Thursday, July 22, 2004
The Mind as the Guru
"Since all things are born of the mind,
Therefore is the mind itself the guru."
From "Tibetan Yoga and Secret Doctrines," ed. by W. Y. Evans-Wentz
This passage is footnoted as follows:
"It is a fundamental tenet of the Buddhism of all Schools that the human guru is merely a guide, as was the Great Guru, Gautama the Buddha. Each aspirant for Nirvanic Enlightenment must be a law unto himself; he himself, not the guru, must tread the Path. One must eat one's food for oneself; and, as the Buddha taught, each pilgrim on the Great Pilgrimage must really be his own light and his own refuge. Nirvana is to be realized not by the proxy of a guru, but by the yogin himself."
Elsewhere in the text, this footnote appears:
"When, in virtue of having practiced yogic meditation, there has been established communion between the human mind and the divine mind, or between the normal human consciousness and the supernormal cosmic consciousness, man attains to true understanding of himself. He realizes intuitively that the Knower, and all objects of knowledge, or all knowing, are inseparably a unity; and simultaneously with this realization there is born the Great Symbol, which occultly signifies this spiritual illumination. Like a philosopher's stone, the Great Symbol purges from the mind the dross of Ignorance (Avidya); and the human is transmuted into the divine by the spiritual alchemy of yoga."
Therefore is the mind itself the guru."
From "Tibetan Yoga and Secret Doctrines," ed. by W. Y. Evans-Wentz
This passage is footnoted as follows:
"It is a fundamental tenet of the Buddhism of all Schools that the human guru is merely a guide, as was the Great Guru, Gautama the Buddha. Each aspirant for Nirvanic Enlightenment must be a law unto himself; he himself, not the guru, must tread the Path. One must eat one's food for oneself; and, as the Buddha taught, each pilgrim on the Great Pilgrimage must really be his own light and his own refuge. Nirvana is to be realized not by the proxy of a guru, but by the yogin himself."
Elsewhere in the text, this footnote appears:
"When, in virtue of having practiced yogic meditation, there has been established communion between the human mind and the divine mind, or between the normal human consciousness and the supernormal cosmic consciousness, man attains to true understanding of himself. He realizes intuitively that the Knower, and all objects of knowledge, or all knowing, are inseparably a unity; and simultaneously with this realization there is born the Great Symbol, which occultly signifies this spiritual illumination. Like a philosopher's stone, the Great Symbol purges from the mind the dross of Ignorance (Avidya); and the human is transmuted into the divine by the spiritual alchemy of yoga."
