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Introduction
There is something attractively romantic about the mysterious, shamanic practice of ancient Chd (Skt: ccheda-sadhana, Tib: gChod sgrub thabs). Chd-practice, cutting through delusion's root, is haunting, strange and mysteriously beautiful all at the same time. This practice involves a whirling dance, accompanied by drum and bell. As the following essay will recount, Chd is a special type of mysticism that unites shamanic practice with profound yogic meditation. Chd has long been a way of seeking direct and personal experiences of mind and divinity outside of conventional and institutional frameworks. In Chd-practice, the yogi or yogini journeys into the night world the dangerous regions of ghosts, spirits and the damned, to bless all souls lost for a time on the wheel of existence. The selflessness of the practitioner's compassion, his or her contact with spirits of the otherworld, and the making of himself into a vehicle of healing, all tends to become a path for the hero to win the noetic Mind-Jewel of true awakening. Chd is a practice that combines Buddhist meditation with ancient Tibeto-Siberian shamanic ritual. The "liturgy" of Chd is sung to the accompaniment of drum, bell and a thigh-bone horn. The word "Chd" means to cut through, to "chop," and what is chopped off is ultimately the Ego. Initially this begins with cutting all attachment to the body and to material things. When identification with the finite mind-body complex is let go of, then the pure awareness is set free to perceive reality as it really is. The whole world becomes potent as a place of blessing power and awareness.
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grew up to become a very saintly Tamil sage and saddhu. It was in this form that he eventually returned to Tibet as the wisdom-master "Father" Dampa Sanggye. When Pa Dampa Sangye came to Tibet, he found the people in the county of Tingri, which is near Mt. Everest on the Tibetan side, to be especially amenable to his instruction. He therefore settled in Tingri and established a school of Yoga practice there. A young Tibetan woman named Machig Labdrn (1055-1153) was one of those who became his disciple. Machig and her guru Dampa Sangye are generally viewed as the founders of the Chd system. However, it would appear that Chd itself is a blending together of Pa Dampa Sangye's teachings and Machig's native inheritance. Pa Dampa Sangye taught Machig the rudiments of Mahamudra meditation. Fairly soon after her meeting with Pa Dampa Sangye, the Tibetan woman Machig Labdrn went to live in Central Tibet, where she took up residence in a lonely cave and set herself to practice meditation. Following her guru's instruction, she began by spending the first year completing the preliminary exercises (ngn-dro). Afterwards she went to a place called Zang-ri Khar-mar, which then became her residence for the rest of her life. It was there that she developed Chd as a definite system of practice. Another leading disciple of Pa Dampa Sangye was a Tibetan known as Kyton Sonam Lama. It was the latter who, we are told, would come and visit Machig in her cave residence, and pass along further teachings from the guru Dampa Sanggye to her. Through the interaction of these three, the Chd system grew into an amazingly beautiful and profound method of spiritual development
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4. Du-do (Skt: Tiryak) - the Animal realm 5. Yi-dag (Skt: preta) - the Ghost realm = Vegetable realm 6. Nyal-kham (Skt: Naraka) - the Hell realm = Mineral realm It may be noted that the Lha and Lha-ma-yin dwell in what people of different cultures have all described as "heaven realms." The humans and animals abide together in what to us is the "physical realm". And ghosts and demons apparently roam what might be called "the lower astral" domain. When animal's die, they too may become elemental spirits chained to the physical location where death occurred. These unseen entities are the Elementals spoken of by occultists and clairvoyants. These are the fairies and sprites of folklore. In Tibetan teachings they are sometimes categorized as follows: 1. 2. 3. 4. Dri-za (Skt: gandharva) - sylphs, air elementals Namkha'lding (Skt: garuda) - phoenix, fire elementals kLu (Skt: naga) - dragons, water elementals gNod-sbyin (Skt: yakshas) - gnomen, earth elementals
But there are many other types of elemental spirits mentioned in Buddhist lore, too. There are the Mi-'am-c'i (Kinnara), or lovely celestial musicians, and the Srin-po (Rakshasa) which appear as dangerous fire elementals. There are 'Byung-po (Bhuta) and harmful Sa-za (pisaca), spirits of the jungle, the cremation grounds and the forest, which can cause misfortune, or disease, or insanity. And there are the Gyalpo and the Tsen, powerful ghosts of slain heroes and Lama-sorcerers, who have died unfulfilled or with a curse on their lips; it is said their thirst for power and vengeance lives on. Do these good and evil spirits (lha-dre) actually exist, or are they but the imagination of a more primitive culture? The decision has to be yours. Science does not appear to have proved, as yet, the existence of parallel realms, invisible to our telescopes, microscopes and measuring devices. As one grows spiritually, an awareness of disincarnate and non-incarnate entities is one of the features that the mystic develops. But the truth of this experience cannot be proven nor demonstrated to the skeptic. It is simply something that one has to experience and judge for oneself no one else can say whether it is true or not. The same goes for death. What happens after death? Some people believe that when the body dies, so does the person, the mind and the consciousness. According to this way of thinking, mind is the product of the physical brain, and when the brain dies, that is the end. The religions of the world, on the other hand, have all taught that after death our experience continues. But the different religions are by no means in complete agreement concerning "how" that continuation will take place. Some insist that the entity will never again return to a human incarnation. Some, though they admit we may be reborn as a human person again, deny the idea that we can descend to an animal level of rebirth. So there are differing opinions. Buddhism describes a world in which the mineral "hell" realm is at the bottom of the ladder of evolution, so to speak, and the "deva" realm at the top. The Deva realm is also said to reach further and further upwards, to ever more refined states of being. But Buddhism does claim that we can also devolve, and not only evolve. We can go down the scale, as well as rise up it. Contact with those who have died, by psychics who are alive, may be able to tell us a lot more about this so called "next world." But what is true, and what really happens after death, can only be known when death itself intervenes. Until then, it is up to the individual to make his or her own rational judgment. The yogini in her tent calls the various spirits of the land to her. These she then must treat in different ways. The higher beneficial spirits, she may commune with for healing disease, and to do so she will establish a relationship of peace (Tib: zhi-wa, Skt: santika) between herself and those which come within the sphere of her influence. She may establish a similar relationship with the ghosts (preta) of the dead, but the more confused or troubled ghosts of the spirit world she must help to guide and, as it where, "raise their vibration" (Tib: rgyas-pa byed-pa, Skt: paustika) if she is to free them from their suffering. Tormented spirits, and elementals, have to be subdued (Tib: dbang-'dus, Skt: vasya) and directed. The really evil entities she must learn to dominate, exorcise (Tib: drag-shul, Skt: marana) and ultimately liberate. All of this the yogini (or yogi) accomplishes through the means of her Chdpractice. At the end, after the dedication of the power which has been generated by the practice, the yogini may make the following prayer: "May all you spirits and elementals eventually be born as human beings, and in future ages, become my disciples. There upon, may the Uncreated Light of pure, original Mind, arise in the consciousness of you beings; and avoiding the erroneous belief in an 'ego', may your consciousness become thoroughly saturated with the gentle moisture of Love and Compassion."
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schooling and university, Rimpoche emphasized that Chd is equivalent to post-graduate work. Done properly, it is a powerful means of cutting delusions root, but it is also a dangerous exercise. Paramount to practicing Chd the seeker must learn to develop empathic altruism. The only thing that can dissolve the emotional distance between the Chd-practitioner and communion with other beings is altruistic love. One really does have to learn to love everyone and everything. It is exactly for this reason that Chd-practice is not taught to anyone who has not first undergone the preliminaries (Skt: purvaka, Tib: ngn-dro). This must be especially emphasized for the Westerner. As most correctly pointed out by the eccentric Russian woman-mystic, Yelena Petrovna Blavatskaya, in the last century: "All western, and especially English education is instinct with the principle of emulation and competition; each boy is urged to learn more quickly, to outstrip his companions, and to surpass them in every possible way. What is mistakenly called "friendly rivalry" is assiduously cultivated, and the same spirit is fostered and strengthened in every detail of life. With such ideas 'educated into him' from his childhood, how can a Westerner bring himself to feel towards his co-students 'as the fingers of one hand'? He who would be a student [of Tibetan occultism] must first be strong enough to kill out in his heart all feelings of dislike and antipathy to others. How many Westerners are ready even to attempt this in earnest? "In the East the spirit of 'non-separateness' is inculcated [in the monasteries] as steadily from childhood up, as in the West the spirit of rivalry. Personal ambition, personal feelings and desires, are not encouraged to grow so rampant there. When the soil is naturally good, it is cultivated in the right way, and the child grows into a man in whom the habit of subordination of one's lower to one's higher self is strong and powerful. In the West men think that their own likes and dislikes of other men and things are guiding principles for them to act upon, even when they do not make of them the law of their lives and seek to impose them upon others." 2 To accomplish Chd-practice it is a prerequisite that one develop an unconditional love for all. Such a love cannot be limited only to those we like, or approve of. Unconditional love means especially a love full of compassion for those who we least would want to be intimate with. For if we are going to heal others at all, we shall have to be intimate with them. We will have to share their pain, as also be able to empathically soothe and alleviate their confusion, their suffering, and their active negativity. Chusang Rimpoche made something of a joke of this. "The novice Chdpa," he said, "is so eager to offer his very own body, to nourish and help the poor misguided evil spirits. But comes along just one mosquito, and then where is his love and compassion for all sentient beings?" The practitioner has to be trained in Maitri-meditation. The latter is meditation on Love, where all the walls protecting the heart from feeling total, unconditional altruism are systematically torn down. There must be no emotional distancing between the practitioner and the being who is the object of his compassion, when he takes up the dangerous, shamanic practice of Chd. If this empathic love has not been thoroughly developed as a basis, the novice at the practice is liable to be overcome and possessed by the very powers which he hopes to work with. Some Chd-practice has already been introduced into the West. Consequently we now have some genuine "Chd-pa" practicing in various places here in America and likewise in Canada. However, something has to be said about some of the practice which has been introduced, but which is not very authentic. In a number of cases where Chd is being taught, the profound nature of the exercise is missing. Sadly, when that is the case, the performance is no more than "play acting," and what was for the genuine practitioner in the Himalayas a very real "out of body" experience, and a way of directly dealing with the spirit-world, in America this has become no more than an imaginary journey. Students, taking up the practice without real training, are left to merely visualize themselves going through the performance. It is all pretend. One "pretends" to become the black wrathful Dakini (krodha kali-ma); one "pretends" to leap out through the fontanel into the open space of the spirit-world. But the actual experience is missing. And that is in part because these Western students are not being correctly informed about what the practice is really all about. The advantage of those who practice Chd without thoroughly understanding it, is that by only play acting the role, they avoid the danger of real contact with the spirit world. The Western student therefore may approach Chd as a mild form of "self-help" system, with the aim of promoting a feeling of compassion for others. In that sense it cannot but prove to be of some benefit for those practicing it. Needless to say, Jerome Edon (see: Machig Labdrn and The Foundations of Chd, Snow Lion, NY 1996) is utterly mistaken when he makes the claim "that in the Chd tradition there is no trace of either trance or ecstasy, nor of what in shamanistic terminology is referred to as an initiatory journey."
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Frequently, once a system of spiritual practice is "popularized" in the West, its power becomes watered down. This has happened to Hatha-yoga, the form of yoga devised by Mahasiddha Gorakhnath which uses physical postures and movements of the body to trigger the Kundalini (Tib: gTu-mo) experience. With the correct physical postures (asanas), Gorakhnath's yoga was a dangerous exercise taught only to advanced initiate's of his Nath Siddha School. However, having been brought to the West, and then re-introduced back into India, as a system of physical exercises for the purpose of inducing health, the whole system has been so changed as to become quite ineffective as a tool for Kundalini. Thus, it is fairly "safe"3. The student of Chd must receive proper transmission and permission to practice Chd. This transmission is a spiritual blessing that is passed down in an unbroken lineage through a line of wisdom-masters, and as such protects the student on this most advanced, critical path of endeavor4. Furthermore, the disciple needs to learn the proper intonation of the mystic mantras; the manner for beating the drum, the sounding of the spirit-evoking horn made of human thighbone, and the rhythm of the bell. Each Chd transmission has a certain specific "liturgy" of its own, and this has to be carefully adhered to. With genuine Chd, the whole practice must be committed to memory. The steps of the dance in relation to the various geometrical arenas have to be mastered. And the spirits, both those that are safe as well as those that are distinctly evil, need to be truly evoked. To accomplish the latter, it is said that it is best to perform the exercise in a place well known to be haunted, such as a cemetery. So, after all the acts of the performance has been thoroughly mastered, the Lama sends the student out, to go to a haunted spot alone. It is then that she or he, in the dark of the night, has to confront not only all the supernatural fears created by such a place, but also actual spirits.
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common to be thrilled by the energy and feeling of magnified glory, by the divine grace flooding through all the cells of one's being. There is nothing wrong with such bliss, but the adept has to become unattached to the experience. The fourth demon described by Machig Labdrn is the Demon of Pride (snyem byed kyi bdud), the Demon of Ego itself. This latter, she said, is the root of all the other three, for ultimately the Demon which must be killed is our own self. As soon as one cuts off the Demon of Ego, all other demons are simultaneously conquered. Immediately the Demon of Ego is slain, the person becomes Enlightened at once. "Using obstacles [i.e., demons] on the path is the meaning of Chd-practice. Realizing that everything is mind, not the slightest object to cut through. When the emptiness of mind itself is realized, then no duality between "cutter" and "cut" remains. When this nonduality is realized, then angels and demons vanish and one is left like a thief in an empty house, with nothing to cut." (Jigme Chokyi Senge) Though Chd may appear on the surface like a shamanic rite, the Yoga of Chd follows the same process of mystical development as in other systems of Buddhism. Machik Labdrn herself explains this as follows: "Once the yogini has recognized the non-existence of inner and outer phenomena, after the psychic energy (prana-vayu) has entered and started to rise up the central nervous system (avadhuti), then she will begin to experience extraordinary states of ecstasy and [eventually] the Clear Light itself. Knowledge of the three times, and clairvoyant perception of events near and far, will begin to emerge. Having attained the uncreate Clear Light, then the yogini will acquire an ability of mind to aid vast numbers of sentient beings everywhere... The instruction lineage that explains how to accomplish this is that called the Chd of Mahamudra."6 To cut the ego off at the root, where it is rooted in the unconsciousness, and likewise to cut off the five root afflictionsgreed, hatred, confusion, pride and avariceis the real meaning of Chd. For the yogini this means also to cut through hope and fear, all of which possesses and controls ordinary individuals just like good or evil spirits. To be free of that, is to be Liberated. This is the ultimate value of Chd.
Conclusion
The system of Chd which comes down to us from the Venerable Bardok Chusang Rimpoche and from Khanchen Palden Sherab Rimpoche to the Dharma Fellowship is the transmission of Yeshe Tsogyal revealed by Jigme Lingpa, known as the "Far-reaching Laughter of the Dakini". (mKha'-'groi Gad-rGyangs), a profound Chd-practice from the Longchen Nyingt'ig tradition. Thanks to the brilliant translation work and musical ability of David Molk and his wife, who reside in Big Sur, we are able to learn to sing this Chd-practice in English, while retaining the ancient Tibetan shamanic melody. Since it is an advanced practice, it may only be taught to members of the Fellowship who are deemed ready to properly take it on. This beautiful and uplifting ritual is a profound meditation with manifold transcendental ramifications, yielding to the highest of insights. Through this Chd-practice many a western person can now rapidly progress on the path of Enlightenment and win through to complete Liberation.
Footnotes 1 When asked whether he thought it a fact that Pa Dampa Sanggye was a reincarnation of Bodhidharma, the founder of Zen, the Venerable Bardok Chusang Rimpoche said that he thought it quite possible, but ultimately whether or not he was, was not overly important. Venerable Bardok Rimpoche is himself recognized as the present day reincarnation of Pa Dampa Sanggye. 2 Gorakhnath was the founder of Hatha-yoga. The heart of his system is to be found in the Six Khorlo of Naropa, which is kept a secret teaching in the Ka'gyu School. Gorakhnath's orginal asanas and mudras are still taught amongst initiates of the Nine Nath tradition. 3 There are some in America who are practicing Chd outside of a recognized line of transmission. This is psychically dangerous. To practice Chd safely and beneficially, one must be intimately embraced by a school or "brotherhood" of others, who are all part of one's particular transmission. There are also different Chd lineages, and one should practice always according to the oral instruction, encoded liturgy, and practice of one's own lineagenot mix the lineage practicesotherwise the practice may result in dire consequences, or even prove fatal. 4 H.P.Blavatsky, Raja-Yoga, or Occultism, Theosophy Company (India) Ltd., Bombay 1931). 5 Is Machig Labdrn here talking about what modern psychiatry calls the "messianic complex"?. 6 Machig Labdron, Phung-po gzan skyun rnam bshad gcod kyi don gsal byed.
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