Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 50-minute session, Khensur Rinpoche opens the sūtra-system portion of the retreat — the mantra system having been completed the day before — by carefully unpacking what “Mahāmudrā” actually means: Mudra is emptiness (all phenomena empty of inherent existence); Maha is the liberation and omniscience gained by realizing it. He traces the lineage through Nāgārjuna and Candrakīrti, surveys the eight Tibetan presentations across Kagyu, Nyingma, Sakya, and Gelug traditions using a gold analogy — different names, identical essence — then focuses on Gampopa’s horse-riding verse as a teaching on the awakening heart. Rinpoche closes with step-by-step preparation instructions: the sevenfold Vairochana seating posture, examining one’s mental state, and a breathing visualization — exhaling afflictive emotions as black light, inhaling white light from the Buddhas — before settling into the awakening-heart motivation. Suited to practitioners already familiar with foundational Mahāmudrā concepts.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 05 MR 1990 04 14.mp3
UUID: b7187fa3-0def-4bce-b822-91dbf2cda011
Teacher: Khensur Rinpoche
Collection: Mahāmudrā Retreat (Khensur Rinpoche)
Date: 1990-04-14
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 49.8 minutes
Words: ~2,484
We pray to the magnificent pervading Lord, vajradhara, root of all the glorious Buddha lineages, spontaneously present in the celestial mansion of the three bodies. Bless us that we may quickly attain supreme Mahāmudrā, path of unity, severing the continuum of attachment to the conception of self and bringing consummate skill and love, compassion in the awakening heart. We pray to the supremely wise Mañjuśrī, father who gives birth to the conquerors of the three times in the infinite Buddha fields of the ten directions of the universe. Bless us that we may quickly attain supreme Mahāmudrā, path of unity, severing the continuum of attachment to the conception of the self and bringing consummate skill and and compassion in the awakening heart. We pray to Losang Drakpa along with the lineage of his spiritual children.
Bless us that we may quickly attain supreme Mahāmudrā path of unity, severing the continuum of attachment to conception of self and bringing consummate skill and love and compassion in the awakening heart. Bless us that we may see our holy spiritual teacher as a Buddha, that we may turn aside our attachment to this place of cyclic existence and taking upon ourselves the burden of liberating all mother sentient beings, may we quickly attain Mahāmudrā, the wondrous union of the ordinary and extraordinary paths. Bless us that our body and your body, father, that our speech and your speech, father, that our mind and your mind, father, may become inseparably one. I must for my own sake and for the sake of all sentient beings eliminate all my various faults and achieve all the excellent qualities. Having achieved Buddhahood, I will establish all sentient beings equal to space and a complete happiness divorced of all suffering.
In order to achieve that end, I am going to practice the supreme method within the great vehicle that of Mahāmudrā and adjusting our motivation such motivation such that we’re going to listen to this teaching on Mahāmudrā with the attitude of the awakening heart. As was mentioned previously, in terms of the explanation of Mahāmudrā there are two systems. There is the Mahāmudrā in accordance with mantra and that of sūtra. And the explanation in accordance with mantra was completed yesterday and I will begin the explanation in accordance with sūtra. So the explanation in accordance with sūtra, we can ask what is the source from where does it come from.
And it comes from the teachings of the Buddha on the perfection of wisdom. And this in terms of the extensive teaching in one hundred thousand verses of the perfection of wisdom, the middling teaching on which is constituted the twenty thousand verse text, and the abbreviated teaching in eight thousand verses. So these actual texts that the Buddha taught the extensive perfection of wisdom in the Tibetan editions they’re about they’re pretty big. They’re about this big and about this high. There’s twelve volumes in this size.
In the middling, there are four this size. And the abbreviated, there’s one of this size. What What is the reason that the Buddha taught these three different lengths of perfection of wisdom sutras? It was he was trying to convey his understanding of the Mahāmudrā and in doing this he had to address himself to different degrees of intelligence of students. Those of the highest intelligence he was able to teach them by means of this abbreviated text.
That is a very condensed manner. Those of slightly less intelligences would not suffice and therefore he also taught them in a more extensive manner. And those of least intelligence he had to explain the perfection of wisdom in extremely detailed manner involving an extensive teaching. So the various lengths of these texts were a method, varying methods according to the intelligence of the disciple in order for them to gain an understanding of Mahāmudrā. And subsequent to the Buddha having taught these various lengths of perfection of wisdom texts, the thinking of the Buddha was commentated on by the master Nāgārjuna.
And Nāgārjuna, in speaking upon the practice of Mahāmudrā, said that all practitioners of the three vehicles, whether they be bodhisattvas, hearers, or solitary realizers, they must mainly practice Mahāmudrā. That there is no greater practice than the practice of Mahāmudrā, and that all of those who seek liberation, who seek Buddhahood, must follow the path of Mahāmudrā. There is no other path than this. Subsequent to Nāgārjuna, the commentator who wrote the text Entering Into the Middle Way, Candrakīrti, commentated on the perfection of wisdom. So this is the sources of the teachings of Mahāmudrā coming from these these great Indian masters and down to including Tsongkhapa.
What do do we mean by Mahāmudrā in terms of sūtra? What do we mean by Mahāmudrā in terms of sūtra? We have to try to identify what we’re talking about when we talk about Mahāmudrā. And there is a quotation from the King of Meditation Stabilization Sutras, the Samādhi Rāja Sūtra, in which it explains that all phenomena in the world — everything — that is to say houses, water, trees, all things are empty of true existence, of natural existence, empty of inherent existence. These are all synonyms: they are not established from their own side.
This is what the word chagya means, or Mudra. Mudra means emptiness. That is to say all phenomena whatsoever are empty of natural inherent true existence. So by the word explaining Mahāmudrā, trying to identify what we mean by it, the word Mudra is emptiness. Now we are seeking to try to realize emptiness, to develop an awareness.
It is by means of the awareness realizing emptiness that we are able to gain realization, that we are able to abandon cyclic existence, achieve a type of happiness which is divorced from suffering, and that we are ultimately able to achieve omniscience and Buddhahood. So we are trying to gain a wisdom realizing emptiness. Now in order we have to eliminate all our various faults. Why do we want to abandon cyclic existence? It’s because this is constituted of various faults in the world that we are constantly having go through the process of birth, aging, disease, and death.
And eliminating all the faults which bring this about. And in order to eliminate all of these, the undesirables, we have to understand what is the root of all of our various faults. And the root of all these is grasping at self, or the conception of self. Therefore, if we eliminate this root, then we eliminate all the various faults and all that entails. We eliminate birth, aging, disease, and death.
And that which eliminates the root, grasping at self, is the wisdom realizing selflessness. Therefore, when this by means of the wisdom realizing selflessness we attain liberation and omniscience. This attainment is what is referred to as maha or great. That attainment of liberation and omniscience by means of the wisdom realizing selflessness is great or maha. So we should understand this in order to understand, to identify what we mean by Mahāmudrā according to the sūtra.
That first all phenomena whatsoever are empty of inherent existence. And this is what is meant by Mudra. By acquainting, by meditating, by realizing this, familiarizing ourselves with this understanding this realization through the process of meditation. All faults are eliminated. All excellent qualities are generated and one attains liberation and omniscience.
This is what is meant by Maha. So this is what the Buddha was teaching in terms of Mahāmudrā and as these teachings moved to Tibet then great meditation, the masters of Tibet began to, through a process of meditation, gain realization of Mahāmudrā. And they in turn explained to each of their disciples realization. And in the various ways in which each of the masters gained realization and explained to their individual disciples, they gave various names to what they were understanding. And therefore in each of the various sects, Kagyu, Nyingma, Sakya, and Gelug, there arose various names according to the various texts written by various masters.
But we can classify all of these differences in terminology and names into eight categories. So but we have a limited time and also in that limited time we try to explain these eight categories in which the text on Mahāmudrā presented the material then it would be quite difficult to understand and we’d all probably become very confused. So Rinpoche just listed the eight names by which these categories were known, and he can’t translate all of them. Some of them, for example, the Great Completion — you’re familiar with that name — the view of the middle way, and different methods of explanation. And Rinpoche is going to select one of these as a way of coming to understand Mahāmudrā. So the tradition in which the Mahāmudrā will be explained is in terms of a Kagyu tradition which came from Marpa: there was Marpa, Milarepa, and Milarepa’s disciple Gampopa.
So it was in terms of the teachings of Gampopa. Quoting from a verse by Gampopa in which he makes an analogy: just like riding a horse, the awareness is to ride the awakening heart.
In the sense that we, to meditate, to cultivate the awakening heart, it is necessary to actually ride it — to express it, to put it into action through altruistic intentions. If we don’t, then what is the fault? We would not have the influence to gather disciples around us if we don’t express the awakening heart like riding the horse. Through our altruistic actions we would create a circle of disciples around us. Meditating upon and gaining stabilization with respect to our meditational deity — that is our Yidam — we will attract the Dakinis.
If we do not, we will not be able to attract the Dakinis. And if the snow mountain has no sunlight, there is no runoff of water into the valley. The snow is analogous to the spiritual teacher. The sun is our showing of respect and reverence. If we do not show respect and reverence for the spiritual teacher, there is no runoff into the valley of blessings from the teacher.
Goes on to say that within our minds we have many afflictive emotions, misconceptions, superstitions. If these are not eliminated then the awakening heart and the view cannot arise. And this — I should have presented the analogy first — just as in the case of when the sky is covered with clouds, though the moon arises we are not able to see it. Likewise, if our mind is clouded by superstitions and afflictive emotions, they will not arise and we will not be able to apprehend the view and the awakening heart. And he goes on to say that through meditation, all our various skillful acts of positive potential and the accumulation of wisdom —
That if we do not dedicate it to the benefit of sentient beings, to the longevity of the teachings, to the gaining of a human life in the future, to the ultimate attainment of liberation and omniscience. If we do not make these prayers of dedication then in the future our desires will be unable to be fulfilled. That we should continually be making these prayers so that in the future thinking may I I attain this, may I have this, may I have this, that so that in the future our desires will be fulfilled. So, there are these eight different presentations of the teachings on Mahāmudrā according to these different spiritual teachers. And they in turn gave various names, made use of various terminologies.
The meaning is exactly the same in terms of what is to be acted upon and in terms of meditation. It’s just as in the case of gold might be found in one area of the north and we call that the gold of the north and the gold and it might have a different appearance in that state, in its natural state. It may have a different appearance in the east and the west and the north. Though we give it these various names, still when we extract the essence, it is still exactly the same gold. There’s no difference.
Its nature is exactly the same no matter where it’s found, but we give it various names depending upon the area in which we found it. Likewise, though we have these eight different presentations giving different names, the essence is still the same. That is the understanding of emptiness. So within the presentation of Mahāmudrā according to sūtra, the manner of meditation, there are the three divisions of first preparation, the actual meditation, and the conclusion. So beginning with the first of these three divisions preparation and what are we to do in the beginning as a means of preparation.
The first is to have a good meditational seat. It should be comfortable, should be slightly higher in the back. And then we take and then to take a good bodily position. As we’ve explained this previously when we explained meditation, the meditational position is exemplified by the sevenfold posture of Vairochana in which we sit in the lotus position with the legs crossed. The hands are placed in the meditation mudra.
We go through these roughly. Position of the hands; the shoulders are level; the head is positioned so that the nose is aligned with the navel; the eyes are focused along the sides of the nose; and the back is straight. Having taken the correct bodily position, we now examine the condition of the mind. What is what is this condition is it in? Is it involved in attachment or hatred or confusion?
Is it in a skillful state, unskillful state, or a neutral state? So, examining what is the condition of one’s mind. If upon examination that one sees that it’s in an unskillful state, we then make use of a breathing meditation. That we first exhale all our unskillfulness, our wrong conceptions, in the form of a black light which goes out to a vast distance and disappears. And then inhaling from the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, a brilliant white light comes in, and then alternating, exhaling the wrong conceptions and the afflictive emotions, inhaling the brilliant white light shown by the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas.
And if we take one exhalation and inhalation as one, then we can do this seven times or fourteen times or twenty one times. And examining your mind at the end of each of these and seeing whether the mind is still under the influence of afflictive emotions or wrong conceptions. Once it’s brought to a neutral state and then to try to adjust to a skillful state by meditating on the motivation of the awakening heart, trying to develop the attitude of seeking to attain Buddhahood for the sake of all sentient beings.