Wylie:Chos drug gi man ngag
The significance of Tilopa’s Esoteric Instructions on the Six Dharmas is twofold: it contains his instructions on the six dharmas, and it identifies which instructions he received from which human teachers. As stated earlier, the biographies of Tilopa vary on the sequence of the major events of his life. However, if we accept the account in the Biographies of the Wish-Fulfilling Gems, Tilopa first relied on human gurus, as he says:
I have these human gurus:
Nāgārjuna, Caryāpā, Lavapa,
and Subhaginī,
who are the gurus of my four entrusted transmissions.[1]
He also said later in his life:
I have no human guru:
my guru is the Omniscient One.[2]
And finally, he proclaimed:
I have neither father nor mother:
I am Cakrasaṃvara, sublime bliss.
I have neither preceptor nor ācārya:
I am a self-born buddha.
I have neither grammar nor valid cognition:
my science of reasoning wells up on its own.
The body, speech, and mind of Saṃvara
and my body, speech, and mind are inseparable.
I go in great bliss.[3]
Esoteric Instructions on the Six Dharmas records the instructions Tilopa received from Caryāpā, Nāgārjuna, Lavapa, and Subhaginī, or Sukhasiddhi. The text does not name the instructions, but they are identifiable as follows, paired with the teacher and in the order that they appear in this text:
- Caryāpā caṇḍālī instructions
- Nāgārjuna illusory form instructions
- Lavapa dream instructions
- Nāgārjuna luminosity instructions
- Sukhasiddhi bardo instructions
- Sukhasiddhi transference instructions
Curiously, even though this text is clear about the sources of these instructions, subsequent accounts in the biographies of Tilopa do not concur with it or necessarily each other.[4]
Esoteric Instructions on the Six Dharmas is not included in the canon catalogs of Chomden Raldri or Butön Rinchen Drup, though it is included in one of the two canon catalogs of the third Karmapa and is found in five Tengyur redactions (Peking, Gaden, Derge, Cone, and Narthang).
Transmission lineage received by Jamgön Kongtrul. Vajradhara to Jñānaḍākinī, Vajrapāṇi, Tilopa, and then the same as previously stated for the Ganges Mahāmudrā.[5]
- Other notes
- Genre from Richard Barron's Catalog
- Instruction manual
- Genre from dkar chag
- gzhung rtsa 'grel
- BDRC Link
- VolumeI1CZ3969
- BDRC Content Information
- No note on contents
- Other Translations
- Morrell, Jerry, trans. The Life of Tilopa and the Ganges Mahamudra. Auckland, New Zealand: Zhyisil Chokyi Ghatsal Trust, 2002. (translation of "phyag chen gang+gA ma")
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 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 Lama Tenam and Gerry Wiener for help with fonts and conversion.
