CyzEpkRoot

Chapter 2

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Chapter 3

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Chapter 4

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Chapter 5

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Chapter 13

I prostrate to glorious Samantabhadra.

Primordial self-existence, wondrous, marvelous Dharma;
Self-arisen wisdom, luminous bodhicitta;
Treasury, source of the rising of all the phenomenal world;
The vessel as well as the essence, samsara as well as nirvana;
I prostrate to that motionless simplicity.

Peak of the yanas, Mount Meru; Space of the sun and moon;
Naturally radiant Space; Space of the vajra heart;
Natural state of Space existing as it is;
Without any effort; without any act of being established;
Listen while I explain the space of dharmadhatu,
Wondrous in its rising, eternal, and universal.

Spontaneous Spaciousness, this is the ground of arising of everything;
Empty in essence, yet unobstructed in its nature,
It is nothing whatever, and yet it arises as everything.
Since the dawn of both samsara and nirvana
Rises out of the Space of trikaya as itself,
They do not depart from the space of the dhatu, the realm of bliss.

Within the great space of Mind, the changeless state of the sky;
Is play without limit, Space of the miracles of compassion,
All ornaments of the dhatu; other than that there is nothing.
To emanate and to gather are powers of bodhicitta.
It is nothing whatever, because it arises as everything.
O the wonderful miracle! Wondrous, marvelous Dharma!

All forms of the outer and inner appearance of sentient beings;
Are ornaments of the space, that arise as the wheel of body.
Whatever sounds and speech are heard without exception,
Are ornaments of the space, that arise as the wheel of speech.
The flickering discharge of memory and understanding,
And also the state of non-thought transcending all reflection,
Are ornaments of the space, that arising as wheel of mind.

Inhabitants of the six lokas, having the four-fold manners of birth,
Do not move even an atom apart from dharmadhatu.
Appearances of the six sense-objects as grasper and grasped
Do not occur within the state of dharmadhatu.
There all appearance seems to be like an illusion.
Tenuous and ethereal, it is without support.
This is the state of eternal emptiness of the great vastness,
Self-luminous suchness, rising to ornament dharmadhatu.

Thus, this glorious splendor, this great spaciousness,
Exists as self-existing equanimity.
This is unmoving dharmakaya, bodhicitta;
Eternally just as it is, self-emptiness that is changeless.
So all that appears is the natural wisdom of dharmata,
Undiminishing space of bliss, without any action or effort.

As for its self-luminosity, which does not depart from it;
This is sambhogakaya, enjoying the perfect expression.
This, from the time it appears, is the self-existing nature.
Without fabrication or change, it is natural, total equality.

The manifestation of play as variety without mixing,
That is the wondrous, magical meaning of emanation.
It does not transcend the actionless state of Samantabhadra.

In bodhicitta itself, there is no dangerous precipice.
Effortlessness of trikaya, spontaneous perfection,
Does not depart from space, self-existing and uncompounded;
Kayas and wisdoms, self-perfected buddha activity,
Eternally perfect assembly, eternally risen great Space.

The self-existing eternal fields are without change.
In dharmadhatu, dharmata is what is seen.
Knowledge without obstruction rises to ornament space;
Not established by action, existing from all eternity;
Just like the space of the sun; wondrous, marvelous Dharma.

In this eternal spontaneous womb, the space of the dhatu,
Samsara is total goodness; nirvana is also good;
And yet within total goodness, the Space of Samantabhadra,
Samsara as well as nirvana never existed at all.
Appearance is total goodness; emptiness also is good;
And yet within total goodness, the Space of Samantabhadra,
Neither appearance nor emptiness ever existed at all.

Birth and death are good; sorrow and bliss are good;
And yet within total goodness, the Space of Samantabhadra,
There are no bliss and sorrow; there are no birth or death.
Oneself is total goodness; the other is also good.
Eternity and the void exist as total goodness;
And yet within total goodness, the Space of Samantabhadra,
There are no self and other, eternal existence or nothingness.

By fixating what is non-existent as existing,
Arises the state that is designated as confusion.
Its nature is like a dream that is without support.
That someone should be attached to samsara and nirvana
As independent realities is something very strange!

Samantabhadra is everything; He is the great self-existence.
He was not and is not confused, and never will be so.
Samsara is only a name, for what in reality
Goes beyond the extremes of existence or non-existence.
Whoever was not confused about things at an earlier time,
Will now be unstained by confusion and will not become confused.
The intention of this is that the three worlds are alpha-pure.

With no confusion or any dharmas of non-confusion,
There is natural, self-existing, eternal great insight.
It never was or is or will be liberated.
Nirvana is only a name. No one is liberated;
Nor will they be, already unbound for eternity;
Completely pure like the sky, unlimited and impartial.
The intention of this is the total freedom of alpha-purity.

In brief, from the vast and self-existing womb of space,
Whatever rises is the skillful play of energy
That is samsara and nirvana equally.
Nevertheless, from the moment of their mere arising,
Samsara as well as nirvana never existed at all.
As from the power of sleep whatever dreams arise
Have no reality, but are just one's own insight,
Which naturally exists on the level of mahasukha,
These are great vastness, self-existing equanimity,
The total all-encompassing equality.

The nature of space, primordial in its self-existence,
Having no inside or outside, pervades and encompasses all.
It is unlimited by any kind of extremes,
Unbounded above and below, as well in all directions.
Without the duality of vastness and constraint,
The purity of insight is like that of space;
Space that is free from complexities of conceptual thought.

From birthless space arise the miracles of birth.
With nothing that is real, there also are no limits.
This describes the signless, which has no marks of things.
Filling the directions, with nature like the sky,
It is unborn self-existence, free from before and after.
In it there is no beginning and no end.

The essence of everything, samsara as well as nirvana,
Bodhicitta is self-existing and has no birth.
It has no rising or birth, and is not something fixed.
Coming from nowhere, it has no place where it can go.
Unbounded by past and future, bodhicitta-Space,
Without any coming and going pervades and encompasses all.

Beginningless, endless, and centerless suchness of dharmata;
All-pervading and all-encompassing nature of purity;
It is just as limitless as the space of the sky.
Without a beginning or end, beyond both past and future;
Unborn and unceasing, with no solidified characteristics;
Not coming and going, with no distinction of this and that;
It is unestablished and effortless, empty of dharmas of action;
Without directions, parts, or center; ground of suchness;
Without any concept or discontinuity, equal space.

Since everything is the equal nature of dharmata,
Not even one thing exists outside of the Space of equality.
Equal as one and equal as all, since bodhicitta
Is unborn in its vastness, limitless as space,
Therefore the state of equality has no discontinuity.
This is the Space of eternity. This is the fortress of vastness.
Boundless and birthless totality, fortress of dharmakaya,
Unchanging self-existence, precious, secret fortress,
Samsara as well as nirvana, all the phenomenal world,
The primordial fortress is perfect, being all in one.

Within the boundless, all-pervading, encompassing ground,
Without any bias toward samsara or nirvana,
Is the fortified castle which is the seat of bodhicitta.
The vastness of Space of dharmata is a lofty peak.
Unmade nature, vast circle of the four directions;
Without any stages or effort this vastest of gates is entered.

Ornamented by this self-existing rich display
Natural wisdom, the King, is seated on his throne.
Wisdom's energies gather and emanate appearance,
So that all objects are empowered as ministers.
Self-existing samadhi is the holy Queen;
And self-rising realization the Prince with his attendants;
Contained in the Space of great bliss, as non-thought and its self-luminosity.

This motionless state, transcending all expression or thought,
Rules over the vessel and essence of all the phenomenal world.
This is the realm of dharmadhatu, vast and wide.

When one dwells in this realm, then all is dharmakaya.
Not going beyond the unity of natural wisdom,
It was never created. It was always complete.

It is the transcendence of effort and establishment.
As if in a droplet of bindu without any angles or corners,
One is contained within the realm of unfigured Space.

The six kinds of beings, as well as all the buddha fields,
Are otherless dharmata, the state of the sky itself.
The single taste of self-luminous, insight-bodhicitta
Encompasses and perfects samsara as well as nirvana.

Within this dharmadhatu treasury, the source of all,
Nirvana has existed from all eternity.
As it is self-existing, it does not need to be sought;
So changeless, objectless dharmakaya is universal.
The vessel and essence, all outer and inner appearance,
Exist as the perfect enjoyment of sambhogakaya.
Nirmanakaya, like a reflection, is self-arising.
Trikaya, the ornament, does not have imperfect dharmas;
So all is the play of the Buddha's body, speech, and mind.
Though all the Sugata's buddha fields cannot be counted,
The Space of trikaya, from which they rise, is mind itself.

The nature of samsara, the city of the six lokas,
Rises from dharmadhatu like a mere reflection.
Apparent variety—joy and sorrow, birth and death—
Is like a magic show within the space of mind itself.
The groundless appearance of existence and non-existence
Rises from temporary conditions, like clouds in the sky.
It is not existent; nor is it non-existent.
And because its nature goes beyond extremes,
By bindu, simplicity, it is encompassed and perfected.

Mind itself, which is the nature of bodhicitta,
Is pure like the sky with no joy and sorrow, birth or death.
Free from the dharmas of samsara and nirvana,
It has no bias toward the solidity of things.
As this is the markless, Space of the sky, supremely vast,
It is motionless, changeless, uncompounded self-existence.
Enlightened as the vajra essence, luminosity,
Everything is the self-arising field of bliss.
This self-existing equality is the supreme enlightenment.

All is completely included, included in bodhicitta.
Since apart from bodhicitta there are no dharmas,
All of the dharmas are of the nature of bodhicitta.

The example of bodhicitta is being like the sky.
Mind has no causes, having no objects that are born.
"Space of the sky" is nothing but a symbolic example
For expressionless, non-existence, transcending the objects of thought.
If even the symbol is something that is unknowable,
How could the meaning exemplified ever be thought or expressed?
It should be known to exemplify purity of the nature.

That which is the meaning of this is our own insight.
It is bodhicitta, as limitless as the sky.
Not an object of thought, beyond expression or symbol,
It is motionless self-luminosity, vast and radiant Space.
Not having been created, it is self-existent.
Vast circle of enlightened essence, dharmakaya,
It has no vastness or constraint, no high or low.

The reason is, for all that rises from its power,
When it arises, nothing rises anywhere.
Rising is only a name, when analyzed like the sky,
There is only the all-inclusive state of perfection,
The great equality without partial limitations,
All-pervading and all-encompassing Space itself,
Without any fixated objects, without any grasping subject.

Self-rising wisdom, dharmata, is free from borders.
It is taught by example; joining example, meaning, and reason.
In equal space the subject of this great threefold ennailment,
All is included, without separation or clearing away.
In this, the great vastness, the all pervading womb of space,
Everything is the state of equality for eternity.
It has no before and after, nor any good and evil.
This is the vision of Samantabhadra and Vajrasattva.

Bodhicitta is like the heart-essence of the sun,
A luminous state, which is eternally uncompounded;
Without obscuration of dharmas; self-existing transparency;
Without complication by dharmas; non-thought of dharmata.

Because it is empty, therefore it is dharmakaya.
Because it is luminous, therefore it is sambhogakaya.
Because it radiates, therefore it is nirmanakaya.
This is trikaya that is not gathered or separated.

As its qualities are eternally self-existing,
It has no obscuration by the darkness of faults and evils.
It is without the transition and changes of the three times.
Being without any past and future, it is one.
It is one, pervading all buddhas and sentient beings.
This is known as naturally rising bodhicitta.

Its manifested power is whatever rises;
Both realization and the lack of realization.
This is the vessel and essence of the phenomenal world,
And whatever appearances there may be of sentient beings.

Though all of these rise as the nature that is unobstructed;
Like the water of a mirage, an echo, or a dream,
An emanation, reflection, or a castle of the gandharvas;
As with distorted vision, what seems to be there is not.
It is mere temporary appearance, without any ground or support.
Realize such interludes to be actually dharmakaya.

Everything here is within the state of bodhicitta.
In the unmade ultimate one is perfect, and all is perfect.
That self-perfected nature is self-arising wisdom.

Bodhicitta is what appears and what does not.
It has no dharmas of samsara or nirvana,
Nor does it have the dharmas of external and internal;
Yet from its power, by its nature of movement,
All the variety that exists in the world of phenomena,
Samsara as well as nirvana, rises up as play.

From the time of their mere arising, they are form that is empty of nature.
From the unborn come all the things that appear to be born.
From the very time of appearing, they were not born at all.
From the unceasing come all the things that appear to cease.
Yet they are only ceaseless, illusory, empty form.
From the time their duration begins, no dharmas are there to endure.
What endures is groundless; there is nothing to come or go.
Since what so appears is not the thing it seems to be,
Natureless, it is nothing more than a designation.

Though from its power appearances rise spontaneously,
Dependent arising is said to be merely symbolic in nature.
From the very time of apparent arising from its power
There is no separation of aspects that rise and do not arise.
Since the power too is merely symbolic, without any essence,
Eternally all is the state without transition or change.
Not even an atom has any motion from bodhicitta.

The Nature of Bodhicitta

The nature of bodhicitta is all-inclusive totality.
It does not appear, transcending the dharmas of appearance.
It is not empty, transcending the dharmas of emptiness.
Not existent, it does not have the marks of things;
Yet not nonexistent, pervading samsara and nirvana,
The self-existing equality of primordial space,
Is neither something existent nor is it nonexistent.
It has no parts or borders, ground or root, or solidity.

Having no gaps, this is the Space of enlightened insight.
Changeless, this is eternal, encompassing space of the dhatu.
Self-arising wisdom is matchless without example;
Unborn, unceasing, gathered into one drop of bindu;
Indefinite, all-pervading, totally boundless and limitless.

Self-existing equanimity is the stuff
Of the motionless essence which is the vajra heart.
This supreme and universal state of space,
Into which nothing is gathered, and from which nothing departs,
Is not within the scope of what words can characterize.
The Space of prajna comes forth within one's own experience.
The yogin who has no complexities of expression or thought
Is sure that marks and the lack of marks do not exist.
Since meditation and its object are not found,
There is no need of struggle to slay one's enemies,
Discursiveness, drowsiness, and the thoughts of conceptualization.

Dharmata, the eternal coronation vase,
Has no thought of itself and none of anything else.
The three worlds are therefore nothing else but this itself,
They are the field of equal nature with this itself.

The pure self-experience of the three times' victorious ones
Does not accept or reject, for all is a single totality.
Not even an atom of this has been obtained from another.
All dharmas are clearly great Space, the nature of the mind.
Without the least movement from the ultimate state of equality.

With nothing inside and also nothing that is external,
Its clarity unclouded by any rising or setting,
When the dark extremes are dispelled, the root is bodhicitta.
Without abandoning, one cuts through the power of straying.

The world, the appearance of things to various sentient beings,
And the kayas and wisdoms of pure enlightened ones,
That rise from the powers of realization and its lack,
As unobstructed play, are all the space of the dhatu.
All there is within the state of dharmadhatu
Is realization and the lack of realization.
Realization is the sugatas' sacred outlook.
With lack of realization, various things appear
From the vasanas of ignorant grasping and fixation.
Nevertheless, they do not go beyond the dhatu.

The actual ground of everything is bodhicitta.
Its mark that whatever rises in unobstructed variety
Is the clear self-apprehension of luminous dharmata,
Illuminating the purity of the space of the dhatu.
Nothing needs to be separated or cleared away.
Therefore, the style of insight is footloose and fancy-free.

The vast and natural Space of the wisdom of transparency,
Having no inside and outside, is unobscured luminosity.
The great light of one's own insight, this is the mirror of mind.
It is dharmadhatu, the precious wish-fulfilling gem.
These are all self-arising, not needing to be sought.
Wisdom arises in natural splendor as all one desires.

However great the extent of these, the buddha qualities,
They are the ceaseless arising of the supreme upaya.
They are the non-obstruction of space arising from space.
Since all is the self-perfection of that unborn space,
Things are overwhelmed by the emptiness of enlightenment,
And emptiness by the enlightened Space of one's own insight.

In bodhicitta appearance and emptiness never existed.
Here unthinkable miracles rise, unattached and non-dual.
The three times are timelessness, as unborn dharmadhatu.
They are unchanging, unaltered, uncompounded Space.
As for all the buddhas dwelling throughout the three times,
Their insight is nothing but that selfsame space of wisdom.
In one's own insight, which is the Space of enlightened Mind,
Fixation and grasping are overwhelmed by brilliant light.
Nothing is within it and nothing is external.
This is the self-existing vastness of dharmata.

Transcending Action, Effort, Cause, and Effect

In the nature of mind, which is the essence of bodhicitta;
There is no view, no meditation, nor any action;
No fruition established, no traversing the paths and the bhumis;
No developing stage with its visualization of mandalas;
No recitation of mantra, and also no stage of perfecting;
Empowerment is not bestowed, nor is samaya guarded.
Pure dharmata, eternal in its self-existence,
Is beyond the struggle of temporary stages
Having to do with the dharmas of cause and its fruition.

All of these are of the essence of bodhicitta.
The sun itself is not obscured by clouds and darkness.
It is not made into a temporary thing,
But by its very nature it always shines in space.

Ten dharmas of effort and establishing have been taught.
These are taught for those with a viewpoint that is confused,
Concerned with the incidental arisings from the power.
They are means for the gradual entering of those
Whose powers are only those involved with stages and effort.
But ati is the meaning of the vajra heart.
To those so joined to the natural state, those are not taught.

As individuals enter by stages involving effort,
Guided into dharmata, primordial space,
The shravaka, pratyekabuddha, and bodhisattva yanas
Are known as the three lesser stages of the teachings.
In the middle trio of kriya, upa, and yoga,
The nature is established by its having descended.

The trio of maha, anu, and ati yoga,
The three stages that are great, appear primordially.
By the opening of the dharma-gates of the causal yanas,
Fortunate beings are conducted into these three enlightenments.

Since all of these yanas finally have to enter in
At the gate of this ultimate meaning which is the vajra heart,
Into this great and wondrously arisen secret;
It is the peak of them all; changeless, supreme, luminosity;
Known as the vehicle manifesting the heart of enlightenment.

Dharmas with dual accepting, rejecting, act and effort,
Are taught so that we might abandon vasanas of mind and its contents,
Even though they arise as the nature's power of play.
Thus, they would like to "purify" wisdom from the mind.

The greater dharma that does not have any action and effort,
Neither accepting or rejecting anything,
Is the essence, self-rising wisdom, bodhicitta.
It does not go beyond the straightforwardness of that essence.
Fully complete, it need not strive for anything else.
Self-established, it seeks for nothing from another.

This is the essence of the sun. This is the meaning.
Luminous, Self-established, maintained to rest without moving.
The others have taught the clearing away of clouds and darkness
As something that is to be accomplished by means of effort.
This is like trying to re-create the eternal sun.
The distinction between the two is like that between heaven and earth.

Nowadays the pompous elephants of ati
Allege that the proliferating multitude
Of discursive, flickering thoughts is really bodhicitta.
All these deluded ones are in the Space of darkness.
They are far from the nature of the great perfection.
They do not even know the power of manifestation
And the manifestation that rises from that power,
What need is there to speak of the essence, bodhicitta?

This is primordial purity of bodhicitta,
The space of the absolute, the truth of dharmata,
Prajnaparamita transcending speech and thought,
Its state unmoving, its nature the field of luminosity.
Eternally free from the flickering discharge of complexity,
That which is called its essence is like the heart of the sun.
By its power of manifestation there is unobstructed arising
Of transparent insight free from analysis and examining,
Vividly luminous, yet without fixation or grasper.

The insight that arises from the power of manifestation
Is the insight of understanding, which is called the mind of complexity.
It produces fixation and grasping, along with their various seeds.
That which is objectless then is fixated as the five objects,
That which is egoless ego grasps as the five-fold kleshas.
No matter what confused appearances there may be,
Of an outer vessel and inner essence of the world,
Though they appear as samsara, still they rise from the power.
They are appearances wrongly grasped by non-realization.

Not coming from anywhere, not going or abiding anywhere,
The realization of the great space of dharmata
Is the vision of the three worlds as perfectly liberated.
The teaching of ati, the self-existing vajra heart,
Arises as the Space of great vastness, Samantabhadra.

In the essence of bodhicitta, which is completely pure,
There are no objects or dharmas about which to have a view.
There is not so much as an atom of a viewer,
Nor is there anything there that might be something viewed.
No mind to meditate nor any dharmas for meditation.
Actor and action are non-dual and self-existent,
Without so much as an atom of fruition to be established.

For a non-existent dharma, there is no progress of bhumis;
So the path by which these are reached is eternally non-existent.
The luminosity of the great bindu already exists;
So there are no discursive emanating and gathering,
As in the visualized mandalas of the development stage;
No mantras or recitations; no samayas or abhishekas;
No concept of gradual union, no subsequent stage of perfecting.
In kaya and wisdom, which have existed from all eternity,
There are no such things as causes and fruitions
Arising from the conjunction of incidental conditions.
There is no self-arising wisdom where these exist.
As what is composite, because of that, will be destroyed,
It is characterized as self-existing and uncompounded.

Therefore, the essence of the absolute space of the dhatu
Transcending cause and effect, not having the ten natures,
Is the nature of mind, without any effort or being established.
This is the ultimate meaning of the natural state.
All the complexities of existence and non-existence,
Should be known to be pacified into emptiness.