Secret Doctrines of the Tibetan Book of Dead

by LAUF, DETLEF INGO

• ISBN13: 9781570626548
• ISBN10: 1570626545
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-05-01
• Publisher: Shambhala

Summary

The Tibetan Books of the Dead are a diverse collection of Buddhist scriptures that yield valuable insight into the psychology of death and dying and suggest the importance of meditative practice and knowledge as tools for self-understanding. This in-depth study of this rich body of Buddhist literature details the Tibetan Buddhist belief in the bardos, of intermediate states, and serves as an illuminating companion volume toThe Tibetan Book of the Dead.Using original texts from both the Buddhist and pre-Buddhist Tibetan religious traditions, this book presents a detailed portrayal of the teachings and the iconography that play a major role in the Tibetan understanding of death and dying. The peaceful and wrathful deities, the mandala principle, the five Buddha families, and the six realms of experience are among the doctrines examined in this volume. A psychological commentary and the illustrations and diagrams in the book illuminate the Tibetan path from death, through the after-death state, to transformation and rebirth. A comparison with Western investigations of consciousness, death, and dying, as well as views of death in India, Egypt, and other ancient cultures, enables the reader to see how the Tibetan Buddhist perspective on death relates to the spiritual and psychological beliefs of other societies.

Author Biography

Detlef Ingo Lauf, a well-known Tibetologist, is a professor of comparative religion and philosophy at both the C. G. Jung Foundation in Zurich and Columbia Pacific University in San Rafael, California.

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. ix
The Traditions of the Tibetan Books of the Dead	p. 1
Basic Elements of Wisdom about Life and Knowledge about the After-Death State and Rebirth	p. 13
Life, Karma, Death, and Rebirth	p. 15
The Trikaya Doctrine as the Basis of the Initiations	p. 23
The Six Kinds of Bardo and Other "Intermediate States"	p. 33
The First Group of Three Bardos as Intermediate States for the Transformation of Awareness in This Life	p. 36
The Second Group of Three Bardos as Intermediate States for the Guidance of Awareness in the World Beyond	p. 38
Bardo as the Indivisible Union of the Essential	p. 43
On the Symbolism of Tantric Polarity, the Trinity, the Quaternity and the Fivefold, and of Colors and Elements	p. 47
From Unity to Multiplicity	p. 49
Duality as an Expression of Polarity	p. 50
Threefold Articulations	p. 53
Some Groups of Four	p. 58
The Fivefold Arrangement of the Mandala	p. 62
The Six Realms of Incarnation	p. 68
Other Symbolic Groupings	p. 71
The Death Ritual as Guidance through the Bardo	p. 74
Signs in the Transition between the Two Worlds and the Primordial Light at the Onset of Death	p. 87
The Great Ritual of the Initiations into the Mandalas of the Peaceful and Wrathful Deities	p. 97
The Peaceful Deities	p. 99
The Adibuddha as the Mystical Creator of the Mandala	p. 101
The Five Tathagatas (Yab-Yum)	p. 104
The Buddha Vairocana	p. 105
The Buddha Aksobhya	p. 106
The Buddha Ratnasambhava	p. 107
The Buddha Amitabha	p. 108
The Buddha Amoghasiddhi	p. 108
The Eight Mahabodhisattvas (Yab-Yum)	p. 114
The Six Buddhas	p. 118
The Six Buddhas of the Bhavacakra and the Ritual of Guidance through the Six Realms of Existence	p. 118
The Six Buddhas and the Great Image of the Realm of Hells	p. 130
The Four Guardians of the Mandala (Yab-Yum)	p. 137
The Five Secret Vidyadharas (Yab-Yum)	p. 139
The Wrathful Deities	p. 141
The Great Heruka of the Adibuddha (Yab-Yum)	p. 144
The Five Wrathful Buddha-Herukas (Yab-Yum)	p. 145
The Eight Keurima	p. 147
The Eight Phra-men-ma	p. 148
The Four Animal-Headed Female Guardians of the Mandala	p. 149
The 28 Powerful Animal-Headed Goddesses	p. 150
The Five Jnana-Dakinis and the Powerful Vajrakumara-Heruka	p. 154
From the Books of the Dead of the Pre-Buddhist Ancient Tibetan Bon Religion	p. 156
The Peaceful Deities	p. 159
The Wrathful Deities	p. 167
Psyche and Awareness	p. 173
Some Comparisons with Ideas about Death and the After-Life in Other Cultures	p. 185
Indian Insights in the Upanisads	p. 188
Comparable Elements in the Religions of Persia, Babylon, and Egypt	p. 194
Comparable Elements with the Greeks, Romans, and Germans	p. 198
The Soul and Death for the Manicheans and the Mandaeans	p. 200
The Soul, Light, Life and Death in Some Western Schools of Thought	p. 202
Psychological Commentary to the Bar-do thos-grol	p. 211
General Basic Thoughts from Buddhist Philosophy and Elements of Psychology	p. 213
Suffering and the Pleasure-Pain Principle	p. 213
The Two Stages of Liberation	p. 215
Ignorance and Wisdom	p. 215
On the Relation of Mind and Body	p. 217
Karma and Self-Responsibility	p. 218
Alayavijnana and Archetypal Structures	p. 220
Psychological Aspects of the Tibetan Book of the Dead	p. 224
Notes	p. 241
Bibliography	p. 250
Tibetan Original Sources	p. 250
Tibetan Buddhist Texts	p. 250
Tibetan Texts of the Bon-po Religion	p. 252
Secondary Literature	p. 252
Comparative Literature	p. 254
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