What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

General discussion, particularly exploring the Dharma in the modern world.
Malcolm
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by Malcolm »

tamdrin wrote:Yes I agree, one will find more satisfaction meditating in the mountains than wandering the cities- mind full of the 3 poisons...

The problem is not objects, said Naropa, the problem is the attachment. If you spike the root of attachment, the leaves of the three poisons wither on their own.
tamdrin
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by tamdrin »

Theoretically,
However I don't agree with the view that renunciation is not necessary especially for beginners. I think it is.
Malcolm
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by Malcolm »

tamdrin wrote:Theoretically,
However I don't agree with the view that renunciation is not necessary especially for beginners. I think it is.

It very much depends on who the beginner is, and who their teacher is, and what tradition they choose to follow.

Not everyone needs to follow sūtra style renunciation.
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conebeckham
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by conebeckham »

Namdrol wrote:
tamdrin wrote:Theoretically,
However I don't agree with the view that renunciation is not necessary especially for beginners. I think it is.

It very much depends on who the beginner is, and who their teacher is, and what tradition they choose to follow.

Not everyone needs to follow sūtra style renunciation.

Very much agree--with the proviso that far fewer people can take sexual activity, alcohol intoxication, and such on the path immediately without training in renunciation and all the other trainings that are known to be "preliminary" to "entering the action," "Karmamudra," etc., than those who need to work with "sutra style renunciation" prior to such practices.

Then again, maybe you've met more mature Dharma practitioners than I...... :shrug:
དམ་པའི་དོན་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ཆེ་བ་དང་།
རྟོག་གེའི་ཡུལ་མིན་བླ་མའི་བྱིན་རླབས་དང་།
སྐལ་ལྡན་ལས་འཕྲོ་ཅན་གྱིས་རྟོགས་པ་སྟེ།
དེ་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ལ་ནི་ལོ་རྟོག་སེལ།།


"Absolute Truth is not an object of analytical discourse or great discriminating wisdom,
It is realized through the blessing grace of the Guru and fortunate Karmic potential.
Like this, mistaken ideas of discriminating wisdom are clarified."
- (Kyabje Bokar Rinpoche, from his summary of "The Ocean of Definitive Meaning")
tamdrin
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by tamdrin »

Hey Cone,
Yeah many westerners are deluded about where they actually are on the path, I believe, or what it really takes to get there so to speak..

http://www.nypost.com/pagesixmag/issues ... hael+Roach" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Malcolm
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by Malcolm »

conebeckham wrote:
Very much agree--with the proviso that far fewer people can take sexual activity, alcohol intoxication, and such on the path immediately without training in renunciation and all the other trainings that are known to be "preliminary" to "entering the action," "Karmamudra," etc., than those who need to work with "sutra style renunciation" prior to such practices.

Then again, maybe you've met more mature Dharma practitioners than I...... :shrug:
Different strokes for different folks.
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ronnewmexico
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by ronnewmexico »

A very minor point to add to a excellent conversation with excellent comments all...

If such a person adept at such things as these, imbibeing in alcohol they would not become intoxicated(and without ingestion of any herb to make that happen). They may imbibe but it would not have that result.
Sex..... such I have heard described.... one may expect to attain spiritual result from engageing in such as spiritual path if one has the attained level to make piss and crap eaten and drunk as equal to the finest ambrosia. Not that they change to such but that their imbibeing of becomes equal to the that (in the person who has attained a understanding).

So I would firstly try that.... then the other. If successful with that, then the other. Not makeing oneself do it but actually finding such with concentration equal in perception. If not possible.... I could certainly engage that thing but be not espectant of any but the most mundane result.

A minor point and feel free to disregard. I agree few talking about such things seem to have those capacities.
A exceptional person may but that is very very rare without extensive training. Extensive training and I'd suppose it is still rare.
No training whatsoever....about unheard of. Never say never but almost never.

That is direct spiritual useage of alcohol or sex. Not simply both without harm effect production. Sure many can do the latter. Monks I'd say should not.
If I was a monk I would not do the second maybe the first but only under very strict specific controlled spiritual guidance. That may require renunciation of vows of being a monk at least Tibetan I would surmise but am no expert by any means on monkly things.
"This order considers that progress can be achieved more rapidly during a single month of self-transformation through terrifying conditions in rough terrain and in "the abode of harmful forces" than through meditating for a period of three years in towns and monasteries"....Takpo Tashi Namgyal.
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fragrant herbs
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by fragrant herbs »

Namdrol wrote:
Urgyen Chodron wrote: The person who wrote the book above has no insight in Vajrayāna. He is coming from the Zen tradition. This is fine, but there it is not appropriate to apply his point of view to Vajrayāna.

N
The persons who wrote the book were students of the Dalai Lama and published his texts and then began reading them. Did they misinterpret them? Another person who followed the Dalai Lama, said, yes, they are sexual. But I don't believe now that all teachers follow the same form of practice that is engaged in by some lineages.

I also do not believe that you have to practice the sex in order to become enlightened as some have said here.
Malcolm
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by Malcolm »

Urgyen Chodron wrote:
Namdrol wrote:
Urgyen Chodron wrote: The person who wrote the book above has no insight in Vajrayāna. He is coming from the Zen tradition. This is fine, but there it is not appropriate to apply his point of view to Vajrayāna.

N
The persons who wrote the book were students of the Dalai Lama and published his texts and then began reading them. Did they misinterpret them? Another person who followed the Dalai Lama, said, yes, they are sexual. But I don't believe now that all teachers follow the same form of practice that is engaged in by some lineages.

I also do not believe that you have to practice the sex in order to become enlightened as some have said here.
There are many people who are students of the Dalai Lama who are not Vajrayāna practitioners. That person is a Zen practitioner.

What tamdrin was saying is that there is a Vajrayāna tradition i.e. that our Buddha, in a past life, took a goddess named Tilottama has his partner and achieved awakening together with her through advanced completion stage practices.

You have to understand the theory. The theory is basically that ordinary, sūtrayāna meditation does not still the wind in the body sufficiently so that one can experience the most subtle level of mind which is necessary to recognize emptiness at the most subtle level. One way of accessing a more subtle mind is through the experience of bliss with a partner. The point is not the bliss itself, the point is to go beyond the bliss in a very direct, visceral way, using bliss to go beyond bliss into the union of great bliss and emptiness. This is what deities in yabyum mean i.e. using sensation of bliss to realize emptiness.

When ever you take a major anuttara yogatantra empowerment, you are symbolically introduced to this practice in the higher three empowerments. Also this kind of empowerment is very much connected with the stages of gestation of human beings and that dependent origination. So it is really not about sex per se. Even the use of sexuality in these practices has more to do with reversing dependent origination of one's conception, gestation in the womb, and so on, than anything else.

Whether or not one uses a partner depends a) whether there is a qualified partner (you cannot have just any partner) b) whether one is a lay person or not (this is an area of controversy where some, for example in the Gelug school, claim is it ok for a monk to have a partner solely for this kind of practice, there are differing opinions about this) c) and you ideally should be between 16 and 26 years old for this kind of practice anyway. I have heard it said by Lamas -- when we are this age, no one will teach us this sort of practice and by the time we learn, we are too old to practice it.

There is also another path in Vajrayana, very wide-spread in the Sakya and Gelug school, in the Vajrayogini tradition i.e. the path for those "who do not enjoy desire", equally effective for realizing mahāmudra based solely on meditation and pranāyama (breathing) exercises.

Then there is Kagyu style mahāmudra -- no need for consort practice in general, though it is present in the six yogas of Naropa.

Then there is Dzogchen. In Mahāmudra and Dzogchen use of partners is not considered essential on any level. It is mainly in Sakya and Gelug that use of partners is considered essential. Tsongkhapa himself wrote that without using a partner, complete liberation was impossible.

The great Nyingmapa master, Longchenpa, on the other hand, wrote that such practices were for people who had a lot of lust who needed something to until they got over it and that that such practices where just a diversion in reality -- not invalid, just a diversion and a possible distraction to the direct path of Dzogchen.

N
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fragrant herbs
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by fragrant herbs »

Tsongkhapa himself wrote that without using a partner, complete liberation was impossible.
That of course is his opinion. I believe that pranayama without the consort works as you seem to have also stated.

Here is the line on the writers of the shadow book:
Victor and Victoria Trimondi are pen names used by Mariana and Herbert Röttgen. Their book was published to wide acclaim in Germany in 1999 by the respected Patmos Group. The Shadow of the Dalai Lama hasn’t been published in English, but a translation can be found at the author’s website, trimondi.de. This scholarly work is highly critical of the Dalai Lama and the religious system he presides over.

The authors were themselves once followers of the Dalai Lama. Herbert Röttgen was a personal friend of the Dalai Lama, he published a number of the Dalai Lama’s books, and he organized several symposia and major events for him. When the authors sat down to research Tibetan Buddhism, they expected to find a world consistent with the Dalai Lama’s expressed philosophies of pacifism and compassion. What they found was the exact opposite.
http://inpursuitofhappiness.wordpress.c ... you-think/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

What interests me is that often on these boards it is denied that this book has any validity, and yet in this thread it is obvious to me that it does.
Malcolm
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by Malcolm »

Urgyen Chodron wrote:
What interests me is that often on these boards it is denied that this book has any validity, and yet in this thread it is obvious to me that it does.

The problem with the Trimondi book is that it is a vilification of HHDL and Tibetan Buddhism in general. They take bits of facts out of context and then distort them with lies.

it is not a serious work.
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fragrant herbs
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by fragrant herbs »

Maybe; maybe not. But a person can get a few of the books it references and check them out:

Here are some disturbing parts of the book:
The “modern” tantric already mentioned, Lama Gedün Chöpel, explicitly warns that children can become injured during the sexual act: “Forcingly doing it with a young girl produces severe pains and wounds her genitalia. ... If it is not the time and if copulating would be dangerous for her, churn about between her thighs, and it [the female seed] will come out” (Chöpel, 1992, p. 135). In addition he recommends feeding a twelve-year-old honey and sweets before ritual sexual intercourse (Chöpel, 1992, p. 177).

Chöpel, Gedün, Tibetan Arts of Love, Ithaca 1992.

Gedum Chopal was a genius monk, artist, historian, seer and womanizer. Educated as a monk in Tibet in the 1930s he once disguised himself as as a type of monk Hell's Angel and challenged the abbot of a pwerful monastery to debate -- and defeated him soundly. Able to draw a perfect circle dead drunk he was reknowned as an inconclast predicting that Tibet would be lost to the Chinese unless something was done right away he also conducted the first scientific research on Tibet's ancient borders proving that Tibet was never truly a vassalof China his outspoken icon busting got the best of him as was arrested and spent the rest of his life in prison.

Naropa refers to the fact that a tantric partner, in contrast to a normal woman, assists the guru in blocking his ejaculation during the sexual act, and as it were “seals” this, which is of major importance for the performance of the ritual. For this reason she is known as mudra, ‘seal’ (Naropa, 1994, p. 81). But the actual meaning probably lies in the following: in Vajrayana the feminine itself is “sealed”, that is, spellbound via a magic act, so that it is available to the tantric master in its entirety.

On a numerological basis twelve- or sixteen-year-old girls are preferred. Only when none can be found does Tsongkhapa recommend the use of a twenty-year-old. There is also a table of correspondences between the various ages and the elements and senses: an 11-year-old represents the air, a 12-year-old fire, a 13-year-old water, a 14-year-old earth, a15-year-old sound, a 16-year-old the sense of touch, a 17-year-old taste, an 18-year-old shape or form, and a 20-year-old the sense of smell (Naropa, 1994, p. 189).

http://www.trimondi.de/SDLE/Part-1-03.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

“Sexual abuse” of Western women by Tibetan lamas has meanwhile become something of a constant topic in the Buddhist scene and has also triggered heated discussion on the Internet. “Sexual abuse” of Western women by Tibetan lamas has meanwhile become something of a constant topic in the Buddhist scene and has also triggered heated discussion on the Internet.
One thing I noticed when in different groups, is that if a woman complains of being sexually abused she is accused of lying, just as June Campbell was after writing her book, Travellers in Space. Any type of complaints end up with the person being called a liar and then the guru said that she was emotionally disturbed--always. I rather grew tired of all of this.
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conebeckham
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by conebeckham »

Naropa refers to the fact that a tantric partner, in contrast to a normal woman, assists the guru in blocking his ejaculation during the sexual act, and as it were “seals” this, which is of major importance for the performance of the ritual. For this reason she is known as mudra, ‘seal’ (Naropa, 1994, p. 81). But the actual meaning probably lies in the following: in Vajrayana the feminine itself is “sealed”, that is, spellbound via a magic act, so that it is available to the tantric master in its entirety.
This is a pretty "unique" interpretation. :thinking: ....has anyone read the alleged source?
Naropa (a cura di Ranieri Gnoli e Giacomella Orofino), Iniziazione, Kalacakra, place of publication unknown, 1994.
I've never seen it, and don't read Italian.....
དམ་པའི་དོན་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ཆེ་བ་དང་།
རྟོག་གེའི་ཡུལ་མིན་བླ་མའི་བྱིན་རླབས་དང་།
སྐལ་ལྡན་ལས་འཕྲོ་ཅན་གྱིས་རྟོགས་པ་སྟེ།
དེ་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ལ་ནི་ལོ་རྟོག་སེལ།།


"Absolute Truth is not an object of analytical discourse or great discriminating wisdom,
It is realized through the blessing grace of the Guru and fortunate Karmic potential.
Like this, mistaken ideas of discriminating wisdom are clarified."
- (Kyabje Bokar Rinpoche, from his summary of "The Ocean of Definitive Meaning")
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fragrant herbs
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by fragrant herbs »

Here is another interpretation:

Wayman, Alex, "Male, Female and Androgyne per Buddhist Tantra: Jacob Boehme and the Greek and Taoist Mysteries", in: Tantric and Taoist Studies in Honour of R.A. Stein, Brussels 1983.
How does the yogi find a real, human mudra? Normally, she is delivered by his pupil. This is also true for the Kalachakra Tantra. “If one gives the enlightened teacher the prajna [mudra] as a gift,” proclaims Naropa, “the yoga is bliss” (Grünwedel, 1933, p. 117). If a 12- or 16-year-old girl cannot be found, a 20-year-old will suffice, advises another text, and continues, “One should offer his sister, daughter or wife to the ‘guru’”, then the more valuable the mudra is to the pupil, the more she serves as a gift for his master (Wayman, 1977, p. 320).
Whether or not a karma mudra needs special training before the ritual is something which receves varying answers in the texts and commentaries. In general, she should be familiar with the tantric doctrine. Tsongkhapa advises that she take and keep a vow of silence. He expressly warns against intercourse with unworthy partners: “If a woman lacks ... superlative qualities, that is an inferior lotus. Do not stay with that one, because she is full of negative qualities. Make an offering and show some respect, but don’t practice (with her)” (quoted in Shaw, 1994, p. 169). In the Hevajra Tantra a one-month preparation time is required, then “the girl [is] freed of all false ideas and received as though she were a boon” (Snellgrove, 1987, vol. 1, p. 261).
Of course, the mudra must swear a strict vow of absolute silence regarding her relations with the tantric master. Should she break it, then according to the tantric penal code she may expect major difficulties, insanity, death and on top of this millennia of hellish torments. In order to intimidate her, Kalu Rinpoche is alleged to have told his mudra, June Campbell, that in an earlier life he killed a woman with a mantra because she disobeyed him and gossiped about intimacies. “The imposition of secrecy ... in the Tibetan system”, Campbell writes, “when it occurred solely as a means to protect status , and where it was reinforced by threats, was a powerful weapon in keeping women from achieving any kind of integrity in themselves. ... So whilst the lineage system [the gurus’ chain of initiation] viewed these [sexual] activities as promoting the enlightenment state of the lineage holders, the fate of one of the two main protagonists, the female consort, remained unrecognized, unspoken and unnamed” (June Campbell, 1996, p. 103). June Campbell also first risked speaking openly about her experiences, which she found repressive and degrading, after Kalu Rinpoche had died.
I am glad that I don't fear hell or gurus. I don't fear bans or locked threads either. I think that women especially should be made aware of what can happen in some Tibetan groups and if they don't mind it, then go ahead an join. This thread has made it clear to me that there is a lot of truth to The free online book, The Shadow of the Dalai Lama. There are good teachers out there, so as one ex Dalai Lama student wrote to me: Be very careful.
Malcolm
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by Malcolm »

Urgyen Chodron wrote:
This thread has made it clear to me that there is a lot of truth to The free online book
I am telling you that the Rottgen's do not understand this tradition and have twisted things to show them in the worst possible light.

But go ahead and believe whatever suits you.
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conebeckham
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by conebeckham »

No offense, Urgyen Chodron, but Snellgrove and Wayman aren't the best sources for a good understanding of Tantra.

And I can't say whether Ms. Campbell is honest or not, but there's no way to corroborate the story she tells about Kalu Rinpoche and the "mantra murder," for lack of a better word....why, I wonder, did Ms. Campbell only come forward after he had died? Please understand, I do not call her a liar, but I certainly don't accept her account at face value, either. I believe she also said there were "witnesses," or at least "people who knew," but those folks are never identified, as far as I know. There is no corroboration at all, from what I've seen.
དམ་པའི་དོན་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ཆེ་བ་དང་།
རྟོག་གེའི་ཡུལ་མིན་བླ་མའི་བྱིན་རླབས་དང་།
སྐལ་ལྡན་ལས་འཕྲོ་ཅན་གྱིས་རྟོགས་པ་སྟེ།
དེ་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ལ་ནི་ལོ་རྟོག་སེལ།།


"Absolute Truth is not an object of analytical discourse or great discriminating wisdom,
It is realized through the blessing grace of the Guru and fortunate Karmic potential.
Like this, mistaken ideas of discriminating wisdom are clarified."
- (Kyabje Bokar Rinpoche, from his summary of "The Ocean of Definitive Meaning")
tamdrin
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by tamdrin »

Urgyen,
It is right of you to be concerned about who you get into tantric practice with.. Maybe check out some female teachers, like Khandro Rinpoche, that way you can be sure they aren't going to ask you to sleep with them...
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fragrant herbs
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by fragrant herbs »

There is a lot of fear in coming forward, especially for women. Always has been always will be. Women are not believed, and if they are believed, they are blamed for seducing their teacher, and either way they are looked down upon. I saw this happening in other groups that I was in, and the women are left damaged by it all. Very damaged. People quit religion on account of it. I have quit religion in the past because of things I learned. I am proud of June Campbell for speaking out, and if I were her and had believed in the threats I would certainly wait until the guru had died. Or I may not even speak out. Fact is I don't believe in the threat of hell or hell, and I don't believe that a guru has the mind power to kill someone. I saw so much in these groups that I am sickened by it all. What Namdrol said on here was enough to cause me to realize that what was written in the Shadow book was true. All the way to real life consorts, to getting drunk, eating feces and urine. I have heard about these things, I am not new to this. If he thought to shock me further, he didn't. Just makes me more disgusted with Tibetan teachings.

Chopel's book is in English and can be found on Amazon. He at least was a Tibetan monk. What happened in Tibet has obviously been civilized in the West. Here we can't use 13 year old girls. And I mean USE. They get them when they are of age and slowly bring them in to their way of thinking.

I remember a woman that I got to know who wrote the book, The Serpent Rising. She had traveled all over India looking for a guru, and they all wanted to have sex with her, so she was discouraged, and of course did not have sex with them. So then she met a man who told her that he met a guru who was not like that. So she went to him, and he said that she could join, but he could not. She was very naive in her youth, and next thing you know this guru seduced her. She hates gurus now and trusts none of them. Spends her time speaking out against them and gets sick of doing this, so she quits for a while. Anyway, her ex guru is still in India practicing. I have been in several groups and they all put down the woman for speaking out, and then she is ostracized by the group. She was a victim of the guru and now is a victim of the disciples.

I would suggest that any woman that desires to join any group, Zen, Tibetan, etc. read the book, Sex and the Spiritual Teacher and remember what they have read. And I mean really remember it. And really check out their guru. The problem is by the time they get to these higher teachings they are already sold on their teacher, and so if he is not what he claims to be, then well... Young women are especially vulnerable. I know of gurus who have had harems and children, and they kept it secret until it was exposed years later, but the disciples called those who exposed it liars. People even get sued for exposing truths. One of my best friends wants to publish her book, but the organization said that if she does they will sue her.

But then there are always women who will fall for this crap, and then are sorry later. I just feel for them.

So you can all say that these sources are bogus. And I believe that some of you may believe this because you are a man or you are a woman who has not been exposed to this. Maybe the guru just didn't find you sexy enough. I remember a woman that I knew whose guru wanted to take her to India in a year, and she was so excited. Then he put his hand on her knee, and she said that she gave him a funny look, and he said, "All women are Divine Mother to me." And she added that he had a dark side, and I didn't believe her then. But you are all spared because my electricity is about to go out.
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fragrant herbs
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by fragrant herbs »

tamdrin, My concern is for other women, not myself.
Malcolm
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Re: What is a tantric teaching in Buddhism?

Post by Malcolm »

Urgyen Chodron wrote: So you can all say that these sources are bogus.
The Trimondi book is a smear job. But you have decided to believe it. That, at this point, is your problem.



N
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