Vajrayana Buddhists are in the midst of a pretty potent
time just now. The first fifteen days of the new year commemorate fifteen
miracles displayed by Shakyamuni Buddha in the Indian hamlet of Sravasti back in the day. Some nifty
ones, too. Emanating golden light from his mouth to illuminate the six realms
of existence so the assembly could see beings being liberated there; getting
the gods from Indra’s realm to come on down and serve him and everyone lunch;
whipping up such a storm that it tossed the 80,000 Hindus who had forced him
into this annoying miracle competition into the nearby river. Where’d I find out
these details? Why, on this Orthodox Jewish guy’s blog, of course.
But today I finally bird-dogged the original source, an ancient collection of “Divine Stories” of the Buddha called the Divyavadana. Not sure what makes your day, but finding this made mine. Seems some smartie done published the first part in English just last year. Man, is my shopping list growing.
Anyway, we feel that due to the great merit accumulated by the Buddha during this time, actions (karma) engaged in on these days increase in strength 100,000 times. And today was the 10th day of this period, sacred also to Padmsambhava and I finally got some of that sourced in the new Terton Migyur Dorje bio. On pp. 87-9, Karma Chagmed pulls some quotes from Padmasambhava’s treasure teachings, including this one from Ratna Lingpa:
Fortunate beings
practicing dharma in the future:
If anyone has
resolute faith in me (Padmasambhava)
I will be sitting
right beside him or her.
Whenever the tenth
day of the month comes
Whoever commemorates me will never be parted from me.
And who were we to argue? Six women from our dharma group came over and we had a really lovely Guru Yoga and tsog ceremony:
Now, one of these women, I’m not saying who, is my translator with whom I’m traveling to America in two weeks. From my last appeal, you all were wonderfully generous and we’ve raised more than half the cost of her ticket. While she’s still struggling to find other sources of revenue to get her to a long-awaited, and deeply necessary, healing session with my teacher, I thought I would give you one more opportunity to make a great difference in the life of another during these especially powerful days. I would love to tell her the ticket’s paid for and put her mind to rest so she can focus on the spiritual aspect of this next stage of her life.
And here’s the thing: we gotta pay for the tickets on Monday (like, Mongolian Monday, half a day ahead of the U.S.), no extensions.
So, beloveds. Would you kick in a little so my translator can finally be rid of the inner suffering that’s plagued her these past 12 years? And I mean a little: the donations so far have ranged from $5 to the ever-auspicious $108. Just click on the friendly neighborhood Garuda below and you’ll be whisked to a secure site to do your thang. Thank you and thank you!
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