[the Conclusion, Showing the Fundamental Importance of the Bardo Teachings]

Whatever the religious practices of any one may have been, —whether extensive or limited,—during the moments of death various misleading illusions occur; and hence this 7édol is indispensable. To those who have meditated much, the real Truth dawneth as soon as the body and consciousness-principle part. The acquiring of experience while living is important :

being,! and thus have had some experience, obtain great power during the Bardo of the Moments of Death, when the Clear Light dawneth.

Again, the meditation on the deities of the Mystic Path of

while living, will be of great influence when the peaceful and wrathful visions dawn on the Chdnyid Bardo. Thus the training in this Bardo being of particular importance even while living,” hold to it, read it, commit it to memory, bear it in mind properly, read it regularly thrice; let the words and the meanings be very clear; it should be so that the words and the meanings will not be forgotten even though a hundred executioners were pursuing [thee].

It is called the Great Liberation by Hearing, because even those who have committed the five boundless sins! are sure to be liberated if they hear it by the path of the ear. There- fore read it in the midst of vast congregations. Disseminate it. Through having heard it once, even though one do not comprehend it, it will be remembered in the Intermediate State without a word being omitted, for the intellect becometh ninefold more lucid [there]. Hence it should be proclaimed in the ears of all living persons; it should be read over the pillows of all persons who are ill; it should be read at the side of all corpses: it should be spread broadcast.

Save for them who have accumulated much merit and absolved many obscurations, difficult is it to meet with it. Even when met with, difficult is it to comprehend it. Liberation will be won through simply not disbelieving it upon hearing it. There-

doctrines.”

The Setting-Face-to-Face while experiencing Reality in the Intermediate State, called ‘The Teaching Which Liberateth By Merely Being Heard And That Which Liberateth By Merely Being Attached ’,® is finished.*

fDre OvK =i 2] [THE SIDPA BARDO|

THIS IS KNOWN AS THE GOOD HEAD-PART OF fHAT CALEED “THE PROFOUND. ESSENCE OF THE LIBERATION BY HEARING’—THE RE- MINDER, THE CLEAR SETTING-FACE-TO-FACE IN THE INTERMEDIATE STATE WHEN SEEKING REBIRTH!

In the Block-Print, the Bardo Thédol being divided into two distinctly separate books—whereas in our MS. Book II is an unbroken continuation of Book I—the first four folios of its second book contain—unlike our MS.—a summary of the introductory parts of the first book; and the title of Book II of the Block-Print is as follows: Bar-do Thés-grol Chen-mo Las Srid-pa Bar- doht Ngo-Spréd Bzhugs-so (pronounced: Bar-do Thé-dol Chen-mo Lay Sid-pa Bar-doi Ngo-Téd Zhu-so), which means, ‘Herein Lieth the Setting-Face-to-

Rebirth), from “The Great Liberation by Hearing on the After-Death Plane”’.

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‘The essence of all things is one and the same, perfectly calm and tranquil, and shows no sign of ‘* becoming”; ignorance, however, is in its blindness and delusion oblivious of Enlightenment, and, on that account, cannot recognize truthfully all those conditions, differences, and activities which characterize the

phenomena of the Universe.’—Ashvaghosha. The Awakening of Faith (Suzuki’s Translation).

INTRODUCTORY SECTIONS 155