Wylie:Slob dpon klu sgrub kyis mdzad pa'i mchod rten drung thob
སློབ་དཔོན་ཀླུ་སྒྲུབ་ཀྱིས་མཛད་པའི་མཆོད་རྟེན་དྲུང་ཐོབ་
slob dpon klu sgrub kyis mdzad pa'i mchod rten drung thob
Obtained in Front of a Stupa Composed by Ācārya Nāgārjuna
Obtained in Front of a Stūpa is a mahāmudrā instruction based on two passages taken from the Guhyasamāja Tantra, which according to Drakpa Gyaltsen form the basis for Saraha’s Treasury of Couplets and Nāgārjuna’s Commentary on Bodhicitta. Relatively brief, the main focus of the text is identifying the nature of the mind, free from arising, abiding, and ceasing—an inexpressible union of clarity and emptiness. Amezhap’s Effortless Accomplishment of the Two Benefits does not specify a deity to meditate on with this instruction, which may account for its usage in other Sakya systems when explaining the meditation of mahāmudrā. He outlines the text in five topics: (1) ascertaining the view, (2) accumulating merit, (3), controlling the mind, (4), introduction to reality, and (5) post-realization conduct.
Drakpa Gyaltsen’s account of the origin of this instruction begins with Nāgārjuna resisting the amorous advances of the queen of King Dejö Zangpo,2 much to her anger and subsequent false accusations. Accompanied by Āryadeva, Nāgārjuna flees south to Śrī Parvata, in the region of Andhra Pradesh, where he meets his guru, Saraha, in front of a stupa. Amezhap adds the small detail of Saraha asking them, “Have you not ascertained the mind?”
Saraha is an elusive figure of great importance in Tibetan Buddhism. He is the direct source for the Laghusaṃvara3 and instrumental in transmitting the Guhyasamāja to Nāgārjuna.4 Amezhap gives one account of Saraha in the Amazing Storehouse of Jewels, a history of Guhyasamāja, in which Saraha is described as one of four sons of a brahmin, who ordains with Arhat Rāhula, the Buddha’s son, taking the name Rāhulabhadra. He becomes the abbot of Vikramśila. Rāhulabhadra hears that a king from South India named Visukalpa has retrieved the Guhyasamāja Tantra and others from a yoginī in Oḍḍiyāna. Rāhulabhadra requests teachings from Visukalpa, receives them, practices them, and becomes renowned as Saraha. 5 The Amazing Storehouse of Jewels further relates that Nāgārjuna was eight years of age when he first meets Saraha/Rāhulabhadra at Nālandā, who grants him novice ordination. Later, Nāgārjuna fully ordains under Saraha/Rāhulabhadra, and receives the empowerment of Guhyasamāja and the explanation of the path.
- Translator's notes
- Note from Ringu Tulku
- The Text Written by Nagarjuna Called "Found Near the Stupa".
- Other notes
- Genre from Richard Barron's Catalog
- Instruction manual
- Genre from dkar chag
- grol byed khrid
- BDRC Link
- VolumeI1CZ3968
- BDRC Content Information
- No note on contents
- Commentary(s) of this Text in the DNZ
- 'phags pa klu sgrub kyi mchod rten drung thob kyi khrid yig bkra shis bil+ba'i ljon bzang
Information about Unicode Tibetan and the digitization of this text
As the only available unicode Tibetan text at the time, Nitartha International's version of the Gdams ngag mdzod Paro Edition of the gdams ngag mdzod is provided here. However, note that it has not been thoroughly edited and that there may also be mistakes introduced through the conversion process. Eventually we will provide a fully edited version of the entire Shechen Edition, entered and edited multiple times by Pulahari Monastery in Nepal, but as of fall 2017 that project has not been finished. Note that the folio numbers that appear throughout were added by Nitartha Input Center at the time of input.
Provided by Nitartha International Document Input Center. Many thanks to Person:Namdak, Tenzin and Person:Wiener, G. for help with fonts and conversion.
