PHILOSOPHICAL FOUNDATIONS OF CHOD

As I explained in the previous chapter, transmission lineages function to legitimate Buddhist Chod by establishing traditions of important predecessors, even as they work to renew these traditions by integrating new interpreters and teachings into these lineages. In this chapter, I will explore how Chod establishes itself as both authentic and innovative through its integration with established Buddhist philosophies and practices. Chod legitimates its practice and philosophy by explicitly drawing from both Sutra and Tantra traditions, but it is innovative in how it intertwines elements from these two sources.

Chod is explicitly grounded in the Sutra tradition, and one of the most important philosophical influences on Chod is the Prajnàpàramità Sutras.’2'6'1 Biographical accounts of Machik stress her precociousness in reading and understanding Prajnàpàramità texts from a young age and the continuing influence of these texts on her own spiritual development and teachings. In fact, the Tibetan name for the Prajnàpàramità is often appended as part of the full title

of the Chod system. According to The Blue Annals, a text that I have discussed more fully in the previous chapter, the full name of Chod is “Shes rab kyi pha rol tu phyin pa bdud kyi gcod yul gyi brgyid." Chod texts frequently cite the dhàrani “gate gate paragate parasamgate bodhi svàhà” from the Heart Sutra163 to the extent that it is also considered a Chod dhàrani. Many

Chod lineages pay homage to the goddess Prajnaparamita as Yum chen mo, and Machik herself is traditionally considered an avatar of Prajnaparamita. While its close connections with the Prajhaparamita situate Chod within a Sutra lineage, the Chod tradition is also consonant with Buddhist tantric teachings. The Great Explanation mentions Machik's training in the Cakrasamvara and the Mahamayatantra. In The Blue Annals, and in Thu'u bkwan's Grub mtha', the authors point to the Hevajratantra as influencing Chod's concern about place. Go Lotsawa Zhonnupel maintains that Chod praxis conforms to Tantra because it conforms to the Hevajratantra. He cites three passages from the Hevajratantra which resonate with three fundamental principles of Chod: “Good meditation is [practiced] at first [near] a solitary tree, in a charnel ground, at the household of the Terrible mothers, at night, and then ultimately at a remote place (V1.6); “having generously given one's body, after that one can correctly perform the practice” (VI.19), and “truly whatever asura is

before one, even if it comes like Indra, moving with a lion's form one is not afraid of it” (VI.25). These three themes in the Hevajratantra—appropriate space for practice, the offering of one's body, and the development of fearlessness—are elemental in Chod. However, Chod does not have its own extant root Tantra. According to many sources, Machik is supposed to have received three Tantras from Tara, but none of them survives.

As I explain in chapter six, the texts that I have translated for this study, which appear to be among the earliest surviving Chod texts, emphasize their relationship to the “Sutra” teachings of Prajhaparamita rather than a particular cycle of Tantra. Even in these early texts, however, there is evidence that Chod not only draws from both Sutra and Tantra, but that it seeks to combine the two in an innovative way. The fruition of this attempt is acknowledged by Jamgon Kongtrul in his 19th century encyclopedia of Tibetan teachings, the Treasury of Knowledge. In his section on Chod, Kongtrul

individuates the tradition as “famous as the combination of sutric and tantric realization”: “Abiding in emptiness, not forsaking beings, acting according to one's word, and the sugatas' blessing: these four are the meaning of the doctrine. Famous even now, this unbroken tradition of ripening and liberating

instructions has the Sutras on the perfection of wisdom (prajhaparamita) as the scriptural source of its view and the various methods that distinguish the mantra vehicle. Therefore it is accepted as the combination of sutric and tantric realization.”269 The Prajhaparamita teachings provide an authenticating canon for Chod teachings, but the Chod tradition also develops its own innovative Tantra methods, especially when it produces mature sadhana, as I will explain below.

The negotiation between legitimation and innovation in Chod can also be seen in its aspiration to be legitimated as authentic Dharma through Indic Buddhist antecedents and its insistence on its indigenous Tibetan origins. The Buddhist tradition of Chod explicitly identifies its roots in the Prajnaparamita teachings, which are themselves identified as buddhavacana, or the authoritative speech of the Buddha. Chod has also traditionally represented itself as uniquely Tibetan: according to the second rnam thar in The Great Explanation collection, Machik claimed that Chod was the only Buddhist teaching to have

been transmitted from Tibet to India, rather than from India to Tibet. Most Western analyses of Chod have been weighted toward its Tibetan context: usually Chod is assimilated to a pre-Buddhist version of “shamanism.” As scholars such as David Seyfort Ruegg have noted, indigenous literature was produced in Tibet from the late 8th century; such works feature explicitly Tibetan elements as well as “adaptations of ideas and motifs that are clearly of Indian origin and also the independent, and indeed confidently original, use of fully assimilated Indic—i.e. typologically, but not (as far as is known)

historically borrowed, Indian—components” (1984, 372). Machik's system of Chod is grounded in an inheritance of Indic teachings and practices during a formative and reformative time in Tibet, a period characterized by developments of and negotiations between different threads of Buddhism.

The Prajnaparamita Sutras obviously ground Chod in an established Buddhist philosophical tradition, but the question of the connections between Chod and Vajrayana teachings is more vexed and insufficiently studied. Since I explore “Sutra Chod” in greater detail in chapter six, I turn my attention in this chapter to exploring “Tantra Chod” and to explaining how Chod seeks to integrate Sutra and Tantra aspects. In the first part of the chapter, I explain that as the Chod tradition developed a more explicit ritual apparatus, many of its texts developed resonances with Tantra texts. In particular, I explore the

ways in which Chod draws from the Vajrayogini cycles of methods of practice (sgrubpa'i thabs; sadhana). In the second part of the chapter, I explain how we can better understand Chod as a fusion of Sutra and Tantra elements, notably through the homonyms of the Tibetan terms “gcod” and “spyod.” In the final section of the chapter, I explain how Machik uses a strategy of “anti-legitimation” to position her teachings as both integrating and transcending their Sutra and Tantra antecedents.

CHOD AS TANTRA: MACHIK AND VAJRAYOGINI

While Chod philosophy is explicitly grounded in the Prajnaparamita teachings, many aspects of Chod practice have affinities with Tantra practices. In much scholarship on Tantra, to argue the role of practice, process and praxis as definitive of “Tantrism” is standard. David Snellgrove says that a general

distinction between Sutra and Tantra is that the former is primarily concerned with doctrine and the latter with ritual. Suggesting a parallel between practice and philosophical engagement, Ernst Steinkellner argues that Candrakirti's hermeneutical system of the fourfold explanation (caturvidham akhyanam, bshad pa rnam ba bzhi), developed in his Pradipoddyotana commentary on the Guhyasamaja Tantra, parallels the progress of a tantric practitioner. Drawing

on the Tibetan commentarial tradition, John Pettit maintains that a paradigmatic teaching of Tantra is the pure perception (dag pa'i snang ba) of the self in relation with the world: through the practice of visualizing such a pure perception, “one creates the immediate and homologous cause for enlightenment” (1999, 63). Pettit emphasizes that this homology of cause and effect in Buddhist Tantra is distinct from the Paramitayana, which emphasizes the causes of enlightenment, and not the effect as cause. The techniques for the emulation of enlightenment elaborated in the Tantra teachings—all of which are

integrated into Chod as it develops its ritual apparatus—include body postures and hand gestures (mudra, phyag rgya), the use of ritual implements, verbal utterances (mantra, sngags), visualization of meditational deities (istadevata, yi dam lha) and their abodes (mandala, dkyil ‘khor),

empowerments (adhistana, byin gyis brlabs pa) and initiations (abhiseka, dbang bskur ba). In its use of various techniques—including purification rituals, mandala offerings, and deity generation—Chod has many affinities with the yoginitantras and the *anuttaratantras. “Tantra Chod” incorporates *anuttaratantra skyed rim (“generation stage”) and rdzogs rim (“perfection stage”) practices. The Tibetan traditions of Nyingma (“old”) and Sarma (“new”) teachings both identify three general categories of Tantra practice. The “outer yoga” of the

“generation stage” is practice working with form, that is, the visualization of oneself as a “deity” (yi dam) complemented by relevant sadhanas. The “inner yogas” of the “perfection stage” can be subdivided into practice working with subtle form, or “signs,” and practice of resting in the nature of mind, or formless practice without signs.

Deity yoga, according to David Germano, is the essence of generation stage practice; he characterizes deity yoga as “the imaginative appropriation of a new subjectivity, self-identity, and body-image as a male or female buddha” (1997b, 314). The technologies of such imaginative transformation include mental

techniques (visualizations), physical techniques (mudras and postures), and communicative or speech techniques (mantras) to support the physical, cognitive and emotional trans-identification with a perfected being. In complement, perfection stage practice aims at “com[ing] to terms with the body's own reality, in terms of both its interior (symbolic) and its mute space devoid of images (nonsymbolic)” (1997b, 314). The techniques of the perfection stage parallel

those of the generation stage, but they emphasize subtle body variants of visualization, breathing, and chanting practices, which incorporate the flows of energy of one's being. The perfection stage also includes nonsymbolic meditations on emptiness, or the true nature of the mind. Germano's characterization of these two stages of practice reveals an interesting chiasmatic relationship between the particular stage and its aim: whereas the generation stage is the process of perfecting the psycho-physical being of the practitioner through trans-identification, the perfection stage is the generation of one's realization through the lived reality of one's psycho-physical constituents. A homological relationship between embodying the divine and divine embodiment is thus created.

I explain in detail how important Chod practices include generation and perfection stage elements in chapters four and five, but now I turn my attention to the ways in which a range of Chod texts provide support for deity yoga. In particular, I explore how and why Machik became associated with the goddess Vajrayogini as Chod developed its Tantra components. Though Chod does not have an explicit source Tantra text, the development of the tradition connects it with the representation of Vajrayogini. Tantra elements associated with Vajrayogini are often featured in Chod paintings, biographies, and practice texts.

The visual imagery of Chod practice often features supramundane figures, including Vajrayogini and the five Dhyani Buddhas. In addition, biographies of Machik establish a connection between Machik and Vajrayogini, simultaneously validating Machik's historical significance within Tibetan Buddhism and equating her with an ahistorical, supramundane goddess. Further, in the genre of sadhana as practice texts, Vajrayogini or one of her avatars often overshadows or even replaces Machik.

As I explained in the previous chapter, in Namkha Gyaltsen's appendix to the rnam thar in The Great Explanation collection, the transmission lineages of Chod are described along three different paths. One derives from the Sutra tradition of Prajnaparamita, or Yum Chen mo. A second lineage, which ultimately derives from Sakyamuni, runs through Manjusri, Nagarjuna, and the Brahmin Aryadeva to Padampa Sangye and finally to Machik. A third lineage of Tantra runs from Vajradhara through Tara to Machik. Missing from this scheme is the strong association between Machik and Vajravarahi. In fact, though there are

significant confluences between Chod and the Vajrayogini and Vajravarahi Tantras, very little has been said about this connection. While Padampa Sangye features prominently in many Chod lineage lists, the strong association between Machik and Vajrayoginr in one of her avatar forms is missing from standard

textual genealogies of Chod transmissions. Because the association between Machik and Vajrayoginr was established later in order to help other schools assimilate Chod, the process of legitimation through this connection has not been noticed. In addition, since most contemporary scholars are interested in Chod's supposed origins in Tibetan shamanic practices, its transformations through Tibetan Buddhist lineages has been largely ignored.

To establish some affinities between the discourse of Chod and the discourse of Vajrayoginr and her avatars, I will look at three different kinds of Chod texts: first, assembly fields (tshogs zhing) as represented in thang ga painings; second, The Great Explanation collection; and finally, a selection of sadhana, or “means of attainment” (sgrub thabs) practice texts, focusing on the central practices of nam mkha' sgo ‘byed (a type of consciousness transference), lus dkyil (body mandala) and lus sbyin (gift of the body). Although Vajravarahr and her avatars are not honored in Chod lineage prayers, thang ga, The Great Explanation, and sadhana often intimate or foreground her influence. Through brief readings of these texts, I would like to suggest that much might be learned about the Vajrayana content and context of Chod by understanding its relation to Vajrayoginr or Vajravarahr practice. The parallel relationship between Machik and Vajrayoginii functioned to justify and emphasize a legitimate Tantra connection for the institutionalization of Chod. Ironically, this process of transmission has resulted in the diminishment of the historical figure of Machik, who is often superseded by Vajrayoginii or one of her avatars.

Reading a Thang ga Painting

In this section, I consider a traditional visual representation of a genealogy of Chod as depicted in a thang ga painting. [See figure one.] This thang ga is from Spitok dgon pa outside of Leh, Ladakh. The date for this thang ga is not recorded, but I was informed by a resident attendant that it is ‘very old,' which it appears to be given its state of deterioration. When I viewed it, it was hanging in the late Bakula Rinpoche's (1917-2003) personal meditation room, above his chair. It depicts a Chod assembly field, with Machik in the center. Machik is surrounded by three notable groups of figures that represent a tradition of Chod in terms of its worldly and supramundane heritages.

On the left side of Machik are the worldly lineage teachers of Chod. An integral part of the Chod practice, in consonance with those of many Tantra, is the preliminary visualization of a lineage of Indian and Tibetan precursors. The central figure in this aspect of the visualization is Padampa Sangye holding a

damaru and kang ling. Above him is Padmasambhava, who is credited with introducing Tantra to Tibet from India. Above Padmasambhava is the Buddha Rdo rje 'chang (Vajradhara). This group also features numerous Indian Mahasiddhas, including Tilopa, Naropa, Sukhasiddhi, Asanga, Nagarjuna, Aryadeva, Saraha and Virupa. These figures represent the Indic lineage of Padampa Sangye's teachings as they inform what will become Chod.

Machik's root teacher, Kyoton Sonam Lama, and Tibetan figures who helped to perpetuate the tradition from Machik's teachings, including the Third Karmapa Rangjung Dorje, are also represented in this group. Slightly below and on either side of Machik are two men considered to be notable inheritors of her Chod lineage. To the left is Tonyon Samdrub in monastic attire. To the right is Gyalwa Dondrub with the characteristic appearance of a yogi. In this assembly

field, these two men represent the main holders of Machik's Chod teachings as passed along both institutional monastic lines and non-institutional lines of yoga practitioners. The commonly cited supramundane sources of Machik's Chod lineage are depicted in the upper section of the painting. Directly above Machik is Tara, and Sakyamuni Buddha is above Tara. Yum Chen Mo, or Prajnaparamita, the Goddess of Wisdom, is above the Buddha. Above Prajnaparamita are the five Dhyani Buddhas with their consorts.

What particularly interests me here are the supramundane figures in the right portion of the assembly field. Unlike the groups organized around Prajnaparamita or Padampa Sangye, this group of figures organized around Vajravarahi is not generally recognized as a vital part of the Chod tradition.

While a few scholars have pointed out iconographic parallels between Machik and Vajrayogini or Vajravarahi, there has not been any systematic investigation of the relationship between these figures. And although Vajravarahi is not commonly acknowledged in Chod lineage prayers, she occupies a conspicuous place in assembly field representations such as this one. Vajravarahi is in the ardhaparyahka (half-lotus dancing posture), echoing Machik's posture in the

center of the painting. She is holding the kartrka (flaying knife) and kapala (skull cap), as per her conventional iconography. When one sees this typical representation, the resonance between the visual image of Vajravarahi and Chod practice is striking. As I discuss further in the next two chapters, a distinctive aspect of Chod is cutting through attachment and ignorance by visualizing cutting up and offering one's own body. The flaying knife and

skullcap are symbolic instruments associated with this practice. In many Chod texts, when the Chod practitioner is preparing for this offering, she transforms her consciousness into Machik, who in turn is visualized as performing the act of cutting through the body. As Chod is assimilated into other Tibetan traditions, Machik's role as meditative support is often taken by Vajravarahi (or one of the other avatars of Vajrayogini): the practitioner thus transforms into an ahistorical goddess rather than a historical woman.

Cakrasamvara, in heruka form together with Vajravarahi, is depicted above Simhamukha, the dakini distinguished by the lion face. The presence of

Cakrasamvara is a reminder of the complicated tantric heritage of Vajrayogini and her avatar Vajravarahi. As Elizabeth English explains, the tradition of Vajrayogini has no root Tantra of its own, and so draws on and transforms Tantra associated with her consort Cakrasamvara. I am speculating that in a similar way, Chod lacks a root Tantra of its own and so adapts the textual and iconographic tradition associated with Vajrayogini.

In the center of the painting, Machik herself is adorned with a five-skull head ornament, which signifies (among other things) the five buddha families, the five wisdoms and the five purified aggregates. Along with the other mudra ornaments, this head ornament marks her as a wisdom dakini. Like Vajravarahi, Machik is in the ardhaparyahka posture. While it would be ritually consonant for her to hold a kartrka and kapala like Vajravarahi, Machik needs to be

iconographically distinguished from her supramundane analogue. Machik thus holds a damaru (drum) in her right hand and a dril bu (bell) in her left. While the bell traditionally signifies the accumulation of wisdom, the damaru here might signify skillful means. Given that the damaru is used for calling the guests to partake of the offering of one's own body in Chod sadhana, this implement also suggests the compassionate subduing of one's demons rather than the wrathful subjugation of them.

The iconographical parallels between Machik and Vajravarahi encourage us to consider the associations between Vajravarahi and Chod praxis more seriously. As I will explain further, some of the more “exotic” elements of Chod praxis may be seen to correspond with aspects of Vajrayogini and Vajravarahi sadhana. Rather than being shamanistic practices overlaid with Buddhist concepts, Chod practices are deeply rooted in Vajrayana thought. Images like this assembly

field are also vital in the lived practice of Chod: they are both perceived as thang ga paintings and reconstructed through visualization. As an integral element of this assembly field, Vajrayogini and her avatars are thus an integral element of Chod as experienced practice. Reading The Great Explanation While such thang ga images establish an iconographic and meditative connection between Vajravarahi and Machik's Chod, written texts such as Machik's The

Great Explanation and her various rnam thar establish a narrative and genealogical link between the two. The two rnam thar that are included in The Great Explanation are the most widely circulated and broadly accepted. These hagiographies are almost certainly the compositions of the 13th century writer

Brtson ‘grus seng ge of the Shangpa Kagyu school, and were written shortly before the Shangpa Kagyu were assimilated into the Kadam school. The editions that are included in The Great Explanation were edited by Namkha Gyaltsen, who seems to have been associated with the Mar pa Kagyü and Dwags po Kagyü monastic lineages in the early 15th century. These hagiographies, which are considered authoritative versions of Machik's life, are thus the product of the scholastic transmission and transformation of Chod.

These texts establish a significant correspondence between Machik and Vajrayogini practice through another male figure from the Indian subcontinent: the prince Arthasiddhi Bhadra. As The Great Explanation recounts, prior to her birth as a Tibetan woman, Machik was incarnated as Arthasiddhi. Arthasiddhi becomes an adept in the Cakrasamvara Tantra cycle, and he also receives teachings in related Tantra traditions, including the Five Goddesses of Nag mo and the secret mandala of Hayagriva-Vajravarahi. Tara directs Arthasiddhi to help sentient beings in Tibet, and his journey to Tibet is facilitated by an unidentified wrathful, blue-black dakini, reminiscent of the Vajrayogini avatar Khros ma Nag mo. The dakini instructs Arthasiddhi to merge his

consciousness with her heart, and then kills him with a flaying knife. This ritual prefigures the Chod nam mkha' sgo byed practice (described in detail in chapter five), which involves the transference of the practitioner's consciousness to Vajrayogini. This narrative also evokes the visualized dissection and

offering of the practitioner's body in the lus sbyin practice. Following the transference of his consciousness to the dakini and her transportation of this consciousness to Tibet, Arthasiddhi's consciousness enters the womb of the mother of the future Machik. As with the lineage position of Padampa Sangyé, discussed in the previous chapter, the association of Chod with Vajrayogini Tantra is here undergirded by Machik's previous experiences as an Indian man.

In this rnam thar genre of narratives, Machik's own proper incarnation establishes her close relationship to, or even identity with, Vajrayogini. While still in the womb, Machik intones the mantra of Vajrayogini and the Five Dakinis: “ha ri ni sa.” At birth, Machik immediately adopts the ardhaparyahka stance and intones the seed syllable “A” of the Prajnaparamita teachings; the seed syllable of Avalokitesvara, “hri,” appears on her tongue; and she manifests a third-eye of five-coloured light, signifying her embodiment as a dakini. As a young woman, Machik receives training in the Cakrasamvara cycle,

and she later marries a yogin who specializes in the Cakrasamvara praxis. According to the Rnam bshad, Machik also gives initiation for the Five Deity Vajravarahi praxis, in which she appears as Vajravarahi with her retinue of four dakini. Machik herself explains that her outer manifestation is Yum Chen mo, or Prajnaparamita, her inner manifestation is Tara, and her secret manifestation is Vajravarahi. In this teaching, Machik identifies herself with

Vajravarahi along with her retinue of four dakini. This group of five figures is manifested in various ways, including as the four syllable mantra “ha ri ni sa” with the seed syllable “bam.” Through these analogues, Machik as Vajravarahi becomes the source of all being, from the cosmic constituents to the aggregates of existential being. As in the thang ga, Vajravarahi's role in The Great Explanation not only suggests the importance of Vajrayogini Tantra in the development of Chod, but also demonstrates Chod's incorporation of elements of Vajrayogini practice.

Reading a Sadhana

The assembly field thang ga illustrates the important role of Vajravarahi in Chod visualization, and Machik's secret manifestation as Vajravarahi in The Great Explanation demonstrates the significance of Vajravarahi in the Chod lineage. When one looks at Chod sadhana, the influence of Vajrayogini Tantra on

Chod practice becomes even more apparent. The most distinctive practices in Chod sadhana involve the practitioner visualizing the offering of her body to all sentient beings. While these meditative practices—including the White, Red, and Multicolored Banquets—are usually discussed in writings on Chod, the parallels between Chod sadhana and yoginitantra or *anuttaratantra sadhana are rarely explored.

Sgrub thabs, literally “means for accomplishment” and a translation of the Sanskrit word “sadhana,” refers to both a genre of ritual literature and the practice this literature describes and discusses. Because of the emphasis on the embodied practice of teachings, sadhana are usually associated with Vajrayana Buddhism. Hubert Decleer (1978, 113) states that texts of this genre include three elements: “1) a scenario for visualization processes of

inspiring symbols”; “2) reference to philosophical material”; and “3) indication of particular moods.” Sadhana praxis usually begins with the foundational Buddhist practice of going for refuge to the Three Jewels— Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. One may also then recollect one's impermanence, the imminence of

death, and one's precious human opportunity to attain enlightenment. The practitioner then generates the spirit of enlightenment, including compassion and its complement of meditation on emptiness, which reflects the Bodhisattva vow as defined by Mahayana: to attain enlightenment in order to aid all sentient beings until they too are enlightened.

These activities ground the Vajrayana practice of deity yoga, which comes next. This aspect begins with paying homage to one's teacher and recollecting one's lineage (bla rgyud gsol ‘debs dang tshog zhing); the practitioner might also incorporate the visualization of deities in front of herself (mdun bskyed) as the recipients of offerings and the source of blessings (byin rlabs). The next component is the generation of oneself as an enlightened being (bdag bskyed), which is usually combined with the notion of being imbued with divine pride (which is not the vulgar pride in one's own ego and self, but the unselfish belief in one's capacity for action informed by wisdom and skillful means). This aspect of the visualization practice underscores the

Mahayana Buddhist doctrine of actuality as emptiness, with all phenomena being fundamentally pure manifestations of the wisdom of bliss and emptiness of the Buddhas. Ordinary appearances must be understood from this perspective and hence the practitioner must “become” a buddha herself. The visualization of oneself as an enlightened being is a method for dissolving conventional appearances through the experiential awareness of the emptiness of things as interdependent and impermanent manifestations.

The offering of a mandala to all sentient beings, or to a field of merit, usually composed of one's lineage holders and other significant beings, is a common component of sadhana practice. A Vajrayana mandala often signifies the domain of a deity or deities. Within the context of offering in Vajrayana Buddhist practice, the “outer mandala” signifies the practitioner's experiential universe; as ritually visualized, it is based on an Indic worldview with Mount Meru in the middle surrounded by the four continents. The offering of an “inner mandala,” which is common in traditions such as Chod, involves

visualization of the practitioner's own body as the universe. For example, the skin is understood as analogous to the ground, the blood to the rivers and oceans, the flesh to the abundance of flora, the trunk of the body to Mount Meru at the center, the four limbs to the continents, the eyeballs to the orbs of the sun and the moon, and the organs to the material resources that support sentient life. As such, the offering of an inner mandala can be done by

anyone, since it requires no more (and no less) than one's own being for its performance. Offered to the Buddhas of the three times, it demonstrates one's non-attachment to the mundane and ultimate desire for enlightenment. As I will explain in the following chapters, the accessibility of this offering to all practitioners becomes a key aspect of the Chod tradition.

Chod sadhana share many generic aspects with other tantric sadhana, particularly in preliminary and concluding practices. Chod sadhana open with preliminaries including the generation of bodhicitta (sems skyed); going for refuge (skyabs ‘gro); the purification of obscurations (sgrib sbyong); and the

making of offerings (mchod ‘phul). The conclusion of the practice includes dedication prayers (sngo smon), the dissolution stage (bsdus rim), and the post-practice of taking on the path (lam khyer). In the context of the Chod sadhana, merit (tshogs bsags) is accumulated through the visualization of a “refuge field” (tshogs zhing), such as the one depicted in the thang ga, with Machik flanked by Padampa Sangye and his coterie to her left, the Buddha and the

supramundane beings above, and Vajravarahi and her retinue to her right. If the particular sadhana includes a bla ma rnal ‘byor (guru yoga) practice, as in a sadhana by the First Panchen Lama, then one visualizes one's lama in the form of Machik Labdron, having the aspect of Vajravarahi.

While some specific techniques distinguish Chod sadhana from other tantric sadhana, many of the most important Chod texts intimately associate Machik as meditative support with Vajravarahi. The main part of the practice begins with nam mkha' sgo ‘byed consciousness transference practice. This is followed by a body mandala practice, which culminates in banquets (‘gyed pa and tshogs) involving the offering of the body. Some instructions for the consciousness transference practice indicate that Machik should be the “support” for the consciousness, while others recommend Vajravarahi or Khros ma nag mo. In most

Chod sadhana, after the practitioner mixes her consciousness with space, she emanates as Vajravarahi. It is in this emanation as Vajravarahi that she also transforms her body into a mandala offering. In this offering, the practitioner shifts her cognitive perspective from mundane to extraordinary: she purifies and transforms herself by visualizing homologies between her body as micro¬cosmology and the universe as macro-cosmology. Identifying a particular body part with a particular enlightened being transforms the practitioner: she is no longer a limited human being with limited resources for offering and

spiritual development, but has the ability to offer the entire universe through her body, and the means for unlimited enlightened activity as an embodiment of a field of enlightened beings. This body mandala technique bears a close resemblance to similar practices in Vajrayogini and Vajravarahi sadhana. These Vajrayogini practices derive from the Cakrasamvara Tantra cycle, in which the body mandala is a core component. Finally, as Vajravarahi, the practitioner distributes her body—transformed into abundant offerings according to the needs and desires of the guests—to all sentient beings. In all stages of the

practice, these texts closely connect Machik with Vajrayogini. Throughout many such sadhana, Machik is thus systematically replaced by the ahistorical supramundane goddess Vajrayogini, making the practice more appealing and accessible to male scholastic institutions.

Though the visual images, lineage narratives, and practice texts of Chod all demonstrate a strong link with Vajrayogini Tantra, the influences do not simply move in one direction. The practice of Kusali tshogs provides one example of the symbiotic relationship between Chod and Vajrayogini praxis. Kusali tshogs is thought to derive from the Siksasamuccaya of Santideva.

In this text, Santideva stresses that even if one is merely a kusali or beggar, one can offer one's body (lus sbyin) for the accumulation of merit and wisdom and for the benefit of others. As Dpal sprul Rin po che describes them in the Kun bzang bla ma'i zhal lung (The Words of My Perfect Teacher), the ritual and meditative techniques of this practice (which he calls “Kusali Gcod ” and connects with the teachings of Machik) are very similar to those of Chod, from the transformation of one's individual consciousness into Vajravarahi or Khros ma Nag mo, to the various feasts for an assortment of sentient beings (1994, 297; 2005, 335). At least one Vajrayogini sadhana, with a commentary by Tsong kha pa, incorporates a Kusali tshogs practice. In this

example, there seems to have been a “pulling-through” of elements associated with Chod. While Chod adapts visual, narrative, and philosophical aspects of Vajrayogini teachings, this Vajrayogini practice is elaborated through the inclusion of a lus sbyin practice commonly identified with Chod.

As I suggested earlier, the reason that Chod sadhana demonstrate such close associations with those of Vajrayogini and her avatars may be that Chod does not have an explicit source Tantra to elaborate. Although the historical figure of Machik is eventually reborn as a dakini in many Chod sadhana, at the time of Chod's systematization during the 11th and 12th centuries, a supramundane figure was also needed for the practice to function. Since Vajrayogini practices were extremely popular during this period, and since the tradition around Vajrayogini offered mature sadhana as models for Chod, it makes a

great deal of sense that Chod would turn to Vajrayogini as the yi dam, or meditation deity, for its sadhana. Chod does not straightforwardly appropriate aspects of the Vajrayogini tradition, but rather interprets and adapts elements of the yoginitantras for its own purposes. For example, as I noted earlier, a form of Vajrayogini is used in the role of yi dam; and in the central practices nam mkha' sgo ‘byed and lus sbyin, Vajravarahi often provides a locus for the transformed consciousness.

Vajrayogini also plays a key role in the incorporation of Chod by various Tibetan Buddhist schools. In later sadhana, as Chod practices become recognized components of institutionalized Tibetan Buddhist systems, Vajrayogini (or one of her avatars) supersedes Machik as ritual support. I would suggest that there are two interconnected reasons for the displacement of Machik by Vajrayogini. First, this association substantiates Chod as a Tantra teaching: Vajrayogini provides a mnemonic marker to remind the practitioner of the association of Chod with Tantra antecedents. As a familiar icon imbued with

Vajrayana resonances, Vajrayogini obviously helped to organize and establish a tradition which was individually practiced outside the regulation of Buddhist institutions. The second reason can be attributed to the male scholastic traditions that came to predominate over the Buddhist landscape in Tibet.

These traditions, including the Kagyu and Geluk, resisted accepting a historical woman as a source for Buddhist teachings and a paradigm for enlightenment, especially since it is a conventional Buddhist belief that it is difficult, if not impossible, to reach spiritual liberation in a woman's body. This attitude is suggested in a quote attributed to Machik's disciple, Tonyon

Samdrub, who is discussing Machik's transformation into Vajrayogini in her avatar form as Vajravarahi: “E ma ho! How wonderful! An ordinary woman whose essence is impure is Vajravarahi herself in the essence of purified appearances” (147). When an ordinary woman is replaced by a goddess as the representative figure of the practice, Chod teachings are more readily assimilable by Tibetan Buddhist schools and their ideologies. Like the establishment of Padampa Sangyé as the Indian male progenitor of Chod, the replacement of Machik by Vajrayogini helped monastic and scholastic institutions interpret and adapt Chod to complement their own traditions.

While I am still at a preliminary stage in explaining the reasons for Chod's association with Vajrayogini traditions, systematic study of the confluences and influences between the Vajrayogini Tantra corpus and Buddhist Chod would help to move the study of Chod away from associations with shamanism and to

locate Chod within the historical and generical ground of the yoginitantra and *anuttaratantra traditions. Both within Chod and between Chod and corresponding traditions, such a shift in interpretation would also facilitate a deeper understanding of the genre of sadhana and of psycho-physical yogic practices in extra- institutional and institutional contexts.