Table Of ContentPRISM UNITY
SACRED TIBETAN
TEACHINGS
ON DEATH AND LIBERATION
G I A C O M E L L A O R O F I N O
SACRED TIBETAN
TEACHINGS ON
DEATH AND
LIBERATION
TEXTS FROM THE MOST
ANCIENT TRADITIONS OF TIBET
Preface by
NAMKHAI NORBU
Translation and commentary by
GIACOMELLA OROFINO
PRISM • UNITY
To my mother
SACRED TIBETAN TEACHINGS
On Death and Liberation
Published in Great Britain in 1990 by:
PRISM PRESS
2 South Street,
Bridport,
Dorset DT6 3NQ^
and distributed in the USA by:
AVERY PUBLISHING GROUP INC.,
120 Old Broadway,
Garden City Park,
New York 11040
and published in Australia 1990 by:
UNITY PRESS
6a Ortona Road,
Lindfield,
NSW 2070
ISBN 1 85327 049 0
© Original Italian Edition Edizion Mediterranee Roma 1985
© English Language Edition Prism Press 1990
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored
in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the
prior permission of the publishers.
Printed and bound in the Channel Islands
by The Guernsey Press Limited.
Contents
Preface (Namkhai Norbu) 1
Introduction 9
I. The Religious Traditions and Literary Origins of the Texts 17
The sNyirtg-thig scriptures of the rNying-ma-pa tradition 17
The Nyi-zla kha-sbyor Tantra 20
The Transmission of the rDzogs-pa chen-po zhang-zhung
snyan-rgyud 21
The sGron-ma drug-gi gdams-pa text 24
Notes to Part I 26
II. The Tantra of the Great Secret Union of the Sun
and Moon 31
The bar-do of the moment of death 31
The bar-do of essential reality and of existence 45
Notes to Part II 55
III. The Doctrine of the Six Lights 61
The doctrine of the six lights 61
The ornament of sunlight: commentary on the text ‘The
doctrine of the six lights’ 67
Notes to Part III 81
Appendix: The Lamp which makes clear the Signs of Death 85
Introductory Note 85
The lamp which makes clear the signs of death 89
Notes to the Appendix 101
Critical Edition of the Tibetan Texts 105
Bibliography 152
Index 157
Acknowledgements
This text was first published in 1985 in Italy as a result of
my research at the Istituto Universitario Orientale in Naples.
The English version is not a mere translation from the
Italian as, rewriting it in English, I took the opportunity of
improving the translation, rechecking it against the Tibetan
texts.
For this new edition I must express my gratitude to Professor
Per Kvaerne of Oslo University who very kindly read this version
and gave invaluable suggestions.
I also wish to acknowledge my debt to Des Barry who helped
me in the work of translating the work into English, and to
Professor Alison Duguid for her help with stylistic problems.
Giacomella Orofino
Preface
In the western world a great interest has arisen in the
translations of a Tibetan book dedicated to the after-death state.
The title given to this book — The Tibetan Book of the Dead —
invariably applied to all translated versions, has no corres
pondence whatsoever with the original ude of the text: Self
liberation through hearing, during the intermediate period that follows
death (Bar-do thos-grol). Probably this choice was made to make an
analogy with the Egyptian Book of the Dead, already known to a
wide public, and thus providing these particular Tibetan texts
with an easily understandable context.1
The doctrine of the Bar-do thos-grol belongs to the collection
of esoteric teachings known as Zhi-khro dgongs-pa rang-grol, or
‘Self-liberation through the understanding of the peaceful and
wrathful deities’. According to tradition the compilation of this
series of teachings had its origin in the 8 th century A.D. when
the master Padmasambhava arrived in Tibet from Uddiyana.
Later the texts were buried as treasures (gter-ma)2 on Mount
Gampodar and rediscovered by Kar-ma gling-pa in 1326
A.D.
This text has never ceased to be of great benefit to those who
were interested in it from the time of its discovery until the
present, and especially now, thanks to the many translations
that are available in the West.
According to the doctrines of Bar-do thos-grol the nature of
any living being is unchanging and is called Dharmadhatu. It is
similar to the spaciousness of the sky in that it is emptiness. The
wisdom of the naturally perfected state arises in this condition
like the bright light and rays that shine out in their luminosity
without any obstruction when the sun rises high in the sky. If
illusion manifests because one has not understood or recog
nised this state, then, in the impure condition, there arise the
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Sacred Tibetan Teachings
illusory visions which manifest in the apparition of the lights of
the six realms of existence: the paradise of the gods, the realms
of the demi-gods, men, animals, ‘hungry ghosts’ and ‘hell
beings’. The light of the gods shines an opaque white, that of the
demi-gods a dark blue, a motded green for the animals, an
opaque yellow for the hungry ghosts, and a dark smoky colour
for the hell beings.
If one feels attachment and one is attracted by those lights,
one obtains the five aggregates which constitute the human
personality: form, sensory perception, conceptualisation, karmic
impulses and consciousness; and the five elements: space,
earth, water, fire and wind. Following the five passions:
attachment, pride, anger, jealousy and egoism one wanders
without interruption or limitation in samsara.
On the other hand, if one recognises the pure condition, the
vision of the uncontaminated nature shines freely, and from the
light of the naturally manifest state which is blue, white, yellow,
red and green, there arise from the dimension of the
sambhogakaya as a living symbol of vision, the five father
divinities: Vairocana, Vajrasattva, Ratnasambhava, Amitabha
and Amoghasiddhi, and as symbols of the void the five mother
divinities: Dhatu Isvari, Buddha Locana, Mamaki, Pandaravasim
and Samaya Tara.
Each one of the father divinities is united inseparably to his
own paxedra, the symbol of energy, representing a quality of
wisdom: the wisdom of essential space, the mirror-like wisdom,
the wisdom of equanimity, the discriminating wisdom and the
all-accomplishing wisdom.
From one’s own state of consciousness there manifest the
forty-two peaceful divinities of the sambhogakaya dimension as a
symbol of the quintessential void. In the moment in which one
recognises that they are none other than one’s own pure vision,
one obtains complete liberation.
If liberation does not occur, however, then from the nature
of one’s own being, which is in itself clear, one projects the fifty-
eight terrifying divinities, which are manifestations of limitless
energy.
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Preface
On the other hand, if these pure visions are recognised as
manifestations of internal energy of one’s own state of
consciousness one obtains definitive liberation in one’s own
condition in a moment.
When one recognises that the peaceful and terrifying
divinities are external manifestations of one’s own state of
consciousness, one realises the supreme teaching of the
profound and direct path of total liberation.
This will take place for those beings with the superior
qualifications and also for those who do not possess them if they
remain in a state of real stability during the moment of the bar-do
of essential reality when the visions of the spontaneous manifest
state appear.
If one does not obtain liberation, however, not having
stability in the knowledge of one’s own original state, one is
introduced to the profound essential doctrines during the
following time of the bar-do of existence. At this time the
teaching on the profound method which brings liberation
through the pronouncing of the names of the peaceful and
terrifying divinities are given, or through the hearing of secret
mantra. If one still does not obtain liberation because of past
negative actions, one intervenes with the rituals and ceremonies
to ensure that rebirth takes place where there is a manifestation
of the Buddha. Such rituals, using the magical formulas of the
peaceful and terrifying divinities, as well as hand gestures and
meditation, purify negative actions.
In the tradition that we are studying the concept of ‘self
liberation’ has a great value: this is the supreme understanding
which all completely realised Buddhas embody and there is
nothing which is superior to it. It is the spontaneously arisen
state of self-perfection. The method to reach it is described in
the principal text of the Zhi-khro dgongs-pa rang-groL
An invaluable clarification of the meaning of the term ‘self
liberation’ is given in the Tantra of self-liberation by the introduction to
the state of pure awareness which appears nakedly from the collection
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Sacred Tibetan Teachings
of the Zhi-khro dgongs-pa rang-grol2 where we read:
The mind of all beings,
is inseparable from sarnsara and nirvana
They wander in samsara,
conditioned by desire and refusal
The whole of the essence is
in going beyond actions.
This is how it is taught to liberate oneself:
through the naked vision of the state ofpure awareness so that one
really obtains the great self liberation, and all this is completed in
the state of the great perfection (rdzogs-pa chen-po).
This profound natural state is the basis of the understanding
of all the illuminates of the past, present and future. When this
sacred understanding really manifests, the necessity for any
action or judgement ceases and one obtains liberation in one’s
own dimension.
Let us now consider the general features of the doctrine of the
Zhi-khro dgongs-pa rang-grol. In the text it is stated that there are six
different bar-do states:
the bar-do of nature, which begins at the moment of
birth,
the bar-do of dreams,
the bar-do of the state of samadhi,
the bar-do of the moment of death,
the bar-do of quintessential reality,
the bar-do of arising existence
The origin of this sub-division of the bar-do states is particularly
derived from the Tantra of the Great Secret Union of the Sun and the
Moon from the collection of the rNying-ma’i rgyud bcu bdun3. In this
text it states concerning the bar-do of nature:
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