The Tibetan Book of the Dead — ed. W. Y. Evans-Wentz

Spreading out in a fountain-like crest, it falls thence as a shower of heavenly ambrosia to feed all parts of the psychic body. Thus becomp. 217ing filled with supreme spiritual power, the yogi experiences Illumination.

Mandalas.—Of the Psychic-Centres, or Chakra, the Bardo Thodol is concerned chiefly with three: (1) the Heart-centre (Anahata-chakra) ; (2) the Throat-centre (Vishuddha-chakra) ; and (3) the Brain-centre (Sakasrara Padma). Of these, two are of chief importance: the Brain-centre, sometimes called the Northern Centre, and the Heart-centre, or Southern Centre. These two constitute the two poles of the human organism. They are said to be the first centres to form in the embryo, and the terrestrial praua, derived from the central srauic reservoir in the sun of our planetary system, is said to direct their formation.

Related to these three principal chakra, there are three chief mandalas or mystic groupings of deities divided into fourteen subsidiary mandalas corresponding to the first Fourteen (7 +7) Days of the Bardo as described in our text.

The first of these three chief sandalas contains 42 deities, distributed in six subordinate mandalas corresponding to the first Six Days of the Chonyzd Bardo ; and they emanate from the Heart-centre. The second mandala contains Io principal deities, which dawn on the Seventh Day; and these emanate from the Throat-centre. The third mandala contains 58 principal deities, distributed in seven subordinate maudalas, corresponding to the last Seven Days of the Chényid Bardo, and emanating from the Brain-centre. The first 42 and the last 58 comprise the Great Mandala of the 100 superior deities, the 42 being called peaceful and the 58 wrathful deities. The other 10 deities, related to the Throat-centre, which dawn intermediately between the 42 of the Heartcentre and the 58 of the Brain-centre, are classed with the 42 peaceful deities. Thus, when united in the Greater Mandala of the whole of the Chényid Bardo, there are IIo principal deities.

It will be observed, too, that there is definite orientation in all the mandalas.

The Five Dhyani Buddhas with their skakécs' are the chief

! The Sanskrit term Shakéz (literally ‘{ Divine] Power’) refers to the female, 3069 : Ff

p. 218

It will be observed, too, that there is definite orientation in all the mandalas.

The Five Dhyani Buddhas with their skakécs' are the chief

! The Sanskrit term Shakéz (literally ‘{ Divine] Power’) refers to the female, 3069 : Ffp. 218 deities dawning on the first Five Days. On the First Day, Vairochana and his shaktz alone dawn. Then on each of the four succeeding days, along with one of the remaining four of the Dhyani Buddhas and the skakt, there dawn two Bodhisattvas and their shakéis. Then, on the Sixth Day, all of these deities, dawning in one mandala, are joined by 16 additional deities: 8 Door-keepers, the 6 Buddhas of the Six Lokas, and the Adi-Buddha and shakiz; and all these deities together compose the 42 deities of the Heart-centre. Then, after the dawning of the 10 Knowledge-Holding Deities (called, in the Obeisances, p. 85, the Lotus Deities) of the Throat-centre, on the intervening Seventh Day, there dawn during the remaining Seven Days the 58 deities of the Braincentre, as follows: on each of the first five days, or from the Eighth to the Twelfth Day, one of the Herukas with his shakiz, in all ro deities ; on the Thirteenth Day, the 8 Kerima and the 8 Htamenma; on the Fourteenth Day, 4 Door-keepers and the 28 animal-headed Deities. Behind the symbolism of deities and zzandalas and psychic-centres there lies the rational explanation, namely, that each deity, as it dawns from its appropriate psychic-centre, represents the coming into afterdeath karmic activity of some corresponding impulse or or negative, phase of that divine force or power concentrated in or personified by the consort of a god, the god representing the positive phase; the Tantric worshipper of Shakti (Power), or divine universal forces, personified as a Mother-Goddess, being called a shakta. The Tantrics—like the ancient Egyptians—exalt right knowledge of the reproductive processes, as no doubt it should be exalted, to the Jevel of a religious science; and in this science, as illustrated in the Bardo Thédol, the union of the male and female principles of nature, in what is called in Tibetan the yab (Skt. deva) -yum (Skt. shaktz) attitude, symbolizes completeness, or at-one-ment, Power, symbolized by the male (ab, or deva), and Wisdom, symbolized by the female (yuuz, or shakti), are said, esoterically, to be ever in union.

deva) -yum (Skt. shaktz) attitude, symbolizes completeness, or at-one-ment, Power, symbolized by the male (ab, or deva), and Wisdom, symbolized by the female (yuuz, or shakti), are said, esoterically, to be ever in union.

It is much to be regretted that actual abuse of Tantric doctrine, due either to wilful perversion or, as is commonly the case, to misunderstanding, resulting in practices (like those of certain decadent sects or individuals in India) improperly called Tantric, by non-initiates in America and in Europe, in some instances under the aegis of organized societies, has brought upon Tantricism undeserved odium. Such unfortunate outcome of lack of guidance under properly trained gurits tends to justify the high initiate of Oriental occultism in his stern refusal to divulge the inner teachings of his cult to any save carefully prepared pupils who have been long on probation and found worthy; this was the view both of the late Lama Kazi Dawa-Samdup and of his late guru in Bhutan,p. 219 passion of the complex consciousness. As though in an initiatory mystery-play, the actors for each day of the Bardo come on the mind-stage of the deceased, who is their sole spectator; and their director is Karma. The higher or more divine elements of the consciousness-principle of the deceased dawn first in the full glory of the primal Clear Light; and then, in ever diminishing glory, the visions grow less and less happy—the Peaceful Deities of the Heart-centre, and then of the Throat-centre, merge into the Wrathful Deities of the Brain-centre. Finally, as the purely human and brutish propensities, personified, in the fiercest of the Wrathful Deitics,! as horror-producing and threatening spectral hallucinations, come into the field of mental vision, the percipient flees in dismay from them—his own thought-forms—to the refuge of the womb, thereby making himself to be the plaything of Maya and the slave of Ignorance. In other words, in a manner similar to that in which the earth-plane body grows to maturity and then withers and after its dcath disintegrates, the after-death body, called the mental-body, grows from the heavenly days of its Bardo childhood to the less idealist days of its Bardo maturity, then fades and dies in the Intermediate State, as the Knower, abandoning it, is reborn.