Now the manner of the dawning of the Wrathful Deities is to be shown.
seven stages of ambuscade. The setting-face-to-face at each
Multitudes will be liberated by that recognition; [and] although multitudes obtain liberation in that manner, the number of sentient beings being great, evil karma power- ful, obscurations dense, propensities of too long standing, the Wheel of Ignorance and Illusion becometh neither ex-
in such detail, there is a vast preponderance of those who wander downwards unliberated.
ful and the Knowledge-Holding Deities, who come to welcome one, the fifty-eight flame-enhaloed, wrathful, blood-drinking deities come to dawn, who are only the former Peaceful Deities in changed aspect—according to the place [or psychic- centre of the Lardo-body of the deceased whence they proceed]; nevertheless, they will not resemble them."
emanations from the heart and throat psychic-centres of the Bardo-body of the deceased, have dawned. The Wrathful Deities now about to dawn issue from
This is the Bardo of the Wrathful Deities; and, they being influenced by fear, terror, and awe, recognition becometh more difficult. The intellect, gaining not in independence, passeth from one fainting state to a round of fainting states. [Yet], if one but recognize a little, it is easier to be liberated [at this stage]. Ifit be asked why? [the answer is]: Because
and awe—the intellect is undistractedly alert in one-pointedness ; that is why.?
If at this stage one do not meet with this kind of teaching, one’s hearing [of religious lore|—although it be like an ocean [in its vastness]|—is of no avail. There are even dis- cipline-holding abbots [or bhcékkhus| and doctors in meta- physical discourses who err at this stage, and, not recognizing, wander into the Sangsara.
As for the common worldly folk, what need is there to mention them! By fleeing, through fear, terror, and awe, they fall over the precipices into the unhappy worlds and suffer. But the least of the least of the devotees of the mystic mantrayana doctrines, as soon as he sees these blood-drinking deities, will recognize them to be his tutelary deities, and the meeting will be like that of human acquaintances. He will trust them; and becoming merged into them, in at-one- ment, will obtain Buddhahood.’
the brain psychic-centre ; they are the excited, or wrathful, reflex forms of the Peaceful Deities (who, when contrasted with their wrathful aspects, include the Knowledge-Holding Deities). (See p. 858 and Addenda, pp. 217-9.) :
By having meditated on the description of these blood- drinking deities, while in the human world, and by having performed some worship or praise of them; or, at least, by having seen their painted likenesses and their images, upon
witnessing the dawning of the deities at this stage, recogni- tion of them will result, and liberation. In this lieth the art.
Again, at the death of those discipline-holding abbots and
doctors in metaphysical discourses [who remain uninstructed in these Lardo teachings], however assiduously they may have devoted themselves to religious practices, and however clever they may have been in expounding doctrines while in the human world, there will not come any phenomenal
reliques [from the ashes]. This is because when they lived
their heart, and because they had spoken contemptuously of them, and because they were never acquainted [through
thus, when these dawn on the Bardo, they do not recognize
they view it as inimical; and, an antagonistic feeling being engendered, they pass into the miserable states because of that. Therefore, if the observers of the disciplines, and the metaphysicians, have not in them the practices of the mystic
not, nor are bone-reliques and seed-like bones ever produced [from the bones of their funeral-pyre]:1 these are the reasons for it. For the devotee who—even at this stage—can be made to realize that these deities are thus but the karmic personifications of his own propensities, born from having lived and drunken life, and who has, in addition, the supreme power to face them unwaveringly (as in Bulwer Lytton’s Zanonz the Neophyte to succeed must face the ‘ Dweller on the Threshold’), meeting them like old acquaintances, and then losing his personality in them, enlightenment as to the true nature of sangsaric existence dawns, and, with it, the All-Perfect Illumination called Buddhahood.
that such phenomena have a purely rational explanation, such as our text herein suggests. Furthermore, the /@mas maintain that, if a reputed saint be
The least of the least of mantrayanic [devotees],—who may seem to be of very unrefined manners, unindustrious, untactful, and who may not live in accordance with his vows, and who in every way may be inelegant in his habits, and even unable, perhaps, to carry the practices of his teachings to a successful issue,—let no one feel disrespect for nor doubt him, but pay
holdeth]. By that, alone, one obtaineth liberation at this stage.
not have been very elegant while in the human world, at his death there will come at least one kind of sign, such as rain- bow-radiance, bone-images, and bone-reliques. This is because
of ordinary [psychic development], who have meditated upon the visualization and perfection processes and practised the essences [or essence mantras],? need not wander down this far on the Chényid Bardo. As soon as they cease to breathe, they will be led into the pure paradise realms by the Heroes and Heroines and the Knowledge-Holders.? As a sign of
really a saint, among the charred bones from his funeral pyre there will be found some shaped into beautiful forms like images, and that small pearl-like (or, as the text has it, seed-like) nodules will appear in the ashes of the bones cremated.
thee : the victorious host, worthy judges, and senators of the holy apostles meet
this, the sky will be cloudless; they will merge into rainbow radiance; there will be sun-showers, sweet scent of incense [in the air], music in the skies, radiances; bone-reliques and images [from their funeral-pyre].
Therefore, to the abbots [or discipline-holders], to the doctors, and to those mystics who have failed in their vows, and to all the common people, this 7édo/ is indispensable.} But those who have meditated upon the Great Perfection and the Great Symbol? will recognize the Clear Light at the moment of death; and, obtaining the Dharma-Kaya, all of them will be such as not to need the reading of this Thodol. By recognizing the Clear Light at the moment of death, they also will recognize the visions of the Peaceful and the Wrathful during the Chényid Bardo, and obtain the Sambhoga-Kaya; or, recognizing during the Sidpa Lardo, obtain the NVirmana-K aya; and, taking birth on the higher planes, will, in the next rebirth, meet with this Doctrine, and then enjoy the continuity of Zarma.*
with thee: the fair, white, shining company of holy confessors, with the victorious number of glorious martyrs, come about thee: the joyful company of holy virgins receive thee: and the worthy fellowship of holy patriarchs open to thee the place of rest and joy, and deem thee to be among them that they be among, everlastingly.’
2 ‘The Great Perfection’ refers to the fundamental doctrine concerning the gaining of Perfection or Buddhahood as taught by the School of Guru Padma Sambhava. ‘The Great Symbol (Tib. Chhag-chhen: Skt. Maha Mudra)’ refers to an ancient Indian system of yoga, related to the same School, but more especially practised nowadays by the followers of the semi-reformed Kargyutpa sect, founded in the latter half of the eleventh century a.p. by the learned Tibetan yog? Marpa, who, having sojourned in India as the disciple of the pandit Atisha and of Naropa, Atisha’s disciple, introduced the Great Symbol into Tibet. Milarepa, the most beloved of all Tibetan yogis, who was Marpa’s successor, developed the practice of the Great Symbol and made it the foundation teaching of the Sect. (See pp. 78-9.)
Therefore, this 7Addol is the doctrine by which Buddhahood may be attained without meditation ; the doctrine liberating
beings of great evil karma on the Secret Path; the doctrine which produceth differentiation instantaneously [between those who are initiated into it and those who are not]: being the profound doctrine which conferreth Perfect En- lightenment instantaneously. Those sentient beings who have been reached by it cannot go to the unhappy states.
gether being like unto a mandala of gold inset with turquoise, combine them.
Thus, the indispensable nature of the 7%0dol being shown, there now cometh the setting-face-to-face with the dawning of