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 (dolma 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 Mañjushri. 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'.
