Rinpoche Returns to Garrison NY - Shitro Empowerment & Bardo Teachings

Ayang Rinpoche Will Offer 100 Peaceful and Wrathful Deities of the Bardo Empowerment and Teachings at the Garrison Institute Sept. 28 2009

According to the Tibetan Buddhist view, the subjective experience of death consists of sequential dissolutions, a process believed to present unique opportunities for the attainment of liberation. The Tibetan Book of the Dead teachings and Hundred Peaceful and Wrathful Deities (Zhitro, Tib. zhi khro) empowerments describe the processes of death and rebirth, introduce the accompanying experiences, and prepare one for making the most of these transient opportunities encountered in the bardo (intermediate state) between death and rebirth.

Padmasambhava, the eighth century pandita credited with bringing Vajrayana Buddhism to Tibet, composed a cycle of teachings which includes the Tibetan Book of the Dead , also known as “Liberation (Through Hearing) During the Intermediate State” (Tib. bar-do’i-thos-grol) and an associated sadhana or liturgy of the two mandalas of forty-two peaceful and fifty-eight wrathful deities. Together the teaching and sadhana are a guide to the experiences of consciousness during the interval between death and the next rebirth, and include teachings on the signs of death and practices to be undertaken when death is approaching or has taken place.

As described by Chogyam Trungpa in his forward to the Tibetan Book of the Dead (Freemantle and Trungpa, Shambhala, 2000), the Tibetan Book of the Dead teachings and Zhitro sadhana composed by Padmasambhava were written down by his disciple Yeshe Tsogyal and then buried as a hidden treasure or “terma” in the Gampo hills of central Tibet (where the renowned teacher Gampopa later established his monastery). Karma Lingpa later discovered the Tibetan Book of the Dead and Zhitro texts in the fourteenth century. Karma Lingpa was an incarnation of one of Padmasambhava’s twenty-five disciples and the eldest son of Nyida Sangye, himself a discoverer of termas regarding Phowa, the practice of the transference of consciousness at the time of death.

These precious teachings are not given frequently in the west. His Eminence Ayang Rinpoche will give the empowerments including the construction of traditional sand mandala.

Sponsors for the retreat are needed. If you would like to make a donation of any amount to help make these teachings possible, please click here or email NY@amitabhafoundation.us