Mahamudra (Tib. p'yag-rgya-chen-po) means literally "the great attitude or symbolic gesture". The term derives from the Hindu Tantra (as s'ri or mahayantra) and the subsequent Buddhist Tantra of North India. One writer of that school, Advayavajra, in his Aaturmudra, refers to Mahamudra in very much the same way that S'akti--as ultimate Divinity as Goddess--is referred to in higher treatises of the Hindu Tantra: "She is not an object subject to time... she combines samsara and nirvana; her substance is universal Love; she is the unique essence of the Innate Transcendent Bliss."

Footnotes

^285:* The translator must here be restricting himself to the skeptical method of Nagarjuna and some schools of Zen, for there exist very explicit Buddhist cosmological and psychological texts, both in Hinayana and Mahayana.--Ed.

^285:** The translator overlooks here the ancient Upanis'adic dictum, which became part of the essence of the much later Zen: O Maitreya, the knower cannot be known! Ed.

^286:* Growing out of more of a Madhyamika emphasis. Ed.

^287:* Not the correct word here, merely "affection" being meant; (see our note to stanza 15) the word "mind" in the same line could also be bettered by "consciousness", "mind" having too intellectualistic a connotation. Ed.

^287:** The editor here assumes responsibility for this term throughout, having suggested it to the translator, in several discussions preceding the writing of this essay, as a better one in this context than "consciousness," quoting to him the editor's definition of mind as "that which orders awareness." The awareness is thus more primal than the ordering.--Ed.

^289:* They become such only when linked to a definite practice of tantric yoga type. See also our remarks in the footnotes on pages <page 244> and <page 296>.--Ed.

THE VOW OF MAHAMUDRA

By GARMAPA RINCHEN DORJE

With Commentary (in smaller type)

by the translator and

notes by the editor

1

I pray to the Guru, to the Yidam, and to those holy beings in the Mandala,
I pray to the Buddhas and to their Sons (Bodhisattvas) in the Three Times and in the Ten Directions,
Remember me, have compassion and pity on me,
Bless with accomplishment my wishes.

First, according to the traditions of Buddhist Tantric ritual, a supplication is offered to one's teacher (who is considered more important than the Buddhas), next to one's patron Buddha, then to the Darginis, Guardians, and other beings of the Mandala who grant protection and certain powers to the yogi. This supplication to the esoteric or Tantric lineage is followed by one to the esoteric lineage of the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas in the past, present, and future, and in all directions of space.

2