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Contents of Eye of the Storm
Foreword by Bhakha Tulku
Translator's Introduction
The Cuckoo's Song of Gnosis
Radical Creativity
The Great Garuda in Flight
Pure Golden Ore
The Eternal Victory Banner
(The Vast Space of Vajrasattva)
Endnotes
Appendices
I. The Tibetan Text and Sources
II. Mind Series Jargon
The Cuckoo's Song of Gnosis
In Tibet's ancient shamanic tradition, the cuckoo was a magical bird, the king of birds. As the cuckoo's first call is the harbinger of spring, so the six lines of the Cuckoo's Song of Gnosis introduce gnostic reality. In this seminal transmission, Samantabhadra defines himself as spontaneously complete and perfect nonaction. It incorporates the precept of undiscriminating joyous activity. This is the root text of the Dzogchen Mind Series.
Hey, Mahasattva, Magnificent being, listen!
The nature of multiplicity is nondual
and things in themselves are pure and simple;
being here and now is construct-free
and it shines out in all forms, always all good;
it is already perfect, so exertion is redundant
and spontaneity is ever-immanent.
All experience, the entire phantasmagoria of the six senses, the diverse multiplicity of existence, in reality is without duality. Even if we examine the parts of the pure essence of mind in the laboratory of the mind, such specifics are seen to be illusive and indeterminate. There is nothing to grasp and there is no way to express it. The suchness of things, their actuality, left just as it is, is beyond thought and inconceivable and that is the here-and-now. Yet diversity is manifestly apparent and that is the undiscriminating, all-inclusive sphere of the all-good buddha, Samantabhadra. Total perfection has always been a fact and there has never been anything to do to actuate this immaculate completion. All endeavor is redundant. What remains is spontaneity and that is always present as our natural condition.
If the six lines are divided into three pairs of verses describing Dzogchen vision, meditation and action respectively, the first two lines express the view that pure mind is an ineffable singularity and cannot be analyzed; the second two lines indicate nonmeditation as the natural state of Samantabhadra's display; and the third couplet shows action as the non-directed action - nonaction - of spontaneous awareness.
Radical Creativity
Samantabhadra's radical creativity is the miracle of illusory display emanated in every moment. It lies in the freeform field of reality that is the dynamic of nonaction. In a more limited sense, however, radical creativity is evident here in the soft touch of Samantabhadra's breath of inspiration that informs these pith instructions. This is a transmission that embodies specific instruction. It teaches that there is no path to traverse and no distinction to be made in pure mind reality.
Hey, Mahasattva, Magnificent Being, listen!
1
All and everything emanates from me,
so all and everything, whatever appears,
is revealed as transmission,
revelation of the timelessly pure reality-field.
The path is the process of Samantabhadra's entire emanation in a timeless moment. In this respect every moment is identical and complete in itself and there can be no progress or development in or of pure mind. There can be no gradual increase or decrease of realization through time. Further, if all is one in the moment, how can there be any valid differentiation of pure mind from reality or, indeed, any distinctions whatsoever? Samantabhadra's all-inclusive momentary emanation is the nonreferential field of reality, which is his transmission and his instruction. The here-and-now is pure mind, the field of reality and Samantabhadra's complete transmission. There is nothing else.
2
All outer and inner is the timeless field of reality
and in such an immaculate field of play
buddha and sentient beings are not distinct-
so why try to change anything?
Pure mind and reality are one in the reality-field and it is quite impossible to make any distinction. We say that all phenomena, whatever exists, composed of earth, water, fire, air and space, is external, and that pure mind and the nature of reality are internal. But this is idle speculative thought imputing mere nominal meaning where there is no real basis for it. The field of reality is an all-inclusive unity. In this timeless sphere of activity there is no distinction between buddha and sentient beings. It is impossible to improve on the timeless moment - it is already perfect and complete, the all-good Samantabhadra. It cannot be altered or transformed because it is the immutable Vajrasattva.
3
There is no ambition in effortless, fully potentiated creativity
and such freeform spontaneous perfection is always the same;
in the pure field of reality, where the conception and the act are one,
however misguided how can we innocents do any wrong?
A moment of bodhi-reality is primordially perfect and lacks any goal-orientation or ulterior intent; it has no desire. It is free of all aspiration. It is uncontrolled and uncontrollable freeform display. It is always the same in the ultimate equality of pure mind. The meaning is always the same. Since it is complete and perfect as it stands, there is nothing at all to do, and there never was anything to do, and thus activity is freeform display. All strenuous practice is rendered effete. Here, both impulse and its simultaneous actualization and both immaculate subject and object are the pure field of reality. In this milieu it is impossible to err, regardless of our naive beliefs and intractable habits. Nothing we fools can do can defile this pure space.
4
The pure-pleasure union of sentient behavior,
conceived by the deluded as a perverse path,
is identical to the pure process of Samantabhadra:
whoever understands such equality is buddha, lord of all.
Pure-pleasure union, sensory or sexual, as an integral part of human conduct, or as a tantric path, is reviled as immoral or perverse by the ignorant. But the course of human behavior, from the beginning, is inseparable from Samantabhadra's transmission as revealed above - freeform play. These two paths are actually one. The lord of past, present and future buddha is he who realizes these apparently incompatible modes as identical.
All dualities, all dualistic structures, are spontaneously resolved in the absolute equality of Dzogchen. This includes the duality of the delusive path of gender union and the pure mind modality where the vision and the act are one. The apparent duality of the gender principles of skillful means and insight united in pure pleasure is actually always a unity from the beginning, a primordial unity, pulled apart (in anuyoga) only in order to recognize it as a unity and always for the first time.
5
On the delusive, extremist path, thinking, 'I' and
'Mine',
deluded innocents enter a structured path of dharma practice
with no chance to realize that it leads nowhere:
how can reality ever be found by seeking?
The teacher who talks in terms of 'I' and
'Mine' implies the existence of a substantial self - or soul - in an individual who must strive to gain and hold something that he lacks. This conventional way of thinking is called 'extremist' because of its lack of a sense of middle way where the 'I' is deconstructed and the notion of possession becomes a fallacy. Such a teacher draws his students into a conceptual, progressive, goal-oriented dharma practice, where there is a presumption that the graduated path has an attainable goal and that realization can be obtained through analysis and where there is no possibility of spontaneous realization. The path of ritual performance and religious practice has no end. In the Great Perfection there is no path - only the timeless modality of momentary unfoldment. Thus the nature of reality cannot be found by seeking; it is already present. The mind cannot objectify its own nature, so reality cannot be found by searching for it. Seeking it would be like a dog chasing its own tail.
6
The instruction of monkey-like masters who lack direct insight
is fraught with false concepts of preparation and technique;
so the master who cleans the tarnish from pure gold,
the authentic teacher, the most precious resource,
he is worth the ransom at any price.
A monkey mimics without understanding, like a teacher who gives precept and transmission without the valid basis of understanding that is direct insight into the nature of mind. Such teaching induces a conceptual notion of the path, a specific starting point and a goal in the mind of the disciple, involving preparation, supports and technique. The master who sees the nature of mind has eradicated any implication of a conditioned path. This is likened to removing any fine film of tarnish from pure gold through the application of black alum - a traditional practice. No refinement, like separating the dross from pure gold, is necessary. The teacher's transmission of this pathless path is worth to his students whatever price must be paid. In early times the student proved his commitment by offering gold to the master.
The Great Garuda in Flight
The garuda is a giant mythical bird, like an eagle. In the mountains he glides high in the sky, wide wings outstretched, riding the currents of air, occasionally beating his wings in unison. He seems to put no effort into his flight. He is utterly alone there. He appears to be flying purely for the joy of it. He has mastery.
Samantabhadra, Pure Mind, taught this seminal transmission on effortless perfection, undirected freeform action, so that the mind can rest at ease. It shows that there is nothing substantial in the mind, that there is no quest to pursue and no possible progress on a path towards a goal, that reality cannot be demonstrated or proven in any way and that it is immune to inflating or deflating evaluating bias.
Within this uncompromising description of the great garuda in flight - the Dzogchen yogi in a nondual modality - there appear references to glitches and veils and also allusions to the keys to the doors through which existential miasma may be forsaken.
Hey, magnificent immutable being, listen!
1
Hey! This freeform field, illusive like space,
nowhere located, has no object of focus;
an unstructured experiential process
it occurs in the slightest subtle projection:
the concept of pure being, indeterminable,
itself is self-sprung awareness,
an ubiquitous, unthinking, authentic presence,
and this illusive freeform field needs no alteration.
The field of nonaction, a freeform field of reality, is the dharmadhatu itself, and its pristine awareness is everywhere naturally present. The projected fields of dualistic perception are instantaneously transcended as a spontaneously emergent, nonobjective field of reality. Therein lies the process.
Pure being, the dharmakaya, conceived as an object in contrived meditation has no content, no specific qualities and no actuality and hence the ubiquitous self-sprung awareness. Think of pure being - a thoughtless, boundless space of equality - and the mind is filled by the nondual actuality of spontaneous pristine awareness. Pure mind is at once the sole cause and effect and for that reason, when relativistic thought-forms arise in pure being, they spontaneously emerge as a freeform field of pristine awareness.
The reality of nondual perception is an integrated field in which objects cannot be located or focused as discrete entities. The innate tendency of the intellect to concretize and reify is perceived here as a subtle projection or 'dedication' that is immediately recognized as the field of reality. It is as if the structuring, conceptualizing, tendency of conditioned mind instantaneously unfolds into an insubstantial, unstructured, inconceivable, field of reality. Thus the dualism of subjective knower and any objective factor never arises. There is only ever pure being, simultaneously a concept of emptiness and an existential reality. Any slight projection that gives intimation of a putative duality is immediately released by itself. Each thought and concept has intrinsic its own automatic release function: as pristine awareness it swallows itself.
Thus the natural field of reality cannot be improved upon and there is nothing at all to be done to attain it. Indeed, there is no object to address in this field, so how can anything be done to it? Any goal-oriented meditative technique employed to discover it is a vain counter-productive attempt that seeks to turn it into an object; but the nature of the causal method itself cannot but find the reality of the pure essence of mind.
2
Seeking the essence through derivative phenomena,
enjoy it only through its nonconceptual aspect:
the manifest essence is just pure being.
The field of experience is perfected as it stands and nothing needs to be done to actualize it as pure being. In whatever manner the pure essence of mind appears, the appearance itself finds its own intrinsic reality. Its seeming appearance is recognized as inconceivable and so its manifestation is free of mental structuring and only as such, free of constructs, can it be enjoyed. 'Derivative phenomena' is to be understood as the relative world that arises through the mutual dependence of twelve causes and conditions (ignorance, habitual tendencies, consciousness, name and form, six sensory fields, contact, feeling, craving, existence, birth, old age and death). But what appears to be interdependent phenomena is the freeform field of the pure essence of mind. 'The field of reality, unchangeably empty, is known through reflections in the nature of mind.' The analysis of samsara as a twelve-fold causal chain may be employed in the meditation technique whereby the emptiness of each link is established and the source of samsara revealed. But in the view disclosed here the twelve concepts in themselves - nothing but pure being - are the means to their own immediate consummation (see also verses 24 and 25).
Relaxing into every concept with an empty mind, the pristine awareness of pure being, which is the individuated pure essence of mind, is spontaneously present. Thus the marvelous display of Samantabhadra is enjoyed as its inconceivable, unstructured nature. Since the pure essence of mind is intrinsic to all, nothing but pure being can ever arise out of it and there is nothing else to achieve. To put it another way, the natural expression of pure being is its own antidote and it is reflexively released into itself.
3
This one nucleus, indivisible, unpatterned,
is the nonspecific actuality of pristine awareness;
in that vivid, unthought, wide-open essence,
on the path of purity lies sovereign equality.
This one indivisible nucleus that can never be particularized or localized is the pure mind essence evoked in the previous verse. Within it pristine awareness, being noncomposite, arises by and from itself. The singularity of this reality is the nonspecific meaning that is the exaltation of pristine awareness. Pristine awareness arises spontaneously in and as the unitary significance of things. This primordial awareness of pure being suffuses all seemingly concrete phenomena in a unitary cognition. It is vivid direct perception, unthought and unstructured, an open-ended expanse. In the modality of utter purity that is immersed in this perceptual nonduality lies effortless awareness of sameness, the natural equality of all things, and this is the nature of the pure essence of mind.
4
Changeless and unchangeable, there is nothing to desire,
no object of perception, no perceiving mind;
impulsion towards direct self-perception implies fixation on a cause,
but no ultimate equality can come in the bliss of meditation infatuation.
This naturally arising pristine cognition precludes attachment because it has no object within it to grasp and to cling to. In the absence of any object of attachment there is no mind to cling and no mind to grasp and so mind is unlimited. There is only the here-and-now. Subjective and objective factors are resolved in unitary cognition. The unchangeable nature of that awareness is like a timeless, primordial absence of object to be grasped and mind to grasp. If, nevertheless, we are still struck by the imperative to seek and find the nature of mind - that timeless primordial absolute - on a path of direct vivid gnosis, then that implies fixation on a causal path of meditation. Employing such technique, most likely we will become intoxicated and obsessed by the pleasure that arises in the projective function of meditative absorption. In that pleasure-attachment the possibility of attaining the famous sovereign equality is denied.
5
To the one buddha-dimension, all-embracing, nothing can be added,
and since the field of reality is unlimited, it cannot be diminished;
in the reality-display there is no place of heightened mood,
for pleasure resides everywhere equally in the vast self-sprung field.
In this nondual perspective 'the one-buddha dimension' is all-inclusive pure being (dharmakaya), which subsumes the dimensions of clarity (sambhogakaya) and compassion (nirmanakaya). From the beginning it is complete and perfect in itself and nothing can augment or improve it. Likewise, since the reality of self-sprung awareness cannot be reached by movement in any direction, its field of reality is the limitless here and now and cannot, therefore, be circumscribed. Thus, in nondual pure mind experience there is no variation in mood, only the one taste of pure pleasure, for reality is the play of pleasure and the field of reality is the playground of pleasure.
6
There is no marvelous vision to be seen here with an eye of insight,
and nothing specific to be heard since nothing can be explained;
here the sacred and profane are always inextricably intermingled,
and an ultimate goal, a superior place, cannot be articulated.
There is no particular understanding or insight to be desired above any other, for all cognition is equal in pure being. There is no particular way of seeing that will provide insight into the here-and-now, for the here-and-now is always present. It is useless to wait to hear something of particular significance because, in the moment, meaning remains unelaborated and cannot be expounded. If the 'sacred', the 'real', is seeming appearance and the 'profane', the 'unreal', is pure fabrication, because verbal expression is an inextricable mixture of these two, it is impossible to articulate the ultimate reality which is, supposedly, a superior state. The ultimate reality of 'absolute emptiness', being expressed and defined, does not exist in reality and cannot be established existentially.
7
The path of pure mind cannot be conceived as true or false
because self-sprung awareness itself cannot be defined;
in the direct vivid presence of timeless inclusive identity
thought arises but like a shadow.
Any attempt to determine the manifest pure mind, the appearances that flit across the mind-sky, as real or unreal, authentic or contrived, true or false, is purely academic. Such discussion is informed by mental constructs which cannot comprehend the spontaneous nature of mind. The self-cognizing mind-sky itself surpasses its content. In the freeform identity lacking directed activity, gnosis does not seek to identify itself. In pristine awareness constructs and discursive thoughts are like gossamer shadows without weight or substance. They are the shadow of buddhahood and a shadow is all we can see of it. They are like rainbow-hued figments of mind, neither existent nor nonexistent, neither coming into existence nor ceasing to be.
Every verbal expression in mind or speech is transcended by its nature as the pristine awareness which occurs at one with the verbal formula. Thus the alphabetic glyphs of thought and speech - whether they express positive or negative meanings - are buddha-speech and it is pointless to discuss with oneself the validity of any given experience with a view to any imagined conclusion. Attachment to any particular premise, hypothesis or formula over any other is thereby pre-empted and argument or discussion becomes a dead issue. Every experience is consummate in itself.
8
Its nonexistence is not unqualified - its essence emerges as an absence
and its emptiness is not voidness - it is present as empty objects;
through recollection of the nature of space, without desire,
the pleasure of consummate freeform action is enjoyed
and in that untargeted field pristine awareness emerges.
The essence does not exist as any thing, but it emerges as an absence of anything else. Likewise emptiness is not voidness because it is present as an empty field. The 'nonexistence' and 'emptiness' of the pure essence of mind are conceptual tools that deny it substantiality and create an ineffable space in which nonaction and spontaneous creativity occur. 'Absence' or 'nonexistence' describes the source - the pure essence of mind - of a non-objectifiable field or object. 'Emptiness' indicates only the absence of anything concrete or specific in that field and, further, implies the infusion of such an indeterminate reality by a vital fullness. Space is its best analogue and, indeed, by evoking the experience of the nature of space, free of any desire or intention the pure pleasure of pure mind emerges in a freeform field suffused by pristine awareness.
9
The ancient sages, focusing a passionate will,
became utterly lost in the torment of strenuous effort;
the omniscience that is immersion in the natural process,
when articulated, engenders conceptual meditation.
Referring back to the sages of yore, to exemplify a nonproductive, self-defeating mode of meditation, it was not so much the strenuous, passionate, effort that doomed their endeavor but the construction of goals fixed by conceptualizing the undoubted state of omniscience of those who had recognized the true nature of mind. Omniscience is the quality of nonconceptual pristine awareness; when such natural understanding is defined as knowledge of this or that through metaphysical speculation and conceptual fabrication it is turned into a desirable goal and spontaneity is precluded. The rishis pursued a futile temporal path of conceptual goal-oriented meditation.
10
Craving pure pleasure is an attachment sickness;
if it is not cured by the panacea of imperturbable equality,
even the causal bases of higher states are infected by passion.
Desire for happiness or pleasure through meditation is as much an extraneous attachment as desire for sensual pleasure or material objects. Hunger for pure pleasure is chronic heart disease. The universal panacea for desire and attachment is our inborn imperturbable sense of the equality of all experience. Without this natural recognition, desire nullifies even the merit accumulated for the purpose of attaining a higher state of being. Without it, social virtues such as generosity, patience and morality are infected and skewed. So the desire that fuels the ambition to attain a spiritual goal is self-defeating.
Desire in itself is self-liberating, but with craving and addiction - like diseased attachment to the bliss of union - desire becomes a glitch in the process. It is the presence of equality that takes the sting out of desire and allows it spontaneous liberation. Even if it is desire for the virtue creating states of beatitude that is infected by goal-oriented craving, the same applies.
11
Those enmeshed in a negative process by this virulent disease,
aching for progress, are like animals stalking a mirage -
their goal has no existence anywhere in the universe;
even the causal bases of the ten stages obscure the purest mind.
Goal-directed craving entails a negative process that is like pursuing a phantom - the goal is a figment of the imagination and cannot be reached no matter how long the journey. Nirvana can never be reached by striving. The principle applies equally to those seeking a mundane goal as to those who strive to traverse the ten stages of the bodhisattva path - the stages and levels cannot be traversed so long as they are separated from the starting point in the here-and-now where pristine awareness is an immediate source of fulfilment. Even when the goal is one of the ten stages of purification on the bodhisattva path or buddhahood itself, ambition to attain it is a glitch in the natural process.
12
Ultra-fast pristine awareness, beyond thought,
like a spiritual friend - a fountain of gems,
unmotivated, independent of changing circumstance,
by its very nature fulfills all wishes.
Goal-oriented striving is redundant because pristine awareness itself, moving so fast that fulfilment is simultaneous with the need, is totally satisfying. Such pristine awareness is like the wish-fulfilling gem of the masters that is the source of infinite virtue, the precious jewel that we carry in veneration upon our heads. It is like a soul-mate who responds to our unspoken wishes, has no self-directed or ulterior motivation and remains constant in all circumstances whatsoever. It is not something that can be imaged or is contingent upon circumstance. It is gnosis arising from within as our own nature - that is what is totally satisfying.
13
Analyzed it is nothing - letting it be, fine exaltation;
it is truly invisible, yet it gratifies every need:
the master, innocent of self and other, a treasure trove;
the happy isles, revealed in selfless compassion.
This precious wish-fulfilling gem of pristine awareness cannot be examined under the microscope or it appears nonexistent. But naturally relaxing into it, it spontaneously emanates a multiplicity of positive qualities; it is the invisible matrix that emanates all our needs and here the great way is revealed to all. In pristine awareness, where the duality of subject and object, self and other, is resolved, there is the master, the guru-buddha, and the teacher. That is the land of milk and honey, where everything is fulfilled, a field of instantaneous accomplishment. The master is a bodhisattva in his pure land which is an emanation of selfless compassion. This is the emanation body (tulku) that never leaves its pure mind source and never becomes a concrete object and this is the wish-fulfilling gem.
14
Unmoving within, it is nothing that can be found within
and turning outside, it cannot be imaged or isolated;
neither extruding nor intruding, this selfless compassion
is inalienable - it abides here timelessly.
This precious jewel of selfless compassion is identical to pure mind and like awakened mind it is said to exist within but cannot be discovered within or indeed anywhere at all. Certainly it cannot be found outside because what appears outside is a projection upon an empty screen and has no substantial reality whatsoever. So this selfless compassion can be neither radiated nor absorbed, neither applied to another nor soaked up from outside, for it cannot move out of its own sphere, which is all-embracing. In no way can it be intentionally or conscientiously applied to an external human or material field or it reduces itself to mawkish pity. It cannot be focused upon a specific target of sympathy. It is a primordial, universal, constant .
15
To yearn for pleasure precludes its dawning -
pleasure is already here, yet still it strains for itself;
in pure delusion we ardently crave nirvana
but such a grasping self has no buddha-vision.
Incessant desire towards a future end frustrates itself because the actual process of desire in this moment is the end itself. Consummation cannot be attained until desire is recognized as the pure pleasure that it always is. The desire for pleasure that looms out of pure mind strains towards what is always ineluctably present in the here-and-now as pure pleasure. In the same way, the desire for nirvana that arises in clouded pristine awareness is consummated only when it recognizes itself as nirvana. So long as it strains towards nirvana the aspiration alienates itself from nirvana and in such a bind the nature of the aspiration as the goal remains obscured. Rather than trying to perform the impossible task of standing aside and admiring pure mind, we jump directly into it!
16
Where there is no buddha there is no buddha to name
and buddha revealed, to label him is error:
to try to catch buddha 'out there' is a false path
for all things are formless without an iota of substance.
So long as dualistic perception maintains a gap between desire and pleasure, so-called 'buddha' cannot be seen. In the absence of 'buddha', to employ the concept is to suggest something that does not exist which creates a dichotomy between what is and what might be. To strive for what might be is a chimerical, mistaken quest because 'buddha' has no color or shape and does not exist anywhere. 'Buddha' has no substance or continuity whatsoever, so the label does not refer to any entity or state. Then, when 'buddha' is revealed, there can be no objectification of nondual buddhahood. It cannot be conceptualized and 'he who knows does not speak'. So the word 'buddha' remains phony in any context and whether in a delusive or nondelusive state 'he who speaks does not know'.
17
Consummate, beyond desire, serene,
insubstantial, and utterly foregone,
the nature of the miraculous ambrosia
does not depend upon any technique.
The 'miraculous ambrosia' is nondual perception where conscious subject and animate or inanimate object are indissolubly joined in the totality of pristine awareness. This ambrosia (amrita) is, therefore, pristine awareness itself which is spontaneously, effortlessly and ineluctably present in every moment. There is no need to apply any technique whatsoever to attain the release and it matters not at all what the shape and color of the immaterial form that is abandoned there. The neurosis of clinging and the pain of attachment is naturally and primordially assuaged.
18
This sublime reality, free and open, all inclusive,
provides recourse for the little ones;
and when concepts dissolve in the vastness
there is no distinction between great and small.
The antidote to the goal-oriented aspirations of adherents to the lesser, causal, levels of Hermits, Disciples and Bodhisattvas, is the vast expanse of naturally perfected reality. In this space all ideas about the nature of reality dissolve, all desire, aspiration and ambition dissolve, all concepts projected upon the sensory fields dissolve. There is only one recourse, technique or antidote, and that is primordial pure mind - which is not to be sought after.
19
Articulated transmission, emergent vision,
which is like an illusionist's trick,
arises in pulsating misty awareness.
Extempore verbalized transmission augmented by secret instruction, or a vision taking momentary form, is like a conjuror's magic, mere illusion. Now you see it; now you don't! It appears to have content but it is utterly insubstantial. Such creativity arises by the power of pristine awareness pulsating in sameness, creating a skein of illusion at each beat, at each beat engulfed in its own purity. Through the self-recognition of ultimate sameness in a torpid mind, pristine awareness is freed from its seeming dullness and cloudiness.
Within seeming delusion pristine awareness emerges spontaneously. In the very process of the volatile fluctuations of delusive energy, in its dispersion and absorption, expansion and contraction, alternating between creative output and ultimately deconstructive rest, in sameness pristine awareness arises. In this way, verbal transmission is the inspired revelation of a dynamic pulsating pristine awareness. Vision arises by the same process. Poetry and art arise likewise. Scripture has the same source. Out of a languid, torpid mind primal awareness shines through and therefore can be said to be the source of spontaneous creativity. This precept is restated in Pure Golden Ore verse 5 and Victory Banner verse 44.
20
In this universal sovereign approach,
released, accepting, our nature
aspires to nothing and appropriates nothing,
and induces not the slightest presumption.
Self-sufficient we are released from all conceptual supports and mental crutches, free of a spiritual base or port. With presence of equality we are undiscriminating. We have no desires and no needs. The ingenuousness of our pleasure assures that no complacence or arrogance can be generated and this frees us from the seeming womb-like security of the gods. The universality of the process where the upper and lower realms are one, and buddha and sentient beings are indivisible, denies the possibility of the gods' exclusivity as also the sage's divine pride.
21
As with the soaring garuda in flight
no complication, no simplification,
nothing to lose and nothing to gain.
The garuda, the mythological king of birds, is egg-born to full maturity and at birth he can glide across the universe with a single movement of his wings. Utterly self-sufficient, fearless, lacking any anxiety, he needs no output or input, radiates nothing and absorbs nothing, without diffusion or concentration, and flying high and free he is completely happy in himself without expectation or trepidation, hope or fear.
22
That ultimate space, like an ocean,
gives rise to the multiplicity of things;
creative potential, coextensive with space,
is unpredictable in the forms that it takes.
The ocean is the source of all variety. Still in its depths, its surface spontaneously takes on all peaceful and wrathful forms that represent every kind of human experience. Just as the shape of the ocean's surface is capricious and variable, so the form of creation, the shape of our experience, is changeable, variable and unpredictable. The creativity of the pure essence of mind is all-pervading like space and where it appears to manifest as this or that is always uncertain.
23
In the pure essence of mind, spontaneously,
ultimate sovereign samadhi arises;
and vision is like a vast ocean,
unstructured, as extensive as space.
The creative dynamic of the pure essence of mind is ubiquitous although its point of apparent manifestation is uncertain. In every adventitious thought or construct, the ultimate samadhi always arises without concentration or relaxation. With that, then, vision is like a vast ocean or like the sky. Vision has no structure; or it is simultaneously structured and destructured. Thought-free with the sense of equality, it is co-extensive with space. That is the vision.
24
In this freeform field of Samantabhadra
nothing is born and nothing transforms;
the twelve fold causal chain
denigrates and demeans it.
In Samantabhadra's field of activity, which is the space of equality, nothing is born and nothing dies, nothing comes into being and nothing ceases to be, so nothing can transform or transmigrate and there is nothing at all that can change. Causality is denied, so there is no karma and no reincarnation. The twelve-fold chain of interdependent origination (ignorance, habitual tendencies, consciousness, name and form, the six sensory fields, contact, feeling, craving, existence, birth, old age and death) is an analysis of samsara, the wheel of life. Entertaining such a theory denigrates and demeans the original buddha, Samantabhadra, by imputing a causal process to what is timeless. Causality precludes the perfection of the here-and-now by the presumption of causes and conditions. It is the premise of an intractable pessimist. But to deny the causal chain diminishes samsara while to affirm it reifies its fleeting appearances - and neither is appropriate to recognition of its nature.
25
Let the wise recognize the twelve-fold chain
as a door into delusion for the ignorant,
while experience of the six kinds of beings
should be recognized as the primary path.
If we believe in samsara, affirming the existence of its causes and conditions, a door into samsara's six realms of suffering opens and endless transmigration from realm to realm begins. The ignorant who walk through that door are trapped by delusive appearances. But whoever recognizes the nature of reality understands the twelve links and samsaric appearances as mere concepts and constructs. At the same time, delusory samsaric experience of the six personality types, or six kinds of beings, who populate the six realms of the wheel of life, recognized by the wise as pure mind itself, constitutes the enlightened modality. In this way, what is a trap for those who affirm or deny samsara and its causal analysis is a lucky break for those who understand it as the pure mind process.
26
Since sensual pursuits are whetted by compassion,
the pleasure of pure mind is enacted in them all;
butchers, whores and taboo-breakers,
unspeakable sinners and outcastes,
all can know nothing but pure pleasure
through inclusive perfection, the nondual elixir.
When there is no gap between vision and action on the wheel of life, when vision and action are congruent and simultaneous, whatever form the sensory continuum takes, regardless of social opprobrium or taboo, there can only be pure pleasure. In nondual perception the apparent form is always mere gossamer illusion of pure mind. All activity is suffused by compassion for others. This includes the activity of butchers and all erotic indulgence - all is pure mind action and pure pleasure is its inevitable feeling tone. Even the breaking of social taboos is suffused by compassion, regardless of whether it is a single action or lifestyle. The five taboos, or inexpiable crimes, of the Buddhist tradition, are matricide, killing an arhat, patricide, creating schism in the community and letting the blood of a tathagata with malice - these actions are said to result in immediate rebirth in hell without a moment for absolution. The elixir of nonduality absolves, absolutely, all guilt and in ultimate equality there can only be pure pleasure.
27
This unstructured, unthought, pure essence of mind
cannot be hidden in the continuum of mind:
for indiscriminate pure mind yogis
pure mind is present in every situation.
Our actual identity, being all-inclusive, perfect and complete, our identity as pure mind, is inseparable from pure pleasure. It is known as 'the inconceivable essence'. It is not something discrete concealed somewhere in the continuity of being, or in the personality. It is there for everybody to see in every situation that arises. As we act without discrimination, neither rejecting nor adopting whatever arises, it is implicit in the sense of total fulfilment. Nothing lacking, nothing superfluous, it resides in the absence of motivation. It is the equanimity that exists in experience of the thing-in-itself, the essence of unstructured experience. It exists as the nature of mind in the continuity of thought.
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