Audio recorded at Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Kyabje Rinpoche introduces secret mantra practice in this 43-minute session by laying out the four foundational purities that structure all tantric meditation. He opens with the Bodhisattva motivation — why practitioners pursue Buddhahood rapidly — then explains why tantra is called “secret”: reserved for those with genuine intention and proper foundation, like a nation’s core security strategy. He walks through each purity concretely: pure residence (vividly visualizing your celestial palace), pure body (visualizing yourself as a deity), pure enjoyment (making offerings transformed and purified, filling all space), and pure activity (reciting mantra while visualizing light rays from your heart purifying all sentient beings). The session ends with Q&A on visualization order, primary versus secondary mind, Buddha nature, and a direct warning: intensive tantra practice requires a skilled lama’s guidance, since the subtle winds can cause serious problems like insanity if improperly managed.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 1989-12-01 – 1B – What is Tantra – KR.mp3
UUID: 3a61aeba-0346-442b-b630-1403cdb9b19f
Teacher: Kyabje Rinpoche
Collection: Tantra General
Date: 1989-12-01
Recorded at: Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Adelaide
Words: ~2,324
And good qualities in the sense of qualifications. So having unlimited qualification through which he’s able to do the welfare of countless sentient beings therefore with that purpose because of that purpose, Bodhisattvas somehow wants to attain Buddhahood as quickly as possible and definitely that is their so-called goal to be attained. So unless a practitioner attains the state of Buddhahood, it is never possible to do complete or unlimited welfare of other beings and even Bodhisattva who is the highest in the level of spiritual or spiritual progress among the sentient being still hasn’t got that power. And tonight, the teaching is on the topic of secret mantra. So for easier purposes it has been called tantra, the same thing.
So tonight the talk is teaching us on the secret mantra and why it is called secret is because it is to be given only to those who want to do the practice of that part and who has reached that level of where the person is able to work on our practice and put into real core accomplishment. Otherwise, apart from those type of person, it is a sort of teaching and instruction which should be kept secret and guarded against what you call a kind of a just do whatever-you-feel-you-do sort of attitude. So that’s why it is called secret. For example, there are whole different nations, Australia and so forth. So all these nations, core or the core basis for progress of the whole nation and to protect it from attack from others so forth.
That core factor in its planning is a kind of project or thing which only has to be known to few real people that matters in implementing those plan and it’s something not to be what I call exposed to all citizens and outsiders. Therefore, it is something to be kept secret. Same like that example, the teachings of the Buddha concerning especially on the secret mantra part, it’s like the nation and it has to be what I call it has to be exposed or given only to those who wants to practice, who want to practice it. But today, now regarding the secret mantra, the tantra. So regarding secret mantra, Rinpoche will now explain briefly what are the principal differences like there are the four principal classes or differences and it’s because the topic has been what I call the topic has been set that the teaching has to go on that topic so Rinpoche will have to explain.
Tonight, the sub topic is about the secret mantra, so there shouldn’t be any room afterward that there wasn’t any teaching on secret mantra at all. In mantra, so we stick to tantra. So in tantra, there are four things which are called the four purities. So those four purities are the pure residence, pure body, pure enjoyment, and pure activity, and pure offerings and pure activity. So regarding the first purity, the pure residence is the visualization.
So the Tibetan word has a connotation of getting used to. So getting used to in one’s visualization practice, the pure residence which one is going to remain in after one attains Buddhahood, after one attains Buddhahood. So that pure residence is even now being vividly visualized and being gotten used to and that pure residence is called, normally called a palace or mansion and literally called the unfathomable house, unfathomable mansion. And regarding the pure body, the second purity, that is to visualize and get get used to one’s body being the body of a deity and with these any deity of any of the four classes of tantra and this one specifically requires requires the practitioner before doing that practice to receive the empowerment of any of the respective tantra classes, and that’s called the pure body. And the pure enjoyment.
So previously we said pure offering and this one now is corrected as saying pure enjoyment. This one is the third purity where one involves or one is doing practices which involves making offering to the front generated deity and to the self as generated as the deity called self generated deity and making offerings. And these offerings are not offered in the ordinary substance or form. Let’s say if one is offering a roti Indian bread then it’s not just offered as ordinary bread and likewise if one is offering fruit it’s not offered as ordinary fruit. Firstly, one has to purify, normally called transform.
So one has to purify them into emptiness and from that state of emptiness it is conjoined or combined as being an inseparability in the aspect of bliss and emptiness and that bliss and emptiness together having the nature together with that offering substance is offered to whichever one is going to offer and offerings constitute such offerings like the normal feet washing, mouth rinsing, flower, incense and so forth. And the sixth what are called objects of the sense like the form, smell, taste and so forth and what are called secret offerings, outer offering, inner offering, secret offering, and offering of suchness and so forth. And these offerings are not just offered in a very small size. One offer is being completely filling the whole expanse of the space. And that’s called pure enjoyment.
And the fourth one one is called pure activity in which one in which one the practitioner generates oneself as the deity arranges the mantras, or sets of syllables of mantra around one’s heart and recites the mantra, normally called the activity called mantra recitation and with that recitation of mantra, the practitioner visualizes countless offering deities or goddesses emitted out who makes countless offerings to the Buddhas and the Buddhas’ blessings are drawn back, visualizes being drawn back and absorbed into oneself and also one visualizes from those syllables around one’s heart countless rays being emitted, touching the sentient beings, purifying their negativities and fulfilling their wishes and ultimately leading or placing them to the state of the state of Vajradhāra Buddhahood. And that’s called the pure activity, and therefore, these four are called the four purities. So tonight we stop here. After this much, there isn’t much time. Some of you might be feeling tired but still there about five, ten minutes for question and answer.
So it was that presuming first before deciding the topic, I was told that it would be the members, the older student who had initiation and afterward it came to be known as a public so it looks like the real one has to be with empowerments before. So you have questions five ten minutes. So the question was like last time there was talk about was the questions to be announced to people. So the question was the four purities have been heard before but in different order but still would Rinpoche’s order would be according to the practice and Rinpoche says yes but still to be precise in practice maybe first you visualize the celestial mansion and then you visualize the celestial deity and then you make offerings and that would be good. And tonight’s explanation, Rinpoche explained in a way easy for people to understand.
Do the visualizations rely on secondary mind? And so the question was the the visualizations of the highest yoga tantra, will it depend on secondary mind or or primary mind? And is that right? And Rinpoche’s answer was yes once there is a secondary mind there will have to be an accompanying primary mind. So it’s always same when there will have to be an accompanying primary mind.
You don’t use secondary mind if you depend on the primary mind. Realize the primary mind? No. That’s what it does. Mhmm.
The no. In the realization of the, what I call, highest yoga tantra, will it depend on the secondary mind? The realization of the primary mind that depends on the secondary mind. So where does the what we call highest yoga tantra comes in here? The yoga of tantra.
In the system of highest yoga tantra. No. So when there is a primary mind, is just a what I call a rough comprehension or rough perception of the object. So let’s say with the flower if the primary mind is focused on the flower then the primary mind roughly perceives the flower But regarding the details of the flower like the blue color and the shape of the flower all those details will have to be known or will have to be perceived by the accompanying of a secondary mind. Therefore the primary mind or the primary mind understands the nature, literally called the entity of the thing and the secondary mind, the functions and the particularities of the thing or the object.
Is is the right question? Secondary mind is the deluded mind in that case? No it’s not necessary if the mind primary mind is virtuous then on the secondary mind along with that will have to be virtuous and if the primary mind is afflictive or the secondary mind is afflictive then the secondary mind will have to be afflictive. And so in in what context? All.
All. In all. Everyday or any any any primary mind. Or Primary mind. And Primary that primary mind.
Mind is it more than nature? The Sages in India, they give it that So that Buddha nature in Tibetan or technically we call the lineage so Buddha lineage or Buddha seed, so that lineage is not with the Buddha because it’s already enlightened but it will have to be Buddha nature or the lineage will have to be with sentient beings because they are yet to be enlightened. But still the Tibetan word Rick has two work application first being referred in the case of lineage or Buddha nature and second in the five words normally translated as five families but still the same Tibetan word. And in that case we can say in the second case Maitreya, Ratnasambhava, in that case Dharmakāya, in Vajrasattva will have a rik or lineage in the sense of a lineage of the five what’s normally called five Dhyāni Buddhas, Akṣobhya, Ratnasambhava, Amitābha, Amoghasiddhi, and Vairochana and so forth. So in meaning saying that Buddha in that state will not have what would Buddha nature.
The Buddha in that state will not have Buddha nature. Yeah. The reasoning being is already enlightened. The lineage is not in the enlightened continuum. So in the name in the mind stream of the Buddha that primary mind we will have to say it’s a mind which which understood or which perceive the nature of things without its particularities.
So in our sentient beings’ minds we can see there is Buddha nature in all aspects like bodhicitta mind, it is the primary mind and it is what call lineage, the Buddha nature. So primary mind what we call, of course, in the sense of principle mind not the original mind. Because in Tibetan we understand it as prime principal mind and then the entourage mind. Principal mind and the entourage mind. So primary not in the sense of a work or the most beginning one.
In danger of becoming insane using this in the so-called secret mantra practice. So that’s right because in this practice, one has to what I call intensively meditate for whole duration of time consistently day after day, day after day and because it extends for many days the meditation, the mind in meditation, the practitioner in meditation his mind is drawn inside and because his mind is drawn inside and because the mind being inseparable from wind, when the mind is drawn in the wind also gathers inside the body. And the wind being so powerful if it is not able to be handled or controlled properly then the slight changes in the movement of the powerful wind, what I call causes a lot of problems like insanity and so forth. And whenever there is any possibility of such problems arising and also even on a normal or general basis it is quite advisable to attend to a lama or teacher especially a skillful one who has had a lot of experiences in such meditation previously that to attend to such teachers and receive instruction how to control the air because on with the with the air on the so normally called the wind.
So with the wind there is a whole what are called different different things about it concerning it like how it should be absorbed, how it should be released, and how it should be directed outward and so forth. So it’s good to attend to a lama and expert lama and receive the instruction and then call put into practice in accordance to what exactly the lama advises. With such practices, there are whole whole thing which come at this point and such solutions as what are called the solution of skillfulness and so forth. Maybe it’s quite good if you can work or study more into these different solutions. And this fact is the reason why Tibetans consider their lamas, their teachers very important because it is due to the instruction, precise skillful instruction of the teachers that they are able to put into practice and be away from such possible problems and make progress.
So in this way would be good to attend to a skillful teacher and as well along with those instruction being put into practice along with that make supplication with fervent prayers to the Three Jewels and also as well engage in such practices which are principally constitute in accumulating merits. So any more questions? So first we recite the prayer which relates to making prayers for His Holiness the Dalai Lama and along with that we pray that all the holders of the path, the teaching may have long life in order to be of benefit to us.