Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. Ven Jampa Ignyen walks through the detailed cosmological geography that underpins mandala offerings in this 45-minute teaching. He systematically explains Mount Meru and its concentric structure — seven golden mountains separated by lakes, surrounded by four continents (each with distinct shapes, inhabitants, and colors), the celestial abodes of the desire realm, and the four symbolic wealth objects positioned at each cardinal direction: the precious mountain, wish-granting tree, wish-fulfilling cow, and unplanted harvest. Throughout, he emphasizes the practical core: when piling a mandala, visualize all of this in meticulous detail, even though modern observation cannot perceive it. He addresses the objection that invisible things cannot exist or matter, arguing that visualization itself gives the offering its power and benefit. The teaching is pitched at practitioners who have already learned mandala offerings and seek to deepen their understanding of the visualization framework. The talk breaks off at the piling instructions, with the teacher indicating continuation in a future session.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 04 MO 1996 05 15.mp3
UUID: 7ca36514-3719-4748-ad59-b5f201a2db47
Teacher: Ven Jampa Ignyen
Collection: Mandala Offerings (Ven Jampa Ignyen)
Date: 1996-05-15
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 44.6 minutes
Words: ~2,176
Full full floor and which is half of that is under the water and half of that is above the water. So then around the mountain, there are the seven, what do you call, seven layers of mountains, one after the other. And and then, like, between each of the mountain, those seven mountains, which is outside around the mountain. In between each mountain, there are the the seven lakes or the seven waters, which is known as yeah. The seven waters.
So these seven, what do you say, like playful water or lakes, which are known as the internal ocean or internal lake. So then outside the last mountain, there again, the vast ocean, the oceans that we say, the great ocean. That is outside that mountain. The last seven mountains. So of the four storeys or four floors of the starting from the beginning.
So from the bottom top. So which from bottom top, like at the bottom starts at the gods of the and like starting the four great kings. Mhmm. And, the very bottom is called the yakṣa or one holding a golden vessel. Holding a golden basin, that’s the guard which, let’s say, So then the second floor up, which is another, again, which known as holding a golden rosary, like made out of berries.
So then on the third level, going up, up, on the third level, there’s again a god, one known as always drunk. Always, yeah, always drunk. So then on the fourth level, then the four great kings, which are like in each, four great kings which is residing in each So on the then on the very tip of the Mount Nou, there there is the the heaven of thirty three. So this called the heaven of thirty three because there are thirty three gods. So those are the thirty three gods are known as the eight Vasus.
And then eight, what do you call it, Rudra gods. Like a Like a such as Shiva and and others that have eight Rudras. And then there are, I wanna say, the twelve. Like like, I say, the god Vishnu and and others, there are total of twelve.
And then and then they are also known as the son and the daughter of god. So so because of the these thirty three gods, it’s called the heaven of thirty three. Also, it’s another reason is that there are thirty three palace of God. It’s it’s given this name. So then at the top of Mount Meru which that valley or that city is known as, what do you call it, the whole city is known as the city of beauty.
So so then the center of that that city At center of that city is the palace of the Indra god. And palace of yeah. The palace of palace of Indra. So the four points on the tip of the mountain level, there are again four palace which in the is vajrapani is one who resides in the palace. So the purpose of vajrapani residing there on that four corners is to, what do say, to stop gods, what was happening in the heaven of thirty three, to stop from being careless.
So so then above the the heaven of thirty three is again the the non-combat heaven. Yeah. That’s all of the land of god. So so sorry. This non-fight or non-war.
Sorry. The land of that gods. Below that, the gods fight each other. But from that upwards, the gods don’t fight. So, peace.
So so so then above the above that, the Tuśita, heaven, and then, emanation above that. And then, controlling controlling dissemination. So this, what do you call, the non war, the Tuśita and Nirmanarati, the enjoying emanation and controlling others emanation. These four are, how to say, not touching the ground. They are in this space.
So then on top of that, above that is the seventeen levels of the form realm gods. Arm span, like two thousand arm span is one yojana, that’s the measurement. What unit? So it’s a unit of measure. Eighty thousand yojanas is the size of the model.
Somewhere in the level of four hundred yojanas is where the sun and moon, what they call, rotates. So when we look into this measurement or formation of the mountain and the eight, what do you call, mountains. And the eight lakes. Then the outer circle, there’s the oceans. So, with our eyes we won’t be able to see it, but it doesn’t mean that if we don’t see it, it doesn’t exist.
So those who don’t accept or believe in Mount Meru is because they said they can’t see it. So, Mount Meru, like above the oceans are all where the gods of desire realm resides. And where the gods of desire realm reside, those places with airplane, we cannot reach there. So, anyway, whether Mount Meru may exist or not, when you make mandala offering, you should imagine that all this exist. When we pile up, we first pile for the Mount Meru ground, one pile, and then the circle which is the iron fence.
And then thirdly, we do the third piling which is for the the Mount Meru. Yep. So so then while you pile the third piling, which is for the Mount Meru, in your visualization as a mandala, you visualize the mandala which is circled by the seven golden mountains and the seven lakes and then the gods of the desire realms. So you visualize all that all all those. So for that purpose of this explanation, So so then you start at the the eastern where you’re looking in this sheet where on your side, that’s eastern, you pile one, which is the continent.
So so when when we the direction, eastern direction, when one is making mandala offering, at this time, we we have to we’re, like, eastern sort of faces towards the person who is making mandala offering. So so the eastern continent where where it where it is formed is that it’s formed outside the just outside the the seventh, say, seventh wall, like, the mountain, sorry. The seventh martin, outside the seventh martin, which is formed in the the external portion or the outside portion. So then the shape of the continent as it is written here, the, what do call, a half moon shape. And then on the south, then you you pile make one piling, which is the the southern continent, Jambudvipa.
And then west, you pile one, which is the northern continent that is. And then you part the northern continent, which is So the eastern continent is known as the tall, which is tall body land. If you look in the page here, the tall body land which means that the being, the size of the human in that continent is double our size in height. So then the southern continent which is the Jambudvipa, the English translation, the rose apple land, which how this name is given is that there was this special, I would say, a tree, fruit tree which its fruit fell into the ocean and what’s it made this noise, jambu. And then given this name, Jampoo and Deepa, which is continent and which is island which is formed in the ocean.
So so that the the shape of the the southern continent or Jambudvipa. I mean as this world, world, it has a round shape. But in the the Abhidharmakośa of Vasubandhu text it says the shape of it is like a cart. The shape of a cart. And this is supposed to be the shape of the cart.
So the space on the southern continent, the sky, it is blue. That is because the surface that which is facing towards southern continent is blue and that reflection made the sky blue on the southern So so then Western continent, which is the cattle enjoyment land, which which the being there enjoys cattle. So then the northern continent which is unpleasant sound which which is said just before dying, like seven days before the death, the being hears the noise or the sound of death. So said, I would say, so it’s given this name unpleasant unpleasant continent. So it has the yellow color and it’s a square shape.
So, then the rest of the subcontinent, are the two subcontinent on the eastern continent. The first one called Deha and that is on the left side of the eastern continent and then the Deha which is on the left side of the eastern continent, you pilot this up. And then the rest is similar to the right and left side of the continent. You pile the two subcontinents. So so then then it continues which the precious mountain, the wish granting tree, the wish fulfilling cow, and the unplanted harvest.
These are the four which is the wealth of each continent. So so then you you pile the world, which is the precious mountain inside the eastern continent. Just just yeah. Inside the the eastern continent. The inner part of the yeah.
Like, the eastern continent. So the precious mountain is main wealth which is which is of the eastern being of the eastern continent. So the precious mountain to which are not a normal mountain but the mountain which is formed by precious stones like the eight precious stones and that of eight auspicious signs, like, they form this mountain. And if you offer with that imagination imagining that and you offer that you you receive that benefit. So then next, the wish granting tree.
That is the the main wealth of the beings of the southern continent. So then, wish granting tree to, like visualizing a special tree. It’s not as an ordinary tree but tree formed by precious stones, like leaves, the branches, the roots all are formed by precious stones. So so the the wish wish granting tree is in in the southern continent. That is this universe, this continent.
And you say that’s the main world. And if we ask where which place it where is it or in which place this which ground tree is? So it is said that the center of this universe, the southern continent, is Bodh Gaya, is known as the center of the universe. So in the Abhidharma text, it says that from the center which is Bodh Gaya, from there on the direction of north, like there are seven black mountains. And beyond these seven black mountains, there are this lake, a lake named So, like measuring from the Anyway, I’m not sure.
It’s on that direction of Mount Everest, which is probably the Mount Everest or another mountain. The name of the mountain is Kang Tise. And from that if you measure then like fifty yojanas again. You reach to that lake, which is the So then, again, and then from there, like there’s again ten yojanas which is in between and that is the place where, that’s again a lake or a big ocean which where one of the Naga king resides. And and So the shore of that ocean, the tree or the wish granting tree, I would say, locate.
So then on the west, you have the the wish fulfilling cow. So, this wish fulfilling cow too, It’s like an ordinary cow which is also formed by all precious stones like silver and all those precious stones. And, And, we’re visualizing that, which the horns are precious stones and bones and everything. And we visualize that and making offering. So so the like, the horns are golden horns and what do call all what do you call ribs or bones are precious stones.
Geshe-la is saying that there won’t be any cow like that. But it’s it’s okay to to visualize that. Yeah. So it’s similar like a visualization. We we don’t have, like, one hundred thousand dollars with us, but we’re just imagining that we have that and we make offering, then we have the benefits, we receive the benefits.
So so then on the north, that again the unplanted harvest. That one, that’s the main wealth of the northern continent. So the unplanted harvest which is the crops, which is the one which you don’t need to sow the seed for that. It just grows. So the human beings of the first lived there in the first kalpa, that those human beings who at that time, they don’t need to plant anything.
All the things that they enjoy is just wild crops which grow without needing to plant. Later, beings became more degenerated And and then then then everything, you know, they enjoy the need to happen that they need to plant it. So so we’ll stop here because we won’t complete. Do our next another teaching and we will try to finish next teachings. He said that this is what he set it up here.
That’s how we should pile it up.