Natural Perfection

Longchenpa's Radical Dzogchen

Lonchen Rabjam, Keith Dowman

• Publisher: Wisdom Publications
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9780861716401
• eBook ISBN: 9780861717255
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Eastern Philosophy

Dzogchen, or the "Great Perfection, " is considered by many to be the apex of Tibetan Buddhism, and Longchen Rabjam is the most celebrated of all the saints of this remarkable tradition. Natural Perfection presents the radical precepts of Dzogchen, pointing the way to absolute liberation from conceptual fetters and leading the practitioner to a state of pure, natural integration into one's true being.Transcending the Tibetan context or even the confines of Buddhist tradition, Longchen Rabjam delivers a manual full of practical wisdom. Natural Perfection is a shining example of why people have continued to turn to the traditions of Tibet for spiritual and personal transformation and realization. Keith Dowman's illuminating translation of this remarkable work of wisdom provides clear accessibility to the profound path of Dzogchen in the here-and-now.

I.1 The Disclosure of Absence

4. THE ABSENCE OF ALL CONCRETE REALITY

First let me tell you about “absence,”

the absence that is essentially emptiness:

in the super-matrix of pure mind that is like space

whatever appears is absent in reality.

Rigpa itself and everything appearing in its scope is utterly empty, lacking any identity, so with all proliferating projection and elaborating concepts undermined nothing ever comes into existence.

In the nirvana of indeterminate rigpa,

there is no proliferation, no substance or attribute.¹⁷

Despite appearances, form is emptiness and emptiness is form and there is no center inside nor any point of focus outside. The state of rigpa is unoriginated and there is no dualistic mind that proliferates ideas and creates an objective universe full of specific things.

The super-matrix of pure mind is the spaciousness of absence, likened to elemental space, in which material phenomena appear as intangible images of light:

5. A DEFINITIVE SIMILE FOR ABSENCE

In the universal womb that is boundless space

all forms of matter and energy occur as flux of the four elements,

but all are empty forms, absent in reality:

all phenomena, arising in pure mind, are like that.

Though all phenomena of all worlds seem to come into existence and perish in the sphere of elemental space, their appearance has no basis and thus, insubstantial, they are said to be absent. The four elements (earth, water, fire, and air) that comprise whatever appears, because they are not composed of discrete particles, never actually come into being and, therefore, never cease to exist. Neither the supported phenomena, therefore, nor the space that underlies them are actually established as existent. Likewise, both rigpa and all experience appearing within its scope are absent in reality.

Just as all worlds, inner and outer,

all forms of matter and energy,

the animate and inanimate,

all contained in space, are absent,

so is the vast field, the super-matrix of pure mind,

with its buddhas and sentient beings,

its crucible and contents, environment and life-forms:

in immaculate reality everything is nondual,

free of inflating or deflating conceptual projection.¹⁸

The hologram is a salient simile for our worlds and galaxies projected into cosmic space. Atoms, elemental components of matter, construed as “supports” of materiality are said to be “absent” insofar as their indivisibility precludes their application as building blocks of more complex structures. Once the fundament is discovered to be absent, “supported” material structures—planets, continents, animate and inanimate, flora and fauna—must also be absent.¹⁹ The absence of the material realm is employed as a simile for the status of all phenomena in the moment. The fundament, “the support,” is the pure space of rigpa, while the “supported” is all experience appearing in its scope. The ontological status of absent phenomena is nondual, free of all evaluation in terms of existence or nonexistence. This existential indeterminacy is termed “absence” or “ineffability.”

Rather than referring to the utter nonexistence of all and everything, absence implies the lack of any exterior or interior identity:

6. APPEARANCES IN THE NATURE OF MIND ARE INHERENTLY ABSENT

Magical illusion, whatever its form,

lacks substance, empty in nature;

likewise, all experience of the world, arisen in the moment,

unstirring from pure mind, is insubstantial evanescence.

All experience of the world and our outer environment and the beings that partake of its energy, the crucible and its contents, no matter what the form, all is as empty of inherent existence as a hallucination of a world with illusory inhabitants—nothing can move outside the space of pure rigpa.

No experience of the world, inner or outer, no matter or energy,

no event in samsara or nirvana, ever leaves pure mind.²⁰

Pure rigpa is our original face of awareness where phenomena appear up-front like empty reflections on the surface of a mirror. Things seem to be there; but actually they are not. Everything is a momentary illusion in the nature of mind; nothing whatsoever stirs from or differs from the nature of mind.

Pure mind is the all-inclusive space-time of the dream—of both samsara and nirvana:

7. INSUBSTANTIAL APPEARANCES NEVER STIR FROM THE SCOPE OF TH...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword by Chögyal Namkhai Norbu
• Translator’s Introduction
• The Treasury of Natural Perfection
• The Commentary to the Treasury of Natural Perfection
• Prologue
• The Concise Exposition
• The Extensive Exposition
• The Conclusion of the Treatise
• Notes
• Appendix I: The Tibetan Text and Quotations
• Appendix II: Index of Similes
• Appendix III: List of Tibetan Headings in the Auto-commentary
• Glossary
• Selected English Bibliography
• Other Titles by Keith Dowman
• About the Author