The Collected Works of Chögyam Trungpa: Volume 4 (51 page)

3
. Here and elsewhere in this book, “Don Juan” refers to the Yaqui Indian spiritual teacher depicted in the books of Carlos Castaneda.

4
. Another way, besides the nine yanas, of delineating the Buddhist spiritual journey is in terms of the five paths. The five paths are the paths of accumulation, unification, seeing, meditation, and no more learning.

Chapter 3. The Preparation for Tantra

1
. These two sentences (“First we prepare . . . Then we begin . . .”) are a synopsis of the three main Buddhist yanas: hinayana, mahayana, and vajrayana.

2
. The Vidyadhara is embarking on a description of five categories, sometimes known as the five powers (Skt.
bala
). The development of these five characterizes the path of unification. They are (with the Vidyadhara’s eventual preferred English translations of them): faith (Skt.
shraddha;
Tib.
tepa
), exertion (Skt.
virya;
Tib.
tsöndrii
), mindfulness or recollection (Skt.
smriti;
Tib.
trenpa
), meditation (Skt.
dhyana;
Tib.
samten
), intellect (Skt.
prajna;
Tib.
sherap
). The fourth category is also often given as
samadhi
(Tib.
tingdzin
).

3
. See
Shantideva
in Glossary.

4
. According to the traditional cosmology of India, much of which became part of the Buddhist tradition, Mount Meru is the great cosmic mountain at the center of the universe.

5
. The bodhisattva (Skt., “enlightenment being”) is the ideal practitioner of the mahayana path. The bodhisattva’s compassionate practice of virtues transcending ego is regarded as heroic and even warriorlike. The Vidyadhara discusses this in greater detail in part two, chapter 3, “The Dawn of Mysticism.”

6
. In Buddhism, the five skandhas (Tib.
phungpo
, meaning “heap” in both Sanskrit and Tibetan) are the five types of aggregates of psychophysical factors that, taken together, are associated with the sense of self or ego. Upon examination, no such self or ego is found, only these collections. They are form (Skt.
rupa
), feeling (Skt.
vedana
), perception (Skt.
samjna
), formation (Skt.
rupa
), feeling (Skt.
vedana
), perception (Skt.
samjna
), formation (Skt.
samskara
), and consciousness (Skt.
vijnana
). See part two, chapter 2, “Competing with Our Projections.”

7
.
Chutzpah (ch
as in Scottish
loch
) is a Yiddish word referring to boldness or audacity that proceeds vigorously rather than being cowed by obstacles.

Chapter 4. The Basic Body

1
. The Vidyadhara describes the buddha families in more detail in part two, chapter 7, “The Five Buddha Families and Mahamudra.” As stated, they are vajra, ratna, padma, karma, and buddha. Sometimes it is confusing when he refers to the last of these. Instead of spelling out the logically complete designation, “the buddha buddha family,” he usually just calls it “the buddha family.”

2
. The five wisdoms are the enlightened expressions of the five buddha families. See part two, chapters 6, “Introduction to Tantra,” and 7, “The Five Buddha Families and Mahamudra.”

3
.
Shunyata
(Skt., “emptiness”) refers to the key mahayana notion that all dharmas (phenomena) are devoid of any autonomous essence. See part two, chapter 4, “The Juncture between Sutra and Tantra.”

4
. The Vidyadhara explains these points in the next chapter.

Chapter 5. The Crazy-Wisdom Holder and the Student

1
. According to tradition, the Buddha, or enlightenment itself, has three modes of existence: dharmakaya, sambhogakaya, and nirmanakaya. These correspond to mind, speech, and body. The dharmakaya (Skt., “dharma body”) is unoriginated, primordial mind, devoid of concept. The sambhogakaya (“enjoyment body”) is its environment of compassion and communication. The nirmanakaya (“emanation body”) is its physical form. The three kayas are also sometimes understood as existential levels, represented by buddhas. The dharmakaya buddha is supreme among these.

2
. The Tibetan word
chö
, which literally means “cut off” or “cut through,” designates a tantric practice the main part of which is cutting through the false concepts of ego by visualizing offering one’s body to demons and requesting them to devour it.

Chapter 6. Alpha Pure

1
. For more on vajra pride, see part two, chapter 6, “Introduction to Tantra.”

2
.
Satipatthana
is a Pali word (Skt.
smriti-upasthana
) meaning “four foundations of mindfulness.” Working on the four foundations is one of the fundamental meditation practices of the hinayana. The four are mindfulness of body, mindfulness of life, mindfulness of effort, and mindfulness of mind. See Chögyam Trungpa,
The Heart of the Buddha
(Boston & London: Shambhala Publications, 1991), pp. 21–58. (Also in Volume Three of
The Collected Works
.)

3
. See note 6 for part two, chapter 6.

P
ART
T
WO

Chapter 1. Suffering, Impermanence, Egolessness

1
. These three qualities are traditionally referred to as the three marks of existence. They are most often listed as suffering, impermanence, and egolessness. The Vidhadhara refers to them again in the next chapter as pain, transitoriness, and nonsubstantiality.

Chapter 2. Competing with Our Projections

1
. See note 6 for part one, chapter 3.

2
. The Vidyadhara later decided in favor of “concept” as the best translation for the name of this fourth skandha. Some years later he revised his translation once more and ended up with “formation.” He felt that “concept” was quite close to the actual process of the skandha, but “formation” was also excellent in this respect and closer to the Sanskrit
samskara
.

3
. Paramita practices are discussed in the next chapter.

Chapter 3. The Dawn of Mysticism

1
. Padmasambhava (fl. eighth century CE) was a great Indian teacher and saint, one of the founders of Buddhism in Tibet. For the Vidyadhara’s account of this major figure, see Chögyam Trungpa,
Crazy Wisdom
(Boston & London: Shambhala Publications, 1991. Also in Volume Five of
The Collected Works
). For Milarepa, see Glossary.

2
. One of the key doctrines in Buddhism concerns not falling into the two extremes of eternalism and nihilism. Eternalism is the hope or belief that something solid and permanent exists that guarantees salvation or at least some good result if we can connect with it, or various levels of failure if we cannot. Nihilism is the conviction that, since there are no solid or permanent reference points, and even cause and effect is meaningless, human effort is futile.
Madhyamaka
, which means “middle way” in Sanskrit, has the sense of a way between eternalism and nihilism, existence and nonexistence.

3
. One of the landmarks of entering the mahayana is taking the bodhisattva vow to renounce one’s own liberation from samsara in order to continue working for the liberation of all sentient beings.

4
.
Paramita
is a Sanskrit word literally meaning “that which has reached the other shore.”

5
. It was not long after this that the Vidyadhara came up with the translation “exertion” for
virya
, with which he remained quite satisfied.

Chapter 4. The Juncture between Sutra and Tantra

1
. The sutra teachings are those related to the first three yanas, which are sometimes referred to collectively as the
sutrayana
in counterdistinction to the six tantric yanas, which are sometimes known as the
tantrayana
. The sutra teachings are based on the class of scriptures of the same name, and the tantra teachings are based on the class of scriptures known as the tantras.

Chapter 5. Overcoming Moralism

1
.
Bodhichitta
is a compound Sanskrit word.
Bodhi
means “awakened,” and
chitta
means “mind.” The term is often simply translated “enlightenment” or the “mind of enlightenment.” In spite of how it sounds, “transplantation of bodhichitta into one’s mind” does not refer to bringing in a foreign element from outside. It means communicating the idea of enlightenment in such a way as to awaken the natural aspiration toward it that already exists within one.

2
. These are meditative techniques used in the vajrayana, which Western students, in the period these talks were given, tended to seek out as picturesque and exotic esoterica.
Pranayama
refers to various kinds of special breathing techniques. Mudras here are various hand gestures that accompany liturgical practices, though the term has other meanings (cf. the discussions of mahayana in the later talks). Visualization of deities is also dealt with in the later talks.

3
. The following passage from Gampopa’s
Jewel Ornament of Liberation
, translated by Herbert V. Guenther (Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1986), p. 208, might help to situate and clarify these remarks:

The Vaibhāṣika declares: Atoms by nature are spherical, undivided, singular and exist physically. A mass of them is an object (of perception) such as colour-form and so on. When massed together, there are intervals between each one. They appear to be in one place, like a yak’s tail [made up of many shifting hairs] in the pasture. They remain in a mass because they are held together by the Karma of sentient beings.

The Sautrāntika claims that when atoms mass together there are no intervals between them, although they do not touch each other.

Although these people make such statements, no proof is forthcoming. Atoms must be singular or plural. If singular they must have spatial divisions or not. If so they must have an eastern, western, southern, northern, upper, and lower part. With these six parts their claim to singularity collapses. If they have no spatial divisions, all material things would have to be of the nature of a single atom. But this clearly is not so. As is stated in the . . . ‘Viṃśatikākarikā’ (12):

When one atom is joined with six others

It follows that it must have six parts;

If it is in the same place with six,

The mass must be the same as one atom.

If you assume that there are many, there must have been one which by accumulation formed the mass. But since you cannot find a single atom physically, neither many atoms nor a single physical object having the nature of one can be found.

4
. The
Heart Sutra
says: “Form is emptiness, emptiness is itself form; emptiness is no other than form, form is no other than emptiness.”

5
. Cf. note 2 for chapter 3.