Teaching Wisdom 5

Teaching Wisdom

Then that holy Sattvavajra addressed him with these words:

The supreme state of self-luminous awareness

Is the knowledge that all things are magnificent wisdom.

We understand all the Dharmas of the three times clearly,

At a single final moment.

Lord,

Please explain your wisdom to me clearly.

Then the Tathagata Vajrasattva proclaimed these words:

O Mahasattva,

The Tantra Equal to the End of the Sky

Is an account of the essence of wisdom.

The stages of the way in which the definitions appear

Open the door to luminous wisdom.

The inestimable self-appearance of wisdom

Cannot be counted among our positions and preferences.

It is of the mind,

The dominion of the Dharma,

The end of the sky.

When we apply ourselves to the ways of these enumerations

Things appear to us

In the way that we put them together.

Self-arising wisdom has no center of border.

The awareness of emptiness does not see anything.

The awareness of clear light knows all things.

The technique in which awareness knows everything

In a single moment

Cuts through the shadows

Made by exaggerations and depreciations.

This is the wisdom of omniscience.

In the mirror of uncontrived awareness

Everything appears to us

As an image of self-luminosity.

Nothing stops it.

It is not an idea.

Non-dual awareness is perfected in unity.

It is a clear light that has no position or preference.

It is subsumed into unity

Without our conceptions about it.

The clear light of the vajra sky

Knows all things clearly,

Without understanding them.

The way of the equanimity in the wisdom of self-awareness

Has no great or small,

No border or center.

In self-luminosity they are equal.

The light of the sun blazes in a light

Of total self-luminescence.

It joins together with the end of the sky.

It does not support divisions or extensions.

It shines within the awareness of equanimity.

In the state of the uncontrived,

There are no dualities,

But in the same way that the planets and stars

That are arrayed within the sky

Of the magnificent clear light of wisdom

Are like heaps of beautiful flowers,

They shine individually,

But coalesce into one.

The place of unpolluted and completely perfect luminescence

Is within self-luminescent wisdom.

We will understand this clearly

Through our measure of the end of time.

Self-luminous awareness is not dual.

It is the perfection of all things,

With no exceptions.

The ocean of wisdom has no shore.

It is primordially formed,

And is free of tasks and searches.

All things, with no exception,

Hold perfectly to this luminous awareness,

Which is not shadowed.

The uncontrived is self-originating luminosity.

It is truly to be seen

By luminescent light

In the mandala of a pure dominion.

We achieve our purpose without working.

The mandala that is the origin of all things,

The door to the awareness that is the source of all things,

The sky,

Holds to a center of awareness

That has no origin or applications.

The wide doors of the mandala that we generate

Become causes for the wheel of awareness

That is the source of all things.

This state seems to be totally pure,

But the mandala of self-luminescent awareness

Is a luminescent wisdom that is not shadowed.

The experience of self-luminous unobstructed awareness

Is pervasive.

This is because the awareness of our minds

Does not hold onto anything.

It shines, but is not to be visualized.

It is free from all things.

It is not to be visualized anywhere.

It is not polluted in any way.

The pervasive light of the vajra sky

Is an awareness that does not search.

It is luminescent wisdom.

It is not to be generated.

It has, from the beginning,

Come from the primordial.

It has no position,

So it is lacking in a position,

Be it clear or unclear.

The self-originated has no cause,

So, from the very primordial,

There is nothing to generate,

And no act of generation.

The magnificent wisdom that does not search.

Leaves all the rivers of our seeking behind.

This not obvious to us, or to others.

The condition of the sky

Is to be apart from objects,

The keepers of objects,

And visualized objects.

It is not anything at all.

It is, from the primordial, empty.

Without our looking for it,

This unshadowed essence shines out in everything.

We give up our conceptions about the experience of bliss.

We maintain conceptions that have no conceptions.

We understand this by means of being done

With origins and applications.

This essence is luminous in everything,

But we have been taught no words

To say: “This” about it.

Our teacher Vajrasattva

Teaches the essence of wisdom

To the gathered retinue of the wisdom of awareness

In the great Akaniṣṭa that is awareness,

But he does not teach the essence of self-arising wisdom

In written words.

It is to be ascertained in our contemplation

After we have entered the space of uncontrived awareness.

This is why great wisdom is especially luminous.

It is not a substance.

The light of self-evident awareness

Is diffused through the palace of the awareness of wisdom.

It is obvious to us in the way that we look at it.

We become aware that it is an unlimited vajra of wisdom.

The transmission of uncontrived primordial self-luminosity

Is based on our having known things from the primordial.

We have primordial wisdom.

The magnificent awareness that we have known from the primordial

Is the great wisdom of awareness.

When we ascertain the meaning of uncontrived awareness,

Just as it is,

This is wisdom.

The transmission of the contemplation of self-luminous awareness

Is a primordial awareness of duality.

Wisdom is a magnificent awareness.

Through an awareness of this contemplation

We understand them to be together.

Not to be looking

Is a luminous wisdom.

It is self-originated wisdom itself.

Our conceptions about a search are therefore

Pure from the primordial.

Its identity is that it is not anything at all.

Its luminosity is that it shines in cooperation with all things.

It is surely difficult to take in definitions

That limit this awareness that has no origins or applications.

It is not anything.

It has no position.

The treasure of our kind lord,

Being without position or preference,

Has the qualities of self-luminous awareness.

The four seals are beyond the objects of our ideas.

This most excellent body is naturally permanent.[75]

The speech of awareness is not complicated,

And is not to be spoken.

The heart of virtue that is neither augmented nor obstructed

Is a great work that has no tasks or search.

It encompasses everything.

It pervades itself.

There is nothing to visualize.

There is nothing to teach.

The great light of this luminescent mirror

Appears to us just as we see it,

Due to the specific qualities of uncontrived awareness,

But those with deluded understandings

Do not want it to be so.

The way by which the wheel of uncomplicated awareness

Appears to be higher or lower

Does not designate anything.

The true nature of a rope

Is that it is not a snake,

But to the deluded it appears to be

Essentially a snake,

Even though there is no snake there in reality,

There is a basis for it to appear as such

To the eyes of the deluded.

It is just the same with uncontrived self-luminescence.

It is not there in our ideas or lack of ideas,

But the deluded use dualistic ideas to grasp at it.

Things are not so in reality,

But to the senses of those who crave for themselves,

They appear to be so.

They are the bases of our delusions.

The crystal palaces in the pure lands

Blaze with the light of signs and exemplary features

Appearing to be in essence luminous wisdom.

They are not so in reality.

So he spoke.

From the Great Tantra Equal to the End of the Sky, this is the nineteenth chapter: Teaching Wisdom.

Prophecy

Then that holy Sattvavajra addressed him with these words:

The three embodiments of all the Buddhas of the three times

Are a miraculously occurring playfulness.

The lord who is the equal of self-luminescent wisdom

Clearly understands the wisdoms of the six classes of living beings.

Lord,

This is what I ask you:

How will it turn out

For this vehicle of miraculously occurring secrets

In time yet to come?

Lord,

Please explain this to me.

Then the Tathagata Vajrasattva proclaimed these words:

O Mahasattva,

The Tantra of the Bodhicitta of the Great Perfection,[76]

Is brought together with The End of the Sky

In my own contemplations.

Its significance is secret.

This aural transmission of my most secret heart,

An ascertained transmission of my contemplations,

Will become famous in three divine abodes.

Then a manifestation of compassion,

Dwelling in a very secret cave

In the charnel ground of the land of Urgyan

Will take the part of an astounding manifest being

And will open the door to the mandala of awareness

For seven heart children that he further manifests.

He will grant them the empowerment of the vase of royal investiture,

And teach them the transmission of secrets.

Then the fortunate ones that are emanated further

Will prosper in the center of Jambu Island.

It will be famed for being like a precious gemstone.

It will fulfill the wishes of everyone.

Then all the fortunate ones,

Those who have the heritage to understand this,

Will come to live on the level of Buddhahood.

Those who understand things according to their own desires,

Who are engaged in definitions and grammar,

And who are not fortunate,

Will wander on from being human

Into a horrible life.

They will hide this from the gatherings

Of the children of those fortunate manifest beings

In a dominion that is not evident.

Then the blessings of compassion

And those who have a diffusion of the karma of faith

Will join together in non-duality,

And it will appear in a barbarous country.

Then those fortunate ones who hold the heritage of the transmission

Will understand the meaning of self-arising awareness,

And they will go on to the level of Buddhahood.

These fortunate children of the Victorious One

Will become certain of their heritage.

This book about self-luminescent awareness

Will be made into a successive transmission for the fortunate,

And they will be stamped with the seal of secret awareness.

They will neither prosper nor fail.

Then, through a disruption of the secrets,

It will be discussed among the gathered communities

Of both the fortunate and the unfortunate,

And will fill the lands of the barbarians.

At that time,

The holy children who retain their heritage

Will dwell on the level of the Victorious One.

The unfortunate who practice according to their own natures

Will have a reverted existence in a horrible life.

They will not agree about their own ideas,

And will hold onto positions about what is and what is not.

Instead of gaining the non-dual wisdom of self-luminosity,

They will become only promulgators of arguments.

That is when even the holy ones who retain their heritage

Will be consumed by doubts,

And will not succeed.

Being forced by their own reputations,

Which they broadcast everywhere,

They will bestow only the ordinary vehicles.

Their blessings in the Dharma will be small.

At that time,

They will have the attitudes of grave robbers.

They will not have one-pointed visualizations.

They will transmit the joys of philosophical conclusions,

And become people who transmit what everyone else does.

They will praise themselves and ridicule others,

And due to their emotional arguments,

They will prosper.

Those who crave for positions and preferences

Will use their power and force

So that even the light of self-luminescence

Will not shine.

Then those who lack the fortune to be compassionate

Will cause this transmission of secrets

To fail.

No one will be able to do anything,

As if they were being digested

In the belly of a lion.

Those who claim they are my children

Will cause this transmission of secrets

To fail.

You might ask how this will come about.

Through their holding onto positions and preferences

About the Dharma,

They will become forgers of arguments.

They will lack the experience of self-luminosity,

And they will toss off the karma of the light.

They will engage in the karma of emotional cravings.

They will not have the aural transmission,

But will use their cravings to make their own designations,

And teach them.

They will prioritize their desires for especially great items:

Their wages and their fame,

So they will make comprehensive summaries

Of both what has been ascertained and what has not,

And teach them to gathered assemblies.

Their views will come down from above,

In the manner of royal commands.

They will have the speech of oxen.

They will cast off their practices,

And the karma of the light.

They will practice the karmas that are to be rejected.

They will announce themselves to be for the world.

They will be ridiculed by all the people.

By force of their rejection of the common vehicles

They will cause this holy secret to fail.

They will lack the enlightened attitude

Of the great vehicle.

For these reasons,

The holy transmission of my contemplation

Will be made to fail

By bad people.

Then this vehicle of great secrets

Will prosper at the center of Jambu Island,

And the fortunate will use this vehicle of no seeking

To go to the level of Buddhahood.

Then this holy secret will prosper

In a transmission in the land in the South,

And all the holy people there

Will attain an unsought fruition.

By force of the flourishing of these secrets,

They will become topics

For those who argue about yoga.

Doubtful and disagreeable treatises

Will proliferate.

The fortunate will not have them,

But they will appear.

The people of that time

Will be experts in livelihoods built on the ascertained Tantras.

They will meditate on the meaning of self-luminosity.

They will hold scriptural traditions that have been ascertained.

They will hold the scriptural traditions of the aural transmission.

They will vow not to propagate secrets.

They will live in monasteries,

And be wise,

Yet they will hold to the unspeakable mind

As having a form.

They will propagate the teachings of demons.

Then, during the final five hundred years

Of the presence of the Dharma in the world

There will be those who crave their own kind of emotional problems,

And those who lack the strength to crave for anything.

There will be a lack of people who are suitable recipients.

The lineal transmission of the gurus,

Who we may be sure were not in error,

Will be broken.

By force of this,

The hearty elixir of the aural transmission

Will be lost.

A multitude of people,

Who have neither the karma nor the fortune,

Will gather,

And those who lack the fortunes of karma and compassion

Will use their force

To cause this most secret vehicle of miraculous occurrence

To fail at the center of Jambu Island.

The final days of the manifest teaching that we hold here,

In times that have not yet come,

Will surely come to pass like this.

So he spoke.

From the Great Tantra Equal to the End of the Sky, this is the twentieth chapter: Prophecy.

Dividing the Nine Spaces

Then that holy Sattvavajra addressed him with these words:

All the Buddhas of the three times

Have made prophecies

About this most secret and miraculously occurring

Supreme playfulness.

So how will the teachings on the nine spaces

Appear to those who are fortunate?

Then the Tathagata Vajrasattva proclaimed these words:

O Mahasattva,

The secret of all the Tathagatas

Is that Buddhas and sentient beings

Are not a duality.

A heart that is aware of uncontrived yoga

Is primordially a Buddha,

Without any tasks or searches.

The foundation of the mind maintains nine realities.

They are evident to those who are immersed

In the path of jewels.

The wisdom of self-originating awareness

Arises by itself,

And will be attained without a search.

The awareness of wisdom diffuses with light

From out of the mandala of supreme awareness.

According to the teachings of unspeakable awareness,

We use the supreme orations on luminescent wisdom

To certify this unspeakable awareness.

The teachings on the nine spaces

Appear in the wisdom of clear light awareness,

In a single moment.

The circle of the clear light of jewels

Is to be seen through the teachings on luminescence,

So there are twenty thousand volumes

For the nine spaces,

Which have been proclaimed to be the measure

Of the illuminator of jewels.

The blazing light of jewels

Is the limit of the mind.

It is the root of the vehicles.

It is to be taught to a general audience.

Nothing has been taught

About the vehicle of the enlightenment of the great perfection

That is not contained in these nine spaces.

Whatever appears and whatever we see,

We do not visualize anything.

We have no object.

We transcend the objects of our thoughts.

Our view is the space of the mind,

And has no planets within it.

Those who cling to a definition for the sky

Will not continue to practice the clear light of wisdom,

While the practice that has extensive import

Is a space of happiness.

Those who crave boundaries

For the mandala of awareness,

Which is not something we generate,

Lose the Dharma.

We are self-luminescent in the Bodhicitta,

So we generate a space for the mandala of self-liberation.

The three realms are the clear light of jewels.

Those who understand non-duality

Impart the empowerments,

And the totally encompassing pervasiveness of awareness,

Making space for the empowerment of the vase of royal investiture.

The nature of the unprotected mind

Is to abide in the basis of our higher samaya.

It does not go beyond its circle.

It is a space in which we do not transgress

The samaya that we protect.

In the dominion of the Dharma of effortless clear light

Good works are spontaneously done,

Without a search.

The wisdom of clear light has no position or preference.

The space for this supreme wisdom that does not search

Is the dominion of the Dharma,

Which is not a thought,

And is not a visualization.

We place ourselves in a space

Of undisturbed self-luminescent awareness,

With a self-luminous awareness that is not disturbed.

This is a space of uncontrived contemplation.

Samsara is primordially Buddhahood.

There is no other place to travel to.

We do not travel on paths or stages.

The mind itself is the space

For the path that goes on to the end.

It is like something that makes a heap of jewels shine.

In spontaneously formed self-luminescent awareness,

Things are not born out of causes and conditions.

It is a space for the wisdom

Of a self-originating fruition.

The wheel of the precious jewels

Of the nine spaces

Rises up from out of the light

Of self-evident awareness.

Samsara is an uncontrived clear light.

It has had no problems or impurities,

Since the primordial.

We use the power of non-dual awareness

To engage in the luminosity of uncomplicated wisdom.

The wheel of secret wisdom

Encircles all things,

And is subsumed into their dominion.

This is the nature of the unspeakable Dharma.

It is obviously the heart-essence of the unspeakable Dharma.

The teachings on awareness that have no sound

Are clear to us,

Just as we want them to be.

In the teachings on the nine spaces

Everything is for the public.

The perfect transmission of the mirror of self-luminescence

Is that all things are self-liberated in wisdom,

And from the primordial are cleansed of the Dharmas of shadows.

In the natural state of the uncomplicated sky

There are no memories or ideas whatever.

In the clear light of uncontrived reality,

Contrived practices are regressive.

Once we understand the significance

Of the island of jewels,

Everything will be clear to us,

Through secret pathways.

From the primordial,

We have not worked on the karma of a mudra.

When we understand the orations on unsought awareness,

We do not work on recitations,

Or the karmas of expansion and contraction.

When we have entered the river of self-luminous awareness

Our minds will be vajras of uncontrived clear light.

This one thing makes nine foundations.

Through them we are joined with whatever we desire.

We are introduced to the meaning of self-luminous awareness

By means of nine methods pertaining to uncontrived awareness.

Dharmas of exaggerated and depreciated definitions

Do not engage in the natural state of primordial peace.

All Buddhas and sentient beings without exception

Are one

In this uncontrived and shadowless self-luminosity.

In the way in which awareness has no visualizations,

We have dwelt in this encompassing pervasion

Since the primordial.

From the beginning,

The Buddhahood we do not seek

Does not abide

In the Dharmas that we work on or do not work on.

In the luminescence of this blazing jewel light

There are no dharmas of deviation or obstruction.

In the wisdom that self-luminosity has no position

We are primordially removed

From a need to take or hold onto

The boundaries between positions.

From among the heaps of unsought jewels,

There are no Dharmas that are not perfect.

Who could measure or visualize

A palace that has no center or border?

This secret transmission of Vajrasattva,

This elixir of the teachings on the nine spaces,

This mirror of the self-luminescence of awareness,

Dwells in each and every one of us equally.

So he spoke.

From the Great Tantra Equal to the End of the Sky, this is the twenty-first chapter: Dividing the Nine Spaces.

Teaching that the Root of the Nine Spaces is Subsumed into One

Then that holy Sattvavajra addressed him with these words:

How do you elucidate

The heart of all the Victorious One’s contemplations,

The transmission that illuminates the jewels of the nine spaces,

In a brief form that makes us sure?

O Heart of Blessedness,[77]

Please explain this.

Then the Tathagata Vajrasattva proclaimed these words:

O Mahasattva,

The nine spaces are subsumed into a single root.

An analogy is that they are like gold.

The meaning is that the way we understand the root,

Which is Bodhicitta,

Is that it is a non-dual wisdom.

The transmission of the heart-essence of Bodhicitta

Is that our awareness, having no duality,

Never engages in

The uncontrived self-liberation

Of the mind itself.

There is no need to discuss its not engaging in

Dualistic conceptions about a clear light

That has no center or border.

All our endless happinesses and sorrows,

And all our goings and comings,

Are self-luminous non-dual self-awareness.

Awareness that does not have problems

Never contemplates a dominion of the Dharma

That is selfless,

And where there are no others.

The way things are,

Without boundaries or centers,

Is the transmission of the highest vajra sky.

It is not a thought.

It is a non-thought.

It is perfected in a dominion

In which there are no conceptions.

Those who seek for dualistic conceptions

Fall into the dominions

Of samsara’s three realms.

They lose the transmission of the vajra secrets.

The transmission of the mind of secret awareness

Is the single wisdom of knowledge,

And does not prevent things from appearing in plurality.

Non-dual awareness is subsumed into one thing.

In the state of non-duality

We do not think of duality.

The sky has no thoughts.

It does not speak.

The meeting of our minds with self-luminosity

Does not move beyond one.

They are there together.

We do not split the root.

We do not search.

Wisdom has absolutely no origin or applications.

It is joined together in non-dual awareness

In the Akaniṣṭa of luminous awareness.

This is the treasure of all the wheels of the awareness.

Its ocean of wisdom has no shore.

The door of methods for uncontrived awareness

Is not connected to the hundreds of mandalas

That are made of living beings.

Perfected wisdom abides in excellence.

This is the transmission of the contemplations of all the Buddhas,

The transmission of the highest clear light wisdom.

All the Buddhas live in this.

It has no shadows.

It has no position.

It is luminescent in everything.

This mind transmission of the luminosity of all Dharmas

Is self-originating,

The god of gods.

The core of this magnificent method

Of the mirror that subsumes all things

Has been described to be, in fact,

A Sutra.

The root of all the vehicles

Is the pervasiveness of the great perfection itself.

It is condensed into nine spaces,

But its root is condensed into the Bodhicitta.

This mind is the root of all things.

Self-luminosity is a state in which

One thing is certain.

It is not possible that there will come a king

Who does not have it.

It will also be impossible for him

To get a vehicle.

All the Dharmas are gathered here,

In brilliant clarity.

Anyone who uses definitive upadeśa

To publish this intent

Will be publishing every Dharma.

The root of all the Buddhas

Is Vajrasattva himself.

The root of the levels and paths

Is the level of the highest awareness of clear light.

When we understand what this means,

We will not need to travel.

When we study this level,

We will not need to study.

The root of all the Buddhas and their children

Is the Bodhicitta.

Once we understand the significance of uncontrived awareness,

We will dwell in the light of self-luminous wisdom.

The five kinds of living beings,

Our five desires,

And the six classes of living beings,

Appear to us through our five kinds of emotional problems,

But their root is the self-luminous Bodhicitta.

Our awareness dwells on a self-evident objective.

It is unmoving.

It is not a thought.

It does not contemplate anything.

It is like a king of lights for the world.

This total luminescence is subsumed into a single heart-essence.

The transmission of ideas about clear light bliss

Does not abide where Dharmas are luminous or not luminous.

This is obvious to an awareness that is free from conventionalities.

It is like a golden island of blazing jewels.

There are no Dharmas other than this.

Names, shapes, great or small,

Karma and designations,

Are conventionalities.

They do not abide in a single essence.

The way we see gold to be gold

Is the way to see self-luminous awareness.

In its self-evidence

There is no duality.

It is like gold,

Which is unchanging by its very nature.

Self-luminosity is not changed by conditions.

See it as a luminosity that does not think of itself.

The transmission of the self-luminosity

That does not grasp and has no thoughts

Is like a primordial and uncontrived purity.

The nature of clear light is primordially pure.

It may transform into anything,

And seem to appear.

In the mandala of clear light awareness

The particular qualities of our sensory inclinations

Make things appear in just the way they do appear.

They are nothing at all.

Their heart-essence holds the wheel

Of self-originating awareness.

It cuts through our exaggerations,

Depreciations and doubts.

The wisdom of awareness has no conditions.

We know it clearly with our own minds.

All the topics for everyone’s contemplation

Are gathered into the root,

The Bodhicitta.

So he spoke.

From the Great Tantra Equal to the End of the Sky, this is the twenty-second chapter: Teaching that the Root of the Nine Spaces is Subsumed into One.

All Dharmas are Published in the Supreme Heart of the Vajra

Then that holy Sattvavajra addressed him with these words:

For all the Buddhas of the three times,

The Tantra Equal to the End of the Sky,

The unexcelled heart-essence of the vajra,

Has been definitively published without error.

The natural contemplations that embody the Dharma

Have been published without error.

In the mandala of completely pure luminous light,

Uncontrived and self-evident contemplations

On the dominion of the Dharma

That is naturally both external and internal

Are published by their own natures.

The teachings of the transmission

Of effortless perfection

Are the vajra transmission of non-dual wisdom.

The heart-essence of self-luminous awareness

Is published by itself, for itself.

In the dominion of the Dharma,

The Akaniṣṭa of awareness,

The supreme palace of awareness,

Our teacher Vajrasattva

Uses the transmission of the bliss of vajra clear light,

The core significance of this self-occurring heart-essence,

A contemplation that has no sound or words,

To definitively publish this without error

For the retinue of self-luminous awareness.

The unspoken sound

For the reality of the supreme vajra

Is heard by self-luminous awareness.

The definitive intent of this unspeakable secret

Will not be publicized by talking about it.

It is shown to us in the way things are,

Like the self-luminosity of the sun.

The vajra of reality has no final ending.

It is uncontrived and primordially pure.

This summary of all the contemplations of the heart

Is published in self-luminosity itself.

The uncontrived contemplation that embodies the Dharma

Is the vajra sky’s domain for practice.

A heart that is not disturbed and has no conditions

Publishes this,

Like gold onto gold.

Nothing is contemplated in the way things are.

Its unique reality is a luminescence

That is not a visualization.

The way things are is like water in water.

Our awareness dwells in this supreme luminescence.

The aural transmission that is a guide for the monkey of awareness

Is employed to publish the knowledge of self-luminous awareness.

An inexpressible magnificence is used here,

So that through the symbolic doors of transmission and upadeśa,

Secret wisdom will be published,

And touch upon the definitive contemplations that are without error.

We engage in the mandala of awareness

In the same way that we engage our minds in luminescence.

The heart-essence of the experience of clear light

Is happy.

It is a non-conceptual path of clarity.

It has no position.

Its view is without planetary concerns.

It does not grasp.

It is a samadhi that does not contemplate anything.

It has no thoughts.

It eliminates conceptions.

It abides as one,

But is comprehensively luminescent.

It does not conceptualize.

It shimmers,

But it has no thoughts about shimmering.

We ourselves and other beings

Are not retained in definitions.

We are perfected in a dominion

That is not an idea.

In a single moment,

We are on a level that we did not travel to.

We abide there like the heart of the sun.

The way things are is not to be sought or worked on.

Our own minds are a supreme awareness that does not flow.

The knowledge of the end of time

Clearly understands all the Dharmas

As having a single point.

Compassion is like the light rays of the sun.

It is the shared identity of all living beings.

It is a pleasure to the end of the sky.

The lake of the wisdom of omniscience,

The greatest treasure in the ocean of secrets,

Is not a domain of practice for the vile.

For those who have the intellect of an ocean of wisdom,

The vajra dominion of the wisdom that overcomes understanding,

The supreme heart-essence of self-liberated causes and results,

Is the domain of the highest wisdom.

They open the door of perfect wisdom,

And in an instant

They blaze in the light of wisdom.

The shadows in their views are cleared away

In this heart-essence of omniscient wisdom.

They are the finest ornaments

For the circle of blazing light.

In keeping with the thoughts of their disciples,

They use the blessings of great compassion

To develop inconceivable numbers of methodical practices

To make this clear to us in a single instant.

They use the mind upadeśa of the aural transmission

To publish the transmission of this effortless perfection,

This highest level of self-liberated awareness,

Definitively and without error.

Self-luminosity is published in a transmission.

The seven circles that are indefinite

Were intentionally proclaimed

To guide living beings.

It was to direct their minds

That the so-called: “Direct transmission” was proclaimed.

The specific qualities of the vehicles were taught this way,

Based on the specifics of their thinking and their beliefs.

Except for the fact that living beings are the ones to be trained,

It is sure that there is no more than one contemplation.

If we do not abide in a self-luminous mind,

It will not matter how we search for the natural meaning,

Using the specialties of editing and compiling,

We will contradict the intent of supreme wisdom.

If we do not give birth to a knowledge of certitude,

It will not matter which memories or understandings we meditate on,

The thing that we meditate on will be the thing that we understand,

And we will not succeed without meditating.

All of these things are the concerns of the blind.

They use reverted understandings of the world

To meditate on clear light awareness,

But they will not succeed.

They will be stuck.

The one who definitively teaches the Victorious One’s contemplations,

Just as they are,

The uncontrived reality

Of the meaning of reality as a natural state,

Is a speaker of ascertained intent.

The Buddhas have no contrivance.

Those whose transmissions are contrived and interpreted

Want the heart-essence of uncontrived wisdom

To be the definitive and highest transmission.

Their Dharmas of searching

Are practices for living beings

That are transmitted indirectly.

Definitive practice does not search.

This is the definitive transmission

Of the Victorious One’s contemplations,

So use the words of this uncontrived contemplation

Just as they are,

To explain that it is certain.

So he spoke.

From the Great Tantra Equal to the End of the Sky, this is the twenty-third chapter: All Dharmas are Published in the Supreme Heart of the Vajra.

Planting the Instructions

Then Sattvavajra addressed him with these words:

The essence of self-luminous wisdom

Is apart from the Dharmas of duality.

Please use the specific qualities of our understanding

Or not understanding

To explain the stages in the way we are to engage in this.

Then the Tathagata Vajrasattva proclaimed these words:

O Mahasattva,

Dharmas that are shadowed by ideas

Do not abide in the luminosity of self-evident wisdom.

Primordially pure wisdom is the same

As the light that illuminates the sky.

The state of this precious jewel that fulfills all our desires

Resembles that of the lotus that has no attachments.

It is self-originating.

It is self-luminous.

It is perfect in itself.

The supreme secret of Vajrasattva,

The excellence of the great desires of the All Good,

The vastness of profundities that are difficult to describe,

This excellent wideness that equals the sky,

And is not to be visualized,

This self-evident transmission of the supreme bliss of clear light,

Is a transmission that equals the end of the sky.

It is truly to be understood as a self-liberating awareness.

The state of uncontrived luminous awareness

Is the blazing light of an embodiment of the Dharma.

It is obvious in a single moment.

In a single moment,

We dwell in the taste of supreme bliss.

If this clear light retains the resolve of awareness,

It is not self-luminous.

This Dharma will not endure.

To blaze forever in self-originated light,

Blazing wisdom is the best abode.

Stages for a single moment are not evident,

So knowledge that is developed gradually

Is a mistaken path.

The dominion of the Dharma in which clarity is not evident

Continually encompasses each and every thing.

For a guru whose understandings are not contrived,

Samsara itself is primordial Buddhahood.

We go into an uncontrived level,

In a single moment.

We dwell forever in the transmission of clear light,

But, for the welfare of living beings,

We have no position of preference.

The three realms of samsara are a prison,

But they seem to be a magnificent awareness

That is self-luminous.

Even the mountain of the heaped up five poisons

Blazes in the five luminescent wisdoms.

The totality of luminous wisdom

Is primordially empty of dualistic understandings.

Those who do not have a mind of awareness

Regarding magnificent clear light

May practice any number of searches,

But when they do,

These will become major impediments.

Those of common mind,

Who do not guard samaya,

Prioritize fame in the world.

They lose the mind of self-originating awareness.

They become darkened.

They fail at the meaning of the truth that they search.

That is their delusion.

However they look at things,

That is their mistake.

Those who practice reverted views,

And Tirthakaras,

Will go on to a great hell

When they die.

They will have lost their chance at freedom,

And will be lost to the family of the secret great vehicle.

When we understand the meaning

Of this most pure secret,

No matter what we do,

We blaze in the light of wisdom.

Through the mirror of secrets,

Everything blazes in the light

Of self-luminescent wisdom.

So he spoke.

From the Great Tantra Equal to the End of the Sky, this is the twenty-fifth chapter: Planting the Instructions.

Investigating the People

Then that holy Sattvavajra addressed him with these words:

O Great Lord,

Please explain how a holy person is to investigate

This treasure that is the secret of all the Buddhas,

This transmission of the contemplations

Of the Victorious Ones of the three times.

Then the Tathagata Vajrasattva proclaimed these words:

O Mahasattva,

These are the stages of the problems and advantages

To explaining or studying the vajra vehicle:

A Vajra Guru has the instructions.

He holds a treasury of secret awareness.

He is immersed in the significance

Of the transmission of self-luminosity.

His knowledge and understanding are obviously his wisdom.

He has the upadeśa of the aural transmission.

He has experience of the treasury of awareness.

He turns and implants the wheel of wisdom.

He has received the empowerment of royal investiture.

He has the upadeśa.

His practices are not contrived.

He has entered into space.

He compassionately perseveres in helping living beings.

He has no position or preference regarding the Dharma.

He is skilled at the livelihood of the secret upadeśa.

He is not confused about the particulars on the vehicles.

He has an understanding of exceptional greatness.

His intellect understands the entire meaning with just one word.

He uses the clear light of great understanding

To burn up his heaps of habitual patterns.

He has been determined to be a Vajra Guru.

Those who are arrogant,

Have little compassion,

Who do not have the upadeśa of the aural transmission,

Who have little learning,

Who apply themselves to the stuff of wages and fame,

Who do not have the empowerment, transmission, or upadeśa,

Are paupers,

And when they become impoverished,

They will be poor due to the holy upadeśa.

Due to their faith,

They will not regard their bodies or their lives.

Through their respect for their Vajra Guru

They will support him.

Once they have gotten the texts for the secret upadeśa,

They will not popularize the secrets.

They will delight in the significance of self-luminous awareness.

It will not be a burden.

Their minds will be on their objects.

They will have compassion and samaya.

They will have perseverance and knowledge.

Designate one as the ascertained regent.

A guru who has the texts and is wise

Will explain the significance of self-evident wisdom

To those princes who are fit recipients,

And in just one instant,

They will be perfect Buddhas.

If we open the door of secrets

For those without faith,

Those with great attachments,

The avaricious and self-glorifying,

Those with reverted views,

Who care about fame in the world,

Who have no faith,

Who have little perseverance,

Who are mean,

Who work to manipulate the deeds of the world,

Who join with the inferior vehicle,

Who have positions and preferences about the Dharma,

Who find fault with contentment,

Who deceive their Vajra Guru,

And who cast blame on the definitive meaning,

While they praise a precious gemstone,

Will surely be born in the vajra hell.

Even if they get out,

And start to have an enlightened attitude,

They will not meet up with the significance

Of this sure secret.

Those who ridicule their vajra guru

Demean all the Buddhas of the three times.

By force of this,

Their lineal succession will henceforth be obliterated.

They will be born inside of a blazing vajra.

When they want to engage in holiness,

They will not find a holy refuge.

Those who reject or cast blame

On the supreme orations of these secrets

Are rejecting the supreme orations of the Victorious Ones,

And are permanently lost from the mind of freedom.

So he spoke.

From the Great Tantra Equal to the End of the Sky, this is the twenty-sixth chapter: Investigating the People.

Retaining the Tantra

Then that holy Sattvavajra addressed the Blessed One with these words:

Please explain in all their vastness

The virtues of teaching, discussing, and reading

This mirror of the bodies, speech, and minds

Of the Victorious Ones of the three times,

This heart of the treasury of secrets.

Then the Tathagata Vajrasattva proclaimed these words:

O Mahasattva,

This treasure trove of the Victorious Ones of the three times,

This Tantra Equal to the End of the Sky,

This elixir of teachings on the inner heart of secrets,

This transmission of the contemplations of all the Buddhas,

This Tantra that teaches one sure thing

In which the three embodiments are equal to the end of the sky,

Is an uncomplicated teaching.

It is not a contemplation of anything.

This commentary on all the highest pinnacles of the vehicles,

This elixir of all the upadeśa of the three transmissions,

Is a heap of jewels that knows no end,

A space for the great bliss of inexhaustible wisdom,

A permanent holder of the wheel of wisdom.

It is most secret,

And difficult to understand.

It is not the domain of those with inferior practices.

It is self-evident,

A treasury of our own wisdom.

We dwell in the light of self-originating awareness.

The essence of this pervasive great bliss

Is lost to those whose attitude is

To hold onto the sky.

A person who reveres this

Has a fortune equal to the level of Buddhahood.

Vajrasattva,

The Blessed One,

Beams the light of self-luminous pervasion,

And lives in the dominion of luminous awareness.

The wisdom of awareness is clearly visible.

It is obvious that it is,

For the six classes of living beings,

The heart-essence of wisdom.

It is a clear understanding of all entities.

One who holds this heart of the teachings

Holds the body, speech, and mind

Of a Victorious One.

So hold it with an unerring awareness.

The light of the sun of wisdom is smooth,

Like light.

Compassion arises in us

To glorify those who live.

We are not tormented by demons or obstructers.

We blaze in the mandala of awareness itself.

We read this, copy it, and memorize it,

Protecting it as if it were our child.

For this reason,

Designate someone as the regent of sure heritage

For this inner heart of the teachings.

Then hide it in the rocks,

Or at the bottom of a water.

Bind it with an oath that is beyond life itself.

So he said.

From the Great Tantra Equal to the End of the Sky, this is the twenty-seventh chapter: Retaining the Tantra.

The Tantra on the Great Perfection of the Bodhicitta[85] that is called The King of Tantras: Vajrasattva’s Unity: The Equal to the End of the Sky[86] is finished.

The Great Khasam Anta is finished.

It was translated by the Indian abbot Śrī Singha and the Tibetan monk Vairochana at the meeting hall in Dhahena.