Green Tara translation

[Guest guest]

Bon Jour Mike,

 

Seeing we need perhaps a path of gentle peace, you who have often helped me

stay grounded on earth, not my strong suit, will perhaps do this again.

>From Mike:

 

The adept of Buddhist mystery, is not of course a translator, and we

have Mike's word on that.

 

*Au contraire! You have mike's word that almost any translator you read

these is incapable of real translation inasmuch as - as a professional - he

or she can never grow the full background of what it is he or she is

translating. This has not always been the case (and *is* not always the

case), but (and I'm sure Mette would agree with me here) it is the general

rule. Traduttori traditori - 'translators are traitors'.

However, among the greatest practitioners have been many great

translators... That is a different matter.

>And the Adept in experiencing the Mandala

>develops out of and around himself an image of the world with the

>Mountain of the Gods, Sumeru, in the midst. This is for him the axis of

>the world-egg, "whose four-cornered and be-jewelled body sparkles with

>sides made of crystal, gold, ruby, and emerald, the colors of the world's

>four quarters A faithful Hindu would see resting upon it the palace of the

>King of the Gods, Indra, and of his blessed companions---Amaravati,

>'Seat of the Immortals.' The adept of the Buddhist mandala develops in

>its place a monastic temple as the one locality appropriate to Buddha:

>a square building made of precious stones with Four entrances at the

>sides ( these are the T-shaped appendices ) girt by magic walls of

>diamond. The roof rises up to a point in the manner of those domed tombs on

earth which, containing relics bear witness to the attainment of Nirvana by

the fully enlightened. Inside, the floor takes the form of a circle with an

open lotus blossom, the Eight petals streching to all points of the

compass ( the four cardinal points And the four points in between). In it the

contemplative sees himself standing in the form of Mahasukha, ( one of the

great god Shiva's manifestations) , holding a female figure in his embrace.

He sees himself as the 'highest bliss of the circles' with four heads and

eight arms, and becomes aware of his own essence (soul ) through

contemplation. His four heads signify the four elements, Water, Fire, Earth,

and Air, in their immaterial suprasensible state. and also the four infinite

feelings, permeation by which through constant

practice causes one to grow ready for Niverana. ( Unless there is a

beautiful young

>Blonde nearby. ) ha!

 

*An incredible amount of guff has been written about mandalas and the

mandala. This - for all it has a few of the basic structural ideas more or

less correct - is no exception. Point one, Hindu and Buddhist Tantra have

their roots in the same cultural revolution, even to the point of sharing

lineal teachers to az degree. Neither one is a down-graded offshoot of the

other. 'Lokeshvara' is NOT Shiva, "he" is - literally - 'the Lord of the

World'. Mahasukha is not Shiva either; "he" is 'Great Bliss'.

A statement such as "... A faithful Hindu would see resting upon it the

palace of the King of the Gods, Indra, and of his blessed

companions---Amaravati, 'Seat of the Immortals.' The adept of the Buddhist

mandala develops in its place a monastic temple as the one locality

appropriate to Buddha: a square building made of precious stones with four

entrances at the sides ( these are the T-shaped appendices ) girt by magic

walls of diamond. The roof rises up to a point in the manner of those domed

tombs on earth which, containing relics bear witness to the attainment of

Nirvana by the fully enlightened...", aside from its obvious antagonism, is

also riddled with inaccuracies as I sall point out in a moment by example.

 

For a start, the palace at the top of Mt. Sumeru is not a monastery at all,

but a wide variety of things. And secondly 'the tombs on earth' of which

our author speaks are the well-known stupa, dagoba and pagoda of Buddhist

art. They are not tombs but symbols, and the fact that they generally house

relics or sacred substances is really neither here nor there. Most important

in a stupa are the various levels of which it is composed, to

wit, a cube, a sphere, a conical spire and a hemisphere, topped by small

sphere or drop dissolving into space, and representing in turn the

psycho-physical aggregates of form, feeling, perception, impulse and

consciousness... They are a map. At a stretch a map could be regarded as a

tomb if one refused to use it. Let us look at a few mandalas (Buddhist

ones)(after all the term is proper only to the Buddhist mandala - its

translation being somewhere between the Greek 'temenos' and the idea of a

centre and circumdference). First a few peaceful ones by my own teacher, His

Holiness Düd'jom Rinpoche (please excuse the translations!):

 

OM MAHÂ SHÙNYATÂ JNÂNA BENZRA SWABHÂV' ATMAKO HANG

 

Oneself and all phenomenal appearance resting in the state of imageless

emptiness,

All directions, above and below, are filled with a blazing jewel-like radiance

Of five-coloured light-rays whose swirling

Settles and firms to become a space-filling, thousand-spoked golden wheel.

In the centre of this, in the crystal citatdel

Of Dewachen, the perfect realisation of all wishes,

One's own awareness, the creative expression of unobstructed emptiness,

(Arises as) a white lotus and moon-disc on which is a brilliant white

TAM-syllable,

Its foot long, adorned with the bindu-tilaka, and from which pours

A five coloured light making offerings to the noble ones and purifying the

obscurations and sins of sentient beings.

As it gathers back, I arise as the Wish-Granting Wheel,

The white-bodied Goddess, with one face and two hands,

The right making the gesture of Supreme Gift-Bestowing at the knee,

While the left, with thumb and ring-finger, grasps the stem of a white

utpala lotus

Which blossoms out beside her left ear.

Her forehead, palms and the soles of he feet each bear the mark of a

peacefully gazing eye,

And she is seated with her feet crossed in the vajra-posture, beautiful in

the youthfulness of her sixteen years .

Her abundant, silky, blue-black hair is partially tied up on the crown of

her head

And adorned with a hanging fringe and garlands of flowers.

Her torso is covered with finest vermilion silks,

Her lower limbs with a poppy-red skirt,

And with sky-blue ribbons dancing in the wind

And a crown of precious gems,

She is bedecked with bracelets and anklets of precious crystal,

And is seated in a vast expanse of five-coloured rainbow light.

 

In the mouth of the eight-petalled lotus of her heart,

In the navel of a golden vishvavajra,

Is an eight-spoked diamond wheel

The colour of the full moon. In its centre

Is a white TAM-syllable with long foot and bindu-tilaka.

And around it, on the eight spokes, are the eight syllables of the secret

mantra,

While, on the circumference, at the junction of spoke and outer rim, spins

the mantra-mala of syllables of increase,

Proclaiming their own sound as they spin towards the left.

Five-coloured light streams forth to fill the skies and,

Transforming the life-energy, power and strength

Of all Buddhas, Rishis and Vidyadharas in the ten directions,

All Bodhisattvas on the ten levels and the fixed and moving things

throughout all of the phenomenal universe,

Into the syllables A, NRI and TA,

Perfectly dissolves the youthfulness of all pride-filled beings throughout

the three worlds

Into one's heart without the least obstruction.

Pacifying illness, demonic possession, sin and defilements,

This increases one's life-force, merit, glory, wealth, good reputation and

dominion.

One's body blazing with splendour like a mass of light,

One attains the level of a Knowlege-Holder of Long Life.

 

OM TÂRE TUTTÂRE TURE PUNYE PUKTING AYUH PUKTING KURUYE SÔHÂ

 

Mike Dickman at: cloudhand

 

I'll put this in tomorrow, as I haven't gone to no mail yet. :-)