Today’s FBA Podcast takes us into the mysterious world of “Tara – Virya Buddha”. Dharmacharini Vanaraji gave this talk to the Women’s Class at the London Buddhist Centre, June 2011.
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Tara – Virya Buddha
(upbeat music) - This podcast is brought to you by Free Buddhist Audio, the Dharma for real life. Our work is funded entirely by donations from our generous listeners. If you would like to help us keep this free, come and join us at freebuddhistaudio.com/community. Thank you and happy listening. - So what I want to do first of all is to ask you to close your eyes and relax, and be receptive. And I'll let you know when to open your eyes. (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) - In the pristine blue sky is a huge white cloud. The cloud is made of light, as is everything in this inner space. Just looking at it, we are filled with serenity. It somehow radiates kindness. In the middle of that great white light is a pair of blue eyes gazing downwards. They are the most beautiful eyes the world has ever seen. As we look into those sapphire eyes, we see scenes reflected in them. We see women painfully giving birth to new generations of hope. And after a little space, those hopes for lying helpless as the day they were born on their death beds. Reflected across those eyes, armies marching pomp and pageantry, and retreat back across them in tattered ranks, carrying the wounded and dying. There are men dressed in skins carrying clubs, mening chain mail, brandishing swords, mening khaki bearing rifles, technicians in casual clothes, looking at screens and pressing buttons. There are mud huts and great cities. There are lovers together, lovers separated, lovers who hate one another. The reflections go on forever. The scenes are not just of human beings, but also of animals and other forms of life. The reflections never stop. The more we watch, the more repetitive they seem. The faces change, the landscapes vary, but there is always birth, building, new hope, a brief flowering, then weakening, undermining, destruction, old age, sickness, death. The reflections become unclear, like images mirrored in a troubled lake. Tears form like dew in the exquisite eyes, and fall in two great streams. They fall to earth, where they form a pool. They pour down endlessly in response to the sufferings mirrored in the tear-filled eyes. Gradually a great lake of tears forms. Slowly, the waters in the center of the lake are ruffled by something emerging from their depths. Out of the lake of tears, rises a pastore blue lotus flower, of an extraordinary delicacy. A stream of tears falls into the soft heart of the lotus and transforms it into a white full moon disk. Slowly, just above the surface of the moon disk, jade green light appears. Its outlines become more definite without gaining any solidity. We are watching the birth of a princess, a bodhisattva, a Buddha. She is jade green in color, clad in a rainbow skirt with a meditation sash tied around her body. She's decked in precious jewels, bracelets, armlets, anklets, necklaces, earrings, and a tiara of gems. She is seated, her left foot resting on her right thigh in meditation posture. Her right foot steps down gracefully, and as it does so, a small pastore blue lotus and moon mat rise out of the lake to make a foot rest. Her right arm reaches down, the back of her hand resting on her right knee. Her palm is open in a mudra of supreme giving. Her left hand is held in front of her heart, palm outwards, the thumb and ring finger together so that the other three fingers point upwards. This mudra bestows protection and fearlessness through invoking the three jewels. Her thumb and ring finger delicately grasp the stem of a lotus flower, which curves upwards to open into a spray of blossoms by her left shoulder. There is a bud, a half-opened flower, and a fully-opened blossom of pale blue. She is 16 years old, full-breasted with flowing black hair. She is supremely beautiful. Her apparitional birth complete, her jade eyelids open for the first time to reveal two perfect blue eyes, identical to those from which she was born. She looks out over the world and the lake of tears and upward to the white cloud of compassion far above her. And her face breaks into a smile of such beauty and tenderness that the whole world trembles with joy. From her heart, rays of light begin to pour forth. Shining through the rain of compassionate tears still falling around her, they produce myriad rainbows, arcing and dancing in all directions. Every rainbow whispers a sound. They carry it like airy messengers out from her heart. They whisper the sound to the troubled waters of the lake, which become soothed and still. They whisper it to the falling teardrops, which reverse their direction and turn into precious offerings to the cloud of compassion high above them. The rainbows whisper the sound to the universe, to you and to me. The sound is, oum tare, tu tare, tu rei suaha. It is the mantra of the beautiful green princess. It is the beginning of the end of all our suffering. So you may open your eyes now. So we've been witnessing the birth of firm Torah, one of the best loved and best known female figures in the whole of Buddhism. And she's unique in belonging not to one, but to two Buddha families. So she appears as a Bodhisattva in the Padma, or Lotus family, and as a female Buddha in the karma or action family. And she's taken on many forms over the centuries. So we have green tara and we have white tara and we have red tara and we have yellow tara and there was a set of verses that praises the 21 tara's. So tara's very well known and she's well written about. But in this talk I'm going to be focusing on green tara, the embodiment of virya. Virya, which is the energy in pursuit of the good. And she's also the embodiment of universal compassion. So first of all, let's examine the origins of tara. And it was in the sixth century of the common era that tara first appeared in Buddhist literature. When the Mahayana was beginning to show tantric influences. And I'm going to talk about two versions of her origin. And one version we've already heard where Adlokiteshra looked upon, we've just heard it, looked upon all the suffering of the world and he wept and out of the lake of tears that were formed, tara appeared. She was born to bring active compassion into the world. So activity, virya and compassion. Another version states that tara was born the daughter of a great king, Ayls ago, innumerable times ago. Her name was Moon of Knowledge. A spiritual and compassionate princess, she devoted her life to the Buddha of that world. So she spent her life performing charitable works, praying for the community, giving offerings to the monastery. So she developed great merit and some monks urged her to pray, to be reborn as a man. Because to continue her life as a Bodhisattva, because in those days, it was considered for various reasons, actually, that it was easier to follow the Buddhist path as an am. "Nonsons," she said. The princess would have none of the monk's arguments. Her understanding went so deep that she saw that male and female were both concepts projected onto experience, having no existence in ultimate reality. So she could see beyond the duality of male and female. That doesn't really exist. Wishing to remain in female form to serve other beings until everyone reached enlightenment, she made a great vow, saying, "There are many who wish to gain enlightenment in a man's form, and there are few who wish to work for the welfare of living beings in a female form. Therefore may I, in a female body, work for the welfare of all beings, until such a time as all humanity has found its forms." So she remained in her palace, practicing meditation until she reached a deep state of meditation called saving all sentient beings. And by entering this powerful state of concentration, she rescued countless beings from the suffering of mundane existence. And for this reason, she was given the name, she began, got to be known as Tara, the saviorist. So those are two versions of Tara as a Bodhisattva. But Tara also appears as a Buddha in tantric literature. So she's introduced in the seventh century in the Vajrayana as the consort of a Moga city, the deep green Buddha of the north, who appears in the midnight hour. More recently, she appears as one of the five female Buddhas, embodiments of enlightened awareness. So she is one of the five female Buddhas. The Santara, a member of the Sri Ratna Buddhist Order, who has written a lot about all the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. I mean, there is a wonderful book, which is where I got that first reading from, called Meeting the Buddhas. And he has written a lot about not just Buddhas, the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, but he has developed quite a lot about the female Buddhas. Anyway, he developed the visualization practice of the five female Buddhas and of Tara. And as a Buddha, Tara has many of the same iconography as her Bodhisattva form. So much of the qualities and symbols are the same. But there are differences. And the Santara says that in developing these figures, Tara's figure changed slightly in response to the other female Buddhas. So I'm going to read, be patient with me, I'm going to read the description of Tara as a Buddha figure. So at the beginning, it's quite similar, but then you can see the differences. So the Santara writes, "She appears seated on a pale blue lotus and a moon mat. She is green in color. She sits with her left leg drawn up in meditation posture, and her right leg extended. The foot resting on another small pale blue lotus and moon mat. She's dressed in exquisite clothing and is adorned with silver and other precious things. So the metal silver is new, actually. And in the Buddha figure. And he continues. This is where some of the differences come. Her right hand is at her right knee, palm turned outwards in the mudra of supreme giving. So that's the mudra of supreme giving. Holding a crossed Vadra. And you've got a crossed Vadra just below Tara on the shrine. And I'll say a little bit more about that symbol. Her left hand is in front of her heart ringing a silver Vadra bell. On her head is a five-jouled crown. She has long black hair, some of which is bound up into a top knot. The rest flowing over her shoulders. In front of her top knot sits the deep green Buddha, Amoga City. He is seated in the Vadra posture. His right hand is in the Abaya mudra. Let's see the mudra of fearlessness. His left rests in his lap holding a crescent moon. Tara's head and body are surrounded by auras of light. She is young, beautiful and smiling compassionately. Gosh. So as you can see there are some similarities, but some significant differences between green Tara as a Bodhisattva form and green Tara as a Buddha. So let's look in detail at her symbolism and her qualities and try to understand what they represent. So let's start looking at some. So let's start with her name. The name Tara can mean star, and it does mean star in some respects, and we will be doing the Tara Pooja next week, which is called Midnight Star, which is beautiful. But it's more often taken to mean either saviouress or one who ferries across. Implying that Tara enables living beings to cross the ocean of mundane existence and suffering to the further shore where there is complete peace, freedom and permanent fulfillment of enlightenment. As the deity embodying Virya and unending compassion, she labors day and night to relieve suffering, and this is reflected in her sitting posture. So her left leg is folded in the meditation position whilst her right leg is extended, representing her compassionate activity ready to spring into action, to step down into the world to come to the aid of living beings. So there's a paradox here, which is a feature of the karma family. Tara is both active and still at the same time. She never ceases working for the benefit of living beings, but she never leaves the stage of meditation. And as someone who's been very active in the world in the past, I find this aspect of Tara extremely inspiring. I admire it, something to aspire to. I've given so much of myself at times that I've ended up depleted in energy, because when I'm very busy, I often actually tend to lose touch with the stillness in my heart. Tara endlessly gives of herself, but always remains centered, always in touch with her inner world. Her activity and her stillness represent the union of wisdom and compassion. The essence of enlightenment. So her mudra, mudra, keep on saying the word mudra, are the gestures that the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas do with their hands. So her mudra also reflects her spontaneous healthfulness, as well as her fearlessness. So her right arm reaches down in the open palm mudra of supreme giving, and her left hand is held in front of her heart, palm outwards. The thumb and ring finger lightly grasping the stem of a spray of pale blue lotus flowers at her left shoulder. And you have a bud, a half open lotus, and a fully open flower. And that reminds us of when the Buddha immediately after his enlightenment, he actually saw the whole of existence, mundane existence, like a pond full of lotus flowers. And some lotus buds are in the mud at the bottom of the pond. Some are in the middle, some are coming further up, some are touching the top of the water, and some have actually cleared the water and have opened out in the sunlight. So that some spray of lotus flowers is a reminder of that. And it's also a symbol that she's there for everybody, for all of us, no matter what stage of development we're out. So she's got her spray of flowers. The other three fingers of her left hand point upwards, forming the mudra that bestows protection and fearlessness. So that's that through invoking the three jewels. And the three jewels, as you probably know, are the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha. Like a mother instantly and unthinkingly leaping into danger if her child is threatened, Green Tara steps down at once to give aid and protection to any living being who calls on her. Traditionally, she is said to protect from the eight great terrors. Lions, elephants, fire, snakes, robbers, captivity, shipwreck, and demons. So we don't encounter many of those, but sometimes this list is understood symbolically to represent the spiritual dangers, the spiritual dangers of pride, delusion, anger, wrong views, avarice, attachment, and doubt. But sometimes this has been taken very literally, as for example in the story of how Tara protects from the fear of lions. The story, the traditional story, that talks about a wood gatherer who went to the forest and met a hungry lioness who set about eating him. Carrying him in her jaws, she returned near her den. Frightened and terrified, he implored Tara, and there appeared before him a woman clad in leaves and took him out of the lioness's mouth and set him down in the marketplace of the town. So, yes, some more symbolism. As a Buddha, Tara is associated with the air element and also with all accomplishing wisdom. So, the five female Buddhas are each associated with a wisdom, and Tara's wisdom is all accomplishing wisdom. So, and as a Buddha, those are two special sort of what she's most associated with. So, the air element can represent constant movement, like the wind constantly moving. But it's also associated with the spaciousness and endless possibilities of our hearts and minds, the openness and vastness of the enlightened experience. So, we all, you know, is pointing to our potential really, the spaciousness that we can experience with practice. The all accomplishing wisdom represents our actions when they're no longer driven by the ego, action in the service of the transcendental, that is, virya, energy in pursuit of the good. So, the all accomplishing wisdom represents the spontaneous and skillful action of a Buddha, which accomplishes all deeds because it is powered by wisdom and limitless compassion. So far, I've explored a few of Green Tara's symbols and qualities, and there are more, but my time is limited. But the aspects of Green Tara that I find most inspiring are the many symbols she manifests that are related to the union of opposites. I've already mentioned that as a Buddha, Green Tara forms part of the karma, the action family, and the karma family is associated with the union of opposites. And the reason why I find this particular aspect so meaningful is that since my early twenties, and that's a long time ago, I've been fascinated by this theme, so I've had a whole lifetime of actually really working with this theme of union of opposites. So, I first encountered and was impressed by the concept of the union of opposites in studying the novels of D.H. Lawrence. And D.H. Lawrence writes over and over again in his novels about the importance of actually uniting male and female energies within each one of us. Doesn't matter whether men or women, that we need to actually sort of balance male and female energy. But more significantly, I became mesmerized by this theme in the myth of St. George and the Dragon. So, I came across the myth of St. George and the Dragon in my early twenties, and I was completely mesmerized by this myth. And it's had a fascination for me or my life, and it's changed in emphasis. I mean, the Dragon has meant different things at different times, and the emphasis has changed for me, but it's always had to do with the pain of separation and the need to unite opposites. And in this myth, it's the need to unite male and female. And you're probably aware of the myth, and it tells of a Dragon that has captured a princess and is holding her captive at the mouth of a cave. St. George mounted on a white horse and with a long spear fights and kills the Dragon, releases the princess and finds the treasure at the bottom of the cave that the Dragon has been hiding. When I encountered Buddhism, because this myth, you know, nearly twenty years after having encountered the myth of St. George and the Dragon that I came across Buddhism, one of the teachings that immediately clicked with me was the Buddhist teaching on the middle way. Yes, I thought, yes, the meaning of St. George and the Dragon made sense. The union of male and female energies pointed to the middle way. And Greve Tara abounds with symbolism of union of opposites. So we've already examined the paradox central to Tara's posture of ease and readiness to step down into the world. So her left leg in the meditation posture represents wisdom, which is the female aspect of enlightenment. Whilst her extended right leg represents compassion, which is the male aspect of enlightenment. So, you know, her posture actually is about unifying male and female. And the symbolism continues, she's green in color, the color of nature, which is healing. But deep blue is also associated with Tara, her eyes sapphire blue, the color of the pool of tears, the lotus flower she sits on, as well as the spray of lotus flowers she holds in her left hand. So the color green represents the earth, our depths, and the color blue represents the sky, our heights. So we've got symbolism of depth and height. And we've already seen that the Princess Moon of Knowledge had such deep understanding that she saw that male and female were both concepts projected onto experience, having no existence in ultimate reality. But by far the most striking symbolism representing union of opposites is the double Vadra that green Tara has a Buddha holds in her right hand. So you've got it there. It's a double Vadra and I'll talk about that in a minute. So here's a quote from the going for refuge section of the Pooja to Tara. And it reads like this, mysterious Queen in the deep midnight of despair when there is no safety, no clarity, no certainty, you appear. With your gift bestowing hand you hold the double Vadra in which all opposites unite. May I accept the wisdom that you offer, see beyond the prison of duality and emulate your still activity. Where Samsara and Nirvana fuse and disappear, there I go for refuge. Where life and death fuse and disappear, there I go for refuge. Where wisdom and compassion fuse and appear everywhere, there I go for refuge. So green Tara is holding a double Vadra in her gift bestowing hand as a gift to the world. And you probably know that the single Vadra is a symbol of awesome power and force. It is a diamond thunderbolt that can cut through anything whilst always remaining unaffected. Nothing mundane can resist its impact. So really the Vadra is a really powerful symbol. It can cut right through into reality. And the double Vadra is a double dose of that. It's got all the same qualities as the Vadra but reinforced. So I'm going to read from the santra meeting the Buddha where he talks about the double Vadra. And it's a little bit long but bear with me because I think it's quite a powerful reading. He says the double Vadra is a symbol of total psychic integration, of the unfoldment of all potential, of perfect harmony, balance and equilibrium. It can only be encountered when one has journeyed into the most profound depths of existence. It can only appear out of the midnight sky of the deepest unconscious. Visualizing it against the deep blue sky, one feels it to be the primordial pattern of human consciousness. It is the perfect ground plan, the potential which we try falteringly and semi-consciously to unfold in our lives. Not only is the double Vadra the ground, the blueprint for human consciousness, it is also, according to Indian Buddhist cosmology, the support on which the universe rests. Buddhist cosmology has a vision every bit as expansive as modern astronomy. It sees universes evolving and passing out of existence over the aeons. The entire universe with its world systems is said to have as its foundation an inconceivably large double Vadra. So deep in meditation, you actually see reality, you see universe is coming and going. How do you describe it? Maybe you describe it as a double Vadra with all that force. The center continues, we can draw a profound lesson from this symbolism. The double Vadra supports the universe. It also forms the deepest pattern in the midnight depths of our own psyche. So the fundamental matrix of both the universe and of every individual consciousness within it is the same. In their common depths, the individual and the universal interpenetrate, to understand yourself in your deepest nature is to understand the nature of the universe. Thus the symbolism of the double Vadra suggests the interpenetration, even the fusion of different levels of existence. In it, thunderbolts intersect, diamond cuts diamond and they fuse together. In the double Vadra, all opposites unite. With this, interpenetration and union of opposites comes total psychic balance and integration. Wow. I wonder I'm so interested in quantum physics. The union of opposites, represented by so much of Green Tara's symbolism, may be the reason why it's sometimes said that her visualization is the quick way to wisdom. We can begin to understand why Tara's practice is considered a very quick vehicle for arriving at insight when we take on board the fact that insight is not an achievement of the rational mind. It is the product of the whole person, wholly attending. So to quote D.H. Lawrence, just going to read a poem called Thought, he says, "Thought I love thought, but not the jiggling and twisting of already existent ideas. I despise that self-important game. Thought is the welling up of unknown life into consciousness. Thought is the testing of statements on the touchstone of the conscience. Thought is gazing onto the face of life and reading what can be read. Thought is pondering over experience and coming to a conclusion. Thought is not a trick or an exercise or a set of dodges. Thought is a woman in her wholeness, wholly attending. So we have to unite head and heart, thought and feeling into one faculty and use that to pierce through the veil of wrong ideas and confused emotions to a direct encounter with things as they are. So gaining insight has got a smudge to do with opening the heart as with developing the intellect. To gain insight, we need the energy coming from the double vadra in which all opposites unite. So one of Tara's qualities, her special quality, is the speed with which she acts. You call on Tara, there she is, very, very quickly. A famous soul of praise to her begins homage to Tara, quick one, heroine. She moves rapidly to help us escape from samsara and it is wisdom which allows us to do this. So that is what she quickly bestows, wisdom. One of the reasons her practice is so effective is that she is such an intensely beautiful figure. This means that you want to contemplate her. The more you become entranced by her beauty, the more time you will spend contemplating her. And the longer you spend with her, the more her message of loving care for all that lives will communicate itself to you. What you set your heart upon, that you become according to Buddhism. Mismarised by Tara, lost in her loveliness, you become steadily more Tara-like. You come closer to compassion and without you move steadily towards wisdom. But who is Tara? So modern western psychology has demonstrated what most religions and cultures down the ages have taken for granted. But there are depths to consciousness of which we are mostly unaware. These depths contain a treasure trove of powerful and meaningful symbols, powerful and meaningful archetypes. Green Tara is not a distant eastern figure from Buddhist canonical literature. She is universal and comes from a level of human experience that transcends east and west. She comes from the deepest level of our own mind. As Visandra says, as we see more deeply into her nature, we come to understand that she is not green, does not hold a lotus, does not reach down with her right leg. Her beautiful form is just the gateway to a deep inner experience that has neither colour nor form nor gender. So let us acknowledge a line with honour and celebrate the green Tara within us. Green Tara is us, our own potential, and lets honour her by paying homage to her with this poem. Midnight Star, lighting up the northern sky with the brilliance of your love. You who are worshipped even by the loving gods, to Tara I pay homage. Sweet breath of all the Buddhas, perfuming the world with the scent of your compassion. You who are worshipped even by the compassionate gods, to Tara I pay homage. Great archer of the Sugatives, striking down the hydra heads of jealousy with the unerring arrows of your sympathetic joy. You who are worshipped even by the joyful gods, to Tara I pay homage. Victory banner of the supreme Dharma, raised standard of the victorious ones, planted in the firm soil of equanimity. You who are worshipped even by the equanimous gods, to Tara I pay homage. We hope you enjoy the talk. Please come and help us keep this free at freebuddhistaudio.com/community. And thank you. [Music] [Music]