Professor Lin Chong-an: Methods of Esoteric Buddhism — An Overview of the Stages of Tantric Practice

Methods of Esoteric Buddhism: An Overview of the Stages of Tantric Practice

〈I〉 Common Stages of Practice

1. Reflecting on how rare and precious it is to obtain a human life with leisure and opportunity
2. Reflecting on death and impermanence
3. Reflecting on the law of karma — cause and effect
4. Reflecting on the sufferings of saṃsāra
5. Taking refuge and generating bodhicitta
6. Confession and purification of obscurations (the Vajrasattva purification practice)
7. Accumulating merit (the maṇḍala offering)
8. Practicing guru yoga
9. Cultivating śamatha (calming the mind through the nine sequential stages of mental abiding — setting the mind, continued setting, close setting, close abiding, taming, pacification, thorough pacification, one-pointedness, and equipoise — until "cessation" is attained)
10. Cultivating vipaśyanā (analyzing the selflessness of persons and the selflessness of phenomena to cultivate insight)

〈II〉 Stages of Practice in Esoteric Buddhism

1. The Kriyā, Caryā, and Yoga Tantras all engage both "sakāra yoga" (yoga with form) and "nirākāra yoga" (yoga without form). In yoga with form, one visualizes the deity with one's own mind; in yoga without form, one adds the cultivation of the deity's emptiness. In practice, the Kriyā Tantra emphasizes the "outer activities" of body and speech; the Caryā Tantra balances "outer activities" with "inner stabilization"; and the Yoga Tantra emphasizes "inner stabilization."

2. The practice of Anuttarayoga Tantra divides into the "generation stage" and the "completion stage," and includes the practices of Mahāmudrā and Dzogchen (the Great Perfection):

〈1〉 Generation stage: On the one hand, one visualizes the deity and realizes its emptiness; on the other, one transforms the "death, intermediate, and birth states" into the dharmakāya, saṃbhogakāya, and nirmāṇakāya.

〈2〉 Completion stage: Drawing on the principle that mind and prāṇa are nondual, one allows the coarser mind and prāṇa to subside, revealing the "subtlest clear-light mind" and the deity's "illusory body." Through the "union of clear-light mind and illusory body," one ultimately purifies them into the dharmakāya and rūpakāya (form body).

〈3〉 Mahāmudrā: First, one seeks out the mind that is "mere clarity and mere awareness"; then one realizes its emptiness; the "primordial co-emergent mind" then manifests, and one rests in the contemplation of emptiness, attaining the nonconceptual "union of bliss and emptiness." Its fruit is the "Mahāmudrā of the unity of method and wisdom."

〈4〉 Dzogchen (the Great Perfection): Without halting the coarser mind and prāṇa, one directly realizes the nature of mind — "essence originally pure, nature luminously manifest, and great compassion all-pervading." Its fruit is the three kāyas: dharmakāya, saṃbhogakāya, and nirmāṇakāya.

The goal of Tibetan Buddhist practice is to attain the perfect buddhahood of the three kāyas. Sentient beings can become buddhas because all possess buddha-nature. "Buddha-nature" points, on the one hand, to the "emptiness" of the minds of sentient beings, and on the other, to the "subtlest mind and prāṇa," empty of inherent nature. To clear away the "defiled mind and prāṇa" — as adventitious as the dust on a passing guest — so that the three kāyas may manifest: this is the fruit sought by every school of Tibetan Buddhism.