Then Sattvavajra presented a request to the great Vajrasattva
With these words:
The sun shines by itself.
It is supreme among the lights.
It holds the treasure
That is an awareness of the nine treasuries.
Through the perfect transmission
That is spontaneously realized and that has no work
Our nine kinds of desire
Let fall a rain of wishes.
Emotional problems and wisdom
Appear to be one thing.
Please explain why the one
Is divided into nine.
Then the great Vajrasattva gave instruction
With these words:
O Mahāsattva,
The one circle is divided into two.
While there is one truth,
Praise and blame arise.
The six samsaras are one,
But we look at them individually.
The nine treasuries are obstructed
In the treasure of our awareness.
A circle is entirely round,
So samsara and nirvana have not existed
From the beginning.
Samsara is the heart of our enlightenment.
Sorrow is the dawning of the playfulness
Of the All Good.
Our thusness shines
In an uncomplicated circle,
But even as it shines
It melts into a dominion that is insubstantial.
As for lust, hatred, stupidity, pride,
And great jealousy,
For some reason they shine out as the five wisdoms,
Without our seeking it.
Our wisdom is like the sun.
It pervades through all things.
The five kinds of desire and five kinds of objects
Are nourishment for us all.
Self-originating compassion is a nourishment for everyone.
It is our own playfulness that appears to us.
It is our own pleasure to work on ourselves.
For living beings whose ignorance is dense
The lamp of clear vision arises naturally.
In samsara itself there is primordial Buddhahood!
The enjoyment of our sorrows
Is the ornament of our bliss.
From the primordial
Our wisdom has been clear by itself.
Our fantasies of dualities
Are pathways of delusion.
Our bodies, speech, minds, and all our good works
Shine out in the dominion of a clear awareness.
This is like the pathways of the birds through the sky.
They melt into the dominion of the sky,
And will not be clear.
Our fields, domains, powers, strengths, and magic
Are also perfected in the treasure
That is an awareness of our equality.
Our contemplations on deeds and practices
May be infinite,
But we live in an experience
In which our wisdom is clear by itself.
Our natural non-duality is pervasive like the sky.
The blessings of our deeds
Are displayed like the stars.
The blessings of our compassion
Are pervasive like light.
We do not join or part from
The experience of our own clarity.
The wisdom of our awareness
Is entirely alone.
Its blessings are like a wish-fulfilling jewel.
The six kinds of living beings
Are a self-evident audience that is a community.
Vajrasattva embodies the enlightenment of all the Buddhas. Everyone who enters the Vajrayana, the path of esoteric Buddhism, encounters Vajrasattva. Students who practice the preliminaries to the Vajrayana recite the mantra of Vajrasattva a hundred thousand times while visualizing a cleansing of their spirits. Vajrasattva is at the core of the Great Perfection teachings, not as a meditation or visualization, but as an embodiment of the true nature of our own minds, which are equal to the sky itself. In the Great Perfection, Vajrasattva is the sky in all its majesty.
Lama Christopher Wilkinson begon zijn loopbaan in de Dharma op 15-jarige leeftijd met het afleggen van de toevluchtsgeloften van zijn stamleraar Dezhung Rinpoche. In de jaren die volgden introduceerde Dezhung Rinpoche hem bij Geshe Ngawang Nornang, Lama Kalu Rinpoche, Dilgo Kyentse Rinpoche, Nyoshul Khen Rinpoche, en vele anderen. Christopher identificeerde zich vanaf het begin met de Rime Non-Sectarische beweging.
Na een formele opleiding in Tibetaanse en Sanskriet talen, studeerde hij in 1980 af met een BA in Aziatische Talen en Literatuur en een BA in Vergelijkende Religie aan de Universiteit van Washington. Na twee jaar rondreizen langs de heilige plaatsen van Azië, onder meer in India en Nepal, werkte hij vijf jaar in de vluchtelingenopvang in Seattle, Washington. Omdat hij zich weer wilde verdiepen in boeddhistische studies, ging hij naar de Universiteit van Calgary, waar hij in 1988 zijn MA behaalde.
In 1990 ging Chris naar Sulawesi in Indonesië, waar hij drie jaar lang docent Engels was en onderzoek deed naar het oude Sri Vijaya-rijk. Terug in Amerika werkte hij als Research Associate voor de Shelly and Donald Rubin Foundation, waar hij een kleine rol speelde bij de vroege ontwikkeling van het Rubin Museum. Daarna doceerde hij vijf jaar lang als adjunct-professor aan de Universiteit van Calgary. Hij werd ook gedurende twaalf jaar Research Fellow aan het Centre de Recherches sur les Civilisations de l’Asie Orientale, Collège de France.
Vanaf 2012 begon hij vertalingen van Tibetaanse literatuur uit te brengen, te beginnen met de zeven delen van de Sakya Kongma Serie.
Vertaald door Christopher Wilkinson. Omslag Lobsang Jamyang
