The Collected Works of Chogyam Trungpa: Volume One (74 page)

genyen
(Tib.): One who has received the primary ordination; this is imparted at one level to lay adherents and at another to celibates training for an eventual monastic ordination in the full sense.

geshe
(Tib.; Skt.
upasaka
): The highest scholastic qualification in the Geluk and Sakya orders; a “doctorate” in religious studies.

getsül
(Tib.): A novice monk.

gönkhang
(Tib.): “House of the protective divinities”; a special temple reserved for certain rites.

gönpo
(Tib.): A protective aspect of divinity.

guru
(Skt.): Teacher. He continues in his search. As long as he does not go beyond his limitations, he can impart spiritual knowledge to other people. A guru must be prepared to regard his students as his teachers also and then true communication and relationship continues. When true communication takes place, there is a meeting of the minds beyond dualistic concepts. When a student has gone through the honeymoon affair with the individual guru, he begins to realize that the guru aspect plays a very important part in everyday life. He begins to perceive the colorful, dramatic, and shocking demonstration of the guru’s teaching in everything. The guru gives the student back his own wisdom, but as it is received through the agency of someone else, spiritual pride is kept down.

Gyalwa Karmapa
: The head lama of the Karma Kagyü order.
Gyalwa
is a Tibetan title meaning “victorious”; sometimes the more exalted title Gyalwang (“victorious lord”) is used.
Karma
means “action” and here refers to the activities of a buddha.

heruka
(Skt.): The masculine principle in tantric symbolism. The heruka plays the partner in the dakini’s dance. The translation of
tragthung
, the equivalent word in Tibetan, is “blood drinker.” This energy principle is called blood drinker because it is the energy of skillful means: that which makes the situation powerful and creative, that which drinks the blood of clinging, doubts, and duality. Skillful means is the active aspect of knowledge and is spontaneous and precise in each situation.

hinayana
(Skt.): The “lesser vehicle,” contrasted with mahayana, the “greater vehicle.” The former corresponds to the preliminary stages of the spiritual way. (This particular terminology belongs to the northern schools of Buddhism in China, Japan, and Tibet; the southern schools of Sri Lanka, Burma, and Thailand do not use these terms.)

Kadam
(Tib.): The school founded by the Indian saint Atisha Dipankara, who came to Tibet toward the middle of the eleventh century. In this school special stress is laid on scriptural instruction and on the practice of loving-kindness. The Geluk school was a later revival of the Kadam.

Kagyü
(Tib.): The “Oral Tradition,” the second oldest school of Buddhism in Tibet; whence also Kagyüpa, a follower of this school. Its characteristic teachings go back to Marpa and Milarepa, two saints who lived in the eleventh century; the former obtained his doctrine from Naropa, the head of the great Buddhist center of Nalanda in what is now the Indian province of Bihar. The Kagyü order has numerous subdivisions, of which the Karma Kagyü is one. Its present form was given to the whole order by Gampopa, a direct disciple of Milarepa.

kalung
(Tib.): “Ritual authorization” allowing one to engage in a particular method or to read the books relating thereto; sometimes
kalung
indicates permission to recite a certain mantra.

karma
(Skt., “action”): In Buddhist parlance this word usually refers to “action and its concordant reaction,” cause of successive rebirth in ever-varying states of existence according to the merit or demerit thus incurred. Karma may be said to correspond to the “immanent justice” of the universe. In relation to any given being, karma is the “fate” that being has inherited from past causes and modified in its present state of existence, thus determining the nature of a future existence in the world. Suffering is the recurrent price of this process; buddhahood is deliverance therefrom through an understanding of the real nature of things, including that of the karmic process itself.

Karma is created from failing to see true egolessness. It results from the vicious circle of continually searching for security. This seems not to permit working with an enlightened attitude to prevent chain reactions. It is precise to the minute details and both body and mind are related to karmic cause and effect. As long as this self-defeating neurotic tendency continues, cause and effect of karma are perpetuated. There are other schools of thought that believe that the entire karmic force is predestined. There is a world karma and also national, family, and individual karma.

knot of eternity
: Symbol of meditation or the mind of the enlightened one. It is the never-ending discriminating awareness of wisdom. It is the state of being fully true, a continuous flow with no beginning and no end.

kshanti
(Skt.): Forbearance in the sense of seeing the situation and seeing that it is right to forbear and to develop patience. It is patience with intelligence, which is not put off by frivolous situations. It is forbearance that has the inspiration to continue and is based on the dana paramita, the perfection of generosity. Whenever a situation is presented, one should get into it without hesitation rather than speculating in the ethical sense. It is a question of acting truly, neither for the benefit of ego nor in terms of purifying oneself in an attempt to make an exhibition. It means allowing enough space to see the other person’s point of view without the distorted filter of ego.

lama
(Tib.): Literally “superior,” by derivation a “spiritual teacher,” the equivalent of
guru
; such a teacher may be a monk or a layman. Therefore, not all lamas are monks, though in India and the West the title is often loosely applied in that sense.

maha ati
(Skt.):
See
atiyana.

mahamudra
(Skt.): The great symbol. It is one of the ultimate practices of meditation in which all experiences are transmuted into transcendental knowledge and skillful means. From the primordial intelligence and energy that arise, there comes great luminosity so that the vividness of experience becomes the display of the mandala.

mahayana
(Skt.): The “great vehicle” or “great way” that leads to enlightenment, to the final awakening.

mandala
(Skt.): Structure or a group. The Tibetan word is
kgil khor
, which means “center and periphery.” It is the unification of many vast elements into one through the experience of meditation. It is the process by which seeming chaos and complexities are simplified into patterns. It is usually presented in a diagram with a central figure (a personification of the buddha principle) surrounded by other elements. The simplification of the center is experienced as the basic sanity of buddha nature. Although the surrounding elements seem to be in chaos, one discovers in the evolution of the meditation that they are related to this center as well. They are the various colors of emotions that are transmuted into the experience of a unified field.

mantra
(Skt.): The way of transmuting energy through sound that is expressed by movement, breathing, and speech. It is the quintessence of different energies expressed in sound. For instance, hum is one-pointedness and penetration. It is incorrect to use mantra frivolously for some kind of excitement. It is rather a straightforward meditation under the guidance of a master.

mudra
(Skt.): A symbol in the wider sense of gesture or action. It is the inspiring color of phenomena. It is also a symbol expressed with the hands to state for oneself and others the quality of different moments of meditation, such as touching the earth with the right hand as a witness to Buddha’s freedom from emotional and mental frivolousness.

nirmanakaya
(Skt.): The “emanation body” of the buddhas; the earthly form of the Buddha in this or any other world cycle; also, symbolic manifestations of the dharma, such as sacred images, paintings, and books.

Nyingma
(Tib.): The earliest of the four schools of Tibetan Buddhism; the word itself means “ancient.” The patron of the order is Padmasambhava, who brought the Buddhist traditions to Tibet.

paramitas
(Skt.): Six transcendental actions that are attributes of buddha activity. In perfecting them, one transcends the notion of a centralized ego.

prajna
(Skt.): Primordial intelligence, which is the key of the bodhisattva’s actions in dealing with practical details of earth and space. He develops such a sharp and penetrating sense that he can cut through the conceptualized notion of duality and see the simplicity. Prajna is that quality which culminates in acting spontaneously with the help of the other paramitas with such precision that the spinal cord of duality is cut.

prasena
(Skt.): A form of divination practiced only by initiates. Chögyam Trungpa was well known as an exceptional master of prasena and was consulted by many high-ranking Tibetan teachers (including His Holiness the Dalai Lama), who asked him to perform a prasena, or divination, for them.

reincarnation
: May more precisely be termed “rebirth” because the accumulation of feelings, perceptions, impulses, and consciousness that are the constituents of so-called spirit do not live through as one solid thing, but are constantly changing. This state of consciousness does not belong exclusively to human beings and is not determined by the physical body. Rebirth into different lives is possible. It is a natural karmic force. (See also appendix 2 of
Born in Tibet
.)

rinpoche
(Tib., “precious one”): A title given to incarnate lamas, senior abbots, and occasionally even kings.

Sakya
(Tib.): The third in chronology of the monastic foundations of Tibet. The chief center (whence comes the name) lies some seventy miles to the north of Mount Everest, but this order also has many adherents in eastern Tibet.

samadhi
(Skt.): A state of spiritual concentration; a yogic trance. The term is also used for the death of any spiritual person.

samanera
(Pali):
See
shramanera.

samatha
(Pali):
See
shamatha.

sambhogakaya
(Skt.): The “fruition body” or “body of bliss” of the buddhas; the link between the inexpressible essence and its manifestation in the visible buddhas; the various aspects of wisdom, compassion, and other divine names or qualities.

samsara
(Skt.): The round of existence; the indefinite play of interacting cause and effect that expresses itself in the birth and death of beings with its incidental suffering.

sangha
(Skt.):The “congregation” founded by the Buddha; his dedicated followers; the whole order of Buddhist monks and nuns. In the mahayana, this term embraces the whole company of saints in all states of existence.

serto
(Tib.; also sertok): A golden crest ornament to indicate dignity, placed on the roofs of sacred edifices and houses; people of importance also put it on the heads of their horses. See illustration in
Born in Tibet
, chapter 7.

shamatha
(Skt.): Mindfulness practice. A basic meditation practice common to most schools of Buddhism, the aim of which is to tame the mind.

shila
(Skt.): Morality or discipline. The excitement of the discovery or glimpse of the awakened state of mind should not be abused. One must not miss a moment of its inspiration. Equally, one must develop, with the help of panoramic awareness, stability and precision of insight and a knowledge of situations, so that the conduct of the bodhisattva is dignified.

shramanera
(Skt.): A monk undergoing training. Many monks remain at this degree and do not take the higher ordination as bhikshus.

shunyata
(Skt.): “Emptiness.” A completely open and unbounded clarity of mind characterized by groundlessness and freedom from all conceptual frameworks. It could be called “openness,” since
emptiness
can convey the mistaken notion of a state of voidness or blankness. In fact, shunyata is inseparable from compassion and all other awakened qualities.

siddhas
(Skt.): Great yogis who have achieved the experience of mahamudra.
See also
crazy wisdom.

sila
(Pali):
See
shila.

skillful means
: The active masculine principle on the feminine ground of prajna. It is not based purely on ego-inclined common sense. If one relates to open space, then his way of perceiving the display of apparent phenomena is colorful and inspiring, so that he doesn’t hesitate to deal with the situation. He simply sees the open situation, the way of unconditioned appropriate response to the nowness.

stupa
(Skt.): A symbolic monument, roughly bell-shaped, common to the Buddhist world from early times. In its Tibetan and kindred forms, the tiers and other details of a stupa denote various stages of spiritual realization.