Does Anybody Else Have Clear Body Experiences?

[Old Student]

Yes, sounds close. Usually this is translated as Pig Head Samadhi, because Vajravarahi is a Pamo, and she is retrofitted by interpretation.

Okay, sounds like something that should be in a footnote not in the translation.

They may talk around it and miss by simply claiming Buddha to be perfect, but, unless they specifically saw Ratnakarasanti's work, there is no way they could be aware of such a question. And so if he was hardly carried forward in Tibet, they probably did not.

It does seem like a fixation on purity.

My understanding of "Hinayana" is that it is individual, whereas "Mahayana" really rebukes the Pratyeka Buddha utterly. As to whether that started over a piece of meat, maybe so.

It was the split into separate schools that began over meat. Previous to that, the two existed in the same schools, they were choices suitable to each individual, like choosing mother or father tantras later was.

It is probably still true that a traditional Guru assigns most of your practices, but, from having scanned the material, there is such a thing as a Jewel Candidate, i. e. that one who basically just has an interest in samadhi, and since we have so many sources about that now, many of us are.

That was always available as well. The Avatamsaka has that as a category of their beings, those who attain through teacherless spontaneous self-awakening (although they seem to say those people cannot become bodhisattvas without taking the vows to save all sentient beings).

[Old Student]

So, there are some Pisacis which can act as Yidams, e. g. Parnasabari and Janguli, whereas the Pisacis called Gauris are Grounds or the components of one's own-being.

Interesting.

Yes Hariti is not likely Indian in origin, but, probably is named from a common Avestan and Indic root, "har", which perhaps helps her assimilate better than "Tyche" as some have suggested.

There are some who say she predates most of Persian religious practice. I don't know, there are like 3 or 4 ancient goddesses in different places that are supposed to be forerunners of many others if not almost all others.

So if you understand this balance of the Queen of Space and her Mamo hordes, it is the same principle with any Gauris. Do it right and you're fine, if not, bad things will happen very quickly, like wildfire.

This is directly from what you said above?

There could have been cemetery yoga way before this, but, that seems like it was a new teaching about making violent Shiva into his own Pithas.

I'm not positive, but pretty sure that meditation in cemeteries and charnel grounds was already a part of the practice by the time of Ashoka.

The reason I admire Dakini Jala is not because it was Chakrasamvara before that name was used, but it actually is supposed to be about Moods and the way it portrays Gauris is incredibly similar to this.

As coming from inside, or as moods?

It is different from the impression I get from Tibetan materials saying Heruka means "blood drinker"

I have read at least on account that asserts that Heruka started out as some kind of a demon and got 'promoted' over and over in the conversion to Buddhism.

The other aspect is there was a Peaceful Cemetery, Sitabani, which is regarded as an important tantric dissemination center, such as to Garab Dorje. I do not even know any names of the other peaceful ones, but, from what I can tell, this was probably the most important one of them all, almost like an outdoor Nalanda.

One of the others was Sosaling, where Niguma taught.

[shaberon]

Here is an interesting turn in looking at the oldest recording of a mantra using Gandhari.

We have found there are two versions, one having Pukkasi and the other, Janguli, which is Kumarajiva's Lotus Sutra. At first it was exciting to see this uttered by Dhrtarastra, king of the Gandharvas, since the mantra also has Gandhari.

But then it is supposed to be a Sutra and a pretty precise scriptural teaching which should be clear, and on this point it is not.

The whole Dharanis chapter is quite short, but, in the prevalent online version, it is in a different chapter, and a close variant of the mantra is spoken by Virudhaka, king of the Kumbhanadas. Otherwise, the versions are basically identical, starting from Bhaisajyaraja, and ending with Raksasis led by Kunti, which sounds unusual (actually it just says this in the common text), since she is the mother of Yudisthira and appears in the same setting as Gandhari, the Mahabharata.

It would be next to impossible to just say these names without those two major characters coming to mind; and we can understand why Gandhari might have a wrathful aspect, but I am not sure why the same would be apparent or suggestive of Kunti, like it is not of Gauri either, there is no clear switch why if they are what their names suggest, they would enter a pisaci state.

As for the translator Kumarajiva, he was a native of Kucha:

His father was an Indian of distinguished family who later in life became a Buddhist monk. His mother was a younger sister of the ruler of Kucha. He entered the Buddhist Order as a boy, and with his mother, who had become a nun, traveled extensively around India, acquiring a profound knowledge of Buddhist texts and teachings. Returning to Kucha, he devoted himself there to the propagation of Mahayana Buddhism.


According to Nichiren, Kumarajiva is the most popular Lotus Sutra across Asia, without textual variations, and:

...though we do not know what language the Lotus Sutra was first composed in, it was clearly not Sanskrit, and therefore the Sanskrit versions of the text are already several steps removed from its first written form. Second, none of the extant Sanskrit versions are as early in date as Kumarajiva’s Chinese translation, done in 406, and all but the earliest differ in some respects from his version. Thus his almost certainly represents an earlier version of the text, one nearer to the first written form.


And so there is also a very old scripture which says:

Kuntī (कुन्ती).—According to the Mūlasarvāstivādin Vinaya, after having crossed the Indus towards the west, the Buddha took eight stages to cross Uḍḍiyāna, the Lampāka, and arrived in the neighborhood of Peshawar.

8th and 9th stages.—On leaving Nandivardhana, the Buddha went to the city of Kuntī, where he tamed the yakṣī of the same name; then to the village of Kharjūra where he foretold the building of the great caitya of Kaniṣka. Hiuan tsang tells us that the caitya was near Peshawar; archeologists have found its location in the tumuli at Shāh-ki-Dheri.


It is a little unclear that she is called Raksasi in one place, Yaksi in another, and Pisaci only by way of association of apparently being grouped with pisacis. It could be retorted that yaksha is a general class which includes gandharvas, etc., and so if they haven't any special names, it probably just means they are earthen and dwarfish, whereas gandharvas and kinnaras are usually considered the highest and most mystical of these classes.


So then with a quick bit from Wiki, well, there is a reason she might be a bit tormented:

Pandavas were given a barren land to rule which was developed into Indraprastha. However Kunti remained in Hastinapura with her sister in law, Gandhari.

Despite supporting her children, Kunti stayed in the Kaurava camp along with her sister-in-law Gandhari. After the death of Karna, Kunti disclosed the secret of Karna's birth to Pandavas and others. All were shocked to learn the fact they committed fratricide. The Pandavas were furious with Kunti, especially Yudhisthira, who cursed Kunti and women of the world that they shall be unable to keep any secret anymore. If Kunti hadn't kept it a secret, there were chances that the war would've been averted and millions of lives would've been spared.


Going back a step to see where her "city" was:

7th stage.—The seventh stage brought the Buddha to the city of Nandivardhana. According to the Mūlasarvāstivādin Vinaya, the Buddha converted king Devabhūti and his family there, the seven sons of the caṇḍāli, the protector yakṣa of the lake, the nāgas Aśvaka and Punarvasu, for whom he left his shadow in a lake close to the city, and finally the two yakṣīs Nalikā and Naḍodayā.

S. Lévi, who has collected a series of references on the city of Nandivardhana, locates it between Jelāl-ābād and Peshawar. The A yu wang tchouan, for what it is worth, restricts the area of search, for it places the conversion of the caṇḍāli in Gandhāra. This event having occurred at Nandivardhana, the city of this name is somewhere between the western border of Gandhara and the city of Peshawar. It is likely that the Buddha, leaving Nagarahāra, crossed Lampāka in an easterly direction and entered Gandhara by the Khyber Pass (or more likely, by flying over the mountains) and arrived at Nandivardhana.


Situated in the broad Valley of Peshawar just east of the historic Khyber Pass, close to the border with Afghanistan, Peshawar's recorded history dates back to at least 539 BCE, making it the oldest city in Pakistan and one of the oldest cities in South Asia.

As the center of the ancient Gandhara region, Peshawar became the capital of the Kushan Empire under the rule of Kanishka.

No one is quite sure what they are saying:

The modern name of the city "Peshawar" comes from the Persian words 'Pesh' - 'Awardan' meaning 'the first coming city. It was named so by Mughal Emperor Akbar from its old name Parashawar, the meaning of which Akbar didn't understand. The name 'Parashawar' itself is seen as a corruption of the Sanskrit name "Purushapura" (Sanskrit: पुरूषपुर Puruṣapura, meaning "City of Men " or “City of Purusha"). However, the name Purushapura does not appear in any ancient Indian literary sources.[20] The ruler of the city during its founding may have been a Hindu raja (King) named Purush; the word pur means "city" in Sanskrit. Sanskrit, written in the Kharosthi script, was the literary language employed by the Buddhist kingdoms which ruled over the area during its earliest recorded period. The city’s name may also be derived from the Sanskrit name for "City of Flowers," Poshapura, a name found in an ancient Kharosthi inscription that may refer to Peshawar.

Peshawar was founded near the ancient Gandharan capital city of Pushkalavati, near present-day Charsadda. Peshawar is the city in which the scholar Pāṇini wrote the book Aṣṭādhyāyī on Sanskrit Grammar in 4th century BCE.


That is hard to say if he exactly "founded" Buddhism there, since he was not really a Buddha yet, although we would have to say he was expressing the same powers, just not as completely. The average person could not possibly tell the difference between an eighth stage bodhisattva and a buddha, especially if there is no way of explaining it to them. Although now we can, the differences are so very, very minor, and the major distinction is the degree of power.

Whenever this group of deities comes up, it is quickly pointed out they are "non-Vedic". The result of Kunti's curse is that women cannot keep secrets.

Well, that certainly has something to say towards Vidyadharis, Dakinis, etc., which mainly remain secret because you are not looking. If you say their names and mantras, they start to transfer whatever they have.

If you read through the chapter, most of the dharanis are just verbs with twists and games, and this one is the only one that looks like it is actually "to" something, while in the case of Kunti it is "from" her, all the other retinue leaders being male.

[shaberon]

Posted by Old Student (here)
The point, though, is that the Siddha tradition gave religious authority to those who could attain some communion in the shakti sense.

Agree, strongly.

The first enemy of Theosophy was dogmatic religion, Catholicism primarily, whereas HPB warned the Indian branch would get suffused by "Hindu Jesuits", which is basically what happened, and fast. This remains the point of saying "original Theosophy" and the like, which has remained a school of thought, and is an institution, the Universal Lodge, which gives no kind of priestcraft, only a membership card. You can't get in there and change it around or hold some kind of office. You can study what is there.

Compare that to any western magical system. Unrelated.

It is said this is what happened to Zoroastrian, Egyptian, Grecian mysteries, etc., and in my view to the historical Jesus as well.

In some cases the power died out over generations, but several thing have been simply usurped.

But when did it become mandatory? Certainly, in Tibet, the original practice was so-called sky burial (similar to the Parsees use of the Towers of Silence). One can tell because it's still practiced in places and because they were known as "cannibals" in early texts describing them from the outside. So were the Yenesei Kyrgyz, for the same reason.

Certainly in Khotan in the 9th and 10th century, one still got a choice between Hinayana, Mahayana, and Vajrayana, as documented by language learning texts found at Dunhuang.

In the 19th century, the Sinhalese began going to Nepal for re-invigoration. If I recall correctly, in the centuries BCE, they had miles of relic-laden stupas or dagobas which visibly glowed at night.

I am less familiar with it, but I do take into account their fairly clear doctrine of a permanent "mind-atom" of seven aspects which dwells in the heart, combined with the clairvoyance of conception, describing a sphere that whirls and diminishes in size on the astral plane, and, I suppose, dropping off the Planck scale, connects to a fetal heart.

Natural tendency to absorb the best of other religions (not sure Confucianism is 'the best' but the guy was okay).

Haha, well, if you take the wife of Shiva and call her a Pisaci, maybe you have absorbed the best.

Despite iconoclasm, some Hindus are at least willing to accept Bauddha Dharma as a legitimate branch of Sanantana Dharma.

That is a little bit better than the avatar thing, which sounds a bit more institutional, "Buddha is just a part of Vishnu, so come to the Vishnu temple".

In some cases, Buddhist sadhanas go ahead and say "Vishnu is a Buddha, because..."

If a Catholic "pronounces" you something millenia posthumously, does that actually do anything to Confucious or change his state?

Probably not the same as being converted by Buddha while you are transmigrating.

[shaberon]

Posted by Old Student (here)
It was the split into separate schools that began over meat. Previous to that, the two existed in the same schools, they were choices suitable to each individual, like choosing mother or father tantras later was.

Ok, so two schools of thought in one building, and one goes to make their own new place.

That was always available as well. The Avatamsaka has that as a category of their beings, those who attain through teacherless spontaneous self-awakening (although they seem to say those people cannot become bodhisattvas without taking the vows to save all sentient beings).

Yes, always available, slightly less profound or detailed or metricly-plottable version.

And, there is something to the point that Bodhi comes from outside the human psyche. I cannot really just say Bodhisattva Vows, they have to be administered by the Sangha. I can read them and admire them, but, at some point, there has to be connection to a Bodhisattva or at least his shaktipat. Most of the tantras constantly rely on a physical Guru.

So I mean yes, of course what one can accomplish on one's own can be highly cathartic, but, we hope to move to a spiritual world of spiritual beings. So anything we can connect to along those lines is beneficial.

[shaberon]

Posted by Old Student (here)
This is directly from what you said above?

Yes I think so.

The Gauri of sight for instance contains everything I have ever seen, good or bad, except it is mainly the activity of Skandhas which produces the bad. If I see something horrible and my Skandhas churn, the one Gauri splits into millions of Mamos and suffuses my system instantly, I might just feel bad, become terrified or angry or then even aggressive.

It is the principle of Acala and how to dwell in space "unmoved" by this.

People could see their own memories or visions of hell or whatever, and so you pacify the sight Gauri by neutralizing those dualistic reactions.

Same principle of Ekajati. In the teachings, it seems, really having such an Ekajati is like having all the Gauris. I mean, if you can subdue the Mind one, then the Hearing one is less likely to become independently vehement. But if you do not have "the big one", then Hearing and other individuals are more relevant.

I'm not positive, but pretty sure that meditation in cemeteries and charnel grounds was already a part of the practice by the time of Ashoka.

In some way, shape, or form, probably so. But probably not as precisely as an array of Gauris and so forth.

As coming from inside, or as moods?

Well, again, lacking the complete text, I can only say so much--it was someone who has actually studied it that says the Moods teaching is prominent.

All the teachings say the Gauris are inner and related to the aspects of Asta Vijnana, each combined with an Element and other correspondences, but, the forms are on a scale. In most Chakrasamvara and Hevajra scriptures, they are violent and gruesome, and then in the Book of the Dead, they are like "ultimate nightmare" mode.

But in Dakini Jala, you get White Vetali pouring Nectar in a nice looking form and an expression that seems like it probably is a Mood, and, if it can be said the book is about Moods, then it probably would be on a per-Gauri basis.

That takes us straight to Rasa Theory and Ekarasa just by looking at her.

I have read at least on account that asserts that Heruka started out as some kind of a demon and got 'promoted' over and over in the conversion to Buddhism.

Gray says the first recoverable mention is herukas as a class like asuras and pisacis in Subahupariprccha Sutra--Tantra, which is perhaps only slightly older than Dakini Jala. It may be related to incest:

However, beginning in the seventh century, members of the Indian Buddhist community began composing tantras that evoke the subject of incest. Both the seventh-century Sub-ahupariprccha Tantra and the eighth-century Manjusrimulakalpa contain descriptions of a yaksini-sadhana, a ritual for summoning a female spirit using a mantra. This was a ritual conducted for the sake of sexual gratification; the texts claim that the yaksini could assume the form desired by the adept, and serve his lust throughout the night. Both texts specify that the yaksini could particularly assume the form of one’s female relatives, such as one’s mother.

This is confirmed by the eighth-century commentator Buddhaguhya, who noted in his commentary on the Subahupariprccha that this rite is intended for men who desire to enjoy another woman without incurring the faults of incest. Some Indian Buddhists appear to have seen sex with a summoned spirit as a way around the third precept. The yaksini could assume any form that one desires, but since she is not truly one’s mother, this is not actually incest. However, this was not a rite to be engaged in lightly; readers are warned that if they do not restrain their passions, the yaksini could devour them.

One of the others was Sosaling, where Niguma taught.

Yes...I looked into it and came out with a riddle. Part of it was from trying to decipher mahasiddhas travelling through marshes and so forth, which I will leave out. But we think it is probably in the neighborhood:

Laughing charnel ground at Bodhgaya and the Cool Grove charnel ground close by (northeast of Bodh Gaya), along with the Frightening charnel ground in the Black Hills of Bihar. "Sosa" would generally be salty or dry. Bihar is really flood-prone. "Sosaling Forest" is also referred to. "Ling" is standard for "dvipa", i. e. Jambuling is Tibetan for Jambudvipa. Tilo's barmaid disciple resided at Sosaling; and it was large enough to have a king, who had an enemy magician named Rakya Dewa.

"Śoṣa (शोष, “drying”) or Śoṣaṇa refers to one of the “seven means” (saptopāya) to be performed when a mantra does not manifest its effect, as explained in the 10th-century Kakṣapuṭatantra verse 1.104-105. Śoṣa, which aims to dry up the mantra, should be performed. The practitioner attaches the bījas of Vāyu, the god of Wind, to it, and keeps the written mantra around his neck. The last resort is the dahanīya, which aims to burn the mantra at the stake.

Accordingly, “if the nourished [mantra] does not have an effect, one should perform the śoṣaṇa (drying up). One should [attach] the mantra to double bījas [of Vāyu (i.e. yaṃ)], in the vidarbhaṇa manner. The vidyā written with the ashes of the vaṭa (banyan) should be kept around his neck. If the dried [mantra] does not have an effect, one should perform the dahanīya (burning) with Agni’s bīja (i.e., raṃ)”."

So really, Sosa is just attaching Vayu bija [Yam] to an ineffective mantra. Esoterically, of course, we are trying to mix wind and mantra in the central.

Padmasambhava arose at Lake Dhanakosha in Indrabodhi's Kingdom of Uddiyana, west of Bodh Gaya, and spent time in Cool Grove, Joyful Forest, and Sosaling cemeteries, blessed by Tamer of Maras and Sustainer of Bliss Dakinis. He was later empowered by Kungamo (Ananda, Ḍākinī Karmendrāṇī, or Khandroma Lékyi Wangmo) or Guhyajnana in the form of a nun in Zahor where Mandarava is from, and they met not much later.

I still cannot tell where Sosa is, other than in Dense Thicket at the edge of what is called a lake, but sounds a lot more like a marsh with trees growing in it.

Both cemeteries are associated:

Peaceful Sitabani charnel ground (or Sosaling when inhabited by Niguma) is called the source of Upa-yoga, which is Vairocana Abhisambodhi and Vajrapani Abhisekha.

That was the conclusion I came to--Sitabani is the source of, maybe not original cemetery meditation, but the developed Heruka Yoga of it.




That curiously had the Iranic MMK remarks following. Not as straightforward as a Kings' list, kind of messy and conjectural, but at least saying something about it along with a bunch of other stuff.

[Old Student]

As for the translator Kumarajiva, he was a native of Kucha.

Yes, he's very well known. Kucha is where the Qocho Uyghurs later made the Kizil caves (much later, Kumarajiva is turn of the 5th c. and Qocho Uyghurs show up in 840 after the Yenesei Kyrgyz overthrew the Uyghur empire.

...though we do not know what language the Lotus Sutra was first composed in, it was clearly not Sanskrit, and therefore the Sanskrit versions of the text are already several steps removed from its first written form. Second, none of the extant Sanskrit versions are as early in date as Kumarajiva’s Chinese translation, done in 406, and all but the earliest differ in some respects from his version. Thus his almost certainly represents an earlier version of the text, one nearer to the first written form.

Kumarajiva's translation into Chinese relied on Dharmarakṣa's which was done a little over a hundred years prior. This pair is well-known, the text by Dharmaraksa was apparently convoluted and not easy to understand, Kumarajiva relied on it and on other sources and created a version that flowed well and was easy to understand.

In at least one source, the original Prakrit was Central Asian Sanskrit, which may mean some hybrid created in the translation factories at Khotan (Kucha is not far away). Or not.

And so there is also a very old scripture which says:

Kuntī (कुन्ती).—According to the Mūlasarvāstivādin Vinaya, after having crossed the Indus towards the west, the Buddha took eight stages to cross Uḍḍiyāna, the Lampāka, and arrived in the neighborhood of Peshawar.

8th and 9th stages.—On leaving Nandivardhana, the Buddha went to the city of Kuntī, where he tamed the yakṣī of the same name; then to the village of Kharjūra where he foretold the building of the great caitya of Kaniṣka. Hiuan tsang tells us that the caitya was near Peshawar; archeologists have found its location in the tumuli at Shāh-ki-Dheri.

Which probably means the text was written after Kaniska and his buildings at Peshawar (then called Kaniskapur). Which means it was quite popular if it's then getting translated into Chinese by Dharmaraksa in 286.

As for the name of the city of Peshawar, it was, as you say, called Purushpur (the city of man). What is told in a less religious setting is that when Akbar came to power, the Afghans made a bid to have Akbar move his capital to Purushpur, a change they felt they deserved, it had been capital to other empires. Akbar's Wazir (chief minister combined with supreme court judge kind of) went to Purushpur and didn't like it and told Akbar who renamed it Peshawar (frontier town), supposedly at the Wazir's insistence. Akbar was forced to make a winter capital closer to there because of subsequent unrest, but he had no real desire to center his empire there.

The Kushans are believed to have been one branch of the Yuezhi. I've always wondered why they were called that. It literally means the moon people.

[Old Student]

In some way, shape, or form, probably so. But probably not as precisely as an array of Gauris and so forth.

Yes, not in the same way. But that would be a reason for having prowess in medicine, and Ashoka bragged about Buddhist medicine at the base of his pillars.

This is confirmed by the eighth-century commentator Buddhaguhya, who noted in his commentary on the Subahupariprccha that this rite is intended for men who desire to enjoy another woman without incurring the faults of incest.

It's quite possible that wasn't the original intent, but became so.

Sosaling Forest" is also referred to. "Ling" is standard for "dvipa", i. e. Jambuling is Tibetan for Jambudvipa. Tilo's barmaid disciple resided at Sosaling; and it was large enough to have a king, who had an enemy magician named Rakya Dewa.

"Śoṣa (शोष, “drying”) or Śoṣaṇa refers to one of the “seven means” (saptopāya) to be performed when a mantra does not manifest its effect, as explained in the 10th-century Kakṣapuṭatantra verse 1.104-105. Śoṣa, which aims to dry up the mantra, should be performed.

Yes, it is indeed Sosadvipa in Sanskrit. It is taken to mean 'withering', but it may be simpler, since there is a plant called the sosana, known as the "broken bones plant". Here is the description from Wikipedia:

The large leaf stalks wither and fall off the tree and collect near the base of the trunk, appearing to look like a pile of broken limb bones. The pinnate leaves are approximately 1 metre (3.3 ft) in length and comparably wide,[5][7] borne on petioles or stalks up to 2 metres (6.6 ft) in length, making this the largest of all dicot tree leaves, which are quadripinnate (leaflets display four orders of branching).[8]

The tree is a night-bloomer and flowers are adapted to natural pollination by bats.[5] They form enormous seed pods – the fruits – are up to 1.5 metres (4.9 ft) long that hang down from bare branches, resembling swords.[5][9] The long fruits curve downward and resemble the wings of a large bird or dangling sickles or swords in the night, giving the name "tree of Damocles".[6] The seeds are round with papery wings.[10]

Of course, in a charnel grounds, there could be other piles of broken bones.

[Old Student]

It is said this is what happened to Zoroastrian, Egyptian, Grecian mysteries, etc., and in my view to the historical Jesus as well.

In some cases the power died out over generations, but several thing have been simply usurped.

You can see this even in the local sects when they jump through hoops to be a shaman, starting training people to do weird things when they are young. The people may never develop the requisite abilities, but the village can't wait around for someone who can so they manufacture ritual to try to create one.

If a Catholic "pronounces" you something millenia posthumously, does that actually do anything to Confucious or change his state?

Of course not, it's a conversion gimmick. The Catholics that the target audience really liked were the Jesuits because they worked hard and resembled Chan monks. In South America, the descendants of the Incas had a ritual that they threw a rock on a pile at the mountain passes as they went by, and they had a cross on one of the piles, and I met a guy who had been a missionary there, and he was all excited that the locals had created their own Christian ritual. Then he found out that the original meaning was to throw a rock on the pile to rid themselves of their bad luck (not to get any good luck) and the crosses were because they were ridding themselves of Christianity. It was too much for my ex-missionary friend and he promptly quit the church.

[Old Student]

Ok, so two schools of thought in one building, and one goes to make their own new place.

Yes. Kind of like in Georgia where there is a church on every street corner. I asked once why there were so many and the reply was, "Oh, you know, the ministers have an argument about something and one of them storms out and goes down the street and starts a new church."

And, there is something to the point that Bodhi comes from outside the human psyche. I cannot really just say Bodhisattva Vows, they have to be administered by the Sangha. I can read them and admire them, but, at some point, there has to be connection to a Bodhisattva or at least his shaktipat. Most of the tantras constantly rely on a physical Guru.

I suppose I could go back to the Zen center where I attended and go through the ceremony but I don't know why I would.

[shaberon]

Posted by Old Student (here)
Yes, he's very well known.

Well, if we say 1500+ years author of a manuscript standardized in China, I cannot really dispute that.

I respect it but I think of myself as only having semi-Chinese influence, mainly as due to the Shaolin legend of Bodhidharma.

I had a girlfriend once who had a Chinese roommate, and she learned the Chinese "alphabet", which I am not sure what that means, but it was...almost alien.

Most of my direct influence is Japanese and I have no clue about Shingon other than as what I would call a workhorse of attaching the fivefold form/pentagram to sixfold mind/hexagram, I guess they train the full Vajrasekhara with all the mudras and so on, which is Kriya.

But I was unaware of anything about Kumarajiva or Lotus Sutra generally speaking, until now I would be forced to contend the presence of the Gauri-esque mantra is probably the oldest...direct suggestion of the major part of Buddhist tantra, which, itself, is indicative of the actual tales of Buddha personally, which involve taming Yakshas while crossing the Bhumis.

If you just take the last part of that sentence at face value, that pretty much is the essence of tantra isn't it?

I think of it as highly imitative, Parrot-like, I do not really want to "be" him, so much as "do what he did".

No shortage of Mamos around there now.

In at least one source, the original Prakrit was Central Asian Sanskrit, which may mean some hybrid created in the translation factories at Khotan (Kucha is not far away). Or not.

It seems to be well-known as the Gilgit Manuscript which was originally attempted to be sold to Lokesh Chandra's father.


The Lotus Sutra is among the oldest existing texts of Buddhism. Others are the Golden Line Sutra and the Mala Devi Sutra, which Chandra points out as “a very feminist sutra perhaps the most ancient feminist text sometimes even more violent than what femnism is today.”


According to History of Information:

Theyere were writein the Buddhist form of Sanskrit in the Śāradā or Sharada script.

"Roughly 60 manuscripts and 17 Avadnas emerging from Naupur are of unmatched significance in Buddhist studies. These are the oldest surviving collection of religious texts in the subcontinent. Based on the paleographical evidence, scholars agree that local Buddhist devotees compiled these texts between the fifth and sixth century AD. With the exception of only a few scripts, all the manuscripts were written on birch bark in Buddhist hybrid Sanskrit language in the Gupta Brahmi and post-Gupta Brahmi script.

"The manuscripts contain sutras from the Buddhist canon, the Samghata Sutra, Samadhiraja Sutra, Saddharma Pundarika Sutra, and Bhaisajyaguru Sutra.The Samadhiraja Sutra is one of the important Mahayana canonical texts, which are collectively called Navadharma. The Saddharma Pundarika Sutra, popularly known as Lotus Sutra, figures prominently in the Gilgit Manuscripts and scholars agree it was the most venerated sutra of the Buddhists from the Gilgit area"


I suppose that is not really a big secret, and I guess it means not the oldest Buddhist text but of any "religious" text, or, specifically collection, leaving the possibility there are older individual ones. For instance, in the past few years, I believe some portion of Prajnaparamita Sutra was carbon dated to ca. year 75.

Which probably means the text was written after Kaniska and his buildings at Peshawar (then called Kaniskapur). Which means it was quite popular if it's then getting translated into Chinese by Dharmaraksa in 286.

I would think there was plenty of fertile ground for the popularizing of such things.

Taksasila University educated the godfather of Sanskrit grammar, Panini, ca. 5th century BCE.

Wiki says:

The role of Taxila University as a center of knowledge continued under the Maurya Empire and Greek rule (Indo-Greeks) in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BCE.

Buddha may have been influenced by the experiences and knowledge acquired by some of his closest followers in the foreign capital of Taxila. Several contemporaries, and close followers, of the Buddha are said to have studied in Achaemenid Taxila, namely:

King Pasenadi of Kosala, a close friend of the Buddha...

Charaka, the Indian "father of medicine" and one of the leading authorities in Ayurveda, is also said to have studied at Taxila, and practiced there.

Chandragupta Maurya, Buddhist literature states that Chandragupta Maurya, the future founder of the Mauryan Empire, though born near Patna (Bihar) in Magadha, was taken by Chanakya for his training and education to Taxila, and had him educated there in "all the sciences and arts" of the period, including military sciences. There he studied for eight years. The Greek and Hindu texts also state that Kautilya (Chanakya) was a native of the northwest Indian subcontinent, and Chandragupta was his resident student for eight years. These accounts match Plutarch's assertion that Alexander the Great met with the young Chandragupta while campaigning in the Punjab.



Although it is not part of India, it is part of the university system such as in Ujjain which is part of the Sapta Puri:

Ayodhya (Ayodhya Puri),
Mathura (Madhura Puri),
Haridwar (Maya Puri),
Varanasi (Kashi Puri),
Kanchipuram (Kanchi Puri),
Ujjain (Avantika Puri),
Dwarka (Dwaraka Puri)


And we have found there was a highway from Dwarka up through the northwestern provinces at a rather extreme age, many thousands years.

So I tend to see Taxila as the immediate foreign outcropping of that, which in turn itself became really powerful. Partly Buddhist and part not.



[

The Kushans are believed to have been one branch of the Yuezhi. I've always wondered why they were called that. It literally means the moon people.

There was a Moon People exterminated by the Cherokee.

They were dwarfish, nocturnal, pale, with eyes like saucers, photosensitive albino cave dwellers.

I do not really know if it is believed they "came from the moon".

But, Hinduism is at least in part the story of Lunar Dynasty.

[shaberon]

Posted by Old Student (here)
Yes, it is indeed Sosadvipa in Sanskrit. It is taken to mean 'withering', but it may be simpler, since there is a plant called the sosana, known as the "broken bones plant".

I first learned about it trying to trace the footsteps of the Mahasiddhas, such as when he went through a "poison lake" perhaps it was a salt marsh. So far I was mostly unable to find volcanic lakes or anything like that naturally occurring, in fact the opposite in mid to south India are some of the most abundant and most variety natural game preserves in the world.

Without precisely locating Sosaling, it should be relatively near Sitabani and the environment of Bihar or perhaps its southern frontier, which I believe funnels into a pass through a minor mountain range or perhaps the Ghats.

Also without being precise, by comparative analysis one can deduce that in many cases what was called "West India" would seem like the south to us, and so you can prove the stories are either partly misinformed if not intentionally misleading.


As a rough analogy, one could perhaps say Ujjain was "the" university like Sitabani was "the" charnel ground. Not necessarily where education or tantra was invented, but the first places we can show as having a major system that became distributed.

Nalanda university is not that old, although as a Buddhist site it is:

A mud brick stupa has also been carbon dated to 6th-5th century BCE which bolsters the case for Nalanda as an important Buddhist site since its early period.

So, that is interesting, Taxila is not really part of Sapta Puri, but it is part of the universities and activity of Buddha, who returned to the Nalanda--Bihar area.

[shaberon]

Posted by Old Student (here)
I suppose I could go back to the Zen center where I attended and go through the ceremony but I don't know why I would.

My question would be if I could perceive the person in charge as having a strong shaktipat.

It is like an ESP sense or something, I can tell if someone is in the frame or state of mind I am talking about. As a consequence I have hardly ever seen it.

There are a couple different views of Vak Siddhi. One is that you accumulate so much shakti that you can say anything and make it magically happen. The other is that you have been telling the truth for so long, everything you say comes true, like a prediction.

And so if there was a ceremony or empowerment or something, from someone who is not a personal Guru, I would want them to have that same level whereby you can comprehend them as a unit of absolute reality.

As a comparison, I was able to meet a couple Drepung Loseling monks and talk to them for a while. They exemplified a calm mind and a Bodhisattva intent very well, but, I would not quite say they were saturated with shakti.

Because shakti is a universal factor anyone could have, I have probably actually perceived it on more non-Buddhists, but I have been around precious few Vajrayanists.


I went through Luminous Heart some more and there are a couple of things that stand out, none of which are about "state of a Buddha".

He says Parikalpita and Paratantra are Samsara, and that Parinispanna is Nirvana.

Well, then when Parikalpita ceases to exist, then you are in the state the Sutras call "Samsara and Nirvana are ultimately one", because now instead of being false, Paratantra is real. And so I suppose in tantric terms, you are still "contacting" Samsara except it is no longer a Skandha, it is the Wisdom of Karma Family, Empty.


So to me it sounds pretty close to saying that Paratantra is real to Buddha and so he still perceives the realm of Samsara, just lacking the conclusion explicitly stating "therefor Buddha still has slight error".

The doctrinal dispute he could be said to be making is that he denies the Alaya is the eighth consciousness, or, rather, when you perfect the Klista Manas or seventh consciousness, you destroy, prevent, and remove the Alaya. I guess that is like saying Alaya is the cosmic response to Parikalpita, or what makes your delusions seem real by giving you input. Paratantra gives or does whatever you are putting into it, mirror-like, and so any of the defilements or skandhas or kleshas give you Alaya, sort of like the Mayavic aspect of Prakriti. The skandha is the male Buddha and the prakriti is Prajna.


The Gauris are Sampatti, i. e. the branches or vijnanas of this experienced as samadhis of an undistractable nature, up to Nirodha Sampatti, call it Baghalamukhi if one wants. Something like Luminous Heart is saying basically this exact same thing at a Sutra level for a broad audience. If I spend a month or so mulling over Three Natures terminology and how it is supposed to work, then I am not going to get much more from poring through it. It has to be internalized and so the tantras are much more vivid and powerful at this.

A deceptively simple deity such as Sukla Tara or Janguli is therefor incredibly direct, because they attach themselves to the cemeteries by definition and so you have "room to work", i. e. to learn and develop it, rather than being the entire system suddenly burst open all over the place. Once you put it together in terms of Inner Meaning, Bhava, etc., eventually you will become at par with the system and it is ready to work, instead of being a bunch of difficult-to-remember names and details like Tara's glaive flailing uselessly in the air.




Today I observed something.

Last year while meditating in the woods at night in moonlight, I kept noticing two unusual asterisms, but then when I found they were not "in a place", I decided they were the optic nerves. Since then, I sometimes keep seeing them in dark settings, white, perhaps radiant or brilliant, but not quite like the sun, more like moon or star light or perhaps distant lightning, or spark plugs.

During the day I discovered the sun causes them to flow with prismatic colors, although a bit more like the kind seen on oil.

In other words, they constantly pour forth expanding multi-colored shapes like polygons or stars, which is a visual form of layers of sheets.

That is like your eyes making light in reverse of what we call light, emanating its own in the outward direction.

It happened two times, briefly, the twenty seconds or so it takes to go in and out of a store. It is not happening now, instead, I am hearing an aspect of Primordial Sound, heavily to the left at the moment.

I cannot visualize anything, but, I am able to meditate on sound and light that have no physical external sources, being what I would call Swayambhu or self-arisen.

Given the opportunity, I can easily train that stuff until I dwell in an alternate perception, whereas the actual Heruka Yoga would be this crossed over to the point of an emanated being, which would first be white like the starry things I first noticed. Adding the other colors would be what we call Families.

That is why I say the physiological aspects of Suksma Yoga, I understand completely and it is literally so. I believe the actual Generation Stage practice will do something vastly better than the simple fact that my body knows how to keep transforming this into bliss and altered states of consciousness. I don't need anything to do the physical Suksma Yoga except time and place. The intent of the teaching is that it teaches you how to do this, which, most people probably need, I do not, but it says a lot of other things that I need to pick up.

At this point I would have to say the sound came from studying Manjushri, the white asterisms are from meditating on Mrtyuvacana Tara, and then this color display is from Maha Ganapati and his curiosity or Dharma Pravicaya about Matangi--Janguli.

Even if it seems like the "energy of the centers" is driving it, this, at least, I have managed to hitch to the Noumenal intent from the Sanskrit Buddhist system, and I think I am getting at least some of the protection and wisdom it is meant to employ.

It is a bit like that summer with the Bees except those were external.

I did not know what was happening and it worked due to curiosity.

At this point I do, it is of course the same thing that was there when I was born, which has a good explanation, "the Nirakara system" and Encounter with Peaceful and Wrathful Deities.

I am a position, for instance, to deny that Ganapati has any objective existence, there is no such thing as him, and yet he is more real in another way. That is like saying he is not in the Parikalpita (Adventitious Stains).

To me he is formless, and so if he ever takes a form, he is in the real Paratantra.


When you look at the Three Natures, it does give you a dynamic interface to the Absolute, which means there is only one real condition with respect to manifestation, a Dharma Path based on seven minds, having Karuna and Bliss as its purpose.

If someone were to ask me if there was something else other than this thing of its own nature, I would say no, not really.

Because there isn't anything else, I wind up spending all my time in it.

[Old Student]

I had a girlfriend once who had a Chinese roommate, and she learned the Chinese "alphabet", which I am not sure what that means, but it was...almost alien.

This is probably zhuyin fuhao, commonly known by students as 'bo po mo fo' because it is an alphabet that starts with those four letters. It's a system used for transliteration in classical Chinese texts, but most of its use is that they teach it to Chinese children (also foreigners in some language classes) so they can get used to writing while they learn the characters. When they made pinyin, they basically created a roman alphabet spelling for each of those letters, and used unused roman letters for sounds that weren't represented (q for ch, x for hs (because earlier systems used sh for retroflex), c for ts, z for ds).

The Chinese need to maintain the character system because otherwise they have 84 languages and 650 dialects, but written down in characters, except for colloquial expressions, all of those look the same.

But I was unaware of anything about Kumarajiva or Lotus Sutra generally speaking

He did a lot, I am aware of only a little, but he did for many earlier translations what he did for the Lotus Sutra, provided a disentangled and ungarbled translation from a cumbersome one.

Theyere were writein the Buddhist form of Sanskrit in the Śāradā or Sharada script.

These must be copies then. Sharada wasn't used until about 6th c., by that time there were already 2 translations into Chinese.

With the exception of only a few scripts, all the manuscripts were written on birch bark in Buddhist hybrid Sanskrit language in the Gupta Brahmi and post-Gupta Brahmi script.

This is an older method. Birch bark as the medium, Gupta Brahmi as the script. Ashoka's pillars use Gupta Brahmi.

BTW, Gilgit is on the road between Khotan and Leh (and eventually either Tholing, Spiti, or Srinagar). It is where one is when traveling south after going through the Karakoram Pass. When Khotan fell, Tibetans who were allied with the Khotanese in the battle headed back to Guge from Khotan through Gilgit (including the King of Guge's son). They were waylaid by pursuing Qarakhanids (Muslim) and the King's son was tortured and poisoned.

I suppose that is not really a big secret, and I guess it means not the oldest Buddhist text but of any "religious" text, or, specifically collection, leaving the possibility there are older individual ones.

Every once in a while, some farmer someplace (usually in modern Pakistan) will be plowing or digging up an old stump or something and find a jar with a birch bark manuscript in it (they were stored in jars, why they would have been buried is anyone's guess).

My rule of thumb is that anything that's really old is probably really older. And they will always be found over in the Indus or on the road up to the Tarim basin, because it's really really dry. Nobody is going to find 2000 year old birch bark in a jungle in Bengal.

These accounts match Plutarch's assertion that Alexander the Great met with the young Chandragupta while campaigning in the Punjab.

This is interesting, I'd never heard of it before.

There was a Moon People exterminated by the Cherokee.

They were dwarfish, nocturnal, pale, with eyes like saucers, photosensitive albino cave dwellers.

I do not really know if it is believed they "came from the moon".

But, Hinduism is at least in part the story of Lunar Dynasty.

These people were to the north of China, and lost a battle to the Xiongnu (some believe Xiongnu to be forerunners of the Huns). They migrated and split into two groups, one of which became the Kushan. No feeling for why the Chinese called them that.

[Old Student]

Without precisely locating Sosaling, it should be relatively near Sitabani and the environment of Bihar or perhaps its southern frontier, which I believe funnels into a pass through a minor mountain range or perhaps the Ghats.

I've seen two main assessments of where it was. One group puts it "not far from Bodhgaya." The other puts it over near maybe modern day Uttarakhand or there abouts. I have no feeling for why each group feels the way they do, except that the group that puts it near Bodhgaya thinks so I think because people went back and forth regularly and the accounts don't seem like long journeys.

That's another thing I don't believe - that people long ago were shy of traveling, nor that they may have had other means of doing so -- some of the trade routes only declined during the Little Ice Age, but historians ended up thinking they never existed for quite a while, and we always find more "ancientness" in deserts because there is more to dig up in good condition. Srivijaya was thought to be apocryphal as late as the 1990s.

Also some stuff requires interest to be investigated. There are remains of Buddhist viharas in Anatolia, when the Mongols first invaded they were Buddhist. Also discovered extremely recently, nobody thought to look.

[Old Student]

My question would be if I could perceive the person in charge as having a strong shaktipat.

Oh, I was just talking about if I wanted formal induction into the Sangha, I personally don't think it's something I need. I did, as I talked about much earlier, worry that I was transgressing by not having initiations into some things having to do with Vajrayana (Tibetan stuff, specifically), but I think I don't worry about it now so much.

So to me it sounds pretty close to saying that Paratantra is real to Buddha and so he still perceives the realm of Samsara, just lacking the conclusion explicitly stating "therefor Buddha still has slight error".

Okay, I guess that explains him. Paratantra I read was the view of things that showed that Parikalpita was illusion, which once experienced precipitates the perception of Parinispanna. But that is maybe different interpretation. Paratantra means 'the other weave' as if it implies the other way of stitching reality together. Parikalpita comes from kalpa to conceive, kalpita conceived (imagined).

Last year while meditating in the woods at night in moonlight, I kept noticing two unusual asterisms, but then when I found they were not "in a place", I decided they were the optic nerves. Since then, I sometimes keep seeing them in dark settings, white, perhaps radiant or brilliant, but not quite like the sun, more like moon or star light or perhaps distant lightning, or spark plugs.

During the day I discovered the sun causes them to flow with prismatic colors, although a bit more like the kind seen on oil.

Just to safety-check, regarding prismatics, you are sure they are not scotoma I hope, because those need to be checked out if they happen to older people (Full disclosure, I had to get one checked out about 4 years ago, it turned out to be nothing.)

But assuming they're not, they seem like things to focus on (from my point of view, which is how I started shaking) in case they blossom.

Given the opportunity, I can easily train that stuff until I dwell in an alternate perception, whereas the actual Heruka Yoga would be this crossed over to the point of an emanated being, which would first be white like the starry things I first noticed. Adding the other colors would be what we call Families.

Exactly. An alternate perception is to me more important than making sure Heruka has all ten arms and his elephant skin and the Brahma heads and that his consort has one eyeball looking up and the other looking down. But it's a minority viewpoint I've found.

Even if it seems like the "energy of the centers" is driving it, this, at least, I have managed to hitch to the Noumenal intent from the Sanskrit Buddhist system, and I think I am getting at least some of the protection and wisdom it is meant to employ.

That sounds awesome.

[shaberon]

Posted by Old Student (here)
I've seen two main assessments of where it was. One group puts it "not far from Bodhgaya." The other puts it over near maybe modern day Uttarakhand or there abouts. I have no feeling for why each group feels the way they do, except that the group that puts it near Bodhgaya thinks so I think because people went back and forth regularly and the accounts don't seem like long journeys.

That is Sitabani Wildlife Preserve in Uttarakhand.

I do not think it is the same one as the Source of Upa Yoga.

Upa Yoga or Ubhaya Yoga is Conduct or Cara Tantra. That is a decent Four Levels of Tantra article including the Six Gods of Kriya--Cara.

Sosaling and Sitabani are depicted in the life of Padmasambhava and why he actually did kill someone and introduces some of the "main characters" Vajrayogini and Guhyajnana Dakini. From RY Wiki:



He married Prabhadhari and ruled the kingdom of Uddiyana in accordance with the Dharma. At that time he perceived that he would be unable to accomplish the immense welfare of other beings by governing a country so he asked Indrabodhi permission to leave which was not granted. In an act of play, he then pretended that his trident slipped out of his hand; it fell and killed the son of one of the ministers. He was then sentenced to be expelled to a charnel ground. He remained in Cool Grove, Joyful Forest and Sosaling, engaging in the conduct of yogic disciplines. During this time he received empowerment and blessings from the two dakinis Tamer of Mara and Sustainer of Bliss. When bringing all the dakinis of the charnel grounds under his command, he was known as Shantarak****a.

Padmakara returned to Uddiyana, to the island in Lake Danakosha where he practiced Secret Mantra and the symbolic language of the dakinis through which he brought the dakinis on the island under his command. He then practiced in the Rugged Forest and was blessed with a vision of Vajra Yogini. He bound under oath all the nagas of the lakes as well as the planetary spirits and was invested with supernatural powers by all the dakas and dakinis. Thus he became renowned as Dorje Drakpo Tsal, Wrathful Vajra Power.

He then journeyed to the Vajra Throne in Bodhgaya where he showed many miracles. People asked who he was and when he replied that he was a self-appeared buddha they did not believe but instead defamed him. Seeing the many reasons to have a teacher, he went to Zahor where he took ordination from Prabhahasti and was given the name Shakya Senge. He received the teaching on Yoga Tantra eighteen times and had visions of the deities. The he went to the female master Kungamo who was the wisdom dakini Guhya Jñana appearing in the form of a nun. He asked for empowerment and she changed him into the letter HUNG which she then swallowed and emitted through her lotus. Inside her body he was bestowed the entire outer, inner and secret empowerments and purified of the three obscurations.


And also with Manjusrimitra:


Manjusrimitra's two chief disciples were Buddha Sri Jnana and Sri Singha. The latter was born in China, perhaps Chinese Turkestan (see p. 297), and studied in China at Wu t'ai shan before following the instructions of Avalokitesvara to go to the Sosa-ling Cremation Ground west of Bodh Gaya if he wished to attain Buddhahood. In Sosa-ling the monk Sri Singha encountered Manjusrimitra who gave him the entire Dzokchen message.


Sosaling is enumerated twice as being west of Bodhgaya, i. e. direction of Kashi. The Sitabani referred to in this neighborhood is northeast of Bodhgaya. Although the major one is also a charnel ground, this appears to be a similarly-named one in Bihar.

Danakosha remains elusive. But I believe further analysis will support a Sitabani which is relatively close to Sosaling, which is probably a few miles west of Bodhgaya.

There are remains of Buddhist viharas in Anatolia, when the Mongols first invaded they were Buddhist. Also discovered extremely recently, nobody thought to look.

Interesting, I would or did expect something like that to happen.

[shaberon]

Posted by Old Student (here)
Paratantra I read was the view of things that showed that Parikalpita was illusion, which once experienced precipitates the perception of Parinispanna. But that is maybe different interpretation. Paratantra means 'the other weave' as if it implies the other way of stitching reality together. Parikalpita comes from kalpa to conceive, kalpita conceived (imagined).

To me, it sounds like a slightly different way of saying almost the same thing as Paratantra (Vikalpa, false discrimination between true and false, real and unreal, Laṅkāvatāra-sūtra 227.18—19 also says, vikalpo 'ṣṭadhā bhidyate, but I find no evidence as to what the eight kinds are (are they connected with the eight vijñāna, mentioned in 227.10?); vikalpa is a common and important word in Laṅkāvatāra-sūtra, one of the five dharma (2, q.v. 3)) when freed from the limitation of Parikalpita, is Parinispanna, the true or real Paratantra.

So yes, when the eight vijnana--cemeteries are transformed, that is what it did, eliminated Parikalpita, and Paratantra is a true discrimination.

they seem like things to focus on (from my point of view, which is how I started shaking) in case they blossom.

If I went legally blind in what to me was a Sampatti of Sight, that would probably be fine.

Instead, they do Blossom, "in the case of" the right conditions.

It is the advanced version of what happened with the Bees.

An alternate perception is to me more important than making sure Heruka has all ten arms and his elephant skin and the Brahma heads and that his consort has one eyeball looking up and the other looking down. But it's a minority viewpoint I've found.

Since I cannot compose one, I do not know.

The true Heruka Yoga does not come from the composed image, but, a self-arisen one, which is held to be the simplest two arm form.

It has a counterpart who is the same way, e. g. Vairocani. And if you can do that, you have a Jnana Mudra.

There is also White Heruka and White Vajrayogini, who may arise individually, and eventually enter union.

Either way is an attempt to portray luminous beings, types of devas, but not exactly nature devas because mind-born, hence, devatas.




I used different figures of speech because altered perception can take place in ordinary mundane consciousness.

I would say there is this, and something a bit different that takes place by altering states of consciousness.

I have a hard time visualizing divine murtis, and, the closest things I have personally seen by way of discovery were what I thought was a totem pole but would also be like Eleven Face Avalokiteshvara, and, I would say, a crude, pallid, colorless Pancha Jina in the sky, in a pentagonal array. Those were unworldly or from altered states of consciousness.


Although I have experienced a wide range of altered perceptions, most of them are Laukika Siddhis or mundane or like someone who can project their Mayavi Rupa at will.


If you enter those altered states of consciousness, those deities are going to present themselves, clearly or otherwise.

Roughly put, the desired result here is glowing beings of male and female forms.

Then those can do the Completion Stages of any deity, not otherwise.

In Yoga, I am, so to speak, trying to ignite the blankish, default Avalokiteshvara in whatever realm that was, with this Heruka power, like passing a torch. Or he can go to Vajrapani or Manjushri.

If I take Vairocani, it will do it for Vajravarahi and Cinnamasta.

If it is Blue you will experience Dharmakaya.

Regardless of their expansive attributes, the base level or two armed form is three forms, With Effort, Effortless, and Luminous.

That may be the most general way of looking at it.








This is a switch to conventional reality, or everyday life as I comprehend it in an occult manner.

I witnessed an outburst of Mamos recently but remained undisturbed or i. e. Acala.

As a consequence there was a Kaustabha that came out of, I don't know, Varuna itself. Moment of clarity.



In the strange delusion of perceiving the Other Self, each of us here sees Uchusma.

As soon as that revealed itself, Jambhala did something.

The resolution of this place I call "the kennel" is that it is completely unresolvable and so instead, it is just to be shut down and gotten rid of. It is a house that, I would say, is probably good for limited kinds of people it may be suited for. I am not one of them, plus, I believe there is an angry Naga causing Water Poison on this disturbance to its environment.

Good answer for me. Best way to pick off a lot of little problems is simply to remove them all at once. It is going to be long, slow, and difficult getting to Destination Unknown, but I am quite sure we can dispose of most of our diseases and fights by moving away from here.

And so if you understand metaphysics, you can see this is what it takes for me to simply craft the locality in which to do a fuller yoga practice that I could otherwise do today, except conditions are not right.

[Old Student]

Okay, I just had something weird happen. I finished up replying to this, I went to post and clicked "Post Quick Reply" and instead of posting, it opened up the full editor with your post instead of mine to edit. So I closed things, and got on from the desk, and it had logged me out and dumped my post. Oh, well, that never happened before.

During this time he received empowerment and blessings from the two dakinis Tamer of Mara and Sustainer of Bliss.

Any idea what the Sanskrit names are for these?

The latter was born in China, perhaps Chinese Turkestan (see p. 297), and studied in China at Wu t'ai shan before following the instructions of Avalokitesvara to go to the Sosa-ling Cremation Ground west of Bodh Gaya if he wished to attain Buddhahood.

Interesting. China did not have real control over the Tarim Basin at this point since Padmasambhava is contemporary with the An Lushan rebellion.

Danakosha remains elusive. But I believe further analysis will support a Sitabani which is relatively close to Sosaling, which is probably a few miles west of Bodhgaya.

Entirely possible. It was the abode of Niguma, and she was related to Naropa (probably his older sister).

[Old Student]

Vikalpa, false discrimination between true and false, real and unreal, Laṅkāvatāra-sūtra 227.18—19 also says, vikalpo 'ṣṭadhā bhidyate, but I find no evidence as to what the eight kinds are (are they connected with the eight vijñāna, mentioned in 227.10?); vikalpa is a common and important word in Laṅkāvatāra-sūtra, one of the five dharma (2, q.v. 3)) when freed from the limitation of Parikalpita, is Parinispanna, the true or real Paratantra.

That is vikalpa. Kalpa has the full retinue of other verbs derived from it -- Akalpa, avakalpa, vikalpa, etc. They won't have the same meaning, but will be related. E.g., gacchati to go, has agacchati to come, avagacchati to understand, vigacchati to go but more or less permanently as in to decease.

If I went legally blind in what to me was a Sampatti of Sight, that would probably be fine.

Instead, they do Blossom, "in the case of" the right conditions.

Okay. Just so you know. If it were scotoma there are thousands of drawings online of what it looks like, when I had it, it looked identical to those drawings (a lot of migraineurs get them just before their head fills up with pain).

The true Heruka Yoga does not come from the composed image, but, a self-arisen one, which is held to be the simplest two arm form.

It has a counterpart who is the same way, e. g. Vairocani. And if you can do that, you have a Jnana Mudra.

Okay, good to know, I guess. I didn't know that when I was doing it out of Lama Yeshe's book (or that I was not supposed to 'try this at home' without an initiation). So I followed what I thought was the directions and arose as the ten armed one with Vajrayogini as consort, and then as Vajrayogini with ten-armed Heruka, and then as both of them conjoined. At the time, I neither thought it was odd to do that, nor knew that maybe I wasn't supposed to.

Regardless of their expansive attributes, the base level or two armed form is three forms, With Effort, Effortless, and Luminous.

That may be the most general way of looking at it.

Okay.

And so if you understand metaphysics, you can see this is what it takes for me to simply craft the locality in which to do a fuller yoga practice that I could otherwise do today, except conditions are not right.

Does this mean you are moving?