Essence of Vajrayana. Geshe Kelsang Gyatso

This book, Essence of Vajrayana, is a complete and authoritative explanation of the Highest Yoga Tantra practice of Heruka body mandala, a powerful method for accomplishing full enlightenment in this lifetime.

The author, Venerable Geshe Kelsang Gyatso Rinpoche, worked tirelessly for several years to prepare this profound text, bringing to it the inestimable benefit of his own vast scholarship and meditational experience. From the depths of our hearts we thank him for his inconceivable patience and kindness in giving us this precious commentary, which for the first time unlocks the secrets of this sublime practice for the Western practitioner.

We also thank all the dedicated, senior Dharma students who assisted the author with the rendering of the English and who prepared the final manuscript for publication.

Roy Tyson,

Administrative Director,

Manjushri Kadampa

Meditation Centre,

June 1997.

Preface

The main subject of this book, Essence of Vajrayana, is training in the stages of the path of Highest Yoga Tantra. Gaining authentic realizations of the uncommon paths of Buddhist Tantra depends upon training in the common paths of Buddha’s Sutra teachings, such as the twenty-one meditations of the stages of the path. These are explained in the books Joyful Path of Good Fortune and The New Meditation Handbook.

To begin with we need to understand what meditation is and how important meditation is for the attainment of both the temporary happiness of this and future lives, and the ultimate happiness of liberation and full enlightenment. Meditation is a mental awareness that concentrates on a virtuous object. It is necessarily mental awareness and not sense awareness. The sense awarenesses of a Buddha are virtuous whereas the sense awarenesses of sentient beings are always neutral. For example, although our bodily actions can be virtuous or non-virtuous depending upon our motivation, our body awareness itself is always neutral. In the same way, the actions of our eye awareness can be virtuous or non-virtuous but our eye awareness itself is always neutral. Therefore, as meditation is necessarily a virtuous mind whereas our sense awarenesses are necessarily neutral, it follows that we cannot meditate with our sense awarenesses.

Another reason why we cannot meditate with our sense awarenesses is that for us the direct object of meditation is the generic image of an object, and our sense awarenesses cannot perceive generic images. Moreover, although eye, ear, nose, tongue and body awarenesses can focus on forms, sounds, smells, tastes and tactile objects respectively, they cannot remember them. Since meditation involves remembering, or holding with mindfulness, the object for an extended period of time, the only type of awareness that we can meditate with is mental awareness.

Meditation is a mental action, or mental karma, that causes us to experience mental peace. At the beginning it does not matter if our meditation is successful or not, because simply by generating a good motivation and trying to meditate we are creating the cause for future mental peace. As humans, we need certain basic conditions such as food, clothing, accommodation and money; but whether or not these things bring us happiness depends upon our peace of mind. If our mind is not at peace we will not be happy, even in the best external conditions.

Meditation is the source of all mental peace and happiness. It is true that people who do not meditate, and even animals, occasionally experience peace of mind, but this is only as a result of the virtuous mental karma they created through

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