Toh 1873Untitled

Commentary on the Tantric Scripture, Vajrayana (Toh 1873)

Context

This scripture belongs to the Kangyur, the treasury of Tibetan scriptures, in the Tantra section, which consists of the highest Tantric scriptures in the Vajrayana tradition. The Kangyur was translated from Sanskrit into Tibetan from the eighth to the thirteenth centuries, expressing the transmission of the Buddha Dharma from India to Tibet and the regions of Northern Buddhism.

Tantra, or Vajrayana, is the summit of Northern Buddhist Dharma, fundamentally distinct from the ordinary Lesser Vehicle and Great Vehicle. It does not seek to avoid mental factors such as desire, nor to gradually reshape them over many long kalpas of practice. Instead, Tantra directly makes use of the energy of mind, speech, and action in order to transform them and advance swiftly toward enlightenment, possibly within a single lifetime.

Toh 1873 is a Tantric scripture that has not yet been fully translated into Vietnamese. However, based on the context of the Kangyur Tantras, it is certainly connected with some deity or Iṣṭadevatā, a personal tutelary deity, or with an advanced visualization and meditative practice using sound (mantra), image (yantra, mandala), and meditative intention (samādhī).

Main Content

The specific content of this scripture has not been fully translated in generally transmitted materials. However, according to the typical structure of the Tantras in the Kangyur, this scripture may focus on one or more of the following aspects:

First, it teaches the nature of the deity or object of practice, whose own nature is unborn, that is, a wisdom-contemplation without beginning or ultimate end.

Second, it presents a step-by-step method of visualization: how to gather the space of mind from the empty expanse of śūnyatā, and how the manifesting deity appears with details of color, adornments, mantra-hrdaya, lotus, wheel, and so forth.

Third, it differs from the Mahāyāna scriptures in that it does not separate the impermanent body from the process of enlightenment, but uses the body itself, subtle energies (nāḍī, prāṇa, bindu), as instruments of transformation.