Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

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Malcolm
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by Malcolm »

In the bone yard wrote:There is only one path, and it must be "pointed out" to us.
Then we will understand what we cannot understand intellectually and was not meant to be understood intellectually.
All Buddhists teachings have three prajñās: the prajñā of hearing, when one listens to the teachings and understands them intellectually; the prajñā of reflection, when one integrates what one has understood; and the prajñā of meditation, where the meaning one has gathered through hearing and reflection is brought to realization.

To claim that we are not meant to intellectually understand the path does not correspond with my education and training. The Tantra of the Union of the Sun and Moon states:
  • Prajñā is three-fold: the prajñā of hearing severs external reification; the prajñā of reflection severs internal reification; and the prajñā of meditation severs secret reification.
Vimalamitra states:
  • The characteristics of prajñā:
    The characteristic of the prajñā of hearing is a great quantity listening and understanding words without interpolation.
    The characteristic of reflection is investigating the words and meanings of the mind, and giving explanations.
    The characteristic of meditation is distancing oneself from afflictions through meditation.

We should pay respect to intellectual learning, not dismiss it.

M
In the bone yard
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by In the bone yard »

I was writing in terms of the 4 (or sometimes 5) yogas of Mahamudra.
We weren't discussing sutra.

Whether it's Mahamudra or Dzogchen the path is the same after realization.
The 4 yogas of Mahamudra encompass the path before and after realization.

I couldn't agree more with respect to intellectual learning but it must be applied intelligently (to sutra not tantra).
Learning sutra doesn't mean much though if you just learn the words. It's a teaching. :smile:
Malcolm
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by Malcolm »

In the bone yard wrote: I couldn't agree more with respect to intellectual learning but it must be applied intelligently (to sutra not tantra).
It must be applied to both, that is why I cited a Dzogchen tantra as well as a Dzogchen master.

M
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by In the bone yard »

Well that's true but the tantras are teachings for those on the path (after realization).
There is outer tantra (Ngondro), but it should be taught by a lama when we are closer to the path.

And the meaning (or view) of prajna is different after realization. The true meaning of prajna won't be realized until after realization.
You might have read Chogyam Trungpa talk about prajna.
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by fckw »

I find it quite interesting, that none of the responses so far really said anything about the cited passages from Berzin. It's okay to criticize my limited understanding, and it might even be true that I misinterpret him - but it's a whole different category to criticize someone like Berzin on that topic. After what he has written, there clearly are several differences in Mahamudra and Dzogchen. And that's the original question of this thread. If you don't agree, go on, point out Berzin's mistakes on that topic. I am eager to learn more about this.
Malcolm
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by Malcolm »

In the bone yard wrote:Well that's true but the tantras are teachings for those on the path (after realization).
There is outer tantra (Ngondro), but it should be taught by a lama when we are closer to the path.

And the meaning (or view) of prajna is different after realization. The true meaning of prajna won't be realized until after realization.
You might have read Chogyam Trungpa talk about prajna.
There are two kinds of prajñā, contaminated, and pure. The former exists in common practitioners, the latter in realized practitioners.

As for this distinction:
Well that's true but the tantras are teachings for those on the path (after realization).
There is outer tantra (Ngondro), but it should be taught by a lama when we are closer to the path.
The path of Varjayāna is taught so that a common, ordinary person can traverses all the paths and stages in a single life, and ideally, within the rite of empowerment itself, or at least so I have been taught (I am someone who has done a three year retreat).
Schrödinger’s Yidam
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

Malcolm wrote: The path of Varjayāna is taught so that a common, ordinary person can traverses all the paths and stages in a single life, and ideally, within the rite of empowerment itself, or at least so I have been taught (I am someone who has done a three year retreat).
If this is not too personal a question, may I ask in which tradition you practiced in your retreat? For some reason I have the impression it was Sakya. But if it is too personal, never mind.
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
In the bone yard
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by In the bone yard »

Within the rite of empowerment itself, yes.
Otherwise how can we understand something that transcends the mind?

I reserve further comment since we are getting off base here as the last poster pointed out.
My apologies to the original poster. :smile:
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by Malcolm »

smcj wrote:
Malcolm wrote: The path of Varjayāna is taught so that a common, ordinary person can traverses all the paths and stages in a single life, and ideally, within the rite of empowerment itself, or at least so I have been taught (I am someone who has done a three year retreat).
If this is not too personal a question, may I ask in which tradition you practiced in your retreat? For some reason I have the impression it was Sakya. But if it is too personal, never mind.

Yes, it was in Sakya. Most of my training in Sutra and Tantra is in the Sakya school. The rest in Nyingma.
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by Malcolm »

In the bone yard wrote:Within the rite of empowerment itself, yes.
Otherwise how can we understand something that transcends the mind?
If you do not attain awakening during empowerment, then you have sadhana practice, cause that's what it is for, i.e., sadhopaya, "method of accomplishment".
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Astus
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by Astus »

fckw wrote:Claiming that the two systems are "basically the same" is therefore only true on a superficial level, but not in terms of various aspects of the practice - at least for the Kagyu, Sakya and Gelug-Systems. Unfortunately, Berzin does not elaborate on the Bons or the Nyingmas.
It seems to me all Berzin says is that Dzogchen deals only with rigpa while Anuttarayogatantra's clear light is a more inclusive term. That is, while AYT encompasses the Dzogchen teachings, that's not true the other way around. However, Mahamudra has more than one meaning or one interpretation, and that's not addressed in Berzin's article at all. On the other hand, previously there were several quotes given right from the beginning of this thread how the view of Dzogchen and Mahamudra can be the same.
1 Myriad dharmas are only mind.
Mind is unobtainable.
What is there to seek?

2 If the Buddha-Nature is seen,
there will be no seeing of a nature in any thing.

3 Neither cultivation nor seated meditation —
this is the pure Chan of Tathagata.

4 With sudden enlightenment to Tathagata Chan,
the six paramitas and myriad means
are complete within that essence.


1 Huangbo, T2012Ap381c1 2 Nirvana Sutra, T374p521b3; tr. Yamamoto 3 Mazu, X1321p3b23; tr. J. Jia 4 Yongjia, T2014p395c14; tr. from "The Sword of Wisdom"
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by Grigoris »

fckw wrote:I find it quite interesting, that none of the responses so far really said anything about the cited passages from Berzin. It's okay to criticize my limited understanding, and it might even be true that I misinterpret him - but it's a whole different category to criticize someone like Berzin on that topic. After what he has written, there clearly are several differences in Mahamudra and Dzogchen. And that's the original question of this thread. If you don't agree, go on, point out Berzin's mistakes on that topic. I am eager to learn more about this.
I already answered your question here. Astus also answered it saying almost exactly the same thing. What do you want? A third opinion?
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE

"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by thigle »

One possible task: Don't focus anything. But now you focus "non-focusing". Why? Because you make a concept and thing out of "don't focus anything". Why? Because there's an expectation, who want's something from "don't focus anything". This is "grasping". Grasping is artificial conceptualisation, artificial conceptualisation is reification, and if there's grasping, there's "something" like "non-focusing'nes". It's like anything "behind", it's like an "entity" which "monitors all". It's like a "big brother", reified identified with "non-focusing".

If you focus on "non-focusing", this artificial conceptualisation tend's to a reified "state" of consciousness. Every "state" of consciousness is impermanent, therefore it carries the germ of suffering in itself. What do to? Stop "non-focusing", ergo stop "non-focusing'nes". Cry: Stop! Interrupt this artificial focus. You can't stop, because you are afraid, you can't "see something", what you expect from doing "don'focus anything"? That's grasping, that's the "big brother", that's ignorance. Great, you detect it once again. At some point one has enough.

You stop "practice" and "non-practice", neither distracted yet focused. So what you will be left? Naturaly relaxed, neither as "practice" nor "nonpractise" - as a self-obvious fact, not constructed, not "made" by anything or anyone. Now, transparency/knowledge is self-obvious.

"Self-obvious" doesn't mean "automatic". 'It's just without any need for an extra artificial knowledge-focus like this: "Transparency is self-obvious". You can't tell "from where" immediate knowledge comes from, because it doesn't matter from itself from where it comes from. The fact that "it doesn't matter" is immediate "knowledge", not to distinct from what appears, therefore everything is obviously transparent and insubstantial, primordially without any base.

When i talk with "mahamudra-disciples", I have the impression, that most of them "practice" non-focusing. And they believe, that's the "ultimate point". But it's only ignorance. When i talk with "semde/longde-context-dzogchen-disciples", I have the impression, that some of them "practice" non-focusing to. And they believe, that's the "ultimate point". But it's only ignorance. When i speak with "menngagde-context-dzogchen-disciples", I have the impression, that most of them neither "practice" nor "non-practice".


(Sincerely, "sorry for my bad spoken english")
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by muni »

:namaste:

"If, when relaxed completely, one observes what happens, this very act in itself produces strength".
— Jetsun Milarepa

Sure, this is not the conceptual mind observing solid things, nor going blank.
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by tobes »

thigle wrote: When i talk with "mahamudra-disciples", I have the impression, that most of them "practice" non-focusing. And they believe, that's the "ultimate point". But it's only ignorance. When i talk with "semde/longde-context-dzogchen-disciples", I have the impression, that some of them "practice" non-focusing to. And they believe, that's the "ultimate point". But it's only ignorance. When i speak with "menngagde-context-dzogchen-disciples", I have the impression, that most of them neither "practice" nor "non-practice".


(Sincerely, "sorry for my bad spoken english")
And what kind of status do your 'impressions' have? Are they neither practice nor non-practice?

:anjali:
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by muni »

Silence is teaching.
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by thigle »

muni wrote::namaste:

"If, when relaxed completely, one observes what happens, this very act in itself produces strength".
— Jetsun Milarepa

Sure, this is not the conceptual mind observing solid things, nor going blank.
I'm not sure. Maybe. But he's dead, therefore I can't ask him the question, what he really meant with this sentence, because it's not about "to be naturaly relaxed" in a "reified" way. It's not about doing or practicing "to be naturaly relaxed". It's not about "to remain" naturaly relaxed. But some people do that in perfection. Therefore they believe, they are "naturaly relaxed" and that's the big goal. As I said in the text before, such a "reified non-practice" tends to a special "state" of consciousness. Now the disciple maybe think: "It's really the big goal, because of my true "natural relaxation", there's some-"thing" like "clarity" or "bliss" or "openness" or "nothingness" or whatever. But his "clarity", "bliss" or "openness" or "nothingness" or whatever are only reified concepts, based on grasping/ignorance. All of this is really different from the terms "naturally relaxed"or "naturally loosed", I meant in the context of the last text. What sounds the same, may also be different.

Another point is "thögal", which you can not find in mahamudra, maybe because mahamudra content sounds like dzogchen, but in fact it's different, with different "output". Why thögal is imporant? Even if immediate transparency/knowledge is obvious, for the senses it does not appear in that way. Metaphor to understand: If you put a straw in a glas of water, the straw appears broken, even if you know, that the straw isn't broken. With "thögal", "the straw appears the senses in the exact way". That's important, because if "the straw is out of the water and appears in the exact way", there's no chance for the "big brother-concept" to conceal transparency/knowledge. But I have discussed this topic enough in a german buddhist-forum, therefore that's all what I wanna say.

(Sincerely, "sorry for my bad spoken english")
Malcolm
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by Malcolm »

thigle wrote: Another point is "thögal", which you can not find in mahamudra...
Not so fast, Kimosabe. My recent studies of Kalacakra and sadaṇgayoga have caused me to revise my opinion about this.

Please examine Ornament of Stainless Light by Norsang Kalsang Gyatso, the section on the daytime withdrawal yoga.
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by heart »

Malcolm wrote:
thigle wrote: Another point is "thögal", which you can not find in mahamudra...
Not so fast, Kimosabe. My recent studies of Kalacakra and sadaṇgayoga have caused me to revise my opinion about this.

Please examine Ornament of Stainless Light by Norsang Kalsang Gyatso, the section on the daytime withdrawal yoga.
Could you elaborate a little Malcolm?

/magnus
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Re: Mahāmudrā & Dzogchen

Post by conebeckham »

..while you're at it, maybe talk a bit about Illusory body in DuKhor and it's relation to Togal and the Body of Light?

If that's not asking too much.....ha!
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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