It is best if the guru from whom the deceased received guiding instructions can be had; but if the guru cannot be obtained, then a brother of the Faith; or if the latter is also unobtainable, then a learned man of the same Faith; or, should all these be unobtainable, then a person who can read correctly and distinctly ought to read this many times over. Thereby [the deceased] will be put in mind of what he had [previously] heard of the setting-face-to-face and will at once come to recognize that Fundamental Light and undoubtedly obtain Liberation.
As regards the time for the application [of these in- structions |:
When the expiration hath ceased, the vital-force will have
sunk into the nerve-centre of Wisdom! and the Knower?
will be experiencing the Clear Light of the natural con-
dition? Then, the vital-force,* being thrown backwards
and flying downwards through the right and left nerves,°
the Intermediate State momentarily dawns.
The above [directions] should be applied before [the vital- force hath] rushed into the left nerve [after first having traversed the navel nerve-centre].
The time [ordinarily necessary for this motion of the vital-
Dreamer is awakened into Reality simultaneously with the mighty achievement of recognition.
1 Here, as elsewhere in our text, ‘nerve-centre’ refers to a psychic nerve- centre. The psychic nerve-centre of Wisdom is located in the heart. (Cf. pp. 217 ff.)
2 Text: Shespa (pron. Shepa): ‘Mind’, ‘Knower’; i.e. the mind in its knowing, or cognizing, functions.
8 Text: Sprosbral (pron. Todal): ‘devoid of formative activity’ ; i.e. the mind in its natural, or primal, state. The mind in its unnatural state, that is to say, when incarnate in a human body, is, because of the driving force of the five senses, continuously in thought-formation activity. Its natural, or discarnate, state is a state of quiescence, comparable to its condition in the highest of dhyana (or deep meditation) when still united toa human body. The conscious recognition of the Clear Light induces an ecstatic condition of consciousness such as saints and mystics of the West have called Illumination.
* Text: rlung (pron. lung’): ‘vital-air’, or ‘vital-force’, or ‘psychic-force’.
5 Text: rtsa-gyas-gyon (pron. tsa-yay-yon): ‘right and left [psychic] nerves’; et Pingala-nadi (right [psychic] nerve) and Jda-nédi (left [psychic] nerve). Cf. p. 215.)
PART I] THE DEATH PROCESS . gi
force] is as long as the inspiration is still present, or about the time required for eating a meal.}
Then the manner of the application [of the instructions] is:
When the breathing is about to cease, it is best if the Trans- ference hath been applied efficiently ; if [the application] hath been inefficient, then [address the deceased] thus:
O nobly-born (so and so by name), the time hath now come for thee to seek the Path [in reality]. Thy breathing is about to cease. Thy guru hath set thee face to face before with the Clear Light; and now thou art about to experience it in its Reality in the Bardo state, wherein all things are like the void and cloudless sky, and the naked, spotless intellect is like unto a transparent vacuum without circumference or centre. At this moment, know thou thyself ; and abide in that state. I, too, at this time, am setting thee face to face.
Having read this, repeat it many times in the ear of the
person dying, even before the expiration hath ceased, so as
to impress it on the mind [of the dying one].
If the expiration is about to cease, turn the dying one over on the right side, which posture is called the ‘Lying Posture of a Lion’. The throbbing of the arteries [on the right and left side of the throat] is to be pressed.
If the person dying be disposed to sleep, or if the sleeping state advances, that should be arrested, and the arteries pressed gently but firmly.2 Thereby the vital-force will not be able to return from the median-nerve * and will be sure to pass out
1 When this text first took form the reckoning of time was, apparently, yet primitive, mechanical time-keeping appliances being unknown. A similar con- dition still prevails in many parts of Tibet, where the period of a meal-time is frequently mentioned in old religious books—a period of from twenty minutes to half an hour in duration.
2 The dying person should die fully awake and keenly conscious of the process of death; hence the pressing of the arteries. (Cf. p. xxix.)
8 «Skt, of text: dhutth (pron. dufi), meaning “ median-nerve’’, but lit. “ tri- junction’”’, V.S. Apte’s Sanscnit-English Dictionary (Poona, 1890) gives dhuiz as the only similar word, defined as “shaking ” or ‘‘ moving”’, which, if applied to our text, may refer to the vibratory motion of the psychic force traversing the median-nerve as its channel.’,—-Lama Kazi Dawa-Samdup.
‘ Duti may also mean “ throwing away”, or ‘‘ throwing out”’, with reference
92 Bardo of the Dying [Book I
through the Brahmanic aperture.!_ Now the real setting-face- to-face is to be applied.
At this moment, the first [glimpsing] of the Bardo of the Clear Light of Reality, which is the Infallible Mind of the Dharma-K aya, is experienced by all sentient beings.
The interval between the cessation of the expiration and
the cessation of the inspiration is the time during which the
vital-force remaineth in the median-nerve.?
The common people call this the state wherein the con- sciousness-principle® hath fainted away. The duration of this state is uncertain. [It dependeth] upon the constitu- tion, good or bad, and [the state of] the nerves and vital- force. In those who have had evena little practical experience of the firm, tranquil state of dhyana, and in those who have sound nerves, this state continueth for a long time.*
to the outgoing of the consciousness in the process of death,’—-Sj. Atal Bihari Ghosh.
1 See pp. 18, 878, 215. If non-distracted, and alertly conscious, at this psychological moment, the dying person will realize, through the power con- ferred by the reading of the Thédol, the importance of holding the vital-force in the median-nerve till it passes out thence through the Aperture of Brahma.
2 After the expiration has ceased, the vital-force (lit. ‘inner-breath’) is thought to remain in the median-nerve so long as the heart continues to throb.
8 Text: nam-shes (pron. nam-she): Skt. vijzdna or, preferably, chaitanya: ‘conscious-principle’ or ‘ object-knowing principle’.
4 Sometimes it may continue for seven days, but usually only for four or five days. The consciousness-principle, however, save in certain conditions of trance, such as a yogi, for example, can induce, is not necessarily resident in the body all the while ; normally it quits the body at the moment called death, holding a subtle magnetic-like relationship with the body until the state referred to in the text comes to an end. Only for adepts in yoga would the departure of the consciousness-principle be accomplished without break in the continuity of the stream of consciousness, that is to say, without the swoon state referred to.
The death process is the reverse of the birth process, birth being the incar- nating, death the discarnating of the consciousness-principle ; but, in both alike, there is a passing from one state of consciousness into another. And, just as a babe must wake up in this world and learn by experience the nature of this world, so, likewise, a person at death must wake up in the Bardo world and become familiar with its own peculiar conditions. The Bardo body, formed of matter in an invisible or ethereal-like state, is an exact duplicate of the human body, from which it is separated in the process of death. Retained in the Bardo body are the consciousness-principle and the psychic nerve-system (the
counterpart, for the psychic or Bardo body, of the physical nerve-system of the human body). (Cf. p. 161%.)
Part I] Thessymptoms of Death 93
In the setting-face-to-face, the repetition [of the above address to the deceased] is to be persisted in until a yellowish liquid beginneth to appear from the various apertures of the bodily organs [of the deceased].
In those who have led an evil life, and in those of unsound nerves, the above state endureth only so long as would take to snap a finger. Again, in some, it endurcth as long as the time taken for the eating of a meal,
In various Zantras it is said that this state of swoon
endureth for about three and one-half days. Most other
[religious treatises] say for four days; and that this setting-
face-to-face with the Clear Light ought to be persevered
in [during the whole time].
The manner of applying [these directions] is:
If [when dying] one be by one’s own self capable [of diagnosing the symptoms of death], use [of the knowledge] should have been made ere this.1_ If [the dying person be| unable to do so, then either the guru, or a shishya, or a brother in the Faith with whom the one [dying] was very intimate, should be kept at hand, who will vividly impress upon the one [dying] the symptoms [of death] as they appear in due order [repeatedly saying, at first] thus :?
Now the symptoms of earth sinking into water are come.’
1 The full meaning implied is that not only should the person about to die diagnose the symptoms of death as they come, one by one, but that he should also, if able, recognize the Clear Light without being set face to face with it by some second person.
2 Cf. the following instructions, from Ars Moriendi (fifteenth century), Comper’s ed. (p. 93): ‘When any of likelihood shall die [i.e. is likely to die}, then it is most necessary to have a special friend, the which will heartily help and pray for him, and therewith counsel the sick for the weal [i. e. health] of his soul.’
3 The three chief symptoms of death (which the text merely suggests by naming the first of them, it being taken for granted that the reader officiating will know the others and name them as they occur), with their symbolical counter- part, are as follows : (1) a bodily sensation of pressure, ‘earth sinking into water’ ; (2) a bodily sensation of clammy coldness as though the body were immersed in water, which gradually merges into that of feverish heat, ‘ water sinking into fire’; (3) a feeling as though the body were being blown to atoms, ‘ fire sinking into air’, Each symptom is accompanied by visible external changes in the body, such as loss of control over facial muscles, loss of hearing, loss of sight,
94 Bardo of the Dying [Book I
When all the symptoms [of death] are about to be com-
pleted, then enjoin upon [the one dying] this resolution,
speaking in a low tone of voice in the ear:
O nobly-born (or, if it be a priest, O Venerable Sir), let not thy mind be distracted.
If it be a brother [in the Faith], or some other person, then call him by name, and [say] thus:
O nobly-born, that which is called death being come to thee now, resolve thus: ‘O this now is the hour of death. By taking advantage of this death, I will so act, for the good of all sentient beings, peopling the illimitable expanse of the heavens, as to obtain the Perfect Buddhahood, by resolving on love and compassion towards (them, and by directing my entire effort to] the Sole Perfection.’
Shaping the thoughts thus, especially at this time when the Dharma-Kaya of Clear Light [in the state] after death can be realized for the benefit of all sentient beings, know that thou art in that state; [and resolve] that thou wilt obtain the best boon of the State of the Great Symbol, in which thou art, [as follows]:
‘Even if I cannot realize it, yet will I know this Bardo, and, mastering the Great Body of Union in Bardo, will appear in whatever [shape] will benefit [all beings] whomsoever : ?
the breath coming in gasps just before the loss of consciousness, whereby /amas trained in the science of death detect, one by one, the interdependent psychic phenomena culminating in the release of the Bardo body from its human-plane envelope. The translator held that the science of death, as expounded in this treatise, has been arrived at through the actual experiencing of death on the part of learned /a@mas, who, when dying, have explained to their pupils the very process of death itself, in analytical and elaborate detail. (See p. 1627.)
1 In this state, realization of the Ultimate Truth is possible, providing sufficient advance on the Path has been made by the deceased before death. Otherwise, he cannot benefit now, and must wander on into lower and lower conditions of the Bardo, as determined by karma, until rebirth. (See p. 135%.)