female is known as a dzomo.
dzogchen (Skt: Mahasandhi or Atiyoga) Literally, “the Great Perfection.” The third of the three inner tantras in the Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, Dzogchen emphasizes direct insight into the primordial purity of all phenomena and the spontaneous presence of the Buddha’s qualities in all beings.
ecotourism A branch of the tourism industry that strives to minimize ecological or other damage to areas visited for their natural or cultural interest.
eightfold path Virtuous practices conducive to the annihilation of ignorance and craving. The Buddha’s Noble Truth of the Way to the Termination of Suffering, namely: Right View, Right Resolve, Right Speech, Right Conduct, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Awareness, and Right Meditation.
emptiness (stong pa nyid; Skt: sunyata) The fact that phenomena and the ego are empty of, or lack, any unchanging, intrinsic essence or existence. Although things are ultimately empty, they nevertheless are said to exist conventionally in dependence on causes and conditions. See Sunyata.
enlightenment (byang chub; Skt: bodhi) Awakening to Buddhahood from the sleep of ignorance; perfect knowledge.
five buddha families The five families (rigs lnga) of buddha, vajra, ratna, padma, and karma correspond ultimately with the purified aspects of the five psychophysical aggregates of consciousness, recognition, feeling, mental formation, and form. The five Buddha consorts are the pure form of the five elements. Earth: Mamaki, consort of Ratnasambhava. Water: Buddha Locana, consort of Akshobhya. Fire: Pandara Vasini, consort of
Amitabha. Air: Samaya Tara, consort of Amoghasiddhi. Space: Akasha Datishvari, consort of Vairochana.
ganachakra (tshog kyi ’khor lo) A Tantric feast offering in which desire and sense perceptions are made part of the path, and phenomenal existence is celebrated in its intrinsic purity.
garuda (T: khyung) Mythical bird that preys on nagas and which is said to be able to travel from one end of the universe to the other with a single movement of its wings.
gelug (dge lugs) A later school of Tibetan Buddhism founded by Je Tsongkhapa as a reformation of the Kadam tradition of Atisha Dipamkara. The present head is His Holiness the fourteenth Dalai Lama.
gnosis A term used by heterodox Christians to refer to a subjective and immediate experience of truth. Gnostics advocated dwelling in an internal “effortlessness” suffused with the energy and power of the Divine Source. “Whoever has not known himself has known nothing,” states the gnostic Book of Thomas the Contender, “but he who has known himself has at the same time already achieved knowledge about the depth of all things.”
great bliss (bde ba chen po; Skt: mahasukha) Joy transcending pleasure, pain, hope, and fear and inferring total existential freedom in the wisdom of bliss and emptiness beyond conceptual thought. The uncompounded quality of changelessness. Great bliss of the lower gate (’og sgo bde chen) refers to the union with another’s body (gzhan lus snyoms ’jug).
great game The term given by the novelist Rudyard Kipling to the often deadly struggle between the British and Russian empires for political ascendancy in Tibet and central Asia. Between the 1830s and 1890s, Russians and Britons, assisted by native agents, penetrated the unknown and forbidden cities of this romantic and wild region, often incognito. Played out by soldiers, spies, explorers, archaeologists and cartographers, many perished in the attempt.
heart center Depending on the context, refers either to the heart chakra or to the center of the heart chakra where the body’s subtlemost winds (rlung) and vital energies are said to reside as a five-colored luminous sphere.
heruka (he ru ka, khrag ’thung) A wrathful manifestation of Tantric energy; activation of the positive qualities of the mind; the masculine principle of energy and skillful means that makes situations powerful and creative. The Tibetan word means blood drinker, that which drinks the blood of ego-clinging, doubt, and dualistic confusion.
hevajra tantra (kye rdo rje’i rgyud ) A Tantra based on the semiwrathful heruka, Hevajra. He is an exclamation of joy. Hevajra transforms sense pleasures and form into joy through realizing the identity of form and emptiness. Hevajra is depicted in four-, six-, and twelve-armed forms, dancing in union with his consort, Nairatmya, the embodiment of pure selflessness.
highest yoga tantra (bla na med pa’irnyal ‘byor; Skt: anuttarayogatantra) The highest system of Tantric theory and practice according to the Gelug and other later traditions of Tibetan Buddhism. It includes advanced techniques for controlling and manipulating the body’s vital energies, making enlightenment possible in a single lifetime.
ignorance (ma rig pa; Skt: avidya) The root of cyclic existence, not knowing the way in which things actually exist.
kangling Ritual trumpet fashioned from a human thigh bone and used to invoke spirits and cut through conceptual thought.
karma (las) Literally, “action.” A willed action of body, speech, and mind, and the impression or seed this leaves on one’s personal continuum, which must eventually ripen and produce a result; the causal connections between actions and their consequences.
khampa A Tibetan from the eastern province of Kham, a region known both for its fierce warriors and enlightened sages.
khata A silk offering scarf often inscribed with auspicious symbols and signifying purity and goodwill in all transactions.
kora (Skt: parikrama) Ritual circumambulation around a holy object or shrine, an action believed to confer merit and align one with spiritual forces.
korde rushen Literally, “separating samsara and nirvana.” Introductory Dzogchen practices involving psychodrama, physical yoga, visualization, and mantra to reveal the nature of mind by dynamically cultivating altered states of awareness.
kukri A curved machetelike knife widely used throughout the Himalayas for everything from chopping firewood to sacrificing animals.
liberation (thar pa) Freedom from all compulsive karmic patterns, mental obscurations, delusion, and discontent. Emancipation from samsaric existence.
lopa Tibetan word for primitive forest-dwelling tribal peoples inhabiting the southern slopes of the eastern Himalayas, including Mishmis, Adis, Daflas, and other groups in India’s northeastern frontier.
luminosity (’od gsal ) Literally, “free from the darkness of unknowing and endowed with the ability to cognize.” The two aspects are empty luminosity, like a clear open sky, which is the cognizant quality of the nature of mind; and manifest luminosity, such as five-colored lights, images, and so forth. Luminosity is the uncompounded nature present throughout all of samsara and nirvana, as well as an experience arising through meditation, possibly associated with DNA’s inherent bioluminescence.
mandala (dkyil ’khor) Literally, “concentric circle”; a mandala is a symbolic, graphic representation of a Tantric deity’s realm of existence and, more generally, a symbol of the infinitely pure sphere of consciousness and perfection of being; an integral dimension purified of all dualistic concepts. The Tibetan word dkyil ’khor means center and periphery. It is the unification of many vast elements into one, through the experience of meditation. Seeming complexity and chaos are simplified into a pattern and natural hierarchy. The outer world, one’s body and state of mind, and the totality can all be seen as mandala. The constructed form of a mandala has as its basic structure a palace with a center and four gates in the cardinal directions.
mantra (sngags) Mystic syllables, usually Sanskrit, recited in conjunction with the visualization of a particular tantric deity; a means of transforming energy through sound.
merit (bsod nams) The positive karmic result of virtuous action.
milarepa (mi la ras pa) 1040-1123. A famous Tibetan yogi renowned for his mystic poetry and mastery of the Tantric yogas. “Repa” means cotton-clad and designates yogins proficient in tummo who, as a result of raising their body temperature, wore only a single cotton cloth despite Tibet’s cold winters.
monpa Non-Tibetan forest-dwelling people generally inhabiting the southern slopes of the Himalayas, parts of southeastern Tibet, and northern Myanmar.
nadi (rtsa) The channels of vital energy in the subtle body. In Highest Yoga Tantra, the practitioner meditates on the nadis, prana, and bindu (rtsa, rlung, thig-le) to realize the fundamental mind of Clear Light. In this context prana is likened to a horse, mind-consciousness to the rider, and nadis to the pathways.
naga (klu) Powerful long-lived serpentlike beings who inhabit bodies of water and often guard great treasure. They belong half to the animal realm and half to the god realm. They generally live in the form of snakes, but many can change into human form and they are often depicted as human from the waist up with a serpent’s tail below. They are said to control the weather, especially rain, and are associated with fertility.
né ( gnas) Sacred site, power place, or place of pilgrimage. Lamas distinguished between two types of nés: rangjung-ki-ney and chinlap-ki-ney, self-manifested natural power places as well as ones that result from the blessing power of highly realized masters.
nectar (bdûd rtsi; Skt: amrita). Literally, “deathless.” Nectar of immortality, ambrosia (conferring immortality or other powers). Blessed liquor, used in Vajrayana rites and meditation practices. More generally, spiritual intoxication. Can also refer to internal glandular secretions resulting from the practice o
f Tantric yoga.
neyig ( gnas yig) Guide, or description of a Buddhist holy place, often in the form of a revealed text.