A Buddhist Spiritual Practice Based
on the Buddha's Night of Liberation
The Bodhi-Tree (or wisdom-tree) is a set of four distinct Buddhist meditations. Each meditation is based on an insight that the historical Buddha experienced as he sat under the Bodhi-Tree more than twenty-four centuries ago. According to Buddhist tradition, the hours before the Buddha's enlightenment were divided into four watches or periods of the night. During each watch, the Buddha experienced a specific set of insights or revelations. During the last watch, as the morning star appeared on the horizon at dawn, the Buddha entered Nirvana.
Many modern Buddhist lineages have not emphasized the importance of these stages as the pattern that the Buddha followed to reach liberation. However, his stages of liberation are an example for all who seek liberation, and in the past, there have been important teachings based on these stages that have been lost.
The Four Watches of the Night
A brief summary of the insights of the Buddha during the four watches of the night follows. These insights will be correlated with the different practices of the Bodhi-Tree meditation as we proceed with the explanation of the practice.
The First Watch:
The recollection of human past lives, and knowledge of the cycle of death and rebirth
The Second Watch:
The recognition that the cycle of rebirth affects all sentient beings in all worlds, and that the law of karma determines the quality and type of rebirth, and its suffering
The Third Watch:
The recognition of the cycle of causality that leads to death and rebirth, and the means of liberation from this cycle
The Fourth Watch:
The recognition of the state of enlightenment, and the great awakening of the Buddha
The Symbolism of the Bodhi-Tree
The Bodhi-Tree or wisdom-tree is a sacred symbol in Buddhism for a number of reasons.
It represents the place of the Buddha's enlightenment, and is therefore sacred geographically.
It is ancient. Some would say it is the mythical World Tree. Thus, it is sacred temporally.
It represents growth towards liberation. Therefore, it is sacred developmentally.
It was said to rain blossoms, and is thus sacred aesthetically.
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In all these cases, the Bodhi-Tree's symbolism gives access to the Dharmakaya, which is the most transcendent aspect of Buddhism. However, this access is not based on simple awareness. The access to the Dharmakaya comes via the Sambhogakaya, the pathways through the intermediate worlds of Tantric Buddhism, which have been mostly lost and forgotten.
The Bodhi-Tree meditation is based on the symbol of a tree, a banyan tree, which provides a multi-layered, rich, and complex symbol of the self and its journey towards enlightenment. Here we describe the symbol and its various levels of meaning:
The Bodhi-Tree or wisdom-tree is the world tree, and its roots drink deep of the waters of |
infinity. Its branches and leaves blow in the winds of the Void, and it is lit by the clear light. It is a tree of refuge, a place of safety from the raging tigers and dragons of desire.
Each leaf has the bright green of spring, and its bark has the darkness and fragrance of the forest. It has fruits of knowledge but these are not fruits forbidden to mankind by a jealous god. These fruits of knowledge are intended for all beings. While the fruits on the lower limbs give knowledge of good and evil, and awareness of many lives, those on the upper limbs give knowledge of unity and immortality.
In Western myth, only the lower fruits have been tasted - mankind was expelled from the garden before eating the fruit of immortality or gaining the knowledge of unity.
Because certain kinds of knowledge are not easily accessible, many people have given up and assume that they know all that is worth knowing. This is not the case. They have partial knowledge which cannot get them any further than the garden from which they were expelled. There they may have innocence, but also ignorance. There, the value of wisdom is unknown, as is indeed its existence.
This world tree, the Bodhi-Tree, unites all worlds, and it has no guardians to protect it. All sentient beings are welcome to gain as much wisdom as their minds can hold. But it is a long journey to that state, for the traveler must unravel the current life and many other past lives to see the components that have been woven together into the patterns of life. Then the strands must be woven again, to create a mind capable and worthy of returning to the source.
While the mind of the individual starts out as a closed and tight center of awareness, as it relaxes and opens, it starts to look like a water-lily in a lake, and then begins to resemble the lake itself. One is no longer an observer watching the mind from a distance. One becomes awareness immersed in awareness, like a water droplet in the depths of a lake. There is no distance in thought, there is only immersion. All minds are united and all minds are ultimately free. The droplet bursts to engulf the lake, and the ocean, and infinity.
The Bodhi-Tree is a symbolic representation of the individual's journey to infinity. As the seed which begins tiny and hard grows open and free, so should the mind and heart. The tree is rooted in the ground as the self is rooted in matter. But the seed grows beyond the ground, as it perceives its environment, cares about it, and ultimately leaves the limitations of the body and matter behind. The branches reach towards the heaven yet the vines of the banyan reach towards the earth. Such is the state of mankind - always being pulled in two directions. One direction is freedom, ultimate liberation, and the transcendence of boundaries. The other direction is security, rootedness, comfort, and tradition - the self that will not turn away from the earth. The traditionalist may justify behavior by Buddhist or other ethics and ritual, but will ultimately seek comfort rather than freedom. Such people should rest peacefully at the roots of the tree and never climb it.
For the others, the spiritual explorers, comfort and security are left behind. There will ultimately come a question: Which world do you choose? Only those who seek the upper branches of the tree and liberation can progress and follow the stages of the watches of the night.
There were many reasons for the historical Buddha's incarnation. One was to provide a model for those that seek freedom.
The Yidam or Spiritual Guide
The Bodhi-Tree is an advanced practice partly because it requires that the practitioner be guided by an inner Buddhist spiritual guide or Yidam (tutelary deity). The practice cannot be undertaken without such a guide. Since obtaining a guide is necessity before even beginning the practice, the first step is to contact a guide either by being initiated into a recognized Buddhist lineage, or through individual effort.
Obtaining an Inner Buddhist Spiritual Guide
The Bodhi-Tree practice is an advanced practice not only because it requires deep insight into past lives and the fundamental nature of awareness, but also because it requires communication with an inner Tantric or Mahayana Buddhist guide or Yidam.
The Bodhi-Tree meditations presented here come from such an inner guide, a bhairava, and this bhairava provides the basic framework and content of the practice. This guide and his origin will be described in greater detail in the First Watch of the Night (or Jivamala) practice. Our focus here is how to obtain an inner guide.
The Bhairava describes the role of Tantric Buddhist lineages in granting Yidams, and also how to contact and obtain a Yidam without being part of a lineage or having a formal initiation:
Most Yidams are given through initiation. If we have a lineage that selflessly seeks the happiness of the world, all reasonable and serious seekers are given Yidams and connected to guides. If we have lineages vain of power and tradition, relatively few are given guides. When we have egotistical lineages that hide teachings, then it is rare to find followers with Yidams, and they must wait many years for the lama [or teacher] to decide that they are worthy. This is the lowest type of lineage.
It is not up to the lama or acharya to decide the worthiness of a candidate - it is up to the dakini or bhairava. If these guides do not like the person, they will not come. But they decide the worthiness, not the lama. For the lama to claim that role is to exceed his authority. It is like the butler deciding if the master's guest is worthy to enter the house.
If the Tantric lineages give out Yidams, then they are doing their jobs. They are Yidam distribution centers. But some do not do their job, and force novices to depend on lamas for everything. In such cases, novices may be treated like servants with bhairavas and dakinis only doled out to those most subservient. It is a violation of the Dharma.
As a general rule, if an obedient novice of good moral character cannot receive a guide within a year, then the lineage is taking undue power, and the novice must look elsewhere. Very little transcendent insight comes from external teaching - all true transformational knowledge comes inwardly, and should be guided by a dakini or bhairava.
If the lineages clutch their Yidams like buried treasure, then the novice must go elsewhere. He or she usually has three choices. One is to go on pilgrimage to sacred sites where monks and saints have done meditation. Sometimes a link is maintained at such sites to the deities involved. Prolonged meditation in such places may rekindle the spark, and the past visionary atmosphere may return [so the seeker may contact a Yidam there].
The second choice is meditation, which creates a link. Bodhisattvas and other Yidams are busy beings, rushing through the worlds in hundred of thousands of emanations. They are like shooting stars that barely have time to breathe. However, extended meditation and concentration on finding a Yidam can slowly create a brilliant meditative flame around a person, and sooner or later, the sheer intensity of desire and concentration will capture the attention of the bodhisattva, bhairava, or dakini. It is the sheer desire for a guide which will draw one down if the person shines with the light of effort.
The third method to contact a Yidam is through dream yoga. There are some bhairavas who prefer to work with people who are fully conscious. However, there are also guides who prefer to work with the inner bodies while the person is asleep. These are specialists and may be called down in different ways.
One technique is to visualize the inside of the physical body as perfectly empty and still. It should appear as dark with perhaps only a few stars. The only winds are those of peace. Drops of nectar should be visualized as falling on invisible waters which respond with concentric circles of blue light. In the center of one of the circles is the bija [or seed] mantra HUM, lit up in neon blue light. This cleanses the inner body which then sparkles with subtle blue light. As the novice rests, he or she should chant the mantra OM BHAIRAVA HUM. By doing this each night, the mind is cleansed and a pathway is developed for the entrance of the guide.
It is important to note that guides come at the beginning of a journey, not at the end. To put off a guide until years of philosophical training are over kills the spiritual development of the novice. The guide is most vital at the beginning, to untangle universal truth from lineage jargon.
If you seek a Yidam, seek a beautiful one. One's path should begin in a positive way. Yidams can always take on their wrathful forms but it is no way to begin. Destruction emerges when it is necessary, but stepping onto the path is a creative choice. Visualize the light that reflects your inner being best, and surround yourself with it like a great flame. Call upon a specific deity, or any bodhisattva who harmonizes with your light [or personality]. You must see with your heart that you do not have a ghost or demon that responds to your call but a true guide. Ask his or her name, visualize the name and see if the being stays. If it stays true and bright, ask if it will guide you on the path. [If he or she says yes, then] this is your Yidam.
Gaining and communicating with a Yidam is certainly an esoteric practice, and one on which some seekers spend a great deal of time and effort. Though the above mentioned difficulties associated with certain spiritual lineages are sometimes the reason that students are not given Yidams, there is also another very good reason why seekers are not assigned Yidams:
To gain a Yidam, people in lineages must request one. Then the teacher must gauge if assigning one will do any good, as the major Yidam problem is that people cannot see them. Even if they have one assigned, it does no good if there is a wall of ignorance between them (the seeker and the Yidam). The Yidam could be there but the person cannot see or hear them. It is a waste of time on both sides.
However, the Bhariava also shows how some basic abilities make the process easier:
So the person must develop the spiritual senses, especially the sense of presence. This is how you know if another person is in the room, even if they make no noise [and they are hidden from view]. It is how you know that a pet wants to go outside or wants food, even at a distance. The sense of presence is like the quality of intuition, and it is important as a means of perceiving a Yidam if you have one.
Yidams can protect the seeker from distractions and demons, motivate and guide him or her, and explain the paths of spiritual development. People have forgotten how useful they are.
Once a Yidam is contacted and agrees to be a guide, the Bodhi-Tree practice can begin.
The Practice of the First Watch of the Night
The first of the four Bodhi-Tree meditations is based on the Buddha's First Watch of the Night. This meditation, which is also called The Jivamala, the Necklace of Souls, is described at a separate web site. The complexity of this process requires an entire site since gaining awareness of many past lives can be a lengthy process.
The Jivamala site shows how a single individual went through this process, and therefore serves only as an example of how this can be done. The individual doing the Bodhi-Tree practice is responsible for working with his or her Yidam or guide to explore the necklace of his or her own past lives. The Jivamala site also contains a more detailed description of the identity and origins of the Buddhist guide who is handing down the teachings of the Bodhi-Tree practice at this site.
The Jivamala (or First Watch of the Night) practice represents the expansion of individual's identity to include awareness of past lives. This expansion of awareness was the earthly Buddha's first realization on the road to his enlightenment. The Bodhi-Tree meditations presented at the current site represent the final three stages of the practice where the practitioner moves beyond the series of identities represented by past lives.
We will now go on to examine the practice associated with the First Watch of the Night which is also called the Jivamala practice. Following that, we will return to this site (wisdom-tree.com) to continue the practices associated with second, third, and fourth watches of the night.
A Buddhist Practice of Purification
Dealing with Reincarnation
This site describes one person's practice of the Jivamala, a process of purification where the individual embarks on a spiritual journey to remember past lives in order to be free of the bondage of those lives.
One of the fundamental elements of Buddhism is the doctrine of reincarnation. Human beings die and are reborn over and over again because they fail to see things clearly and wake up to the spiritual emptiness which lies behind the phenomenal world. It is this false perception of the nature of things that leads to wrong thinking and wrong behavior, which in turn causes this painful cycle of death and rebirth.
In the sixth century BCE, when prince Siddhartha Gautama (the Buddha) began his process of awakening, tradition has it that his first stage of meditation involved remembering his past lives.
The Jivamala practice maintains that a similar process can be revealed to and practiced by others who are on the spiritual path. This site contains detailed biographies of many lives, and documents the initiatory Jivamala practice showing how it works. It also contains descriptions of many deaths and many afterlives, where several of the past lives or personalities describe where their actions and experiences in life led them after death.
The Jivamala practice is ideally performed by renunciants (monks or nuns) initiated into a Tantric Buddhist lineage, but is sometimes also practiced by householders. The Jivamala practice should only be performed under the direction of an inner guide, a dakini, or bhairava, or bodhisattva acting as a yidam (spiritual guide or tutelary deity). In this instance, the practice of the Jivamala was revealed to a householder by a bhairava. The practice was therefore not begun in a traditional way, since it was not handed down to a disciple by a living teacher in a recognized spiritual lineage.
This is a description of a meditative practice based on the life of the earthly Buddha.
The Purpose of Remembering Past Lives
Many people have used memories of past lives to bask in the reflected glory of their former selves, thus increasing egotism and ignorance, and even causing confusion of identity in the present life. Past lives have been treated like ancestors, with the individual claiming glory and fame as a kind of inheritance from their previous selves. This use of past lives is unacceptable for the Jivamala practice, and is in direct opposition to the Buddhist notion that the individual's current life and problems are a direct result of mistakes in past lives. Had past lives been lived correctly, the individual would not have required another incarnation.
From a Buddhist perspective, we can ask the questions:
Why be proud of the mistakes, confusion, and ignorance of past selves that have led to the prison of one's current circumstances in life? Why take pride in a disability like spiritual blindness? Why be proud of wealth and power that have been misused, leading to rebirth?
The purpose of remembering past lives is not to increase pride, but rather to increase detachment and purify the individual of residual karma from those past personalities (jivas). Knowledge of past lives should bring humility, recognition of the universality of suffering, and spiritual wisdom. The jivamala practice also permits an expansion of personal identity where the self grows beyond the bounds of an individual ego to encompass a broader identity which has knowledge of many past selves.
During such experience, one individual temporarily gains intimate knowledge of a string of individual selves, and as identity widens, compassion tends to increase. This compassion, because it derives from direct experience, can be more powerful than more common notions of compassion, which are based on sympathy for the suffering of others. The basis for these more common feelings of sympathy is limited because it falls short of the intuitive knowledge of individual suffering that can come from the experience of past lives.
The First Stage of the Buddha's Enlightenment
The Jivamala meditation is the first of a set of four practices based on the Buddha's four watches of the night. The later three practices are described at a separate site, and all four practices are known collectively as the Bodhi-Tree meditation.
The basis for the Jivamala practice may be seen in a description of the Buddha's enlightenment in the Buddhacarita, written by Asvaghosha in the second century CE. As the Buddha's enlightenment progressed through various stages, so it is appropriate for a modern day disciple to pass through those same stages. The Buddha's stages of liberation are an example for all who seek liberation.
According to the Buddhacarita, while the Buddha was sitting under the Bodhi Tree, he first gained mastery over all degrees and kinds of trance states. Then, during the first watch of the night, he experienced all his past lives:
In the first watch of the night he recollected the successive series of his former births. 'There was I so and so; that was my name; deceased from there I came here' - in this way he remembered thousands of births, as though living them over again. When he recalled all his own births and deaths in all these previous lives of his, the Sage, full of pity, turned his compassionate mind towards other living beings, and he thought to himself: 'Again and again they must leave the people they regard as their own, and must go on elsewhere, and that without ever stopping. Surely this world is unprotected and helpless, and like a wheel it turns round and round.' As he continued steadily to recollect his past thus, he came to the definite conviction that the world of samsara is as unsubstantial as the pith of a plantain tree.
(From the Buddhacarita of Asvaghosha, cited in Ninian Smart, Sacred Texts of the World, (Crossroad, 1982), p. 234. Original translation from E. Conze, Buddhists Texts Through the Ages, (London, Faber, 1954))
At this point, the Buddha proceeded to the second watch of the night in which he acquired the "supreme heavenly eye" which allowed him to see further into the nature of samsara, and explore the six worlds of rebirth.
The Jivamala - The Necklace of Souls
In the meditative practice of the Jivamala, the past lives or personalities of the individual are threaded together like beads on a string in the shape of a necklace. Each individual life with its karma or jiva** is visualized as a pearl, shining and in the shape of perfection.
The dark pearls represent lives that contain destructive karma that acts like a millstone, limiting the individual in various ways even in the present life.
The white pearls represent the lives that have been purified by memory, realization, and atonement. Past passions must be realized and understood as delusion. Past sins must be realized as wrong or destructive actions. Past lives must be understood as combinations of good and bad intentions, as wise choices and errors. The person must be liberated from unconscious bondage to those lives and their passions.
The process of remembering one life after another is like going from bead to bead using a rosary. Each bead contains a mosaic of memories from a previous incarnation.
Vajradhara - The Source
of the Jivamala Practice
It is through the compassion of Vajradhara, the primordial Buddha (Adi-Buddha) of indestructible blue light, that the Jivamala practice came to be known. Vajradhara, who is a celestial Buddha in the Vajrayana Buddhist tradition, assigns one of his emanations to direct the Jivamala practice for the individual who has been initiated.
The Bhairava Introduces
the Jivamala Practice
I have been assigned by Vajradhara to direct your progress. My role as bhairava is both guardian and guide. As guardians, we accompany Buddhas on their adventures, make straight the path, clarify the winds, and create the backgrounds. We make the mountains where the Buddhas sit.
As guides, we also accompany those blessed by the Buddhas. We work with their karma, opening cramped passageways causing the seeds of karma (bijas), which contain past frustrations and anxieties, to blossom. We try to motivate these individuals and direct their minds. We put on terrifying forms to frighten them into obedience.
There are many bhairavas, and Vajradhara is our lord. We spread out in concentric circles around him. Some circles have archetypal animals, some have yoginis and dakinis. These circles retreat far back into space. They move inward and outward at the same time. The meditator must jump from one spinning wheel to another to pass from the guardians who surround the Buddha, to the Buddha.
As bhairavas, we are dedicated to Vajradhara, who is the Adi-Bhairava, the primordial Buddha form and bhairava form in one. As Adi-Buddha, he is the origin of [moral or karmic] order and stability. As Adi-Bhairava, he acts to maintain this order in a continually shifting universe. We are his emanations, and we work in the more manifest worlds.
We are linked with practitioners through initiation. This ritual creates a karmic link, which allows us to interact in the practitioner's life. It also creates mutual obligations and responsibilities. It is the Buddhist practitioner's obligation to show respect, and to listen to the guide's words. It is the guide's obligation to help the practitioner in meditation, if he or she is distracted, of weak concentration or endangered.
Bhairavas who act as guides normally specialize in one of three areas. These are karma, purification, and performance of ritual. Karma bhairavas can see the webs of karma in which people are bound, and work with past lives in order to cleanse the mind. Purification bhairavas work primarily with mantras to rid the body of impurities by vibrating each region or aspect of it. Temple bhairavas oversee both temple and private ritual.
I am a karma bhairava. As karma bhairavas, we look at the karma of the practitioner, analyze the information, and draw conclusions. We act without generating karma ourselves. We do our duty. This is the best way to act in order not to create karma. Figure out your duty and your goals in life, and act without passion to perform your duty and attain those goals.
Most bhariavas are described in the literature as warthful. This is only one form that we take. Like bodhisattavas, we may appear in both peaceful and frightening forms. But our deeper forms are light.
On the Conclusion page at this site, there is a link to the Bodhi-Tree or wisdom-tree practice web site. This site contains a page that describes some methods that can be used to contact an inner Buddhist spiritual guide or Yidam.
Here is a metaphor provided by the Bhairava to help in understanding the importance of the Jivamala practice.
The Rosebush - The Bhairava Explains the
Function of the Jivamala Practice Using a Metaphor
During spiritual evolution, individuals are like rose bushes, and each blossom is a life. Sometimes, as in the case of difficult and painful lives, the roses are eaten by insects, or harmed by chemicals or disease, but they still stay on the bush, taking nutrients. They need to be taken from the bush, placed in new earth and cured of pests, or scattered on the ground if the harm is too great.
The individual's past personalities have been damaged, but not destroyed. They need to be separated from the stem of the individual's spirit, where they have been taking vital energy with their rage and fury at imprisonment. They need to be replanted, put in vases, and taken away from the stem, so that the bush can grow new roses.
The Jivamala brings about this liberation from spiritual death by freeing these past personalities, in order to recapture the bright force of spirit that runs through the individual.
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