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                                               SOME NOTES ON THE CHENREZI PUJA

These notes are intended to give a general idea of the meaning and symbolism of the puja  (Sanskrit for ‘worship’, for those who like to understand what is chanted.  If you prefer simply to stay with the imagery, the sounds and the silence, that's fine!

 Most Tibetan pujas involve the imaginative creation of a ‘deity’ (i.e. an image which embodies qualities of Enlightenment such as compassion, energy, understanding  and so on). The puja aims to transform our ordinary perceptions of the world into a way of seeing which is more open to the light of Emptiness. The Dalai Lama writes:

             “....imagining everything that appears as the divine body and supporting mandala of the deity - should be understood as a perception to be developed for a very specific purpose, rather than out of belief in its correspondence to reality, this purpose being to overcome our sense of ordinariness. On the level of our imagination, we try to develop the ability to see all appearances as the divine forms of the deity; by doing so, our apprehension of any thought remains always within the context of emptiness”.            -   The World of Tibetan Buddhism, p.119

The 17th Karmapa recently said:

"Many people understand the practice of a deity to be supplicating them, prostrating and making offerings to them. But actually, this kind of practice that sets the deity apart from us and makes them into a separate entity to be the object of our actions is not the true practice of the deity. The real practice of Chenrezik is one that develops within our being the qualities of love, compassion, and altruism. We are able, for example, to speak kindly to others and benefit them. This is the actual practice of Chenrezik, and we should begin with this foundation in mind".

   [From "The Karmapa teaches the practice and mantra of Chenrezik", on his website]

Aspiration for enlightenment

‘The unity of peace and vision’ refers to the two basic dimensions of Buddhist meditation, shamatha (peaceful abiding) and vipashyana (clear seeing).  These can to some extent be developed separately, but it is their union that is aim of Buddhist practice. Dagpo Tashi Namgyal writes: “This is what is given many names, such as buddha-mind, mind-essence of sentient beings, non-arising dharmakaya, basic natural state, innate mind, original wakefulness, mahamudra, and so forth.  And this is what all the sutras and tantras, true treatises and instructions aim at and lead to.” (Clarifying the Natural State: A Principal Guidance Manual for Mahamudra, pp.41-2.  Rangjung Yeshe, 2001).

Connecting to the lineage

Tibetan Buddhism tends to emphasise the traditions, or lineages, through which the teachings are passed on through the generations. There are many such lineages which have both merged and separated over the centuries. The Kagyu tradition, from which this puja comes, traces its main lineage back to:

Tilopa (988-1069), who grew up in Northern India as a Brahmin, before becoming first a wandering yogi and then a Buddhist monk.  He practised with a yogini, the daughter of a sesame seed pounder, and the monks expelled him from the monastery. He then made a living by grinding sesame seeds, and was taught by many prominent monks and yogis. He experienced visions of the Buddha in the form of Vajradhara, so that it is said that his teachings did not have a purely human source. Or, we might say, he drew on his own experiences as well as on what others had taught him. According to legend, the entirety of mahamudra was directly transmitted to Tilopa.

Naropa (1016-1100) also grew up as a Brahmin in Northern India.  He became a Hindu scholar before encountering the Buddhist sutras, and becoming a monk. He became a learned Buddhist scholar and taught at Nalanda monastic university, before in a vision being instructed by a dakini to seek his teacher Tilopa. He abandoned his academic career and spent many years seeking Tilopa.   He received the mahamudra teachings from Tilopa and transmitted them to his disciple, Marpa.

Marpa  (1012-1097)  was born in Lhodrak in Tibet, began studying at an early age, and mastered the Sanskrit language. He was also a prosperous farmer, with a wife and sons, and was renowned for his hot temper. He travelled across the Himalayas several times in order to study with Buddhist masters in India and Nepal. He spent twelve years in India, studying with Naropa and other teachers, before returning to Tibet and translating many Buddhist texts into Tibetan.  He is often referred to as ‘Marpa Lotsawa’  - ‘Marpa the Translator’.

Milarepa (1040-1123), one of Tibet’s best-loved poets and yogis, came to Marpa after seeking revenge on an uncle and aunt who had mistreated his immediate family after his father died.  Marpa eventually accepted him as a student after giving him seemingly impossible tasks to complete.  On completion of his studies with Marpa, Milarepa led the life of a wandering yogi, meditating in caves, and teaching the villagers who came to see him, often presenting his teachings in the form of songs.

Gampopa (1084-1161) was one of the principal students of Milarepa.  He was trained as a doctor, but became a monk after his wife died.  He pioneered the later form of the Dhakpo Kagyu lineage by unifyimg Milarepa’s mahamudra lineage with the ‘stages of the path’ tradition of the Kadampa lineage. Amongst his students was Düsum Khyenpa (1110-1193), who established the Karma Kagyu lineage, and later became known as the Karmapa.  The Karma Kagyu lineage then continued with the line of Karmapas up to the present day.

The lineage thus includes a wide variety of characters: Two scholars who became monks, but later disrobed, an irascible farmer who was a brilliant translator, a wandering yogi-poet, and a doctor who brought together two very different Buddhist traditions. There were many other teachers in the lineage, including some women, each with their own slant on the teachings.  Throughout the history of the Karma Kagyu there has been a creative tension between the monastic tradition, and that of the wandering yogis and poets such as Milarepa, and more recently Shabkar (1781-1851), who like the later Rimé teachers took a non-sectarian rather than a purely Kagyu approach.

The word ‘Kagyu’ derives from the Tibetan ‘ka’ meaning ‘speech’ or ‘teaching’, and ‘gyu’ meaning ‘continuity’ or ‘transmission’, and so it means something like ‘the continuity of teaching’ lineage.  It is sometimes called in English ‘the whispered lineage’, with the implication its teachings are often passed personally from teachers to students. Its teachings are often found within the life-stories of its teachers, such as the stories of Marpa and Milarepa, rather than set out in a systematic way. However it has also been home to many distinguished scholars, and Gampopa’s book The Jewel Ornament of Liberation is one of the earliest expositions of the Buddhist path in Tibet, based on a systematic study of the Six Perfections:  generosity, morality (self-discipline), patience (forbearance), strength (effort, energy), contemplation (awareness, concentration, mindfulness), wisdom (insight).

‘Dharmakaya’:  In Mahayana Buddhism the word ‘Buddha’ can refer not only to the historical figure of Gautama, but also to the reality of things to which he pointed. In the Pali texts there are also brief references to this:

There is an unborn, an un-brought-to-being, an unmade, an unformed.  If there were not, there would be no escape made known here for one who is born, brought to being, made, formed.  But since there is an unborn, an un-brought-to-being, an unmade, an unformed. An escape is therefore described for one who is born, brought to being, made, formed. 

(Udana 8:1-3, translated in Ñanamoli The Life of the Buddha (1992), p. 223).

This ‘unborn’ is often called the Dhamadhatu (‘reality realm’) or Dharmakaya (‘truth body’).  It is in some Buddhist traditions seen as the world as a whole, before we divide things up according to our individual and general human interests. As Lama Chime puts it:

The whole is always there, but we have to learn to see it. We have to learn to let go of our attachment to everything in the relative world. It is only because of the whole that the parts exist, but one cannot see the whole as a part. It is like the eye that sees but cannot see itself.

This view of reality as a Whole is strongly emphasised in the Avatamsaka Sutra, which is best known in China and Japan, but was translated into Tibetan several times.

‘Samsara and Nirvana’  :  Samsara is the everyday world, the ‘mundane whirl’.  Nirvana is the release from Samsara, but in Mahayana Buddhism this ‘release’ is not a matter of escaping from the world.  It is rather a matter of coming to see, and respond to, the world differently.  Samsara and Nirvana are not different in themselves, but we create the difference.

Refuge and bodhichitta

The refuges can be understood on several levels. For example,

 ‘Buddha’ can refer to the historical figure Siddartha Gautama, or to one’s own enlightened mind, or to the realm of enlightenment.

‘Dharma’ can mean the teachings of the Buddha, or the spiritual path to which they refer, or to one’s own special path.

‘Sangha’ can refer to Buddhist monks and nuns, or to the Buddhist community generally, or to all beings that support the Buddha-dharma.

Bodhichitta (enlightened mind/heart) refers to the Mahayana aspiration to be of benefit to all beings

Visualization of Chenrezi (Avalokiteshvara)

The compassion aspect of the Buddha.  ‘Avalokiteshvara’ in Sanskrit means something like 'the lord (ishvara) who looks down (avalokita)'.  The Tibetan translators rendered this as ‘chen-re’ (which means the brightness or glance of the eye), and ‘zi’ (which has meanings including ‘looking’, ‘regarding’ ‘esteeming’, ‘giving’). So ‘Chenrezi’ has the sense of  a being who values us, regards us with love.  An English version might be ‘Kind Eyes’ or ‘Loving Eyes’.

You can visualise Chenrezi either in front of you or above your head.  For most of us, the visualisation may be a rather vague image, but the full traditional visualisation is:  One visualises that a lotus in full bloom appears a forearm’s length above one’s head, and above the heads of others.  Then on top of the lotus, a moon disc appears on which vertically stands a syllable of white light in the form of the Tibetan syllable HRI  (see below).   The HRI generates a luminous radiance that spreads in all directions.  One imagines that the light going up is an offering presented to the buddhas and bodhisattvas while the light going down is a stream of compassion that relieves the suffering of ordinary beings.  Then the light returns back to the syllable HRI which is transformed into Chenrezi.

The white lotus is associated with unfolding insight, the moon disc with compassion.  The five colours are white, yellow, red, green, blue, each with its own network of associations. The deer skin is an association with the legendary kindness of deer, and is also a reminder of the Deer Park in Sarnath, where the Buddha preached his first sermon. The Buddha with whom Chenrezi is adorned is Amitabha, the red Buddha of infinite light of the setting sun. Amitabha has associations of  'discriminating wisdom', and displays the mudra (hand gesture) of meditation. 

The pictorial details of the visualization don't matter so much - it is a way of representing the compassion aspect of the Buddha in a vivid way; an imaginative means of getting in touch with the reality and presence of Compassion.  You might prefer to visualise your own image of Kind Eyes, or simply stay with the sense of Compassion that the image represents. 

Seven-branch prayer

1) Paying homage to Chenrezi and all the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas

(The ten directions are the four compass points and the four intermediate points, plus the zenith and nadir (i.e. all directions). The three times are past, present and future (i.e. all times).

2) Offerings of flowers, incense etc

3) Confession of negative actions

(The ten unvirtuous acts are made up of three physical acts: killing, stealing, sexual misconduct; four verbal acts: lying, alienating speech, wounding speech, useless speech; and three mental acts: greed, malevolence, aberrant beliefs. The five defilements are greed, hate, delusion, pride, jealousy).

4) Rejoicing in the merit of virtue accumulated

The Shravakas ('hearers') are people who achieve enlightenment through listening to the Buddha's teaching; the Pratyekabuddhas ('lone Buddhas') are people who achieve enlightenment through their own practice, without the help of an external teacher.

5) Request to turn the Wheels of the Dharma, i.e. to propagate the teachings of the Buddha. The ‘Great Vehicle is the Mahayana, the ‘Small Vehicle’ is the Hinayana, and the ‘Ordinary Vehicle’ covers other traditions that are compatible with Buddhist teachings.

6) Request to look with compassion on all

7) Dedication of merit for the enlightenment of all

Chenrezi prayer

At the start there is reference to Lama, Yidam and Protector.  These are the three personal, experiential, ‘roots’ that are related to Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, respectively.  ‘Lama’ can mean a human teacher, or a text, or something in the natural world from which one learns.   ‘Yidam’ is one’s own personal ‘way’, often associated with the characteristics of a particular ‘deity’, and the ‘Protectors’ are those elements in our experience that protect our Dharma practice. (Dakinis have a similar function of supporting Dharma practice).  So here Chenrezi is seen as teacher, personal deity, and protector.

The prayer involves a tour of the six realms or states of existence in which dwell : hell beings, hungry ghosts, animals, human beings, titans, and gods. Each of these states of being is associated with a particular sort of negative emotion leading to a particular sort of suffering:

Hell beings - hatred, leading to intensely heated and intensely cold emotional states.

Hungry ghosts - miserliness, leading to hungry longing

Animals - ignorance, leading to lack of understanding

Human beings - desire, leading to excessive activity

Titans - jealousy, leading to disputes and quarrels

Gods - pride, leading to decline and fall

Each of the states is imagined, and Chenrezi's mantra OM MANI PADME HUM is repeated, to pacify the suffering of that state, and to help the beings involved towards birth into the realm of Potala. This is  Chenrezi's realm, which is also called Dewachen - 'the Great Happiness'.  (‘Potala’ is Sanskrit for ‘harbour’,  so that Dewachen/Potala suggests the happy place to which one finally comes home).

Then: 'May I be like Chenrezi ... May I possess the dharma for the benefit of beings.'

Then we visualize light radiating from Chenrezi, purifying the ordinary world into Dewachen, the Great Happiness. The body, speech and mind of all beings become the Body, Speech and Mind of Chenrezi, who is compassion arising from Emptiness.

Keeping this in mind, Chenrezi's mantra is chanted

                            OM MANI PADME HUM (HRI)

and we are left with the vision of our bodies as being the embodiment of Chenrezi, our speech as the sound of his mantra and our minds as his expanse of awareness.  MANI means the jewel of compassionate action that arises from PADMA, the lotus of wisdom.  HRI, the syllable from which Chenrezi is generated, can mean ‘self-respect’, ‘conscience’, and ‘shame’ (in a positive sense -- the discrimination of the Good, or what is 'felt deeply in the heart').  It is one of the eleven positive mental states in the Abhidharma teachings.  It can have the sense of reddening or blushing, and is especially associated with the red buddha of the setting sun, Amitabha (see below). 

This is the climax of the puja, followed by a period of silence in which we remain aware of Compassion (Chenrezi, Avalokiteshvara) in whatever way one finds helpful. (The mantra may be repeated silently as part of this practice).

Dedication of merit

We wish that through our becoming like Chenrezi, others may attain the same state; that we at death may be born into the Great Happiness (Dewachen), and be of benefit to all beings.

'The tenth level' refers to Buddhahood, the tenth and final stage [Sanskrit: bhumi; Tib: sa] of the Bodhisattva path.

Dewachen short prayer

This centres on Amitabha, the Buddha of boundless light.  He is especially associated with the sunset, and the end of life.  Also with discriminating wisdom.  Chenrezi (symbolising compassion) and Vajrapani (symbolising power, or capacity) are here visualised as sitting on either side of Amitabha (symbolising wisdom).

The four immeasurables

We end with a recitation in English of the 'Four Immeasurables':

Love, Compassion, Sympathetic Joy, and Equanimity.