Prefatory note:
The founding patriarch of the Sakya tradition, Sachen Kunga Nyingpo (1092-1158) received, at the age of 12, through a direct realization of the Bodhisattva Manjushri, the teaching known as The Parting From the Four Attachments (Zhenpa Zhidrel). The teaching was only one verse of four lines but its meaning includes the entire path leading to Buddhahood.
Sachen Kunga Nyingpo’s son and student, Jetsun Drakpa Gyaltsen (1147-1216), received from his father a detailed commentary on these verses spoken by Manjushri.
Jetsun Drakpa Gyaltsen, too, had a vision of Manjushri and had great experiential realizations, such as those he condensed into a song illuminating the four lines spoken by Manjushri to his father, Sachen.
It is this “Song of Experience” (nyam yang), sung to explain the four verses of Parting from the Four Attachments, that Chogye Trichen Rinpoche comments on in this book.
Drakpa Gyaltsen passed these teachings on to others, in particular, to his nephew and disciple Sakya Pandita, the fourth founding master of the Sakya tradition, who is himself regarded as an emanation of Manjushri.
The annotations indicated in italics in Drakpa Gyaltsen’s “Pith Instruction on the Mind Training Teaching of Parting from the Four Attachments” are by Sakya Pandita.
H.E. Chogye Trichen Rinpoche, Ngawang Khyenrab Thubten Leksay Gyatso, (1920-2007), a renowned tantric master, was the head of the Tsharpa school within the Sakya tradition, one of three principal sub-schools of this tradition.
In “Parting from the Four Attachments,” Chogye Trichen Rinpoche writes, “This teaching is the very quintessence of all of the teachings of all of the buddhas of the three times. The entire pith instructions, the key oral instructions for practice, are presented here in the simplest possible form. This means that everyone can apply these instructions to their own lives and will find them practical and useful. In order to gain the greatest benefit from receiving these teachings, it is important to generate the appropriate state of mind. Resolve to turn your mind toward these Mahayana Buddhist teachings in order to benefit innumerable sentient beings.”
The four-line verse taught by Manjushri is:
If you are attached to this life, you are not a person of the Dharma.
If you are attached to cyclic existence, you do not have renunciation.
If you are attached to your own purpose, you do not have bodhichitta.
If grasping arises, you do not have the view.
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This brings us to the final meaning of the teaching on Parting from the Four Attachments. Just as the third line spoken by Manjushri is concerned with relative bodhichitta, this fourth and final line indicates ultimate bodhichitta, the ultimate mind of enlightenment. Finally, we must arrive at the ultimate view, the understanding of the nature of reality as it is. The intrinsic nature of mind is something that we can look into, discern, and clarify.
The very “suchness” nature of our own minds (dharmata) is no different from that of the buddhas themselves. The essence of the enlightened state to be discovered in oneself is exactly the same essence as that of a fully enlightened buddha. It is only due to our defilements and obscurations that we have failed to recognize this nature of mind, the original wakefulness of our own natural awareness. If we really recognize the nature of reality, our awareness-wisdom, then whether we speak of what the Nyingma School calls dzogchen, or what the followers of the Kagyu call mahamudra, or what the Sakya tradition calls khorde yerme, the intention is the same. These teachings are all concerned with how to recognize and realize this intrinsic awareness, as it is.
To continue and gain confidence in the correct view, the subtle meanings of the view must be explained. It is important to question further, to acquire a very clear and precise understanding of the authentic view, by receiving instructions from a qualified Dharma master. This is not something everyone can simply attempt without proper guidance and instruction, without transmission from an authentic lineage. This is because, without proper instruction and continued guidance, one may practice the incorrect view and will be unable to attain liberation from samsara, let alone ultimate enlightenment. This must be understood. Otherwise, when speaking about the view, there is the risk that the teacher may incur transgressions that are greater than the benefits the students may gain from hearing these things.
The genuine view is the one that liberates us from all suffering and all conceptuality. Hence, it is necessary from the beginning to understand that if one clings to or fixates upon one’s view, the effect will be the opposite of that intended by the teachings; instead of being liberated, one will be bound. As it is impossible to reconcile or balance the two extreme positions, even if one were to try to hold to both the eternalistic position of “it is” and the nihilistic stance of “it isn’t,” this still would not resolve the matter. Fixations like these keep us from recognizing the view. Is it not much better to remain simply in a state of non-duality?
The genuine view is free of any duality of subject and object. The observer and the observed are not two separate things that one can somehow perceive independently of one another. Rather than conceptual attitudes that adopt one position or another, one needs to rely upon the recognition of one’s own awareness-wisdom, the intrinsic nature of one’s own mind. This is, of course, more challenging than merely settling for inaccurate views. However, there is no genuine view of reality apart from the nature of one’s own mind.
If all things are dependently produced and do not possess any intrinsically existing nature, then what is the ultimate nature of dependent origination? Between the thought that has just passed and the next thought that is yet to arise there is a pause, a space. This gap between the thoughts, is it something that can be apprehended by thought, or is it inexpressible? Is this gap between the thoughts something you have contrived or fabricated, or is it simply as it is? It is necessary first to rest the mind in this gap or space between the last thought and the next.
Drakpa Gyaltsen says in one of his songs that when he searched for his mind, he was unable to identify the mind’s arising, abiding, and ceasing, and so he discovered that mind is birthless. Drakpa Gyaltsen realized that from the beginning, mind has always been empty. This is because mind is empty of cause, empty of any seed of birth, and hence empty of any result. If there is no cause for mind, if the cause does not exist, then there is no birth, abiding, and passing away.
Having found mind to be empty of seed or cause, Drakpa Gyaltsen further found that the mind was also empty of abiding or remaining. Outwardly, one can discover that everything that appears to abide externally is actually composite, a chain of interdependent factors. For example, in the case of a tree, there are the roots, the trunk, the branches, leaves, fruits, seeds, and so on. Inwardly, our mind functions according to interdependent factors, the twelve links of dependent origination, as taught by the Buddha. None of these links exist, none
of these links abide independently.
Finally, Drakpa Gyaltsen also found no result or fruition of mind. Mind is totally empty. It has no beginning and it has no end. Hence, there is no way for mind or thought to have any result or conclusion, to end up anywhere. In this way, everything really is empty! If we understand all of this clearly through meditation, then the pure view of emptiness can arise from within us. If we do not understand this well, there are possible risks and pitfalls we may face in our practice. Therefore, these points must be correctly understood.
© 2003 Chogye Trichen Rinpoche.