Chapter 53 - Final Initiations

After the Tséwang Phiyang Lama continued his daily instructions and finally crowned them by giving us in short succession two esoteric initiations which completed the circle (Maṇḍala) of our previous initiations and introduced us to many new aspects of meditative practice, belonging to the most ancient tradition of Tibetan Buddhism as preserved by the Nyingmapas (lit.: 'The Old Ones'). Thus we began to understand the various esoteric aspects of Padmasambhava, which have created such a sorry confusion among Western scholars, who neither understood the symbolic language of Padmasambhava's biography nor that of his teachings, and who mixed up descriptions of mystic experience with historical facts and legendary accretions.

In these initiations all the psychic centres (cakra) were employed and activated, a process which I have tried to describe to some extent in my Foundations of tibetan Mysticism. The different forms in which Padmasambhava appears depend on the psychic level from which he is viewed or on which he is experienced. His name, `Lotus-born' indicates his spiritual birth from the lotus or one of the psychic centres in the movement of his enlightenment or in the process of his spiritual realisation, which has to be re-enacted by each of his devotees, i.e. by all who have been initiated into his teachings and his way of ultimate liberation.

Thus Phiyang Lama not only became the last of our Tibetan Gurus, but he gave us the unique opportunity of experiencing for ourselves the completeness and harmony of Tibetan Buddhist tradition, marked by the great streams of Nyingmapa, Kargyütpa, and Gelugpa hierarchies, each of which had contributed valuable religious experience to the mainstream of Buddhist life. Though some of the powerful monasteries had been drawn into political rivalries (an inevitable concomitant of power) which were utilised by nations and warlike tribes beyond the borders of Tibet and disturbed the peace of the country, the validity of different religious traditions was always recognised. Reformers like Atīśa, Tsongkhapa, and others never rejected the traditions of earlier sects, but tried to synthesise their teachings and only criticised the faults of those among their followers, who had fallen from the high standard of their own professed ideals, and insisted on a re-establishment of those standards and the personal integrity of every member of the clergy.

Before Phiyang Lama left Poo, he performed a very remarkable ceremony which culminated in a baptism or purification through fire, so to say a counterpart or natural complement to the Tséwang, the purification and spiritual renewal through the Water of Life. This ceremony (me-dbang) was remarkable for two things: for the unexpected interference of the local gods and for the way in which all the participants were actually enveloped by the flames of the fire, without anybody being hurt.

The procedure was as simple as it was ingenious and impressive. While Phiyang Lama intoned the mantras of consecration, he held an earthen bowl with fire in his left hand, and with the other he threw a fine incense powder (made of some local shrub or tree-bark) through the open Flame, issuing from the bowl. The powder ignited instantly, and being thrown in the direction of the devotees, who were sitting in a group before the Lama, the fire enveloped them for a moment in a flashlike flame that vanished before it could burn anybody.

However, the first part of the ritual was more important, and it was here where the gods of the locality stepped into action. The ritual was concerned with the warding off and destruction of evil forces by the sacrificial fire, which was lit over the Maṇḍala of the five Dhyāni buddhas, enclosed in a hexagram formed by two intersecting equilateral triangles, set in a square whose corners were protected by two vajra-hilted semicircular chopping-knives. The firewood was carefully built up around the Maṇḍala, and the whole structure rested on a raised platform in the centre of the open place in front of the Mani Temple. The Lama's throne stood with the back to the Mani Temple, facing the fire-altar, and the people sat around in a wide circle.

During the first part of the ceremony the Lama remained on his high seat, reciting mantras and invocations and wielding his magic dagger (phurbu) in various directions. He then descended from his throne and lit the sacrificial fire, into which ghee or oil was poured, so that it burned with a clear, smokeless flame. While chanting further invocations, he circled the sacred fire in a measured dance. In spite of his age and his heavy robes, he moved about with perfect ease, and every step and every mudra was in harmony with the rhythm of his chant. His deep voice never wavered, his movements never faltered. His body seemed to be carried by a force generated and guided by the mind and maintained by a state of unshakable concentration.

It was in the middle of this liturgical dance that we observed a stir among the people sitting at the foot of a row of chortens, which formed one side of the square. A tall man got up, his body trembling and his eyes fixed as if in a trance. The people around him were visibly perturbed, and we felt that something strange and unforeseen was going to happen, something that had to do with the struggle between invisible opposing forces. Was it that the forces of darkness felt challenged and had risen to contend for supremacy?

The man's movements became more convulsive and somebody whispered: 'He has been seized by one of the gods!' No doubt the man was possessed, and nobody dared to interfere when, as in a trance, he moved towards the fire-altar, confronting the Lama and imitating his movements, as if challenging or mocking him. Everybody was horrified.

If the man succeeded in breaking up the ritual, disaster might follow. Two superhuman powers seemed to face each other, measuring their strength. The tension became almost unbearable.

But the Lama, without missing a single step, without interrupting his incantations, moved on unperturbed, as if the possessed man were a mere phantom. The latter, however, persisted in his antics and handed to the Lama some scraps of paper or cloth, which he had snatched from one of the chortens. The Lama, without interrupting his movements, took them one by one and dropped them into the fire.

Now the spell was broken, and the possessed man rushed back towards the chortens and dashed his head against the stone foundation on which they stood, so that the blood spurted from his skull. It was a horrible sight, and we feared any moment to see the man's brains spilled on the ground. People now tried to hold him back and restrain him from killing himself; others were running about, shouting for wine and weapons to pacify the gods or whatever spirit had entered the man's body. His wife was weeping with fear. Apparently something was happening beyond anybody's control.

(picture of the Maṇḍala is not included in the text only version)

In the meantime, the sacred dance had come to an end, and now the Lama enquired into the matter and was told that the local gods apparently objected to the performance of the ritual, as they had inhabited this place since time immemorial, even before the advent of Buddhism. The Lama immediately understood the situation and agreed that the gods should speak through the possessed man, who was their appointed medium.

By now a bowl of wine (or chang) and the emblems of the gods in the form of various weapons had been brought. The medium drank the wine and pierced his cheeks with iron spikes, and finally placed two swords upright on the ground, inserted their sharp points into his eyes and, leaning on them, he thus supported the weight of his body. A slip or the slightest loss of balance and his eyes would be gouged out, while the swords would penetrate his brain. It was too gruesome to contemplate! If I had not seen even more gruesome things of this kind among the Aissaouas in Northern Africa -- I would not have believed my eyes.

After the medium had gone through all these tests of faith and devotion -- or whatever the underlying meaning of these self-inflicted tortures or proofs of immunity might be -- it seemed that the gods were satisfied and were ready to speak. The man sat down, trembling in every limb, but slowly quieting down. And now the gods spoke through him.

What they said was that, though this place was their rightful abode, they had neither been consulted nor invited to this ritual. If their permission and consent had been asked, they would have felt satisfied. They felt offended, because this common courtesy had not been shown to them.

The Phiyang Lama, towards whom these complaints were directed, answered, with great presence of mind and without losing his composure, that he had not intended to exclude anybody from the ritual, to which all beings of goodwill of all the realms of existence were welcome, but that, if he had known that this place was inhabited by them, he would have asked their permission and consent and would have invited them moreover to participate in this ritual for the benefit of all living beings. He, therefore, asked them to forgive this unintended offence and to give their consent to the completion of the ritual, as well as to participate in it for the benefit of all the people inhabiting their realm.

The gods accepted the apology and consented to the continuation of the ritual, which now proceeded without further disturbance. This incident showed us again that invisible forces, whether we call them gods or spirits, divine or demoniacal powers, that influence the human mind, are not merely abstractions or the outcome of a sick mind, but realities with which every religion and psychology has to cope. I could very well understand now the type of forces against which Padmasambhava had to fight, and that such forces could only be conquered or subdued by calling up counter forces in the human mind, which is exactly the function of ritualistic age, or magic ritual. We are dealing here with spiritual realities, not with theories, with actual forces, and not with religious doctrines. Modem psychology had to accept the facts of hypnotism, auto-suggestion, extrasensory perception, telepathy, mediumism, psychokinesis, faith-healing, and the uncanny powers of our depth-consciousness irrespective of whether it fitted into the prevailing scientific theories or not. And likewise Buddhism, whether it accepted or denied the value of these phenomena, had to cope with them on their own level.

Seen from this point of view, it becomes clear why Padmasambhava succeeded in establishing Buddhism in Tibet, while Śāntarakshita, an equally great scholar, but not a man of practical experience and insight into other people's minds, was not able to succeed. He confined himself to the teaching of ideas and doctrines, trying to convince people intellectually, appealing to their reasoning powers, but he had nothing with which to oppose or to convert the subtle forces of the mind below the threshold of the intellect.