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An Introduction to the Chanting - Lineage of the Guru Puja

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An Introduction to the Chanting

In this second teaching in the Guru Puja is the Heart Practice series, Lama Zopa Rinpoche primarily focuses on the chanting aspect of the puja.

First Rinpoche introduces why it is important to learn the chanting, the different lineages of chanting, the motivation for chanting, and how to set about learning the chanting.

Then Rinpoche begins teaching three different speeds of chanting to be used for the Guru Puja in the FPMT lineage.

This book covers the chanting and practice instructions for the sections from Taking Refuge to the Invocation of the Merit Field (LC 1-17).

Rinpoche’s own chanting of the FPMT lineage for the Guru Puja is presented here using two different sources: audio from Light of the Path, USA 2009 and video from Lama Zopa Australia, Bendigo 2014.


THE IMPORTANCE OF LEARNING THE CHANTING


I think it’s very important for everybody to learn the chanting for the Guru Puja, Nyung nä and a few other practices that are normally done together.

Of course anybody can learn the chanting, but I think particularly the sangha should put more effort to learn it well.

There is also the chanting used for the Vajrayogini practices, but more important is to learn how to lead those practices that are usually done in public and everyone can join in, like the Medicine Buddha and Cittamani Tara pujas.

If you know how to chant the pujas you don’t have to read them in English all the time, just blah, blah, blah, because the English can’t be chanted.

It is more pleasant to chant the pujas and can also be more effective for the mind. If the chanting is good it can move the mind.


One reason for chanting is to give time for meditation. Another reason for chanting is as an offering and to inspire the mind.

The lineage lamas of the lamrim who achieved enlightenment created the chanting to be used for meditation—for the blessings of the chanting to soften the mind that is harder than a rocky mountain.

If the chanting is good, it can transform the mind into Dharma, into devotion and compassion, and bring it closer to the realizations.

“If the chanting is good, it can transform the mind into Dharma, into devotion and compassion, and bring it closer to the realizations.”

Of course if the person’s chanting makes you laugh—well, that might be a good medicine for depression! If someone who is very depressed sits next to that person, it might cure their depression and bring them some mental peace.

The older students will know Piero from Italy.

When he sits next to me, I cannot chant. His chanting goes all over the place “ooooooooh” and I lose stability. I get controlled by his voice.

One reason why its good for the sangha to learn the chanting is because it is more likely that they will be asked to lead the practices wherever they go, especially at the centers.

So if they know how to chant the prayers it is more pleasant and moving for the mind, rather than just going blah, blah, blah.


Three speeds of chanting

It’s also very important to understand that the puja can be done in an elaborate, medium or short way according to the time available.

It doesn’t have to be fixed.

I heard that one time somebody at one of our centers asked if there could be a Guru Puja and they were told that it wasn’t possible because there was only one and half hours available and the puja takes two hours.

That’s very silly! The person who gave that answer only had one idea of how to chant the puja. They didn’t realize there are longer and shorter ways of chanting.

For example, His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s translator, Thubten Jinpa, does the Guru Puja in five minutes—I mean that is his daily commitment, not leading it in public.

Still, maybe you can get the lineage from him and do that too! I heard that Doboom Rinpoche does it in 90 seconds.


I think what happened is that in the early days a tape from the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives in Dharamsala went all over the FPMT centers and that is what people were using for the chanting. Everybody was chanting in a similar way, neither fast nor slow.

But the Guru Puja can be chanted in an elaborate, middle, or fast way in Tibetan. Of course in English it is difficult because the English can’t be chanted, but you have so much freedom in Tibetan.

In fact, most of the time the Tibetan can be chanted faster than reading the English. So it’s ridiculous to think you can’t do the puja any faster or slower. That is just funny.

It is up to the chant leader, the umdze, to determine how fast or slow the chanting is done.

It depends very much on the audience.

If you are doing the puja with Westerners, it doesn’t make sense to chant very quickly in Tibetan, it is better to read the English.

But if you are leading the chanting with Tibetans present, it is good to chant more in Tibetan.

Sometimes you might find you are leading a puja and there are many new people present and not everybody has faith in tantra. This may not be a problem with Westerners but in other countries it may be better to chant the secret parts in Tibetan.

I’m not sure if those people would read the book, but at least chanting in Tibetan rather than reading in English has the benefit that people won’t understand those secret things.

Anyway, my suggestion is that it is good to know the elaborate, middle, fast and even fastest way to chant. Otherwise you will have a very stubborn mind and stubborn idea.


Some things can be read in English


Of course some things can be done in English. For example, the lamrim section (LC 84-114) in the Guru Puja can sometimes be chanted in Tibetan but is mostly better read in English. Except for the verse on taking and giving (tonglen)


LC 95

DE NA JE TSÜN LA MA THUG JE CHÄN

And thus, perfect, pure, compassionate gurus,

MA GYUR DRO WÄI DIG DRIB DUG NGÄL KÜN

I seek your blessings that all negativities, obscurations

and sufferings of mother migrators

MA LÜ DA TA DAG LA MIN PA DANG

May without exception ripen upon me right now,

DAG GI DE GE ZHÄN LA TANG WA YI

And that by giving my happiness and virtue to others

DRO KÜN DE DANG DÄN PAR JIN GYI LOB

All migrators may experience happiness.


This verse can be read once in English to get an idea of the meaning. Then chanted nicely and very slowly to give everyone enough time to meditate on the practice of taking and giving described in the verse.

If the chanting is done quickly, unless the person is well trained, they won’t have enough time to meditate on the meaning. Some people might be able to finish the practice of taking but not the giving—that sometimes happens to me.

So the chanting should be done nicely and it must be done very slowly so that everyone can meditate on taking and giving.

This verse gives us an incredible opportunity to practice. Even if you are not doing the taking and giving meditation at other times, at least you can do it here with the Guru Puja.

This practice of taking and giving brings you closer to enlightenment each time you do it.


“Even if you are not doing the taking and giving meditation at other times, at least you can do it here with the Guru Puja—it brings you closer to enlightenment every time.”


Generally, if you want to help somebody who is very sick, what you can do is this practice of taking and giving. While you are walking do the practice and while you are sitting do the practice.

Take all that person’s sickness on yourself along with its causes, the karma and delusions.

That’s excellent. Then give all your merits along with the resultant happiness to them.

It is very good to do this practice for someone you have seen or know is sick; it is more realistic than visualizing taking on other sentient beingsobscurations and sufferings but without having much feeling in your heart.


Sometimes when you do the practice of taking and giving practice for a sick person they may get better. It can also happen that the sick person gets better but you get sick.

That’s actually very good. It is not always like this but sometimes when the practice is done with a lot of compassion it can happen.

Even if the sick person doesn’t get better, you purify many eons of negative karma and collect extensive merits each time you meditate on taking and giving.

That brings you closer to the realization of bodhicitta and to enlightenment, which means you are closer to liberating numberless sentient beings from the oceans of samsaric suffering and bringing them to enlightenment.

Since you are closer to achieving that, even if sickness, cancer and all these things happen as a side effect, there is great benefit.


“My suggestion is that it is good to know the elaborate, middle, fast and even fastest way to chant.”


THE LINEAGE OF THE CHANTING


Usually each monastery has its own lineage of chanting that comes from the great lama who founded the monastery.

For example, there is a special lineage of chanting that comes from Pabongka Rinpoche, author of Liberation in the Palm of Your Hand, who was not only a great bodhisattva, but also a great yogi, enlightened being and the actual living embodiment of Heruka.

I have already mentioned Pabongka Rinpoche’s qualities and how he benefited the teachings of the Buddha and sentient beings like the sun shining in this world.

He composed incredible teachings on sutra and tantra completely from his own experience and many of his tantric commentaries on the deity practices are still widely used to this day.


“The lineage lamas of the lamrim who achieved enlightenment created the chanting to be used for meditation—for the blessings of the chanting to soften the mind that is harder than a rocky mountain.”


I’m not sure if the usual chanting for the tsog offering verses (LC 63-67) comes from Pabongka Rinpoche, but there is a special way of chanting these verses that does come from Pabongka.

There is a story that he heard the dakinis chant this while he was on the way to Lhasa, either from his own monastery or from Ganden monastery.

Lama Lhundrup would sometimes use this special chanting at Kopan monastery because he learned it from Gegula in Buxa.

Gegula was the attendant of the great Pabongka Dechen Nyingpo in Tibet and also the disciplinarian monk of his monastery, Tashi Choling.

Many monks studied chanting with Gegula, including Geshe Jampa Tegchok, who was the abbot of Nalanda Monastery—not the Nalanda monastery that existed in India many hundreds of years ago but the Nalanda monastery we created in France.


Some of Pabongka Rinpoche’s chanting came from Pabongka himself and some he heard from the dakinis.

Many lineages of chanting are like this—they come from great yogis who either created it themselves or heard it chanted by dakas and dakinis.

That’s why the chanting is kept exactly according to the original—by using that chanting you receive the blessings of that lama or of the dakas and dakinis.


The Lower Tantric College (Gyume) and Upper Tantric College (Gyuto) have their own founding lamas—Jetsun Sherab Senge for Gyume and Jetsun Kunga Dhondup for Gyuto—and they follow exactly the chanting of the lama who founded the monastery.

Since these lamas were highly attained beings and the chanting came from their bodhicitta to benefit sentient beings there is great benefit in using it.

It’s not something composed by a musician.

It comes from the great qualities of compassion, loving kindness, bodhicitta, realization of emptiness and of course tantric realizations of those masters and carries great blessing.


It is good to know the source of the chanting. The chanting that I use mainly follows Kyabje Zong Rinpoche and my root guru Kyabje Trijang Dorje Chang, who both had a great lineage of the practice of chanting from Pabongka Rinpoche.

Most of the Guru Puja and also the chanting for Vajrayogini and Cittamani Tara comes from them.

(I’m not sure about the chanting for the offering section in the Guru Puja from the inner offering (LC 34-37).

That may be my own chanting? It must be from somewhere but I don’t remember the lineage.)


Some people might think it is necessary to go to tantric college to learn the chanting for Vajrayogini, Cittamani Tara and Guru Puja, but it is not like that.

The tantric colleges focus more on Guhyasamaja, Yamantaka and Chakrasamvara and have their own particular traditions. Each college has its own system.

If you belong to the Lower Tantric college you do exactly according to their system and if you belong to the Upper Tantric college you do exactly according to that system.

Even within the tantric colleges the rituals are taught a little bit differently depending on the teacher.


“Many of the lineages of chanting come from great yogis who either made it up or heard it chanted by dakinis.”


“By using that chanting you receive the blessing of that lama or of the dakas and dakinis.”

To learn Pabongka Rinpoche’s chanting for Guru Puja and Vajrayogini, we have to go to Ganden Shartse.

Even though Kyabje Pabongka Rinpoche was from Sera Me, Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche and Kyabje Zong Rinpoche were from Ganden Shartse and that is where the lineage was preserved.

It’s not that all the monks at Shartse know this chanting, but there are some older monks who are good at chanting and who practiced with Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche and Kyabje Zong Rinpoche in the past when they were alive and they know it.

Most of the chanting I use is from Kyabje Zong Rinpoche who followed the lineage of Pabongka Rinpoche. That is the source. It is not that everyone who is Gelukpa knows it.

I started the chanting in the very old days at Kopan and from there it spread to all the FPMT centers—perhaps also to Geshe Sopa Rinpoche’s center because people from Kopan went there.

But of course other centers don’t use this chanting. You must understand that different monasteries have different lamas and follow that lama’s lineage.

It’s not that there is one lineage of chanting that everybody has to follow, and otherwise the chanting is wrong.


SETTING A GOOD MOTIVATION FOR CHANTING



Before you start it is good to generate the motivation for your chanting to have a very deep effect on other people’s minds.

Dedicate that the minute other sentient beings hear your prayers and chanting they are able to generate the realizations of renunciation, bodhicitta and right view along with the tantra realizations, and achieve enlightenment as quickly as possible.

Due to all the three times’ merits collected by all the buddhas and bodhisattvas as well as by us sentient beings, may anyone who hears my voice immediately be healed of all their physical suffering and mental suffering.

May all their negative karma and defilements collected from beginningless rebirth be purified; and especially may they develop guru devotion, the root of the path to enlightenment, and immediately actualize renunciation, bodhicitta, right view and the two stages of tantra.


Or


When other sentient beings hear my chanting, may it transform their minds into renunciation, bodhicitta and right view, as well as guru devotion and all the tantric realizations.

May they be able to tame their minds and pacify the self-cherishing thought, delusions and wrong concepts that create problems for themselves and others, along with all obstacles to realizations.

Generating this kind of thought before you chant is very good because it helps prevent any feeling of pride or the arisal of other negative emotional thoughts that would make your chanting become negative karma.


Advice for Singers


I advise singers, like Faye Wong who is famous in Hong Kong and China, to think like this before performing in public

Due to all the past, present and future merits, collected by me and by others:

may any sentient being just by seeing me or my photos, hearing about me or hearing my voice, touching me, remembering or talking about me, immediately pacify all their physical and mental sufferings.

This includes not only the negative emotional thoughts of depression, anger and so forth, but also the sufferings of rebirth, old age, sickness and death along with their causes.


Then pray

And may I become wishfulfilling for everyone to achieve all the happiness they seek and especially to actualize the realization of bodhicitta, the ultimate good heart, and quickly achieve enlightenment.

This is not only a motivation but also a dedication.

If you frequently pray and dedicate like this, your singing will have a positive effect on others and be healing for them.

It will be able to subdue their minds, pacify their self-cherishing thought, calm their anger and delusions, and generate virtuous thoughts in their minds, especially the good heart and bodhicitta.

Your voice will have this quality due to the power of the mind, through making prayers and generating the wish for it to happen.


It is mentioned in a sutra that

All phenomena depend on the tip of the wish.

This means that our prayers and wishes are a condition for things to happen.

It’s the same with enlightenment: How does enlightenment come about?—through making prayers and generating the wish to become enlightened, bodhicitta.

That is why it is very good to make prayers like this in our daily life.

Pray for your voice to benefit other sentient beings whenever you chant or sing, and also when you give a public talk or teach.

There is also a mantra from the Kangyur that can be recited a few times before teaching, speaking or singing that is very powerful to purify the negative karma of sentient beings who see or hear you. (See below).



Mantra to Bless Your Voice

It is very good to recite the Exalted Stainless Beam Totally Pure Light Mantra every morning after blessing your speech and before talking.


NAMAH NAWA NAWA TIINÄÄN / TATHAAGATA GANG GAA NAM DIIWAA LUKAA NÄN / KOTINI YUTA SHATA SAHA SRAA NÄN / OM BOBORI / TSARI NI* TSARI / MORI GOLI TSALA WAARI SWAAHAA



This mantra is from the Kangyur, the Buddha’s teachings, and one of its benefits is that if you recite it a few times, your voice will have the power to purify the five very heavy negative karma without break of anyone who hears you, along with lighter negative karmas like the ten non-virtues, and not just people, but also animals and spirits.

All they have to do is hear your voice, whether you are talking with somebody, reciting mantra, teaching, counseling, singing and so on.

If you want to purify other people’s negative karma, and you don’t know what sound to make, you can even just cough and your coughing will have the power to purify those who hear it!


If you are somebody who appears on television or talks on the radio, by reciting this mantra you will be able to liberate the millions of people who see or hear you.

Take the famous singer, Lady Gaga for example, who performs in front of millions of people. If Lady Gaga were to recite this mantra in the morning before singing, her voice would purify the heavy negative karma of all those people who come to hear her sing or talk.

That shows how fortunate we are to know about this mantra and have the opportunity to use it to purify and help other sentient beings.

If you are a teacher or schoolteacher, you can recite this mantra before teaching. If you are a therapist or counselor, you can recite it before meeting with others.

It’s the same if you spend your life working in an office, talking on the phone, at meetings or working in a hospice. If you recite this mantra every morning, you can purify the negative karma of whoever hears you, talks to you or sees you throughout the day. This is such an easy way to benefit others.



Learning the Chanting

As you listen to the chanting, it is good to mark on the prayer book the places where the voice goes up or down. Try to get an idea of the design and draw the rhythm of the music.

That will help make it easier for you to learn. Otherwise you will have no basis for learning.



Keypoints from Lama Zopa Rinpoche for learning the Chanting

1. Most of the chanting starts with ooooh (except for the Chöd chanting).

2. As you listen to the chanting

Mark on the text the places where the chanting goes up and comes down.

Draw the rhythm of the music.

Note the places where there is emphasis.

Pay attention to the places where the chanting goes up and down.

Write down the tunes between the words.

You must know where to stop because it is very precise.


The text used here is the version in the FPMT Retreat Prayer Book (Lama Chöpa Jorchö, pp. 79-218). Verses are usually referred to by their first line, e.g. de chhen ngang lä rang nyi la ma lha, but I have replaced this with the titles and verse numbers in the FPMT prayer book, e.g. Generating Oneself as the Deity (LC 1)





Source

http://multimedia.lamayeshe.com/introduction-to-the-chanting-lineage-of-the-guru-puja