Category Archives: Garuda in Buddhism

Flight of the Garuda in Dzogchen

28 Friday Oct 2011

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From ‘Flight of the Garuda’ by Keith Dowman:

http://www.wisdom-books.com/ProductExtract.asp?PID=14813

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=gjHGZOPc-DQC&pg=PA49&lpg=PA49&dq=Shabkar+Lama,+Tsogdrug+Rangdrol,+author+of+The+Flight+of+the+Garuda.&source=bl&ots=kMBtrESxcC&sig=4Do2r81JfxBDXI5Hpo0EciRtm7c&hl=en&ei=y3WqTs7SHYaEhQeCwPS6Dw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CCcQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=Shabkar%20Lama%2C%20Tsogdrug%20Rangdrol%2C%20author%20of%20The%20Flight%20of%20the%20Garuda.&f=false

The book is a commentary on Shabkar’s poem ‘Flight of the Garuda’.  The full text of the poem is available here:

http://drupal.hps.com/Venture/Readings/garuda.php

Extract  from Keith Dowman’s book:
Introduction to the chapter, Flight of the GarudaThe gentle pilgrim wanders Tibetan trails from power place to power place, sometimes passing over the high Himalayas down to the valley of Nepal. Long dreadlocks are piled on his head, and he wears a ragged patched skirt with a white shawl over his shoulders distinguishing him from most Himalayan monks. At nightfall he can sleep anywhere he finds himself, for he spent his early years in caves in the snow-capped mountains of the Tibetan plateau and cares nothing for comfort. He is vegetarian and he can fast if food is unavailable. Occasionally he may be spurned or ill—treated by bandits, but there is something about him that immediately evinces acceptance and kindness. At the house where he receives hospitality he may offer a healing charm to the sick or aged or an exorcising mantra to banish a malignant spirit. A request for help on the Dharma path is answered in a song composed spontaneously in the moment. He does not stay long in any place but leaves quickly and moves fast down the trail. This mellow yogin, an archetypal figure of the Tibetan plateau, is Shabkar Lama, Tsogdrug Rangdrol, author of The Flight of the Garuda.

Shabkar Lama was the scion of a nomad family in a tribal area in the far northeast of the Tibetan ethnic region. In this area there were no aristocratic families ensconced in their hereditary castles producing tulkus for the local establishment monasteries in each generation. His tribal society was democratic and egalitarian. His wonderful life story reflects the humility of a beggar, the magnanimity of a saint without a shred of pretension or affectation, and the good humor and compassion of a man familiar with the hardship of life on the survival line. Lacking the advantages of a princely monastic education, he was a scholar nevertheless, but a scholar who wrote from experience, directly from his heart—he lived what he wrote and taught. Free of political and social bias, following the spirit of Dzogchen, he had no time for sectarian distinctions and took initiation and instruction from not only Nyingnn lanias but teachers of every school. It was this impartial ethos that was the foundation of the great nonsectarian revival in eastern Tibet in the nineteenth century. He heralded the great Khyentse Wangpo (i 820—92), Jamgon Kongtrul Lodro Taye (1813—99), Patrul Rinpoche (1808—87), and Mipam Jamyang Gyatso (i 846—1912), who were the figures most prominent in the full blooming of the eastern Tibetan renaissance.

Shabkar Lama was born in Rebkong in Amdo in 1781. At this time the Gelugpa school dominated Amdo through its great monastic academies; but the Rebkong region, to the north of the Amnye Machen massif, was—and still is—renowned for its Nyingma yogin-tantrikas (ngagpas) guided by the Dzogchen tradition. They were respected for their total commitment and devotion, but with their unshorn hair and unkempt appearance, roaming throughout Tibet, they were also feared. Practicing ritual magic for villagers while on pilgrimage, they also taught Tantra and Dzogchen to those ready and willing to learn. Shabkar grew up in this ngagpa ambience, receiving transmission from several Nyingma masters before taking full ordination with a Gelugpa lama at the age of twenty. Thereafter the Dzogchen ethos of Rebkong remained his heart practice, indicated by the white and red shawl he wore, while his gelong ordination, the outward show, was indicated by the patched lower robe. After ordination he was directed not to monastic discipline but to the lama who was to become his root guru and inspiration throughout his life, whose name was Ngakyi Wangpo.

The Lord of Dharma Ngakyi Wangpo (1736—I 807) was a descendant of the Mongol prince Gushri Khan, and his extended family was the ruling family in an area south of Rebkong and the north of the Amnye Machen range. Ngakyi Wangpo was a secular leader and a married lama, a ngagpa. We may see this personage as a severe and uncompromising preceptor, like Marpa Dopa, Milarepa’s master; but Shabkar paints him only as the most gracious and compassionate of teachers. His principal gift to Shabkar was the initiation, transmission, and instruction upon the revealed cycle of The Wishfulfilling Union of Tamdrin (Hayagriva) and Dorje Pagmo (Vajravahari). This comprehensive cycle of theory and practice provided Shabkar with his personal buddha-deity (yidam)—the union of Hayagriva and Vajravarahi. It also gave him a manual of meditation and yoga practice that was to sustain him for the remainder of his life.

After initiation Shabkar spent some time in retreat, practicing the preliminary techniques, the creative and fulfillment stages, and Dzogchen— Cutting Through and Immediate Crossing—according to the Wish-fulfilling Union of Tarndrin and Dode Pagmo, his lama’s chief practice and now his own. Then after spending more time with his lama, when he received all the initiations of his lineage, he entered a further period of rigorous retreat. In the middle of the Kokonor Lake, the vast Turquoise Blue Lake sacred to Avalokiteivara, is an island called Great God Heart of the Lake, Tsonying Mahadewa. Since no boat was permitted to sully the lake, the island could only be reached on foot by crossing the ice that covers the lake for a brief period each year. Yogins would provide themselves with a year’s provision and isolate themselves in the perfect solitude on the island at the center of the lake mandala. Shabkar remained there three years practicing the maha—, anu-, and ati- yogas of the Tamdrin-Pagmo cycle. During his sojourn on this island Shabkar wrote The Flight of the Garuda. It was an early work of his genius.

Shabkar was known as an incarnation of Milarepa, Tibet’s great yogin and composer of divine songs extempore, and his lama, Ngakyi Wangpo, as an incarnation of Marpa the Translator, the patriarchal yogin. Milarepa’s talent in composing and singing mystical songs extempore was shared by Shabkar, and so was his propensity for the anchorite’s life. But the yogin from Rebkong in Amdo was also a wanderer, roaming on pilgrimage throughout the Tibetan heartland and beyond. Punctuating his pilgrimage with retreats in caves and hermitages, he visited Amnye Machen, Amdo’s sacred mountain; he performed the Tsari Rongkhor (the long circumambulation of the Tsari mountain); and he spent a year at Kang Rinpoche, on Mount Kailash. On his pilgrimage to Labchi, to the west of Mount Everest, it was said of him that wherever he traveled he left the people established in the Dharma, and wherever he stepped he converted “black:’ or tarnished, worldlings into “white,” or refined, practitioners. Thus he gained his sobriquet Shabkar (White Foot). During his pilgrimage, between retreats, he would continue his instruction at the feet of lamas of every school, particularly the Drugpa Kagyu, with which his own heterogenous brand of yogin-monk mix had a strong affinity. However he was also interested in the Kadampas (the school founded by Jowo Atisa and assimilated by the Gelugpas), and Je Tsongkhapa himself, whose great work, The Stages of tile Pat/i, received sustained attention from Shabkar.

Shabkar’s study and practice bore fruit in his own writing. He had the gift of speed writing. It was said that he could write a hundred pages daily. If so, he could have spent only a month or so to produce his thirteen volumes of writing, the chief of which concerned his principal practice, the TamdrinPagmo cycle. Other volumes treated the Kadampa School, bodhisattvahood, the Nyingma tantras, and Maflju~ri, demonstrating the wide purview of his scholarship. Shabkar’s rounded personality is evinced also by his meritorious works: the gift of a solid-gold butter lamp to the great monastery of Samye; the gilding of the superstructure of the Boudhanath Stupa in Kathmandu; the construction of numerous monasteries and temples in his own Arndo homelands. No antisocial, cantankerous hermit, he had the bodhisattva’s ability to transform himself into a receptacle of offerings that he used for the good of all sentient beings.

Shabkar passed away in 1851 at the age of seventy-one. On the completion of a long discourse to his disciples, his spirit left his body while he still sat upright in lotus posture. So passed the carefree spirit of the “little anchorite” who, in many ways, both by example and in words, did more to feed the faith and support the spiritual needs of the common people than a multitude of tulkus on brocaded thrones. His spirit returned to inhabit another body, but it did so in the obscurity in which the original Shabkar spent much of his hfe. His lineage, however, proliferated. Trulshik Rinpoche of Thubten Choling in Solu, Nepal, is the principal contemporary practitioner of his lineage.

That, then, is the Shabkar Tsogdrug Rangdrol who wrote and sang The Flight of the Garuda. In his own judgment he was a simple, perspicacious mendicant without a care in the world. The clarity and power of the succinct, simple expression for which he is justly renowned is evident on every page of his work. The Flight of the Garuda also demonstrates the writer’s eclectic erudition and the fertile memory that allowed him in his extempore compositions to quote or paraphrase verses of Saraha’s Dohakosa, for instance, and passages from Longchenpa’s Dzodun, among the works that he hsts in his colophon.

The Garuda of the title refers to a mythological bird, the Khading, or Khyung, of ancient Bon legend. It may have been that Khading and Khyung originally represented the powers of light and darkness in the eternal conflict of Manichean Bon myth. The Manichean influence on Bon was derived from countries to the northwest of Tibet. Later, Khyung and Khading were confounded, and the bird came to represent the Bon spirit of fire. It is to be found, for example, in the upper left-hand corner of prayer flags. When the Sanskritic tradition of Buddhism became dominant in Tibet, both Khading and Khyung were assimilated into the Garuda. In the Vedic mythology of ancient Aryan India, it was Garuda who stole the nectar of immortality from lndra, the king of the gods, in much the same way as the cosmic bird Zu stole the Tablets of Destiny from the gods in Babylonian myth. In the later Indian context, Garuda became the vehicle of Vishnu, the lord of preservadon and order in the cosmos, and particularly Lord Krisna’s vehicle. Also, in the Pural2as and epics, as a fire spirit, Garuda features as the implacable enemy of the naga water spirits. In Tibetan Buddhist Tantra, Garuda represents the energy of fire that heals naga—related diseases, particularly cancer.

In the Great Perfection, Garuda is seen to represent the Dzogchen yogin. The nature of the bird is illuminated by the ancient Bon myth that relates how, at the beginning of time, the Khyung manifested spontaneously out of the cosmic egg as a fully mature being. The Garuda can transfer itself instantaneously from one place to another. From the tantric tradition is derived the image of the garuda’s wings beating in unison to demonstrate the unitary nature of duality, particularly the simultaneous arising of the gender principles of skillful means and perfect insight. Then from nature, observing the flight of the Tibetan eagle vulture, the Dzogchen yogin can perceive an analog of his own effortless path. The bird in flight is a wonder to behold. Gliding for miles using the wind’s currents to support its weight, its instinctual mastery of aeronautics is incomparable. The same kind of natural, intu— itive faculty that coordinates the bird’s flight governs the Dzogchen yogin’s activity.

The two wings that beat in unison in the garuda’s poetic flight are form and meaning. Unfortunately the abstract, technical content of The Flight of the Garuda does not lend itself to versification and poetic expression in English, so that the balance in Shabkar’s songs is not reflected in this translation, in which poetic form and rhythm have been sacrificed to clarity of meaning. Often, several words are required to render a single technical term into English, and it is impossible to maintain a regular meter. Rather than attempt unsatisfactory versification, I have translated these songs into prose, which is a more suitable medium for their metaphysical and technical vocabulary. Still, the Garuda’s flight should appear effortless, its wings beating in unison.

Useful Links

22 Saturday Oct 2011

Posted by in Garuda in Buddhism, Garuda in Hinduism, Garuda in Other Religions, Garuda LInks

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GENERAL INFORMATION

http://www.khandro.net/mysterious_garuda.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garuda

http://www.rigpawiki.org/index.php?title=Garuda

http://www.mythicalcreaturesguide.com/page/Garuda

Robert Beer’s handbook of Tibetan Symbols: http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=-3804Ud9-4IC&pg=PA50&lpg=PA50&dq=robert+beer+garuda&source=bl&ots=FQBITTOcHy&sig=X-iwphcwMaL6qcDg7YBxV7wLImI&hl=en&ei=DgujTpK-HYzssga69tn9Ag&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBwQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=garuda&f=false

Bird Headed Beings

http://www.crystalinks.com/bird.html

BUDDHIST TEXTS AND PRACTICES

The Fire Sword of Black Garuda (Highest Yoga Tantra Empowerment required):

Click to access flu_black_garuda.pdf

The Threefold Wrathful One (Vajrapani, Hayagriva, Garuda):

FPMT Booklet $1: http://shop.fpmt.org/Vajrapani-Hayagriva-Garuda-bkltlttr_p_1216.html

Garuda Multi-colored, Sadhana of Transcendental Wisdom

http://shop.fpmt.org/Garuda-Multi-colored-Sadhana-of-Transcendental-Wisdom-c5_p_1040.html

Avatamsaka Sutra

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=JdEKGM18EtUC&pg=PA88&lpg=PA88&dq=avatamsaka+sutra+garuda&source=bl&ots=ozM5nrq-FZ&sig=M8s0rttOdNWocrDTKX6G6UQpScI&hl=en&ei=phGjTsrbMs_2sgbQveXrAg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCYQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

Dzogchen Texts

http://www.khandro.net/meditation_garuda.htm

HINDU TEXTS AND PRACTICES

Garuda Purana

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garuda_Purana (In the Hindu text the Garuda Purana, Shakyamuni is described as the 21st incarnation of Vishnu. )

Click to access GarudaPurana.pdf

Garuda/KirtiMukha Comparison

http://johnnyringo.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/garudakirtimukha-comparison/

Bhagavad Gita (10 verse 30)

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=Bhagavad+GIta+garuda&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&client=firefox-a

“Among the Daitya demons I am the devoted Prahlada, among subduers I am time, among beasts I am the lion, and among birds I am Garuda.”

Introducing Garudas

21 Friday Oct 2011

Posted by in Garuda in Buddhism, Garuda in Hinduism, Garuda in Other Religions

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GARUDA

This site will become a resource for Spiritual Development with a focus on Garuda in Buddhism, Hinduism and related Shamanism. I have included a few images. Please let me know if you hold any rights over them.

GARUDA’S MANTRA:   OM PA KSHIM SVAHA  ॐ प क्षिम्‌ स्वाहा

INFORMATION ON GARUDA  from KHANDRO.NET:

Credit for info from Khandro.Net = Karma Sangey Khandro (H.B.Holt). “Garuda” Khandro.Net.

[30.5.2011]

The Indian mythological bird, Garuda, (Jap. Karura) is usually depicted as part human. It was created from the cosmic egg that also hatched the 8 elephants supporting the universe. Fully mature when hatched, it can easily traverse the universe from one end to the other. It can kill and eat poisonous snakes with no harmful consequences to itself.

The oldest collection of Indian hymns, the Rig Veda says:

They call him Indra, Mitra, Varuna, Agni

And he is heavenly nobly-winged Garutman.

To what is One, sages give many a title;

They call it Agni, Yama, Matarishvan . … .

In the image at Flight of the Garuda, a Song by Shabkar, whose Shangpa lineage emblem it is, we see him as the traditional mount or vehicle [vahana] of the Hindu god Vishnu and his consort Lakshmi [Abundance.] His kneeling form is often found in front of shrines and temples dedicated to Vishnu.

According to a south Indian legend, a sculptor who was an ardent devotee of Lord Vishnu carved a Garuda image out of wood while in Kanchipuram. When completed, having been carved correctly as decreed by the Shilpa Shastras, it came to life and took off towards the south.

At Parakkai village, the Garuda took a dip in the tank in front of the temple there exclaiming with delight. Then he rose again and hovered around the deity as if doing pradakshina (Tib. kora, devotional circling.)

An artisan working on a pillar at the temple saw the bird and for some reason, hurled his chisel at it hurting its right wing. The bird fell to earth crying, “Madhusudhana,” to the disbelief of the man. The 4-armed stone image of Vishnu was later carved and installed on that spot.

Cha Khyung (Bird-Garuda) was a mountain deity of Rebkong, Tibet, an area on the west side of the river in Amdo province. After he was subjugated by Padmasambhava he became a worldly protector.

In some cultures, the garuda acquired a human torso and became half human — a man-bird known as a kinnara or shang-shang. The shang-shang is associated with Buddha Amoghasiddhi (Unerring Accomplisher,)whose consort is Green Tara.

Amoghasiddhi is the Buddha of the northern direction and is representative of the skandha Samskara. He is depicted as green, with his hands in the abhaya — the “do not fear,” or protection, mudra. He is the conqueror of “thirst.” That is, working with visualizations and other Vajrayana methods that focus on him, we can transmute the yearning leading to attachment, which is often simplistically expressed as “desire” or “greed.” Another of his symbols is the vishvavajra or double vajra that stands for Foundation and also, for resolve and stability — here as concerns meditation and its objective (as in Shabkar’s Song 6 linked above.)

Garuda and the Kumbh Mela

The Hindu festival, the Kumbhmela, is held at a different spot on the shores of the Ganges every 12 years. At the beginning of 2001, Allahabad was the focus for this largest of the world’s gatherings. It is one of four spots where Garuda is believed to have rested during a battle with demons over the pot of divine nectar of immortality. Garuda’s flight lasted 12 divine days, or 12 years of mortal time, so the Kumbh Mela is celebrated at each city of 3 towns, alternating among them every three years.

Garuda and the Sacred Kusha Grass

The Hindu epic, Mahabharata, tells of the connection between Garuda and the sacred kusha grass [Poa cynosuroides] which was offered to the Buddha as a seat under the tree:

When Garuda brought some amrita from the moon for the Nagas as his mother’s ransom, Indra tried to prevent it. The amrita would make the nagas immortal, and they would pose a threat to Indra’s position as King of Heaven.

But faithful Garuda would not compromise his mother’s liberation. However, he arranged that after the nagas received it, it could then be stolen from them. In preparation for this, Garuda laid the nectar of immortality contained in its flask on the grass. That made it easy for Indra to steal which he did while the nagas were bathing in the stream.

When they emerged from the water, they expected the amrita to be on the kusha grass, itself. As they tried to lick up the divine substance, the spiky leaves of kusha slit their tongues. It is for this reason that the tongues of serpents are forked, and also that kusha [or kusa] is sacred — for having been in contact with amrita.

When Buddha Was a Suparna

Garuda is king of the class of beings known as suparnas. To demonstrate and share his profound understanding of the lure of a woman with a monk who was having difficulty with his vow of celibacy, the Buddha is said to have recounted his own experience as King of the “sunbirds,” who once ruled the Isle of Seruma, a land of nagas:

Once while on a gambling junket to Varanasi (formerly anglicized as Benares,) he had a love affair with his host’s extraordinarily beautiful chief wife, Sussondi. She had been informed of the garuda’s gorgeous appearance by palace attendants, and he was smitten as soon as she entered the gaming room. Under the cover of a dark and dangerously violent wind that the suparna had stirred up, they flew away to his island home. There, they made passionate love, but then he had the nerve to return to the host-king’s palace – without her.

Meanwhile, Sagga, the magical minstrel of the King of Benares, was sent to search for the missing Queen. On board ship, his song was so wonderful that a makara emerged from the ocean depths in excitement and smashed it to bits. He drifted on a plank that finally landed under a banyan on Seruma. Queen Sussondi, walking alone by the shore, recognized the nearly-drowned man and took him to her quarters to revive him. She had to hide him in case the garuda should recognize him, of course, and with Sagga living in secret there in her quarters, one thing led to another.

Six weeks went by until a ship from Benares landed to provision there, and Sagga made it successfully back to his home having fulfilled, at least to a certain extent, his royal mission.

Skillfully and with delicacy, he sang of his adventure and his longing to the King and his faithless guest, the suparna, who even joined in with his wonderful voice. On hearing Sagga’s story expressed so skillfully, the garuda understood its significance.

Though he was the most splendid of all creatures, he had not been able to keep Sussondi for himself alone. Now filled with regret, he flew away to fetch her and returned her to the King. In that lifetime, he never again visited Benares.

There, in Jeta’s Grove, Buddha then told The Four Noble Truths and all about the births revealing also, that the long-ago King of Benares had been his own student, Ananda.

Indonesia Airlines

Besides embodying stamina and determination, the garuda’s association with luxury and sensuality is probably a further reason why it was chosen as the emblem of Indonesia Airlines. Indonesia was once the ancient playground of Indian rajahs, and the Isle of Seruma may well have been somewhere in that extensive archipelago.

Myth of Garuda recounted by an Indonesian Airlines pilot.

Brother Chhepu

In Nepal, the “mask of protection” is the face of a garuda-child called Chhepu. Folklore tells of his origin. He was one among the three brothers, Garuda, Chhepu and Hitimanga. Their mother had requested her husband to help her produce a son

“. . . who would be the bravest, most truthful, and endowed with all superior marks. Her husband told her to wait for a certain period. She being too impatient to wait for a long period, looked in the nest to see whether he was born or not. She found Chhepu in a premature condition, only with his head formed.

It is also told that Chhepu disappeared from the world as he did not want to see the Kaliyuga, the great yuga, when evil would completely triumph over good and the world would be destroyed by Vishnu in his incarnation as Kalki, the destroyer.

Knowing his bravery, truthfulness and endowment with all superior marks, Manjushree wanted to see him and requested Chhepu to show his full form. Chhepu appeared slowly amidst the cloud. Manjushree, as a veteran artist, immediately drew his form with his foot secretly without the knowledge of Chhepu. When Manjushree had only finished drawing his head, Chhepu came to know Manjushree’s deception and immediately disappeared. Due to his bravery, truthfulness and superior marks, he was given the [pride of] place at the top of the main entrance of stupas [as a] protection from all the dangers. Nagas [snakes] are the food of Chhepu.” ~ Nepali site, no longer available.

Garuda as Shiva’s Guardian

In the Shaiva tradition of Hinduism, Garuda is a guardian of Lord Shiva. A tale is told how once, perched on Mount Kailash, Garuda noticed a tiny bird. He was struck by the contrast between the majesty of Kailash and Shiva’s palace, and the delicacy of ” . . . a beautiful creature, a little bird seated on the arch crowning the entrance to Shiva’s place. Garuda wondered aloud: “How marvelous is this creation! One who has created these lofty mountains has also made this tiny bird — and both seem equally wonderful.”

Just then Yama, the god of death appeared, riding his black buffalo. Garuda noticed that the gaze of the Master of Death briefly fell upon the bird, but then he continued on his way into the abode of Shiva.

Since a mere glance from Lord Yama presages death, Garuda’s heart was filled with pity for the tiny bird. He gently picked it up and flew off with it clutched carefully in his powerful talons. He took it far, far, away to a deep forest where he gently placed it on a rock beside a rushing brook. Then he returned to Kailash and assumed his customary position at Shiva’s gate.

When Yama emerged from his consultation with the Great God, he nodded to Garuda in

recognition. Garuda took this opportunity to ask Lord Death, “Just before you went inside, I saw you notice a little bird. You seemed to have a pensive expression on your face. May I know why?”

Yama answered, “When my eyes fell on the bird, I saw that soon it would find its death in the jaws of a great python. But there are no such serpents here, high on Kailash, and I was briefly puzzled.”

Again, Garuda marveled; this time at the inevitability of karma.

Hybrids

Hybrids, or what we might call monsters such as creatures like the makara, originated, according to Buddhist tradition, during the time right after the Buddha’s Awakening when all hatred vanished from the world. Then, animals that had been foe and prey mated with each other, and produced offspring such as these.

~ Loden Sherap Dagyab Rinpoche. Buddhist Symbols in Tibetan Culture. Wisdom Publ.,

Garuda in its form as part-human is certainly in this category. Garuda Bherunda is a double-headed form that may have led to the Austro-Hungarian and American forms called the Double Eagle (as in the title of J. P. Sousa’s famous march.)

Burmese birds and animals

The Two Kinnara

There was once a hunter who caught a pair of kinnara alive in the Himavanta forest. (As you know, the body of such creatures is human but the feet, wings and tail are those of a bird.) The hunter took them to the king, who asked why he had brought them. Were they offerings? Could they be roasted and eaten?

The hunter answered that kinnara have two interesting qualities: they have sublime voices, so if you can get them to sing they are able to do so more beautifully than people. The second interesting point is that kinnara dance wonderfully, much more beautifully than people.

The king commanded the kinnara to sing and dance, but even after being ordered two or three times, they just stood there looking at the king. The king, seeing that the kinnara would neither sing nor dance, then ordered his minister to have them roasted for dinner. Confronted by this dreadful situation, the female kinnara (called kinnari cf. canary) sat last spoke up:

That we do not dance is not because we can’t; that we do not sing is not because we are afraid of losing our voices. In fact, we would really like to sing and dance because we are sure that we do so more beautifully than any human being. The reason why we do not sing is because nearly all the songs known to man are just idle chatter. If we were to sing such songs, then we would not be following the tenet of Right Speech.

Because we are afraid of doing any evil is the reason why we do not sing for you. The reason why we do not dance is that such dancing will only cause Your Majesty to be sensually aroused which again is a source of evil.

That’s why we won’t sing or dance – it’s not that we are lazy or don’t want to show our skill or are too stupid to understand you. To sing and dance would be harmful to ourselves and harmful to Your Majesty, and we would both fall into hell as a result.

The king was pleased by what he heard. He said, “This is indeed an artful thing that has been said. Release the kinnari, but have the male which has remained silent roasted for tomorrow’s breakfast.”

The male kinnara said, “All grass-eating animals have the rain as their support. Farm labourers have beasts of burden as their support. As for my life, at this moment my life has Your Majesty as my support, as this kinnari has me as her support. If Your Majesty wishes to release this kinnari, do as you wish, but she will be without refuge. And I will be faulty in the performance of my duty to her as her refuge.

If you are going to release her alone, please slay me here and now so that the kinnari will have no doubt that I am unable to help her anymore.”

(These words were true, polite and said at the right time, with the right intention. Then again, what the kinnara had said also qualifies as artful speech.) Thus the king released the both of them, and had the hunter take them back to where they had been caught, together with a golden ornament fitting for a couple able to speak artful speech.

~ from a Mangala Sutra (wedding) teaching at Dhammakaya Institute of Belgium

Canary

Some etymological speculations: kinnari = canary, the warbling yellow bird; kinor is Biblical (and modern) Hebrew for the melodious ancient harp or lyre, the musical instrument whose shape provides the name for the freshwater lake at the north eastern tip of Israel, “Gennaseret” ie. the “Sea” of Galilee, source of the Jordan river. What is relevant here is the association with sweetness, either in the sound of its waves lapping the shore, the sweetness of its water or that of the fruit which grows by it.

The garuda is certainly related to the simurgh of Persian mythology. A related creature is the rukh or roc of The Arabian Nights’ Entertainment ( a.k.a. A 1000 Nights and a Night.) Both these mysterious creatures of a class known to mythologists as wundervogel, are distinctly but entirely birds.

There is a Garuda Valley, Kyunglung, to the south-west of Mount Kailash. Once the capital of the land called Zhang Zhung, it was the site of the Silver Palace (Khyunglung Ngulkhar,) the ruins of which are still there in the upper Sutlej Valley of India.

Tibetan: Khyung

Garuda, Black (Tibetan: khyung nag po)  isused to transmute the various poisons of worldly existence, specifically the harm caused by nagas.

Having the face of a bird, two eyes, a beak and two horns raising above with a slight curve, his orange eyebrows and hair flow upward like flame. The arms are outstretched to each side holding the head and tail of a long spotted snake while biting the mid-section with the beak. On the crown of the head is a golden jewel plundered from the Naga Realms. He is adorned with gold and jewel ornaments in the form of bracelets, armlets and two necklaces. Behind and beneath the arms green and brown feathered wings are unfurled. From the waist up he is blue-black in colour. The waist and lower body are well covered in yellow plumage with dark brown tail feathers showing between the legs. With two red talons each clutching a green snake he stands above a sun disc and pink lotus seat. In front of a four tiered white structure symbolic of mount Sumeru, the king of mountains, Black Garuda stands completely surrounded by red and orange flames of pristine awareness.

At the top left is a Gelugpa lama wearing monastic robes and a yellow pandita hat holding the right hand at the heart in a gesture of blessing and the left cradling a black begging bowl in the lap. At the right side is a lama wearing monastic robes and a yellow cap typical of the early Panchen lamas. Both are seated on cushions with backrests.

Historically, from classical Indian mythology, Garuda is the king of birds. In Tantric Buddhism, Garuda is yet another form in which various buddhas arise for the purpose of removing disease and injury caused by nagas and poisoning. Metaphorically the worst ‘poisons’ are desire, hatred and ignorance. Various forms of Garuda are found in both the Nyingma and Sarma traditions. The Chakrasamvara and Kalachakra Tantras of the Sarma tradition are the main sources for the various lineages of practice.

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Credit for info from Khandro.Net = Karma Sangey Khandro (H.B.Holt). “Garuda” Khandro.Net.

[30.5.2011]

Copyright © 2005 Shelley and Donald Rubin Foundation.

Photographed Image Copyright © 2004 Rubin Museum of Art

Note: Offerings to Garuda

In addition to offerings traditionally made to a Buddhist Tantric Deity, there was formerly a ‘red offering’ of flesh and blood to Garuda.  In Tibet, in both Bon and Nyingma historically regarded Garuda in some aspects as a ‘bdud’ demonic force to be propitiated with such an offering. This practice has now been abandoned although it is not known if isolated practices continue.

Amoghasiddhi

In the same way as Garuda is seen as the guardian and mount of Shiva, in the Vajrayana he is seen to have the ame relationship with Amoghasiddhi.  The shang-shang half-man half-bird is seen as representing man in transition towards a new level of consciousness.  (Lama Govinda).

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