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Universal love and compassion are the very foundation
of every bodhisattva's spirituality yet nowhere are they more
evident than in Chenrezig. In many ways, he is the archetypal
expression of compassion, which is the sine qua non for
attaining enlightenment. He occurs throughout mahayana
Buddhism, either as a specific being or, more commonly, as an
archetypal bodhisattva who is the quintessential expression of
every Buddha's love.
The legend of Chenrezig as a specific
being
Whether it be plain fact or apocryphal legend,
the story of Chenrezig as a specific being is also the tale of
compassion as it develops in the mind. Compassion is first
born through a sincere wish for enlightenment and a vision of
life's meaning which puts others first. The initially heroic
approach towards helping others mellows and deepens as the
infinite vastness of the task unfolds and the underlying
nature of samsara becomes clear. One also comes to recognise
the diabolical skill of ignorance in eluding the truth and
thwarting attempts at its destruction. This forces one to
learn how to tackle it from many angles simultaneously. After
long experience of the battle between good and evil, one finds
a need to draw closer to the real heart of the problem and to
befriend and understand it rather than attacking it. For this,
one must learn how to mobilise both the masculine and feminine
aspects of mind's innate loving compassion, and be both
dynamic yet responsive in one's dealings with the myriad
manifestations of mind. These steps are all reflected in the
traditional story:
"Countless ages ago, a thousand
young men vowed to become Buddhas, each offering up a
different resolution. One resolved to become Gautama Buddha,
in what was a far distant time in the future and which has now
become our era. Another, Chenrezig, resolved not to become
enlightened until all the others had succeeded, promising to
assist them all in their task and to be the servant of any
being wishing to attain enlightenment, anywhere in the
universe. He would both teach them and put questions on their
behalf to the Buddhas, as humans often find it difficult to
formulate their enquiries clearly.
Feeling great compassion for all beings, he made many
journeys into their various domains of existence, from the
highest realms of the gods to the most pitiful hells. The more
he saw of the confusion and suffering that predominated
everywhere, the more he longed to be of help. He prayed to the
Buddhas, May I help all beings. Should I ever tire of this
great work, may my body be shattered into a thousand pieces.
Subsequently he visited the worst hell (avici hell) and
liberated as many beings as were receptive to his teachings.
Progressively he worked his way up through the worlds until he
reached the deva realms. Surveying the universe, he saw that
although he had released thousands from the sufferings of the
three lower realms - animals, spirits and hell-beings -
thousands more new entrants were pouring in to take their
place. Distressed by this and despondent, his resolve waned
and he flew into a thousand pieces, like the seeds of a
pomegranate. He cried out to all the Buddhas who, like a fall
of snowflakes, came to his rescue and made him whole again
through their beneficent influence. Thereafter, he had a
thousand arms and nine heads, to which Amitabha Buddha added a
special head along with the blessing of his higher wisdom.
Then Bodhisattva Vajrapani added a wrathful head symbolising
the special powers of all the Buddhas. This is why Chenrezig
is sometimes depicted with a thousand arms and eleven heads.
In his new form, Chenrezig became even more powerful
than before but he was still moved to tears by the manifold
sufferings of samsara. Again he took a solemn vow before all
the Buddhas, May I not attain enlightenment until every last
being has been liberated. At one time, his tears of compassion
fell to the ground and caused two lotuses to spring up. From
each of these emerged a form of the female Bodhisattva Tara,
one white and the other green. Tara (dölma in Tibetan) means
the Saviouress, the One Who Carries Across the Ocean of
Samsara. The two Taras pledged to be Chenrezig's sisters in
dharma and to help him bring beings to
enlightenment."
The mahayana scriptures also recount that Chenrezig
offered his mantra Om mani padme hung to the Buddha, who
advised him to use it a a very special means for liberating
beings. The Enlightened One blessed the mantra, pronouncing
that it embodied the compassion of all the Buddhas combined.
At that time the gods rained flowers on the worlds, the earth
quaked with soft rumblings and the air was filled with the
sound of celestial beings chanting the mantra.
Chenrezig - the guiding light of
Tibet
It is not unusual for one buddha, or even bodhisattva,
to be placed centre stage by a particular sect, as is the
case, for instance, with Buddha Amitabha in the teachings of
the Japanese Pure Land school. But the fact that a whole
nation - possessing the greatest diversity of Buddhism found
anywhere on Earth - considers itself to be guided and
protected by Chenrezig is a tribute to him indeed.
The
early kings who brought Buddhism to Tibet are believed by
Tibetans to have been emanations of Chenrezig and Mańjushri.
Since then, some of the greatest reincarnate lamas, such as
the seventeen generations of Karmapas and, more latterly, the
fourteen Dalai Lamas, are also considered to be his
emanations. More strikingly, almost every Buddhist in Tibet
recited Chenrezig's mantra om mani padme hung on a daily
basis, to such an large extent that a popular saying recounts
that Tibetan children pick up the mani mantra before learning
to say mama or papa.
Chenrezig the cosmic bodhisattva
Mahayana Buddhism offers a wealth of techniques for
transmuting the negative into the positive. At the heart of
them all is compassion. Chenrezig the bodhisattva is the
symbolic expression of all these forms of compassion in
action. As the Discourse on Chenrezig's Realisation
says:
Were one thing and one thing alone to represent every
enlightened quality, as though it were in the palm of one's
hand, what would it be? Great compassion.
The light of compassion shines wisely and with
timeliness. It illuminates things appropriate to a particular
disciple. It shows the family person how to bring peace,
wisdom and harmony into the household. It shows the solitary
meditator how to relate lovingly yet firmly to the
complexities of his or her own mind. It shows the ruler how to
govern and the afflicted how to cope with their suffering.
Some of the techniques of compassion are superficial and
remedial. Others are extremely profound and radical. Of the
more profound techniques, Chenrezig is particularly associated
with the use of the power of sound as a gateway to
liberation.
The Suramgama Sutra tells how, in ages long gone by,
the bodhisattva followed a certain Buddha Avalokitesvara, from
whom he took his name, who instructed him to focus his
meditation on the faculty of hearing. By analysing what at
first seemed to be two things - external sound and the inner
faculty of hearing - the bodhisattva soon recognised their
inseparability; their non-duality. Neither could be found to
have existence on its own and hence each was devoid of
existence. By then pursuing this voidness, with direct
awareness rather than intellectual analysis, the bodhisattva
understood the whole question of consciousness and attained
successive degrees of enlightenment, thereby acquiring
extraordinary powers to help others. We find these powers,
which are embodied in his mantra om mani padme hung, also
mentioned in the Lotus Sutra. They enable him to manifest to
anyone, in forms having direct relevance to their needs. He
appears as the Buddha to teach bodhisattvas, as a disciplined
monk to those seeking the Four Noble Truths, as a mighty
dharma warrior to those wishing to protect the weak, as a wise
civil elder to those wanting to learn government, as a nun to
women weary of their worldly lot, as a powerful Brahmin to
those wishing to master natural energies and so on and so
forth.
Praying to Chenrezig, reciting the mani mantra and
practising profound meditation on the nature of sound is
believed to save people in dire situations, such as
shipwrecks, fires and armed attacks. Some hold that reciting a
million such mantras can enable the blind to see. Sometimes
such claims are meant to be taken at face value but fuller
explanations show them to be more reasonable, since they work
over a period of lives. The general theme of such explanations
is that misfortunes are caused by bad karma and that such
karma is more often than not habitual, and therefore likely to
produce the same misfortune in future lives. Meditation on
Chenrezig and his mantra not only radically ruptures these
negative habits but also opens the inner floodgates of
compassion, spontaneously giving rise to their opposites,
replacing aggression with love and tolerance and so
forth.
Chenrezig takes on many forms in the tantras, having
one, three, five, seven, nine, eleven and so on up to 84,000
faces, with two, four, six, eight, ten twelve and so on up to
84,000 arms. Some of his forms are gentle, kind and merciful.
Others show the wrathful face of compassion. The extraordinary
quality of the most common form - that with one face and four
arms - is to be the only tantric practice which bears no
element of risk and which can be practised by anyone and
everyone. In general, mahayana Buddhists believe the grace of
Chenrezig to be so powerful that even one sincere recitation
of his mantra or one open-hearted look at his kind face is
enough to sow a seed of future illumination in the mind.
Also widely practised is the eleven faced,
one-thousand-armed form associated with the two-day uposita
fasting ritual, known as nyungné by Tibetans. Involving an
austere first day and total abstention from food or drink
during the second day, this ritual is one of continuous
prayer, humility and generation of compassion. It is aimed at
helping wretched ghosts and spirits and, in the process,
eliminating some of the participants' bad karma, caused
through greed and avarice. More wrathful than this form is the
red standing form of Chenrezig known as 'He who shakes the
very foundations of existence'. |
