Tibetan Phenomenology

All phenomena are primordially pure; they cannot be located and are empty;
Empty though they are, like a magic show they clearly appear to our perception;
What appears to our perception, when we look into its nature for something identifiable, is nonexistent.
Nonexistent though it is, it can give rise to the experience of all happiness and suffering. *
*(Fifth Dalai Lama (1617-1682))

Sunday, August 10, 2014

The Ushnisha

From Dilgo Khyentse's The Heart of Compassion: Thirty Seven Verses on the Practice of a Boddhisattva (translated by the Padmakara Translation Group)

"The ushnisha (gtsug tor), or crown prominence, one of the major marks of a fully enlightened Buddha, is usually represented in paintings and statues asa protuberance resembling a topknot in size, but is said to rise up from the top of a buddha's head to the infinity of space. Its full extent, however, can only be seen by a boddhisattva who has attained the first bhumi.* In the Kalachakra Tantra, the ushnisha corresponds to the sky chakra (nam mkha'i 'khor lo), the sixth chakra, which extends upward without limit and respresents the unlimited wisdom of enlightenment. In the thogal practice of the Great Perfection, the ushnisha corresponds to the five-colored lights and buddhafields that manifest above one's head as the infinite display of sambhogakaya realization (footnote 89, p. 248 Heart)."




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