Bonpo Dzogchen Teachings
according to LOPON TENZIN NAMDAK
Transcribed and edited, together with Introduction and Notes, by John Myrdhin Reynolds
Preface to the First Edition
During 1991, the Bonpo Dzogchen master, Lopon Tenzin Namdak, visited the West twice, coming first to Europe and later to America, where he taught a number of meditation retreats and gave a series of public talks on Bon and Dzogchen. In March and April, Lopon Rinpoche taught a meditation retreat focusing on the practice of Dzogchen at Bischofshofen, south of Salzburg in the Austrian Alps, and several weeks later he gave a series of talks on Dzogchen at the Drigung Kagyu Centre in Vienna. After that he went to Italy where he taught two retreats in Rome, and also briefly visited Merigar in Tuscany, the retreat center of Namkhai Norbu Rinpoche. Coming to England next, the Lopon taught a ten-day Dzogchen retreat in Devon in the west of England, at a locale near Totnes, and after that he gave several talks in London. Proceeding later to Amsterdam, he taught a five-day retreat on Dzogchen in the city at the beginning of June. With the exception of the Italian visit, I was present on all of these occasions and served as a facilitator and sometime translator for the teachings.
Then in October, Lopon Rinpoche visited New York city at the invitation of H.H. the Dalai Lama and Tibet House, to par¬ticipate in the Kalachakra Initiation and in other activities con¬nected with the Year of Tibet. In particular, the Lopon was the first speaker in the afternoon series called “Nature of the Mind Teachings.” During the Devon retreat, the Lopon had prepared a brief paper on the Bonpo teachings for presentation in this series in New York. I translated this into English as “The Condensed Meaning of an Explanation of the Teachings of Yungdrung Bon” and this has been published elsewhere. [1] During his time in x ~ Preface to the First Edition
New York city, the Lopon gave three further talks, at which I was again the facilitator as I had been in Europe. Towards the end of the month, at the invitation of the Dzogchen Community of Conway, known as Tsegyalar, the Lopon gave a weekend seminar at Amherst College in western Massachusetts. In November, I met up with the Lopon in San Francisco where, again at the invitation of the Dzogchen Community, he gave a two-day seminar on Guru Yoga practice. After that he went to Coos Bay, Oregon, where for eight days he held a retreat on the Dzogchen teachings.
On these occasions also I served as facilitator and translator and made detailed notes on the teachings. These notes again served as the basis of the transcripts found herein of the Lopon’s teachings in America. Although the Lopon spoke in English, on many occasions he asked me to translate technical terms and help clarify various other technical points. All of this I recorded in my notes. In order to further clarify matters, he requested that after each portion of the teaching I repeat from my notes what he had said. So the transcripts found here result from our collaboration together. Nevertheless, I alone must take responsibility for any errors that might be found. I have done some editing of the tran¬scripts, adding any additional clarifications required as well as any sentences needed to link the various paragraphs or topics. But generally, I have left the language in the style of the Lopon’s oral presentation and have not rendered the text into a literary presen¬tation since the present collection of teachings is not envisioned as a commercial publication, but as an aid for practitioners of Dzogchen.
I have included only transcripts directly related to the Lo¬pon’s teachings on Dzogchen, and to where the views of Sutra and Tantra are contrasted with that of Dzogchen. The Lopon’s teachings on Guru Yoga, the Rite of the Guardians, specific Tan¬tric teachings such as the practice of Zhang-zhung Meri, and so on, as well as the Dzogchen teachings from specific texts of the Zhang-zhung Nyan-gyud, are found elsewhere in the publications of the Bonpo Translation Project. [2]
I began working on the translation of Bonpo Dzogchen texts first with Geshe Tenzin Wangyal in Italy some years ago, and continued doing this with Lopon Tenzin Namdak on his three visits to the West. As a consequence of this work, I organized the Bonpo Translation Project in order to make translations of Bonpo texts and prepare transcripts and monographs on the Bonpo tra¬dition available for interested students and practitioners in the West.
Before the arrival of these two learned Bonpo Lamas in the West, my interest in the Bon tradition was stimulated by Nam- khai Norbu Rinpoche, head of the Dzogchen Community. Rin¬poche, although not a Bonpo Lama himself, was for many years interested in the Bonpo tradition because he was researching the historical roots of the pre-Buddhist Tibetan culture known as Bon. [3] He was also very interested in discovering the historical sources of Dzogchen teachings, for which there exist two authen¬tic lineages from at least the eighth century CE, one found among the Nyingmapas and the other found among the Bonpos. [4] More than any other Tibetan teacher, Namkhai Norbu Rinpoche has played a key role in transmitting Dzogchen teachings to the West, and for this he has the profound gratitude of all of us.
For their help and assistance in various ways during the re¬treats with Lopon Rinpoche and also later while compiling and editing these transcripts, I wish to thank Gerrit Huber, Waltraud Benzing, Dagmar Kratochwill, Dr. Andrea Loseries-Leick, Armin Akermann, Ken Rivad, Tim Walker, Lee Bray, Florens van Can- stein, Michael Katz, Des Berry, Dennis Waterman, Bob Kragen, Michael Taylor, Anthony Curtis, and last, but not least, Khenpo Nyima Wangyal and Geshe Tenzin Wangyal. It is also my hope here as translator and editor that this small collection of Lopon Tenzin Namdak’s teachings on Dzogchen according to the Bonpo tradition, its view and its practice, will prove of use and benefit to Western students and practitioners of Dzogchen.
MU-TSUG SMAR-RO
John Myrdhin Reynolds (Vajranatha),
March 1992
Preface to the New Edition
Even though these teachings on Dzogchen were given by Lo- pon Tenzin Namdak Rinpoche some years ago in 1991, and have circulated privately as transcripts, they remained in need of some further editing regarding repetitions and annotations. This has been provided here, as well as a new introduction to Bon in gen¬eral, and some further material on the education given to young monks and nuns at Lopon Rinpoche’s monastery in Kathmandu, Triten Norbutse (Khri-brten nor-bu’i rise). This further material is found in the appendix. The monastery is primarily an educa¬tional institution for monks and nuns, aimed at preserving and perpetuating the ancient culture of Bon, rather than a residential monastery. After finishing their education here, the former stu¬dents will go elsewhere and serve as teachers or enter lay life. Students are drawn from the Bonpo areas of Nepal, such as Dolpo and Mustang, as well as from Tibet itself, where a tradi¬tional Bonpo education is becoming progressively more difficult to obtain.
The educational program at Triten Norbutse includes the thirteen-year course in Geshe studies at the Dialectics School or Lama College (bshad-grwa), at present under the direction of the chief teacher of the Dialectics School (mtshan-nyid bshad-grwa dpon-slob), Lopon Tsangpa Tenzin. The focus is on the philoso¬phical studies (mtshan-nyid) found in the Bonpo tradition, and on cultivating skills in correct thinking and the art of debate (rtsod- pa). In addition, a number of traditional secular sciences (rig- gnas) are studied and mastered. Upon completion of the course and passing several examinations, the student is awarded a Geshe xiv ~ Preface to the New Edition
degree (dge-bshes), the equivalent of a Western doctorate. Inde-pendent of this program in Geshe studies, there is also a Medita¬tion School (sgrub-grwa) at the monastery which has a four-year program for the study and practice of the four major systems of Dzogchen found in the Bonpo tradition. Whereas in the Dialec¬tics School, the emphasis is on academic study and learning the skills of debate, here the emphasis is on the actual meditation practices of Dzogchen in a semi-retreat situation. This school is at present under the direction of its Abbot (sgrub-grwa mkhan-po), Kenpo Tsultim Tenzin. During these courses of study and prac¬tice, the students are housed and fully supported by the monas-tery. Frequently young monks and nuns come as refugees from Tibet seeking a Bonpo education and possess no funds of their own at all.
With Lopon Rinpoche now in retirement at the age of 80, the monastery is under the able direction of its present Abbot, Khenpo Tenpa Yungdrung. However, Lopon Rinpoche continues to teach on occasion at the monastery, in sessions open to both monks and lay people, and also to Westerners at his new medita¬tion center in France, Shenten Dargye Ling, near Saumur in the Loire region, south-west of Paris. Moreover, Lopon Rinpoche’s collected works (gsung ’bum) in thirteen volumes were published last year by the monastery. A number of Geshes at the monastery, with the help of modern computer technology provided by Jap¬anese friends, have been digitalizing the basic Bonpo texts which are studied at the monastery, including those of Dzogchen. The texts are then published in India and Nepal for the use of stu¬dents.
Now that Bon is becoming increasingly recognized in the West as an important spiritual tradition in its own right, and as an original component of the Tibetan culture and civilization which continues and even thrives today both in Tibet and in exile, it was felt that these teachings of Lopon Rinpoche on Dzogchen should be republished for a wider reading audience. My thanks, as the
editor of these teachings, go to Vajra Publishing of Kathmandu for undertaking this project, to Elisabeth Egonviebre for provid¬ing the photographs included here, and to Dr. Christine Daniels for her editorial and other help while completing this project. I would especially like to thank Khenpo Tenpa Yungdrung for sup¬plying additional information on the expanded educational pro¬gram at Triten Norbutse. It is my prayer that these rare explana¬tions of Lopon Tenzin Namdak Yongdzin Rinpoche, being excep¬tionally lucid and clear, will help to clarify the relationship be¬tween Dzogchen and Madhyamaka, Chittamatra, Tantra and Mahamudra, for interested Western students.
MU-TSUG SMAR-RO!
John Myrdhin Reynolds (Vajranatha),
Kathmandu, Nepal, Losar, February 2006
14 ~ introduction to Bon
was the famous lengthy hagiography of Tonpa Shenrab known as the gZi-brjid, dictated to Lodan Nyingpo (bLo-ldan snying-po, b.1360) by the ancient sage Tangchen Mutsa Gyermed (sTang- chen dMu-tsha gyer-med) of Zhang-zhung. [16] This classifica¬tion is quite similar to the Nyingmapa classification of its canon of scriptures into bka’-ma and gter-ma. [17] This form of Old Bon has flourished in western and central Tibet down to our own day.
The teachings of Bon revealed by Tonpa Shenrab are classi¬fied differently in the three traditional hagiographical accounts of his life. In general, Tonpa Shenrab was said to have expounded Bon in three cycles of teachings:
1. The Nine Successive Vehicles to Enlightenment (theg-pa rim dgu);
2. The Four Portals of Bon and the fifth which is the Treasury (sgo bzhi mdzod Inga);
3. The Three Cycles of Precepts that are Outer, Inner and Secret (bka’ phyi nang gsang skor gsum). [18]
These Nine Ways or Nine Successive Vehicles to Enlighten¬ment are delineated according to three different systems of hid¬den treasure texts (gter-ma) that were said to have been concealed during the earlier persecutions of Bon and rediscovered in later centuries. These hidden treasure systems are designated according to the locations where the concealed texts were rediscovered:
1. The System of the Southern Treasures (lho gter lugs): these were the treasure texts rediscovered at Drigtsam Thakar (’brig-mtsham mtha’ dkar) in southern Tibet and at Paro (spa- gro) in Bhutan. Here the Nine Ways are first divided into the Four Causal Ways which contain many myths and magical
shamanic rituals, and which principally concern working with energies for worldly benefits. Then there are the five higher spiritual ways known as the Fruitional Ways. Here the pur¬pose is not to gain power or to ensure health and prosperity in the present world, but realization of the ultimate spiritual goal of liberation from the suffering experienced in the cycles of rebirth within Samsara. The final and ultimate vehicle found here in this nine-fold classification is that of Dzogchen.
2. The System of the Central Treasures (dbus gter lugs): these treasure texts were rediscovered at various sites in central Ti¬bet, including the great Buddhist monastery of Samye (bsam- yas). In general, this classification of the Bonpo teachings is quite similar to the system of the Nine Vehicles found in the traditions of the Nyingmapa school of Tibetan Buddhism. Some of these Bonpo texts are said to have been introduced from India into Tibet by the great native-born Tibetan trans¬lator Vairochana of Pagor, who translated works from both the Buddhist and the Bonpo traditions. [19]
3. The System of the Northern Treasures (byang gter lugs): these treasure texts were rediscovered at various locations north of central Tibet. However, according to Lopon Tenzin Namdak, not much is currently known regarding this system. [20]
