GLOSSARY

aggregate. The association of body and mind. A person consists of five aggregates: form, feeling, discrimination, compositional factors/karmic imprints, and consciousness.

arhat. Lit. “foe destroyer.” A being who, having ceased his or her karma and delusions, is completely free from all suffering and its causes and has achieved liberation from cyclic existence.

arya. Lit. “noble.” One who has realized the wisdom of emptiness.

Atisha Lama Dipankara Shrijnana (982–1054). The renowned Indian master who went to Tibet in 1042 to help in the revival of Buddhism and who established the Kadam tradition. His Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment was the first lamrim text.

attachment. A disturbing thought that exaggerates the positive qualities of an object and wishes to possess it. One of the six root delusions.

bhumi. Lit. “stage” or “ground.” Bodhisattvas must traverse ten bhumis on their journey to enlightenment, the first reached through the direct perception of emptiness.

bodhicitta. The altruistic determination to achieve full enlightenment in order to free all sentient beings from suffering and bring them to enlightenment.

bodhisattva. One who possesses bodhicitta.

bodhisattva vows. The vows taken when one enters the bodhisattva path.

Buddhadharma. The teachings of the Buddha.

Buddhist. One who has taken refuge in the Three Jewels — Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha — and who accepts the philosophical world view of the four seals: all composite phenomena are impermanent, all contaminated phenomena are in the nature of suffering, all things and events are devoid of self-existence, and nirvana is true peace.

causative phenomena. Things that come about in dependence on causes and conditions; includes all objects experienced by the senses as well as the mind itself.

central channel. The channel or nadi that runs from the crown of the head to the secret chakra. It is the major energy channel of the vajra body, visualized as a hollow tube of light in front of the spine.

clear light. Very subtle mind. This subtlest state of mind occurs naturally at death and through successful tantric practice and is used by practitioners to realize emptiness.

compounded phenomena. Phenomena that arise due to causes and conditions.

conventional bodhicitta. The altruistic mind of enlightenment; a mental primary consciousness holding the two aspirations of wishing to benefit all sentient beings and wishing to attain enlightenment in order to do this.

conventional truth. As opposed to ultimate truth, which is the understanding of the ultimate nature of reality or emptiness, conventional truth is what is true to the valid conventional consciousness. See also two truths.

cyclic existence. The beginningless, recurring cycle of death and rebirth under the control of delusion and karma and fraught with suffering. See also samsara.

delusions. The disturbing negative thoughts, or minds, that cause suffering and negative karma. The three main delusions or three poisons are ignorance, attachment, and anger.

demigod. A being in the god realm who enjoys greater comfort and pleasure than human beings but who suffers from intense jealousy and quarreling.

dependent origination. Also called dependent arising, this describes the way the self and phenomena exist conventionally as relative and interdependent. They come into existence in dependence on causes and conditions, on their parts, and most subtly on the mind imputing or labeling them.

desire realm. One of the three realms of samsara, comprising the hell beings, hungry ghosts, animals, humans, demigods, and the six lower classes of gods. Beings in this realm are preoccupied with desire for objects of the six senses.

Dharamsala. A village in the northwest of India, in the state of Himachal Pradesh, the home of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government in exile.

Dharma. In general Dharma describes spiritual teachings, and more specifically the teachings of the Buddha, which protect from suffering and lead to liberation and full enlightenment. Dharma is also described as “that which overcomes delusions.”

dharmakaya. The truth body of a buddha, the blissful omniscient mind of a buddha, and the result of the wisdom side of the path. Dharmakaya can be divided into the wisdom body and the nature body.

dualistic view. The ignorant view characteristic of the unenlightened mind, in which all things are falsely conceived to have concrete self-existence. To such a view the appearance of an object is mixed with the false image of its being independent or self-existent, thereby leading to further dualistic views concerning subject and object and self and other.

eight freedoms. These eight are the defining features of the perfect human rebirth: freedom from birth as a hell being, hungry ghost, animal, long-life god, when no buddha has descended, in a place where there are no Dharma teachings, with defective mental or physical faculties, or as a heretic holding wrong views.

eight Mahayana precepts. One-day vows to abandon killing, stealing, lying, sexual contact, taking intoxicants, sitting on high seats or beds, eating at the wrong time, and singing, dancing, and wearing perfumes and jewelry.

eight types of suffering. Also known as the sufferings of humans. The suffering of birth, old age, illness, death, encountering what is unpleasant, separation from what is pleasant, not getting what you want, and the five aggregates.

eight worldly dharmas. The worldly concerns that generally motivate the actions of ordinary beings: wanting gain and not wanting loss, wanting to be happy and not wanting to be unhappy, wanting praise and not wanting criticism, and wanting a good reputation and not wanting a bad reputation.

emptiness. The absence of inherent, true existence. Ultimately every phenomenon is empty of existing truly or from its own side.

enlightenment. This is called full awakening, or buddhahood, or omniscience. Enlightenment is the ultimate goal of a Mahayana Buddhist, attained when all limitations have been removed from the mind and one’s positive potential has been completely and perfectly realized. It is a state characterized by infinite compassion, wisdom, and skill.

eon. A world period, also called a kalpa — an inconceivably long period of time. The life span of the universe is divided into four great eons, which are themselves divided into twenty lesser eons.

eternalism. The belief in the inherent existence of things, as opposed to nihilism. It is one of the two extremes.

form realm. The second of samsara’s three realms, which contains seventeen classes of gods.

formless realm. The highest of samsara’s three realms, which has four classes of gods involved in formless meditations. The four meditative levels attained in this realm are: limitless sky, limitless consciousness, nothingness, and neither existence nor nonexistence (also called the peak of samsara).

four immeasurables. Also known as the four immeasurable thoughts or the four sublime attitudes, these are four states of mind or aspirations: loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity.

four noble truths. The subject of the Buddha’s first turning of the wheel of Dharma: suffering, the origin of suffering, the cessation of suffering, and the path leading to the cessation of suffering.

gelong. A fully ordained Buddhist monk, also called a bhikshu.

Gelug. One of the four main traditions of Tibetan Buddhism, it was founded by Lama Tsongkhapa in the early fifteenth century and has been propagated by such illustrious masters as the successive Dalai Lamas and Panchen Lamas.

Gelugpa. A follower of the Gelug tradition.

god. A rebirth in a state within samsara of luxury and much pleasure.

guru. Lit. “heavy,” as in heavy with Dharma knowledge. A spiritual teacher or master.

guru devotion. The practice of devotion to the guru with thought and with action.

guru yoga. The fundamental tantric practice whereby one’s guru is seen as identical to the buddhas, one’s personal meditational deity, and the essential nature of one’s own mind.

hearer. A Hinayana practitioner who strives for nirvana on the basis of listening to teachings from a teacher.

higher realms. The higher realms comprise the more fortunate rebirths as a human, god, or demigod.

highest yoga tantra. The fourth and supreme division of tantric practice, sometimes called maha anuttara yoga tantra. It consists of the generation and completion stages. Through this practice one can attain full enlightenment within one lifetime.

Hinayana. Lit. “Small Vehicle.” The path of the arhats, whose goal is nirvana, or personal liberation from samsara. The term Theravada is often preferred, although it is not fully synonymous.

hungry ghost. Also known as pretas, these abide in the three lower realms of the six classes of samsaric beings. Hungry ghosts experience the greatest sufferings of hunger and thirst.

ignorance. A mental factor that obscures the mind and prevents it from seeing the way in which things exist in reality. There are basically two types of ignorance: ignorance of karma and ignorance of ultimate truth. Ignorance is the fundamental delusion from which all other delusions arise.

impermanence. The gross and subtle levels of the transience of phenomena.

imprints. The seeds, or potentials, left on the mind by positive or negative actions of body, speech, and mind.

inherent (or intrinsic) existence. What phenomena are empty of; the object of negation, or refutation. From the viewpoint of ignorance, phenomena appear to exist independently, in and of themselves.

karma. Lit. “action.” The working of cause and effect, whereby positive actions produce happiness and negative actions produce suffering.

lamrim. The graduated path to enlightenment. A presentation of Shakyamuni Buddha’s teachings as a step-by-step training of a disciple to achieve enlightenment.

liberation. The state of complete freedom from samsara; the goal of a practitioner seeking his or her own escape from suffering.

lineage lama. A spiritual teacher who is in the line of direct guru-disciple transmission of teachings, from Buddha to the teachers of the present day.

loving-kindness. The wish for others to have happiness and its causes.

lower realms. The three realms of cyclic existence with the most suffering: the hell, hungry ghost, and animal realms.

Mahayana. Lit. “Great Vehicle.” Mahayana is the path of the bodhisattvas, those seeking enlightenment in order to liberate all other beings.

Maitreya. The next buddha after Shakyamuni Buddha and the fifth of the thousand buddhas of this present world age.

Manjushri. The bodhisattva (or buddha) of wisdom. Recipient of the wisdom lineage of Shakyamuni Buddha’s teachings, which he passed on to Nagarjuna.

merit. Positive imprints left on the mind by virtuous or Dharma actions, merit is the principal cause of happiness. The merit of virtue, when coupled with the merit of wisdom, eventually results in rupakaya, the Buddha’s form.

merit field or field of accumulation. The visualized or actual holy beings in relation to whom one accumulates merit by going for refuge and making offerings, and to whom one prays or makes requests for special purposes.

method. All aspects of the path to enlightenment other than those related to emptiness. Method is primarily associated with the development of loving-kindness, compassion, and bodhicitta.

Middle Way. The philosophy presented in Shakyamuni Buddha’s Prajnaparamita Sutras and elucidated by Nagarjuna, which is that all phenomena are dependent arisings, thereby avoiding the mistaken extremes of self-existence and nonexistence, or eternalism and nihilism. Also called Madhyamaka.

Milarepa (1040–1123). Tibet’s great yogi, who achieved enlightenment in his lifetime under the tutelage of his guru, Marpa, who was a contemporary of Atisha. One of the founding fathers of the Kagyü school.

mind. Synonymous with consciousness and sentience and defined as that which is “clear and knowing.” Mind is a formless entity that has the ability to perceive objects.

Nagarjuna. The great second-century Indian philosopher and tantric adept who propounded the Madhyamaka philosophy of emptiness. He is one of six great Indian scholars known as the six ornaments.

Nalanda. A Mahayana Buddhist monastic university founded in the fifth century in north India, not far from Bodhgaya. Nalanda served as a major source of the Buddhist teachings that spread to Tibet.

Naropa (1016–1100). The Indian Buddhist master and meditator who, by the practice of meditative disciplines, attained miraculous powers. A disciple of Tilopa and the guru of Marpa and Maitripa; transmitted many tantric lineages, including the renowned Six Yogas of Naropa.

nihilism. The doctrine that nothing exists, as opposed to eternalism. Nihilism contends there is no cause-and-effect to actions and no past and future lives.

nirmanakaya. The emanation body of a buddha that manifests in a variety of forms for and perceivable by sentient beings.

nyung ne. A two-day Avalokiteshvara retreat that requires fasting, prostrations, and silence.

object of negation. The object that seemingly appears to be inherently existing.

obscurations. Also known as obstructions, they hinder the attainment of liberation and enlightenment.

om mani padme hum. Also called the mani, this is the mantra of Avalokiteshvara, the buddha of compassion.

oral transmission. The verbal transmission of a teaching, meditation practice, or mantra from guru to disciple, the guru having received the transmission in an unbroken lineage from the original source.

perfect human rebirth. The rare human state, qualified by eight freedoms and ten richnesses, that is the ideal condition for practicing the Dharma and attaining enlightenment.

perfections. The main practices of a bodhisattva are the six perfections. On the basis of bodhicitta a bodhisattva practices the six perfections of generosity, morality, patience, joyous perseverance, concentration, and wisdom.

pervasive compounding suffering. The most subtle of the three types of suffering, it refers to the nature of the five aggregates contaminated by karma and delusions.

preliminary practices. The practices, also called ngondro, that prepare the mind for successful tantric meditation by removing hindrances and accumulating merit. These practices are found in all schools of Tibetan Buddhism and are usually done 100,000 times each. The four main practices are recitation of the refuge formula, mandala offerings, prostrations, and Vajrasattva mantra recitation.

puja. Lit. “offering.” A religious prayer ceremony.

pure land. A pure land of a buddha is a place where there is no suffering. In some, but not all, pure lands, after taking birth, the practitioner receives teachings directly from the buddha of that pure land, actualizes the rest of the path, and then becomes enlightened.

real I. The I that seemingly appears to exist from its own side without depending on anything such as causes and conditions, parts, or the mind’s imputation. It is the object to be refuted. See also object of negation.

refuge. Heartfelt reliance on the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha for guidance on the path to liberation and enlightenment.

Rinpoche. Lit. “precious one.” Generally a title given to a lama who has intentionally taken rebirth in a human body to continue helping others. It is also a respectful title used for one’s own lama.

root guru. The teacher who has had the greatest influence on a particular disciple’s entering or following the spiritual path.

rupakaya. The form body of a fully enlightened being. The result of the complete and perfect accumulation of merit.

sadhana. Step-by-step instructions for practicing the meditations related to a particular meditational deity.

sambhogakaya. Called the enjoyment body, the form in which the enlightened mind appears in order to benefit highly realized bodhisattvas.

samsara. Cyclic existence, or samsara, refers to the six realms of conditioned existence or suffering. These are the lower realms of the hell beings, hungry ghosts, and animals, and the upper realms of the humans, demigods, and gods.

samten. The first of the four levels of calm-abiding meditation.

Sangha. Absolute Sangha are those who have directly realized emptiness; relative Sangha are ordained monks and nuns. Also used loosely to refer to a lay Dharma community or members of a Dharma center.

self-grasping. The mind of ignorance that believes in an inherently existent self, which leads to self-cherishing.

self-cherishing. The self-centered attitude of considering one’s own happiness to be more important than the happiness and well-being of others. This is the primary obstacle to realizing bodhicitta and thus enlightenment.

Shakyamuni Buddha (ca. 563–483 B.C.E.). The founder of the present Buddhadharma. The fourth of the one thousand founding buddhas of this present world age, Shakyamuni Buddha was born a prince of the Shakya clan in north India. He taught the sutra and tantra paths to liberation and full enlightenment.

shamatha. Meditation to attain the state of concentration or calm abiding.

Shantideva (ca. 685–763). The great Indian bodhisattva who wrote A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life, one of the essential Mahayana texts.

shunyata. The direct realization of emptiness.

six perfections. On the basis of bodhicitta a bodhisattva practices the six perfections: generosity, morality, patience, enthusiastic perseverance, concentration, and wisdom.

stupa. A reliquary, also called a chorten, symbolic of the Buddha’s mind.

suffering of change. What is normally regarded as pleasure, but which because of its transitory nature sooner or later turns into suffering.

suffering of pain. Also called the suffering of suffering. The commonly recognized suffering experiences of pain, discomfort, and unhappiness.

sutra. The open discourses of Shakyamuni Buddha; a scriptural text containing teachings and practices.

tantra. Also called Vajrayana, Mantrayana, or Tantrayana, these are the secret or esoteric teachings of the Buddha. Tantric practices generally include identifying oneself as a fully enlightened deity in order to transform one’s own impure states of body, speech, and mind into the pure states of that enlightened being.

tantric vows. Vows taken by tantric practitioners.

ten nonvirtuous actions. The three nonvirtues of body are killing, stealing, and sexual misconduct; the four nonvirtues of speech are lying, speaking harshly, slandering, and gossiping; the three of mind are covetousness, ill will, and wrong views.

Theravada. The Way of the Elders. One of the eighteen schools into which the Hinayana split not long after Shakyamuni Buddha’s death. Theravada is prevalent in Thailand, Sri Lanka, and Burma, and is well-represented in the West.

thought transformation. Also known as mind training or lo-jong, this is a powerful approach to developing bodhicitta, whereby the mind is trained to use all situations, both happy and unhappy, to destroy self-cherishing and self-grasping.

three higher trainings. Ethics, concentration, and wisdom.

three poisons. Ignorance, attachment, and anger.

three realms. The desire, form, and formless realms.

tonglen. The meditation practice of generating bodhicitta by taking on the suffering of others and giving them happiness.

two truths. The two ways of relating to phenomena, as conventional or all-obscuring truth understood by a worldly mind and as ultimate truth understood by a mind engaged in ultimate analysis.

ultimate truth. One of the two truths, the other being conventional truth. It is the understanding of the ultimate nature of things and events as being empty of inherent existence, also known as emptiness.

upper realms. The three higher realms in samsara of humans, demigods, and gods.

Vajrasattva. A male meditational deity symbolizing the inherent purity of all buddhas, Vajrasattva is the basis for a major tantric purification practice for removing obstacles created by negative karma and the breaking of vows.

Vajrayana. The Adamantine Vehicle, and is also called Tantrayana or Mantrayana.

vipassana. The higher seeing or special insight into emptiness.

wisdom. Refers to levels of insight into the nature of reality, and ultimately refers to the wisdom realizing emptiness, which frees beings from cyclic existence and eventually brings them to enlightenment.

Yama. The lord of death, seen on the Wheel of Life.

yana. Lit. “vehicle.” A spiritual path that takes you from where you are to where you want to be.

Yeshe, Lama (1935–84). Born and educated in Tibet, Lama Yeshe fled to India, where he met his chief disciple, Lama Zopa Rinpoche. They began teaching Westerners at Kopan Monastery in 1969 and founded the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition (FPMT) in 1975.

yoga. Lit. “work.” Yoga also means “to yoke.” This refers to the spiritual discipline to which one yokes oneself in order to achieve enlightenment.

yogi. A highly realized meditator.

Zopa Rinpoche, Kyabje Lama Thubten (b. 1946). Born in Thangme, near Mount Everest, and recognized as the reincarnation of the Lawudo Lama, Lama Zopa Rinpoche became the heart disciple of Lama Thubten Yeshe. Lama Zopa is now Spiritual Director of the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition (FPMT).