The Collected Works of Chögyam Trungpa: Volume Five (2 page)

Next are two short articles that present the vajrayana practice of mantra, which uses the repetition of sacred syllables to invoke the wisdom and energy of egolessness in the form of various herukas,
¹
or nontheistic deities. The first article, “H
UM;
An Approach to Mantra,” is a general explanation of the basic usage of mantra as well as a specific discussion of the mantra
HUM
which is the seed, or root, syllable for all of the herukas. The next article, “Explanation of the Vajra Guru Mantra,” also presents general guidelines for understanding the practice of mantra. However, the main body of this piece is an explanation of this mantra and its association with invoking the power and presence of Padmasambhava.

Next is an interview with Chögyam Trungpa on the ngöndro practices, or the four foundations, which are the entrance into the formal practice of vajrayana. This interview was part of the introduction to the English translation of
The Torch of Certainty,
a classic Tibetan text on ngöndro composed by Jamgön Kongtrül the Great and translated by Judith Hanson. Trungpa Rinpoche’s foreword from this book is also included.

“The Practicing Lineage” and “The Mishap Lineage” discuss the origins of Trungpa Rinpoche’s own spiritual lineage, the line of the Trungpas. Then there is the short piece “Teachings on the Tulku Principle” and finally three articles on Milarepa, Tibet’s most famous Buddhist yogi.

Lineage, one of the main topics of this volume, means the continuity and transmission of the awakened state of mind, which is passed down in an unbroken, direct line from teacher to disciple, beginning with the Buddha—or
a
buddha—and continuing up to the present day. There are many branches of transmission. Some of them trace back directly to Gautama Buddha, the buddha of this age or world realm who appeared in human form. Other lineages trace back to a transmission from one or more of the buddhas who exist on a celestial plane, such as Vajradhara or Samantabhadra, who manifest in a transcendental or dharmakaya aspect. This is often the case in the Tibetan lineages.

As mentioned earlier, the teachings presented here concern themselves with two major branches within Tibetan Buddhism, both of which were part of Chögyam Trungpa’s direct heritage: the teachings of the Nyingma, or “ancient,” lineage of Padmasambhava; and those of the Kagyü, the “oral” or “command” lineage, which originated with the Indian guru Tilopa, who received the ultimate teachings directly from the dharmakaya buddha Vajradhara.

Chögyam Trungpa’s primary intent was not to present a historical or scholarly approach to these lineages of transmission. As he says in
Crazy Wisdom,
“Our approach here, as far as chronology and such things are unconcerned, is entirely unscholastic. For those of you who are concerned with dates and other such historical facts and figures, I am afraid I will be unable to furnish accurate data. Nevertheless, the inspiration of Padmasambhava, however old or young he may be, goes on” (Seminar II, chapter 1). In his talks on the forefathers of the Tibetan Buddhist teachings, he drew on events from their spiritual biographies, which are stories of complete liberation, or
namthars,
composed in order to bring to life the journey that each of these great practitioners made. He shows us the enormous commitment to sanity that they made and the extraordinary difficulties that they endured in order to become holders of the wisdom of buddhadharma and to transmit that wisdom to others. Above all, he presents their lives as examples to guide us in awakening our own sanity as we tread on the path of dharma.

Devotion, the other main theme of this volume, is the emotional attitude and experience of the student that make transmission and realization possible. Devotion is the water that flows through the teachings and maintains them as a living transmission. Devotion is the human element of lineage, the bond between teacher and student that brings vajrayana to life. If one approaches the vajrayana teachings purely with the intellect, it is like trying to use physics to fathom outer space. The physics of space may be extremely subtle and profound, but studying those principles and equations does not bring any genuine
experience
of space. In fact, it may make it seem that direct personal experience of something so far-reaching and profound would be impossible.

What makes the impossible possible is, first, meeting a genuine teacher, someone who is the embodiment of what one is seeking. Second, one has to make friends with outer space as presented in this human form. That is the role of devotion in one’s relationship with the teacher. It involves surrendering one’s egotism and selfishness unconditionally in order to gain a vast perspective. It seems that there is really only one thing that allows us to sacrifice ourselves completely, and that is love. We have to begin with love—completely giving ourselves to one person, the teacher, before we can surrender properly to the whole world. Without a personal connection, devotion is too abstract and, paradoxically, too limited. You might say that it’s not important to surrender to a teacher per se: you could give yourself to anyone. However, devotion is about unconditional surrender, not about creating further ego-oriented entanglements. In the student’s “love affair” with the teacher, you give yourself to space; you give yourself to someone who speaks for space. That someone is the teacher, and that surrender, or abandonment of oneself, is the experience of devotion.

In many respects, this is even more difficult to talk about now than it was when Chögyam Trungpa first gave these talks and translated the devotional texts that are excerpted or referred to here. Throughout his years of teaching in America, Chögyam Trungpa warned against the dangers of charlatan gurus. As he said in
Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism
, “Because America is so fertile, seeking spirituality, it is possible for America to inspire charlatans. . . . Because America is looking so hard for spirituality, religion becomes an easy way to make money and achieve fame.”
²
He advised people to be careful, to think twice, and to use their intelligence to seek out and connect with a genuine teacher. However, there is an entirely different approach that has become more popular in the last few years, which is to do away with the absolute nature of the student-teacher relationship altogether, so that the student goes it on his or her own, accepting advice where it is helpful but never surrendering beyond a certain point.

That is certainly one way to avoid a disastrous relationship with a fraudulent teacher. Rather than accepting a “pseudo” guru, it is preferable to keep one’s own counsel. There is much that can be accomplished on one’s own or with a teacher as adviser rather than as the ultimate reference point. To learn to meditate and practice loving-kindness—one could do far worse than that! For most of us, to accomplish just that is a lifetime’s work.

But to deny the possibility of attaining stainless, pure enlightenment and to deny the possibility of the means—to deny the value of genuine devotion and the existence of genuine teachers—seems to be closing off one of the greatest opportunities that human beings have: the opportunity to be fully awake. Awakening is not achieved easily or comfortably, and the journey is not without dangers and extremes, but that makes it no less real or precious. In this volume are the wonderful stories of some of the outrageous and fully awakened gurus of the Buddhist lineage. What an inspiration they are! At the same time, it is almost unthinkable that these are stories about real people, not just mythical figures in the past. Yet part of Chögyam Trungpa’s genius was his ability to personally introduce you to this cast of characters, as though they were sitting in front of you, as though they might walk in the front door anytime. As though one of them might be your teacher . . .

In
Crazy Wisdom—
which is made up of talks edited from two seminars that Chögyam Trungpa gave in December 1972—we are introduced to some of the main themes in the life of Padmasambhava. An Indian teacher, he brought the Buddhist teachings to Tibet in the eighth century at the invitation of King Trisong Detsen. Thus, he is regarded as the father of Buddhism in Tibet and is revered by all Tibetan lineages and by the Tibetan people. Often, biographies of a teacher present the story of how that person became a student of the buddhadharma, met his or her guru, underwent extensive trials and training, and finally became enlightened, or realized. Such stories provide inspiration and many helpful lessons to students entering the path. In this case, however, Padmasambhava is considered to have been primordially enlightened. That is, he was born fully enlightened, it is said, as an eight-year-old child seated on a lotus flower in the middle of a lake. It is a highly improbable story. As Chögyam Trungpa says, “For an infant to be born in such a wild, desolate place in the middle of a lake on a lotus is beyond the grasp of conceptual mind. . . . Such a birth is impossible. But, then, impossible things happen, things beyond our imagination” (Seminar I, chapter 3). Rather than trying to explain or defend this tale, Trungpa Rinpoche accepts the story of Padmasambhava’s birth as the ground to discuss primordial innocence. As he says, “It is possible for us to discover our own innocence and childlike beauty, the princelike quality in us . . . it is a fresh discovery of perception, a new discovery of a sense of things as they are” (Seminar I, chapter 3). Throughout this book, he is describing not so much the life of a Buddhist saint who lived over a thousand years ago, but the aspects of our own journey and our own lives that might connect with this timeless and extraordinary energy.

Sherab Chödzin Kohn, the editor of
Crazy Wisdom
, has rendered this material artfully, with love and fidelity to the original talks. In reading this book, one has the opportunity to plumb the depths of what crazy wisdom actually is—which is both crazier and wiser than one could possibly imagine!

“Crazy wisdom” was one of a number of terms that Chögyam Trungpa coined in English. It has caught on and has come to be used to describe a variety of styles of behavior, some of them more crazy than wise. In his original meaning of the term, which is a translation of the Tibetan
yeshe chölwa
, it describes the state of being of someone who has gone beyond the limitations of conventional mind and is thus “crazy” from the limited reference point of conceptual thinking; yet such a person is also existing or dwelling in a state of spontaneous wisdom, free from thought in the conventional sense, free from the preoccupations of hope and fear. Crazy wisdom is sometimes referred to as “wisdom gone beyond.” The outrageousness of crazy wisdom is that it will do whatever needs to be done to help sentient beings: it subdues whatever needs to be subdued and cares for whatever needs its care. It will also destroy what needs to be destroyed. Padmasambhava was the embodiment of crazy wisdom; hence the title of the book. This topic is particularly alive and juicy in the hands of Chögyam Trungpa because he was a guru in the lineage of crazy wisdom. It is in part his own fearless wisdom that he communicates in this book.

Sherab Chödzin Kohn also edited the next book in Volume Five,
Illusion’s Game: The Life and Teaching of Naropa
, a commentary on the biography of the great Indian teacher. Naropa’s biography takes the more traditional approach of Tibetan spiritual biography: it is the inspired tale of Naropa’s arduous search for his guru and his experiences while studying with the Indian master Tilopa.
Illusion’s Game
is based on two seminars in which Trungpa Rinpoche reflected on the meaning of events in Naropa’s life, using the biography translated by Herbert V. Guenther as his main reference point. Most of the students who attended the seminars had read Dr. Guenther’s book. In
Illusion’s Game
, excerpts from Dr. Guenther’s translation are included to help readers understand the context of the discussion, and in his editor’s introduction, Sherab Chödzin also provides an excellent summary of the salient events in the biography.

Naropa was the abbot of Nalanda University. One day while he was studying, an ugly old woman suddenly appeared and asked him if he understood the words or the sense of the Buddhist teachings he was reading. She was very happy when he told her that he understood the words, but she became very angry when he said that he also understood the sense. He asked her to tell him who, then, knew the real meaning, and she answered that he should seek her brother Tilopa. Inspired by this encounter, Naropa left the university, much to the dismay of his colleagues and students, and set out to find his guru Tilopa.

On the way, he encountered one horrific illusion after another. Each situation was a test by Tilopa of his prospective disciple’s understanding, and on each occasion Naropa missed the point, so that he had to keep searching on and on. Eventually, he found Tilopa eating fish entrails by the side of a lake. This was just the beginning. Naropa had to undergo many trials, over many years, until finally he became fully realized. As Sherab Chödzin Kohn tells us in the introduction of the book, “Tilopa required him [Naropa] to leap from the roof of a tall temple building. Naropa’s body was crushed. He suffered immense pain. Tilopa healed him with a touch of his hand, then gave him instructions. This pattern was repeated eleven more times. Eleven more times Tilopa remained either motionless or aloof for a year; then Naropa prostrated and asked for teaching. Tilopa caused him to throw himself into a fire, . . . be beaten nearly to death, have his blood sucked out by leeches, be pricked with flaming splinters . . . ,” and on the story goes. It is difficult to know what to make of such a tale. We could dismiss it as craziness or treat it as symbolism. But could we imagine that such things actually took place and that such people could actually exist?

Trungpa Rinpoche published a poem in
First Thought Best Thought
titled “Meetings with Remarkable People.” After describing encounters with three very strange beings, who are actually vajrayana deities, he says: