Author: Jamgon Mipham
Translator(s)/ Editors(s): Padmakara Translation Group
Publisher: Shechen Publications
Year: 2008
Language: English
Pages: 127
ISBN/UPC (if available): 8174721738
Description
The Commentary translated in these pages is unusual and rare. But if the commentary is a rarity, its subject matter the seven – line invocation of Padmasambhava is one of the best-known prayers in the Tibetan Buddhist world.
The overall significance of the Seven-Line Prayer is perhaps best appreciated in relation to a practice called guru-yoga, or “union with the nature of the guru”. The purpose of guru-yoga is to purify and deepen the student’s relationship with his or her teacher. It is introduced as one of the preliminary practices and it remain crucial-in fact, its importance increases-as one progresses through the more advanced levels of the tantric path.
The cultivation of devotion to the guru and the blending of one’s mind with his or her enlightened mind is, in the words of Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche, “the most vital and necessary of all practices and is in itself the surest and fastest way to reach the goal of enlightenment.”
Regarding the origin of the commentary, Mipham refers in the colophon to an event that triggered the abrupt appearance in his mind of the hidden meaning of the prayer. It is interesting to note that the language Mipham uses suggests that the commentary itself is not an ordinary composition but perhaps a treasure teaching, specifically a “mind-treasure”, or gongter.
COMMENTS
“Thanks to the marvelous wisdom and learning of Mipham Rinpoche, we have a commentary that lays before us all the different ways in which the Seven-Line Prayer can be understood. It shows how this precious invocation contains the whole of the Secret Mantra in concentrated form”.
-JIGME KHYENTSE RINPOCHE
“The Seven-Line Prayer is the most majestic of all prayers to Guru Padmasambhava the Buddha for our time. It has been cherished over the centuries as the most powerful way to invoke his blessings. How wonderful that we have this commentary, one of Mipham Rinpoche’s most inspiring works, to elucidate these sacred verses and reveal their profound meaning”.
-SOGYAL RINPOCHE, author of The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying
“Jamgon Mipham Rinpoche’s Pema Karpo is a beautiful and essential text describing the outer, inner, and secret ways that the wisdom in Vajrayana manifests as Padmasambhava. This new translation will be of great benefit to those traveling on the path of tantra.”
-THE SAKYONG, JAMGON MIPHAM RINPOCHE, author of turning the Mind into an Ally and Ruling your World
“The Vajra Seven-Line Prayer enshrines the most sacred supplication to Guru Padmasambhava. White Lotus elucidates its five layers of meaning as revealed by the eminent scholar Mipham the Great. This is a prayer to and meditation on Guru Padmasambhava, the self-present primordial wisdom of the mind, the changeless great bliss of the vajra-body, the innate radiance of wisdom light-buddhahood.”
-TULKU THONDUP RINPOCHE, author of Peaceful Death, joyful Rebirth and The Healing Power of Mind
Contents
Foreword by Jigme Khyentse Rinpoche
Translator’s Introduction
WHITE LOTUS
Prologue
An explanation of the outer, literal meaning of the Seven-Line Prayer
An explanation of the Seven-Line Prayer according to its hidden meaning
An explanation of the Seven-Line Prayer according to its teachings of the path liberation
An explanation of the Seven-Line Prayer according to the path of skillful means
An explanation of the Seven-line Prayer according to the general perfection stage of the unsurpassable Secret Mantra
An explanation of the Seven-Line Prayer according to the innermost, secret Great Perfection, the Heart-Essence of Luminosity
An explanation of the Seven-Line Prayer according to the conclusive pith instructions related to the achievement of the practice of the paths of liberation and skillful means previously explained
A brief explanation of how the foregoing exposition may be implemented as a practice
Colophon
THE RAIN OF BLESSINGS
A GURU-YOGA BASED ON THE SEVEN-LINE PRAYER
Notes
Glossary
Bibliography
Index