Fetching
One moment.
Fetching
One moment.
1The Jewel in the Lotus! Him!’ (Cf. pp. 134’, 149', 206.) PORE WO KD BY SIR JOHN WooDROFFE THE SCIENCE OF DEATH! ‘Strive after the Good before thou art in danger, before pain masters thee and thy mind loses its keenness,’—Kularnava Tantra, I. 27. THE thought of death suggests two questions. The first is: ‘How may one avoid death, except when death is desired as in “ Death-at-will” (/chchhamrityu)?’ The avoidance of death is the aim when Hazhayoga is used to prolong present life in the flesh. This is not, in the Western sense, a ‘ yea- saying’ to ‘life’, but, for the time being, to a particular form of life. Dr. Evans-Wentz tells us that according to popular Tibetan belief no death is natural. This is the notion of most, if not of all, primitive peoples. Moreover, physiology also questions whether there is any ‘natural death’, in the sense of death through mere age without lesion or malady. This Text, however, in the language of the renouncer of fleshly life the world over, tells the nobly-born that Death comes to all, that human kind are not to cling to life on earth with its ceaseless wandering in the Worlds of birth and death (Sangsara). Rather should they implore the aid of the Divine Mother for a safe passing through the fearful state following the body’s dissolution, and that they may at length attain all- perfect Buddhahood. The second question then is: ‘ How to accept Death and die?’ It is with this that we are now concerned. Here the technique of dying makes Death the entrance to good future lives, at first out of, and then again in, the flesh, unless and until liberation (Vzrvaza) from the wandering (Saxgséra) is attained. 1 As to the title of this Foreword, ‘The Science of Death’, see Thanatology, by Dr. Roswell Parks, in The Journal of the American Medical Association April 27, 1912. 3069 d Xxvi FOREWORD This Book, which is of extraordinary interest, both as regards Text and Introduction, deals with the period (longer or shorter according to the circumstances) which, commenc- ing immediately after death, ends with ‘rebirth’. In the Buddhists’ view, Life consists of a series of successive states of consciousness. The first state is the Birth-Consciousness ; the last is the consciousness existing at the moment of death, or the Death-Consciousness. The interval between the two states of Consciousness, during which the transformation from the ‘old’ to a ‘new’ being is effected, is called the Bardo or intermediate state (Antarabhava), divided into three stages, called the Chikhat, Choinyid, and Sidpa Bardo respectively.
2The interval between the two states of Consciousness, during which the transformation from the ‘old’ to a ‘new’ being is effected, is called the Bardo or intermediate state (Antarabhava), divided into three stages, called the Chikhat, Choinyid, and Sidpa Bardo respectively. This Manual, common in various versions throughout Tibet, is one of a class amongst which Dr. Evans-Wentz includes the Egyptian Book of the Dead, a guide for the use of the Ka or so-called ‘Double’, the De Arte Moriendit and other similar medieval treatises on the craft of dying, to which may be added the Orphic Manual called The Descent into Hades (cf. ‘He descended into Hell’) and other like guide-books for the use of the dead, the Pretakhanda of the Hindu Garuda Purana, Swedenborg’s De Coelo et de Inferno, Rusca’s De Inferno, and several other eschatological works both ancient and modern. Thus, the Garuda Purana deals with the rites used over the dying, the death-moment, the funeral cere- monies, the building up, by means of the Pretashraddha rite, of a new body for the Pre¢a or deceased in lieu of that destroyed by fire, the Judgement, and thereafter (ch. V) the various states through which the deceased passes until he is reborn again on earth. Both the original text and Dr. Evans-Wentz’s Introduction form a very valuable contribution to the Science of Death from the standpoint of the Tibetan Mahayana Buddhism of the so-called ‘Tantrik’ type. The book is welcome not merely in virtue of its particular subject-matter, but because the ritual works of any religion enable us more fully to com- prehend the philosophy and psychology of the system to which they belong. The Text has three characteristics. It is, firstly, a work on REINCARNATION v. RESURRECTION xxvii the Art of Dying ; for Death, as well as Life, is an Art, though both are often enough muddled through. There is a Bengali saying, ‘Of what use are Fafa and Tapas (two forms of devotion) if one knoweth not how to die?’ Secondly, it is a manual of religious therapcutic for the last moments, and a psychurgy exorcising, instructing, consoling, and fortifying by the rites of the dying, him who is about to pass on to another life. Thirdly, it describes the experiences of the deceased during the intermediate period, and instructs him in regard thereto. It is thus also a Traveller’s Guide to Other Worlds. The doctrine of ‘Reincarnation’ on the one hand and of ‘Resurrection’ on the other is the chief difference between the four leading Religions—Brahmanism, Buddhism, Chris- tianity, and Islam. Christianity, in its orthodox form, rejects the most ancient and widespread belief of the Kziklos genesedn, or Sangsara, or ‘Reincarnation’, and admits one universe only—this, the first and last—and two lives, one here in the natural body and one hereafter in the body of Resurrection.
3Christianity, in its orthodox form, rejects the most ancient and widespread belief of the Kziklos genesedn, or Sangsara, or ‘Reincarnation’, and admits one universe only—this, the first and last—and two lives, one here in the natural body and one hereafter in the body of Resurrection. It has been succinctly said that as Metempsychosis makes the same soul, so Resurrection makes the same body serve for more than one Life. But the latter doctrine limits man’s lives to two in number, of which the first or present determines for ever the character of the second or future. Brahmanism and Buddhism would accept the doctrine that ‘as a tree falls so shall it lie’, but they deny that it so lies for ever. To the adherents of these two kindred beliefs this present universe is not the first and last. It is but one of an infinite series, without absolute beginning or end, though each universe of the serics appears and disappears. They also teach a series of successive existences therein until morality, devotion, and knowledge produce that high form of detach- ment which is the cause of Liberation from the cycle of birth and death called ‘The Wandering’ (or Sangsara). Freedom is the attainment of the Supreme State called the Void, Nirvana, and by other names. They deny that there is only one universe, with one life for each of its human units, and then a division of men for all eternity into those who are saved in Heaven or are in Limbo and those who are lost in xXviii FOREWORD Hell. Whilst they agree in holding that there is a suitable body for enjoyment or suffering in Heaven and Hell, it is not a resurrected body, for the fleshly body on death is dissolved for ever. The need of some body always exists, except for the non- dualist who believes in a bodiless (Vzdeha) Liberation (AZuki2) ; and each of the four religions affirms that there is a subtle and death-surviving element—vital and psychical—in the physical body of flesh and blood, whether it be a permanent entity or Self, such as the Brahmanic Adma, the Moslem Ruh, and the Christian‘ Soul’, or whether it be only a complex of activities (or Standha), psychical and physical, with life as their function—a complex in continual change, and, therefore, a series of physical and psychical momentary states, succes- sively generated the one from the other, a continuous trans- formation, as the Buddhists are said to hold. Thus to none of these Faiths is death an absolute ending, but to all it is only the separation of the Psyche from the gross body. The former then enters on a new life, whilst the latter, having lost its principle of animation, decays. As Dr. Evans-Wentz so concisely says, Death disincarnates the ‘soul-complex’, as Birth incarnates it. In other words, Death is itself only an initiation into another form of life than that of which it is the ending.
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
1The Jewel in the Lotus! Him!’ (Cf. pp. 134’, 149', 206.) PORE WO KD BY SIR JOHN WooDROFFE THE SCIENCE OF DEATH! ‘Strive after the Good before thou art in danger, before pain masters thee and thy mind loses its keenness,’—Kularnava Tantra, I. 27. THE thought of death suggests two questions. The first is: ‘How may one avoid death, except when death is desired as in “ Death-at-will” (/chchhamrityu)?’ The avoidance of death is the aim when Hazhayoga is used to prolong present life in the flesh. This is not, in the Western sense, a ‘ yea- saying’ to ‘life’, but, for the time being, to a particular form of life. Dr. Evans-Wentz tells us that according to popular Tibetan belief no death is natural. This is the notion of most, if not of all, primitive peoples. Moreover, physiology also questions whether there is any ‘natural death’, in the sense of death through mere age without lesion or malady. This Text, however, in the language of the renouncer of fleshly life the world over, tells the nobly-born that Death comes to all, that human kind are not to cling to life on earth with its ceaseless wandering in the Worlds of birth and death (Sangsara). Rather should they implore the aid of the Divine Mother for a safe passing through the fearful state following the body’s dissolution, and that they may at length attain all- perfect Buddhahood. The second question then is: ‘ How to accept Death and die?’ It is with this that we are now concerned. Here the technique of dying makes Death the entrance to good future lives, at first out of, and then again in, the flesh, unless and until liberation (Vzrvaza) from the wandering (Saxgséra) is attained. 1 As to the title of this Foreword, ‘The Science of Death’, see Thanatology, by Dr. Roswell Parks, in The Journal of the American Medical Association April 27, 1912. 3069 d Xxvi FOREWORD This Book, which is of extraordinary interest, both as regards Text and Introduction, deals with the period (longer or shorter according to the circumstances) which, commenc- ing immediately after death, ends with ‘rebirth’. In the Buddhists’ view, Life consists of a series of successive states of consciousness. The first state is the Birth-Consciousness ; the last is the consciousness existing at the moment of death, or the Death-Consciousness. The interval between the two states of Consciousness, during which the transformation from the ‘old’ to a ‘new’ being is effected, is called the Bardo or intermediate state (Antarabhava), divided into three stages, called the Chikhat, Choinyid, and Sidpa Bardo respectively.
2The interval between the two states of Consciousness, during which the transformation from the ‘old’ to a ‘new’ being is effected, is called the Bardo or intermediate state (Antarabhava), divided into three stages, called the Chikhat, Choinyid, and Sidpa Bardo respectively. This Manual, common in various versions throughout Tibet, is one of a class amongst which Dr. Evans-Wentz includes the Egyptian Book of the Dead, a guide for the use of the Ka or so-called ‘Double’, the De Arte Moriendit and other similar medieval treatises on the craft of dying, to which may be added the Orphic Manual called The Descent into Hades (cf. ‘He descended into Hell’) and other like guide-books for the use of the dead, the Pretakhanda of the Hindu Garuda Purana, Swedenborg’s De Coelo et de Inferno, Rusca’s De Inferno, and several other eschatological works both ancient and modern. Thus, the Garuda Purana deals with the rites used over the dying, the death-moment, the funeral cere- monies, the building up, by means of the Pretashraddha rite, of a new body for the Pre¢a or deceased in lieu of that destroyed by fire, the Judgement, and thereafter (ch. V) the various states through which the deceased passes until he is reborn again on earth. Both the original text and Dr. Evans-Wentz’s Introduction form a very valuable contribution to the Science of Death from the standpoint of the Tibetan Mahayana Buddhism of the so-called ‘Tantrik’ type. The book is welcome not merely in virtue of its particular subject-matter, but because the ritual works of any religion enable us more fully to com- prehend the philosophy and psychology of the system to which they belong. The Text has three characteristics. It is, firstly, a work on REINCARNATION v. RESURRECTION xxvii the Art of Dying ; for Death, as well as Life, is an Art, though both are often enough muddled through. There is a Bengali saying, ‘Of what use are Fafa and Tapas (two forms of devotion) if one knoweth not how to die?’ Secondly, it is a manual of religious therapcutic for the last moments, and a psychurgy exorcising, instructing, consoling, and fortifying by the rites of the dying, him who is about to pass on to another life. Thirdly, it describes the experiences of the deceased during the intermediate period, and instructs him in regard thereto. It is thus also a Traveller’s Guide to Other Worlds. The doctrine of ‘Reincarnation’ on the one hand and of ‘Resurrection’ on the other is the chief difference between the four leading Religions—Brahmanism, Buddhism, Chris- tianity, and Islam. Christianity, in its orthodox form, rejects the most ancient and widespread belief of the Kziklos genesedn, or Sangsara, or ‘Reincarnation’, and admits one universe only—this, the first and last—and two lives, one here in the natural body and one hereafter in the body of Resurrection.
3Christianity, in its orthodox form, rejects the most ancient and widespread belief of the Kziklos genesedn, or Sangsara, or ‘Reincarnation’, and admits one universe only—this, the first and last—and two lives, one here in the natural body and one hereafter in the body of Resurrection. It has been succinctly said that as Metempsychosis makes the same soul, so Resurrection makes the same body serve for more than one Life. But the latter doctrine limits man’s lives to two in number, of which the first or present determines for ever the character of the second or future. Brahmanism and Buddhism would accept the doctrine that ‘as a tree falls so shall it lie’, but they deny that it so lies for ever. To the adherents of these two kindred beliefs this present universe is not the first and last. It is but one of an infinite series, without absolute beginning or end, though each universe of the serics appears and disappears. They also teach a series of successive existences therein until morality, devotion, and knowledge produce that high form of detach- ment which is the cause of Liberation from the cycle of birth and death called ‘The Wandering’ (or Sangsara). Freedom is the attainment of the Supreme State called the Void, Nirvana, and by other names. They deny that there is only one universe, with one life for each of its human units, and then a division of men for all eternity into those who are saved in Heaven or are in Limbo and those who are lost in xXviii FOREWORD Hell. Whilst they agree in holding that there is a suitable body for enjoyment or suffering in Heaven and Hell, it is not a resurrected body, for the fleshly body on death is dissolved for ever. The need of some body always exists, except for the non- dualist who believes in a bodiless (Vzdeha) Liberation (AZuki2) ; and each of the four religions affirms that there is a subtle and death-surviving element—vital and psychical—in the physical body of flesh and blood, whether it be a permanent entity or Self, such as the Brahmanic Adma, the Moslem Ruh, and the Christian‘ Soul’, or whether it be only a complex of activities (or Standha), psychical and physical, with life as their function—a complex in continual change, and, therefore, a series of physical and psychical momentary states, succes- sively generated the one from the other, a continuous trans- formation, as the Buddhists are said to hold. Thus to none of these Faiths is death an absolute ending, but to all it is only the separation of the Psyche from the gross body. The former then enters on a new life, whilst the latter, having lost its principle of animation, decays. As Dr. Evans-Wentz so concisely says, Death disincarnates the ‘soul-complex’, as Birth incarnates it. In other words, Death is itself only an initiation into another form of life than that of which it is the ending.
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
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