Beyond the Ordinary Mind
Beyond the Ordinary Mind
Dzogchen, Rimé, and the Path of Perfect Wisdom
selected works by Khenpo Pema Vajra, Patrul Rinpoche, JamgÖn Mipham, Jigme Tenpe Nyima, Amdo Geshe Jampal Rolwe Lodrö, Yukhok Chatralwa Chöying Rangdrol, and Dongak Chökyi Gyatso
Translated and introduced by
Foreword by
Beyond the Ordinary Mind_4th Pass.indd 3 10/9/17 11:41 AMSnow Lion An imprint of Shambhala Publications, Inc. 4720 Walnut Street Boulder, Colorado 80301 www.shambhala.com © 2018 by Adam Pearcey All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
First Edition Printed in the United States of America o This edition is printed on acid- free paper that meets the American National Standards Institute Z39.48 Standard.
This book is printed on 30% postconsumer recycled paper.
Distributed in the United States by Penguin Random House LLC and in Canada by Random House of Canada Ltd
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: O-rgyan-ʼjigs-med-chos-kyi-dbang-po, Dpal-sprul, 1808–1887. | Mi-pham-rgya-mtsho, ʼJam-mgon ʼJu, 1846–1912. | Pearcey, Adam, translator. Title: Beyond the ordinary mind: Dzogchen, Rimé, and the Path of Perfect Wisdom: selected works / by Patrul Rinpoche, Jamgön Mipham, and other masters; translated and introduced by Adam Pearcey.
Description: First edition. | Boulder: Snow Lion, 2018. | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Includes translations from Tibetan. Identifiers: LCCN 2017019422 | ISBN 9781559394703 (pbk.: alk. paper) Subjects: LCSH: Rdzogs-chen. Classification: LCC BQ7662.4 .B48 2018 | DDC 294.3/444—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017019422
Beyond the Ordinary Mind_4th Pass.indd 4 10/9/17 11:41 AMThe pure awareness beyond the ordinary mind Is the special feature of the Great Perfection. –Jigme Lingpa
Beyond the Ordinary Mind_4th Pass.indd 5 10/9/17 11:41 AMBeyond the Ordinary Mind_4th Pass.indd 6 10/9/17 11:41 AMContents
Foreword by Alak Zenkar Rinpoche
Preface
Introduction xvii 1. A Yogi’s Guide to the Dharma 1 Overview of the Three Turnings and the Mantra Collection of the Vidyādharas Khenpo Pema Vajra 2. The Consolation of Solitude 13 Uniting Outer and Inner Solitude: Advice for Alak Dongak Gyatso 17 Patrul Rinpoche 3. The Rimé of the Ancients’ Monk- Scholar 23 Wondrous Talk Brought About by Conversing with a Friend 25 The Four Dharma Traditions of the Land of Tibet 30 Jamgön Mipham 4. Analysis and What Lies Beyond 33 Profound Instruction on the View of the Middle Way 35 The Essence of Mind 39 Beyond the Ordinary Mind_4th Pass.indd 7 10/9/17 11:41 AMviii B Contents The Essence of Wisdom: How to Sustain the Face of Rigpa 41 The Nature of Mind 43 A Lamp to Dispel Darkness 44 Jamgön Mipham 5. A Midlife Crisis (of Allegiance) 51 Advice to the Dodrup Incarnation, Jigme Tenpe Nyima 55 Jamgön Mipham 6. The Final Roar of a Scholar- Lion 59 Advice in Response to the Request of the Faithful, Diligent, and Intelligent Deshul Drakden 62 Jigme Tenpe Nyima 7. A Little Learning Is a Dangerous Thing 67 On the Ignorance of the Learned 69 Jigme Tenpe Nyima 8. Remembrance of Awareness Present 73 Advice for the Devoted Student Gyurme Dorje 75 Jigme Tenpe Nyima 9. A Portrait of the Master as a Young Tulku 85 Answers to Questions on the Great Perfection 87 Jigme Tenpe Nyima 10. Please Debate the Messenger 101 The Messenger of Authentic Reasoning 104 Amdo Geshe Jampal Rolwe Lodrö Beyond the Ordinary Mind_4th Pass.indd 8 10/9/17 11:41 AMContents B ix
Demolition, Dzogchen Style 113 How to Practice the Path of the Great Perfection 117 Yukhok Chatralwa Chöying Rangdrol 12. Playing a Flute in an Empty Valley 129 Memorandum on Mahāmudrā and Dzogchen Instructions 133 Dongak Chökyi Gyatso Acknowledgments 137 Notes
Texts Translated 147 Bibliography 151 Index
Beyond the Ordinary Mind_4th Pass.indd 9 10/9/17 11:41 AMBeyond the Ordinary Mind_4th Pass.indd 10 10/9/17 11:41 AMForeword
Not so long ago I saw this anthology of writings compiled by the noted translator Adam Pearcey for his book Beyond the Ordinary Mind. As I read through it, I found it contained many authentic original texts, composed by authors who not only were all univer-sally acknowledged as learned and realized masters, but who also did an enormous amount to enhance and enrich the teachings of both the New and the Ancient traditions of Tibetan Buddhism.
Dzogchen Khenpo Pema Vajra, Dza Patrul Jigme Chökyi Wangpo, Jamgön Mipham Namgyal Gyatso, the Third Dodrupchen Jigme Tenpe Nyima, and Yukhok Chatralwa Chöying Rangdrol were all holders of the lineage of the Great Perfection tradition of Secret Mantra, and yet they also recognized its ultimate compatibility and harmony with other traditions. At the same time, Amdo Geshe (also widely known as Drakkar Geshe) Jampal Rolwe Lodrö, and Tulku Sungrab Dongak Chökyi Gyatso, who were both great geshes within the Geluk “Yellow Hat” tradition, equally established the ultimate convergence of New and Ancient Schools. Using scriptural citation, logical reasoning, and pith instruc-tions, these masters showed how their own traditions transcended sectarian prejudice. Likewise, they undermined false views, over-came opponents, realized all teachings to be without contradiction, and clearly perceived all the scriptures as actual, practical advice.
They cared for their fortunate followers through instructions on how to integrate every aspect of the Dharma, and they ensured the continuity of the teachings through their writings. That this anthology contains so many texts by such masters makes it, to my mind, seem like an exquisite vase filled with a great treasure of won-drous and marvelous explanations.
Beyond the Ordinary Mind_4th
Foreword
Reading through these texts, which convey secret, crucial points of instruction on the Profound View—from the Great Perfection, the Great Seal (Mahāmudrā), and the Great Middle Way—they feel like an elixir for the eyes. Consider, for example, how these writings demonstrate so clearly the critical importance of the three essential qualifications in the Dzogchen tradition. For pure awareness— or rigpa—to be introduced, an authentic teacher must possess the qualities of knowing wisdom, caring love, and spiritual power. The authentic student must have faith and pure samaya commitments, be free from the stain of wrong view, and uncorrupted by doubt.
In addition, the student’s mind must be trained through authentic instructions, such as the uncommon preliminary of “destroying the house of the ordinary mind,” thereby uncovering mental flaws through contemplations such as the investigation of mind’s com-ing, staying, and going. These various texts refer to the Great Middle Way beyond the conceptual elaborations of refutation and proof, which is a theme Mipham Rinpoche emphasizes in his sūtra- level instructions on the view of the Middle Way. This, in turn, corresponds to the Great Seal (Mahāmudrā) of the Path of Liberation in the instructions on the view bringing together sūtra and mantra from the Kagyü tradition, and to the view of the Inseparability of Saṃsāra and Nirvāṇa among the Sakya, and so on. Works that cite such themes bring together points from hundreds of sūtras, all summarized in a single instruction. I therefore am left with the impression that this collection is just like a treasury of precious jewels, or a powerful wish- granting tree capable of fulfilling every need. There is really nothing more to say than that.
Let us conclude, then, with some words from the Fourth Paṇchen Lama, Lobzang Chökyi Gyaltsen: Pacification (Zhijé), Severance (Chöd), the Great Perfection, Instructions on the View of the Middle Way, and the like, Are known by many different names, Beyond the Ordinary Mind_4th Pass.indd
But when an experienced yogi, who is learned in scripture and reasoning, Investigates their definitive meaning, they are found to be of a single intention. And from the Precious Guru Padmasambhava: Some call it the Middle Way, Some call it the Transcendent Perfection of Wisdom, Some call it Essence of the sugatas, Some call it the Great Seal, Some call it Single All- Encompassing Sphere, Some call it Space of Phenomenal Reality (dharmadhātu), Some call it All- Ground (ālaya), Some call it Ordinary Awareness— It may be pointed out directly as follows: Once a past thought has dissolved without trace, In the freshness of mind before a future thought rises.
While remaining naturally without fabrication in the present, If that ordinary state of consciousness Should turn and look directly into itself, There is clarity, in which nothing is seen through looking, A direct form of awareness, naked and alert. Unmade in any way, it is open and clear.
Its clarity and emptiness indivisible, it is lucid and awake. It is not everlasting, for it is entirely uncreated. Nor is it a void, for it is penetrating clarity. It is not one, because it is aware of and cognizes the manifold. Nor is it multiple, for it embraces all in indivisible experience. And it is not found elsewhere, for it is one’s very own awareness. Beyond the Ordinary Mind_4th Pass.indd 13 10/9/17 11:41 AMxiv B Foreword
In response to a request from the Buddhist scholar, the talented trans-lator Adam Pearcey, I, the one named Thubten Nyima, wrote this in Brooklyn, New York, on April 14, 2017. May virtue and goodness abound.
Many different circumstances came together to shape and bring about this book. Several of the texts translated herein featured in my PhD research, which was itself a continuation of themes first encountered while working on His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s Mind in Comfort and Ease, published in 2007. Two (and a half) of the introductory essays have been adapted from blogposts; many of the translations first appeared on the Lotsawa House website.
Yet this collection also includes much that is new, including four previously unpublished translations together with most of the introductory material.
The arrangement of texts is roughly chronological, allowing a story to unfold over several generations of teachers and students.
The general introduction and the individual essays that precede each translation—or, in chapters 3 and 4, sets of translations— attempt to tell this story by providing some biographical and historical background to the texts themselves. But this is not a thor-oughgoing history. Rather, it is a collection of essays, poems, letters, notes, and advice, that touch upon common themes: education, (non)sectarianism, and the perfect wisdom that transcends the intellect. Names reoccur throughout the book, some well known, others perhaps less so. Texts and authors have, in fact, been chosen as much for their idiosyncrasies and what these might reveal as for their reputation or renown. After all, Tibet’s great literary heritage, so much of it still awaiting the attention it deserves, contains sim-ply untold riches, and many an untold story too.
Adam Pearcey February, 2017
What does it mean to go beyond the ordinary mind? For prac-titioners of Tibet’s Great Perfection (or Dzogchen) tradition, the transcendence of ordinary concepts and mental processes marks the very beginning of the path. Once mind’s true nature, which is pure, open awareness (rigpa), has been revealed by the teacher, the path involves nothing more than getting used to this aware-ness, until eventually it becomes an uninterrupted experience.
Dzogchen (also known as Atiyoga) thus describes itself as an awareness- centric approach, in contrast to lesser methods based on the ordinary, discursive mind (sem).1 But there is still a question as to the role of the intellect (and, by extension, scholasticism) in the Dzogchen tradition. This book attempts to address this question by looking at some of the writings of various Dzogchen masters from the last two centuries. To put these texts and their concerns into context, however, some historical background is in order.
Between the mid- nineteenth and mid- twentieth centuries, Eastern Tibet witnessed many cultural and religious changes. One particularly significant development for followers of the old-est of Tibet’s four main Buddhist schools, the Nyingma or Ancient Ones, was the expansion of scholasticism within monastic com-munities. This school had produced its share of great scholars before—including, for example, Rongzom Chökyi Zangpo (elev-enth century), Longchen Rabjam (1308–1364), and Jigme Lingpa (1730–1798)—but during this period a new intellectual movement developed. Whereas these previous masters had focused primarily on esoteric subjects, especially the tantras and the Great Perfection, their lineal descendants took a keen interest in exoteric topics as well. Senior figures such as Dza Patrul Rinpoche (1808–1887) and
Khenpo Pema Vajra (c.1807–1884), for example, composed com-mentaries on major Mahāyāna treatises and contributed to what was effectively a revolution in monastic education.
Some historians have linked this new scholasticism to the Rimé (nonsectarian) movement spearheaded by Jamgön Kongtrul Lodrö Taye (1813–1899) and Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo (1820–1892). It is indeed true that students and allies (and incarnations) of both mas-ters were among those working to improve monastic learning in the Nyingma, Sakya, and Kagyü schools. However, just as relevant to the burgeoning of Nyingma scholasticism was another, lesser-known group, which E. Gene Smith referred to as the Gemang movement—named after the hermitage near Dzogchen Monas-tery, where the scholar Gyalse Shenpen Taye (1800–1855) lived and taught. Shenpen Taye and his followers made it their mission to revitalize monastic education and strengthen monastic discipline. Dzogchen Monastery’s scriptural college (shedra), the famed Shri Singha, which Gyalse Shenpen Taye established in 1848, eventually became a model for the entire region, producing scores of influen-tial scholars. Yet it was only with the remarkable career of Khenpo Shenpen Chökyi Nangwa, or Shenga (1871–1927), another member of the Gemang group and unofficially Shenpen Taye’s incarnation, that this brand of monastic education in Eastern Tibet decisively took hold and spread throughout the region. Shenpen Chökyi Nangwa founded several colleges himself, trained students who established more, and wrote commentaries that became the core of the new curricula.
Shenpen Chökyi Nangwa’s texts were annotated editions of Indian treatises; they therefore ignored many of the controver-sies that had preoccupied Tibet’s scholarly minds for centuries.
But while Shenpen Chökyi Nangwa focused on Indian sources, other authors preferred to emphasize what they saw as the distinc-tive viewpoints of their own Tibetan traditions. Jamgön Mipham (1846–1912), for instance, set out a uniquely Nyingma perspective, based on the writings of earlier scholars, especially Rongzom and Longchen Rabjam. But his treatises sparked debate, both within
the Nyingma school and externally, between the Nyingma and Geluk. (A famous example was the contest between Mipham and Alak Dongak Gyatso discussed in chapter 2.) In addition, when the writings of such Sakya philosophers as Gorampa Sönam Senge (1429–1489) were reprinted and distributed during this period, they too proved contentious, reigniting age- old rivalries between the Sakya and Geluk, as is made clear in Amdo Geshe’s open letter, “The Messenger of Authentic Reasoning” (chapter 10).
Quite apart from such controversies, however, the expansion of scholasticism also had an impact on the kind of literature pro-duced and read within the Nyingma school. Among the new generation of well- educated Nyingma scholars, instructions on Dzogchen—an approach renowned today for its almost Zen- like simplicity—could, in certain contexts, be expressed and explained in the sophisticated, often abstruse language of Buddhist philoso-phy. This is what we find, for example, in the final testament of the scholar- monk Orgyen Tendzin Norbu (1841–1900), a prominent member of the Gemang tradition. His last words (which are the subject of chapter 6) combine a so- called lion’s roar proclaiming that buddhahood is to be sought nowhere but in the very nature of one’s own mind with a declaration of Dzogchen’s superiority expressed through Abhidharma terminology. The language used is therefore as much a testament to his prodigious learning as it is to his commitment to, and mastery of, the Great Perfection.
Extensive erudition is equally evident in the writings of the Third Dodrupchen Jigme Tenpe Nyima (1865–1926), who was a disciple of, among others, both Mipham and Orgyen Tendzin Norbu.2 As someone well versed in logic and philosophy and renowned for his deeper realization, Jigme Tenpe Nyima was ideally positioned to warn of scholasticism’s potential dangers. His On the Ignorance of the Learned, the subject of chapter 7, cautions against misusing the intellect to formulate trivial arguments and seek flaws in the asser-tions of an imagined opponent. Such preoccupations only erode positive qualities, he explains, and squander the precious opportu-nity that human life affords.
Jigme Tenpe Nyima’s own spiritual development provides a revealing insight into the scholasticism of the period. A child prodigy who, much to Patrul Rinpoche’s delight, lectured on the Bodhicaryāvatāra at the age of just eight, he went on to study with both Alak Dongak Gyatso and Mipham, inevitably becoming caught, to some extent, between their opposing views. At the age of thirty- five, as foretold in a message from Mipham (translated in chapter 5), Jigme Tenpe Nyima underwent something of a midlife crisis of allegiance before reaffirming his Nyingma identity. Later in life, as an acknowledged authority on Dzogchen, he was often called upon to explain abstruse or difficult points and clarify the words of Longchen Rabjam (as in chapter 8, for example) and Jigme Lingpa. And in his answers to the questions of the young Jam-yang Khyentse Chökyi Lodrö (translated in chapter 9), we see this expertise communicated alongside a caring concern for his pro-tégé’s education and the continuation of the lineage.
While Jamgön Mipham was unafraid to highlight or even pro-mote differences between the various Tibetan schools (see chap-ter 3), others took a more conciliatory approach. Dongak Chökyi Gyatso (1903–1957), for instance, attempted to highlight unity rather than difference, and he made it his mission to reconcile Nyingma and Geluk views. His Memorandum on Mahāmudrā and Dzogchen Instructions (translated in chapter 12) demonstrates an extraordinary commitment to harmonizing. In it he suggests that the Gradual Path (lamrim) instructions popularized in the Geluk school should be combined with the advanced meditations of Mahāmudrā and Dzogchen to create a path suitable for the average student. He also calls upon his fellow Gelukpas to accept both the validity and the necessity of Mahāmudrā and Dzogchen practices.
By the time Dongak Chökyi Gyatso was writing, however, Mipham’s characteristic explanations of emptiness and Middle Way philosophy, complete with their criticisms of key Geluk ideas, were widely studied and accepted within the Nyingma tra-dition. So great was Mipham’s influence, in fact, that it is clearly
discernible even in such a practical instruction as Yukhok Chatralwa’s How to Practice the Path of the Great Perfection (translated
in chapter 11). Some readers might find the extent of philosophical content in this text a little surprising, especially given its title, but the initial audience evidently included recipients of a shedra (or at least shedra- style) education.
Whenever appropriate, Dzogchen masters also offer less theo-retical, more practical forms of guidance. One notable example is Mipham’s A Lamp to Dispel Darkness (translated in chapter 4), through which, he tells us, even an “ordinary village yogi” can reach the level of a realized master. Reading the text’s quotation of Saraha, advising us to go beyond thinking and to “remain like a young child, free of thoughts,” we might even begin to question the need for training in Buddhist philosophy at all. Yet none of the authors featured in this collection endorses an anti- intellectualist approach. Most Dzogchen instruction manuals do not dwell on philosophical points, but that is because they are part of a bigger literary picture: the final layer in a three- part structure consisting of tantras, commentaries, and pith instructions. The third stage is the most concentrated and refined, but, like the leaves on a tree, it derives from, and ultimately depends upon, the trunk of canonical scripture.
Some degree of intellectual knowledge is important during the initial stages of the path. Understanding is to be cultivated through listening to and reading the teachings, then reflecting deeply upon them. After this, however, meditation is essential if understand-ing is to develop into genuine wisdom. Yet, ultimately, from a Dzogchen perspective, even the form of insight known as prajñā (sherab in Tibetan)—precise, discerning wisdom or intelligence— must eventually be transcended, as the whole of one’s experience is transformed into the purest form of primordial wisdom. Tibet-ans call this second type of wisdom yeshe, and it is simultaneously a way of knowing—fresh, pristine awareness beyond the duality of subject and object—and a way of being—open, responsive, and uncontrived.
The method whereby the lesser insight of prajñā is transcended so that it can give way to pure, primordial wisdom—which is itself ordinary, in the sense of natural—is explained in detail in the Dzogchen manuals. Although some instructions of this kind are translated in the following pages, putting them into practice requires the guidance (and authorization) of a qualified teacher.
Moreover, the focus here is generally on the preliminaries rather than the main practices. It is through the preliminaries that we “demolish the house of the ordinary mind,” cultivating insight in order to transcend it. For all but a few supremely gifted individuals, this process must begin with analysis, but meditation remains cru-cial, both for stabilizing the insights gained through investigation and for allowing insight to develop into wisdom. The notion of transcending the intellect was perhaps of spe-cial interest in an environment where scholasticism had grown in popularity and importance. This, then, is the key topic at the heart of this book: the means of making evident “nondual, primordial wisdom beyond the domain of the ordinary mind”—as Mipham puts it in Profound Instruction on the View of the Middle Way
(translated in chapter 4). Here, Mipham writes of those “with only dry, theoretical understanding,” who are “worn out by all kinds of reasoning and ideas.” What they need, he says, is meditation, regu-lar and properly graduated. And so, rather than merely provoking such theorizing and speculation—in Mipham’s view as useless as descriptions of water to the thirsty—or fueling controversy and division, may what follows serve as an inspiration and reminder to put the profound instructions into practice and drink from the waters of meditation, thereby discovering what lies beyond the superficial, the partial, and the ordinary.
