All Apologies to Vajrasattva
Vajrasattva THE SECRET OF THE FOUR WISDOMS
Trekcho, Togal and Bardo
The good compassionate enlightened Buddhists who have been so kind to stake this book with words such as disrespectful, terrible, pompous, condescending, shoddy, shocking. illiterate, even worst. I beg you to read the next three pages suspending all grasping at conceptual constructs of the illusory ego and its cultural conditioning. It is funny that in 1999 I wrote of the very same subject in Inherent Solutions to Spiritual Obscurations, comparing Advaita and Dzogchen, Trekcho and Togal in the lives of Gaudapada and Garab Dorje. It attracted no unkind words. Now, why all the jumping around. I deeply apologize to anyone I have disturbed or angered. The Buddhist saying that your enemy is your greatest teacher, is really true. Gratefully and Heart-fully. I pray to Vajrasattva that this humorous story will heal us all. At one time in Chan Buddhism a Sect was discussing the Lankavatara Sutra. Their discussion turned to heated anger over two differing interpretations. One side of this sect broke off to follow their own interpretation and the other side formed their own sect where they vowed to no speaking of words and no reading of scriptures. Extreme views, extreme ways. In Japan the large laughing happy Buddha is Maitreya, the Tathagata of the future promise to bring great happiness. Tibetans do not see the future Buddha as the Japanese do. Their picture is more ornamental like their other great deities. Yet I have never heard of a war over their different imagery. It is the same in Dzogchen. Their are varying views of interpretation. Should we all go to extreme views and extreme ways over the delightfully different understanding of this magnificent practice.
All Apologies to Vajrasattva Introducing the Purpose of this Text
Anticipating the exact words the critics would use before this book was published. I have only written of the thoughts, coming out in my own words, that were ignited as feelings of inward inspiration from the highly excelling upliftment found when studying Dzogchen systems and methods. I must assert that this essay is in no way, nor tries to be a teaching text, a manual, nor a guidebook on Trekcho and Togal or Bardo, for I am in no way at all possible, a teacher, an expert nor a guide in these practices. Nor do I ever wish to be one. . So I have had to explain what little or nothing that I know about these special secret and restricted practices to answer the primary question this text attempts to answer. How is this disrespectful? In great respect for the Nyingma tradition, I, whole heartedly surrender my deepest apologies, if I have overstepped my boundaries in answering this essay’s fundamental inquiry. To the Nyingma these subjects are restricted for the most serious students and practitioners. There is good reason for this, because without being grounded in Trekcho one may not engage Togal for it may just lead to deeper illusion, a support-less dream delusion. Without confidence in the decisive encounter with the Luminous Void, Kadag, the Four Appearances of Togal may only fortify the mind’s conceptual hallucination and magnification of the unreal. I certainly hope this text will not do that, nor can I see how that could ever happen by reading this work. Keeping all this in mind, then the very nature of Kadag, Samantabhadri, as Void, is never dual from Samantabhadra as Luminosity or Rigpa Knowingness. Where can you not find some sounding note of this truth? Why be so busy about splitting these atoms of subtlety? In Bonpo Dzogchen these secrets of Dzogchen are available to any who wish to study them. It is completely opposite to Nyingma who restrict these secrets with fear inducing threats of harm to oneself and others. How might true Buddhism harm others? So in respect of all traditions I ask forgiveness for all mistakes made in this writing, for my heart’s intention is only to help in some small way and know that this Wisdom will persevere any persecution of the world’s opinions. That harmful thinking in the thread of an illusory learned ego is just there, from ancient days to now, imagined on the Primordial Sea. As with all beliefs the battles go on and will continue and the different sects of all religious belief systems will hive off into their own circles of believing what they want to believe, then insulting others in turn.
For anyone who stops your creative expression and seeks to control you, is not your friend. These types may be powerfully expert in Tibetan Dzogchen teachings for they think they have the only correct view, but their hearts are full of anger, if anyone challenges their arrogance in thinking their own way is true, their reply is you are wrong. This is such a problem in Tibet, there arose the Rime Movement, meaning unbiased or non-partisan to all, because some lama sects would hold only to their own tradition and show aversion and prejudice toward all others. This happens within sects from all religions you believe it? I apologize for not treating enemies as an only child or as one’s best teacher, lama, guide as Buddhism advises by compassionate enlightenment. For the last word is that Buddhism is Selflessness or Egolessness. The comments on abuse applies to all sects from all religions, not just Vajrayana or Nyingma Buddhism. Fear and control are a problem all over the Earth. Did not the Lion of Sakya seek to give us a cure for what was called the great fright? It is nothing new to me to be exiled, excommunicated, thrown out or driven away, for I have always felt an inner correcting impulse to speak up and write about contradictions, confusions and loopholes discovered in different traditions and for that I have been considered a polluted outcast, cursed, rejected and belittled by the so-called compassionate wisdom of some systems of belief. These ridiculous abuses, some so mean that you would not believe. If you want to keep your own Light, which was definitely among the last advice of the Lion of the Sakyas, this is completely ignored, This may ruin your love of and upliftment by ancient teachings. I understand the why of this but would the Buddha, the Prince of Compassion, ever curse you as sick. His reason for living was to find a cure to the sickness of suffering. “Ananda? I have set forth the Dharma without making any distinction of esoteric and exoteric doctrine; there is nothing, Ananda, with regard to the teachings that the Tathagata holds to the last with the closed fist.” The Pali Canon. The Lion of the Sakyas. Is this misguidance or terrible misconception? I do not believe in secrets that are hidden with threats based on superstitious fear arousing control tactics over others, which you find everywhere in religion, politics, finance or war. I have already been attacked by these rigid superstitious threats even before finishing this text. Yet I go on because superstitions make a good thing toxic and I do not see Togal as harmful to anyone by throwing them into deeper confusion. It seems the whole world is lost in deep confusion and I do not see how access to Togal could increase this confusion anymore than already is so. "If a teacher's actions are unethical, then, even if they have practiced for many years, their practice has been wrong-footed. “Quite simply, they lack a proper understanding of the Dharma. There is a gap between the Dharma and their life." Dalai Lama. How is this pompous or condescending? I pray that Samantabhadri, that Kuntuzangmo, the Mother as Pure Voidness will not allow this to happen to any of us. For if examination is a flaw then I am full of flaws, and if it is not, then flaws may not touch the Vast Expanse of Her. So why would you fear man made superstitious
beliefs? Trekcho cuts through all superstitions, conceptual beliefs, extreme views, thought concepts, visions, imaginations, fears, hopes and expectations while being the relaxed and effortless Clear Light of Evenness for one and all. Trekcho is Cutting Through (all Barriers of the conceptual) or Cutting Through the illusion of rigid solidity. There are different renderings of this word, such as Cutting to the Essence. I have heard it as simply Letting Go, which conveys to Westerners the Effortless Letting Go of all barriers, rather than the effort to pick up a sword and cut away the obstructions. It is an Effortless Relaxation, not as a striving to cut through the layers of conceptual obscurations. I like this one very much. Then, thod-rgal in Tibetan may be rendered as Togal, Togel or Thogal. It means Final Leap, Leaping Over, Crossing Over, Final Arrival, Instantaneous Arrival. This Leaping or Crossing Over is the practice of the Four Togal Appearances, which some feel are progressive visions and others believe they are kinds of realities since their base is the Luminous Void. Yet both Trekcho and Togal end in the cessation of it all in Kadag, the Primordial Clear and Pure. I prefer Togal for word to word use, but my favorite is one I heard from an excellent and good Nyingmapa Lama, that is so simple to understand, that is Soaring On. This conveys the Across and Through, the Final Leaping Over the Four Togal experiences.
RCP
