Anuttarayoga, Clear Light Mind and Non-Conceptual Cognition of Voidness

In anuttarayoga tantra, we work with the level of mind that is going to be involved with the omniscient mind of a Buddha. This subtlest level of mind is known as the clear-light level of mind, or clear-light level of mental activity. For this, we need to understand that there are three levels of mental activity.

Gross

First, there is the gross or coarse level. This is sense consciousness. It works on the basis of our sensory apparatus, such as the photosensitive cells of the eyes, the sound-sensitive of the ears and so on. These are the so-called cognitive sensors. 

Subtle

Second, the subtle level refers to mental consciousness. This doesn’t rely on the sense apparatus. We have thinking and imagining things when we are awake. More subtle than this is when we are dreaming and more subtle than that is being under anesthesia, unconscious or in a coma. All of these are very subtle levels in which the consciousness is more and more withdrawn, in a sense, from the physical body.

Subtlest or Clear Light

Third, we have the subtlest level. This is what provides the continuity, what continues through death and into rebirth, lifetime after lifetime. This is what will continue and become the omniscient mind of a Buddha. A Buddha’s mind is only with this clear-light level. 

Characteristics of Clear Light Mind

There are many advantages to accessing this subtlest level. Normally, it only manifests at the time of death. However, it is possible through working with the subtle energy systems to access it in meditation. This is difficult but it can be done. The subtlest level is more subtle than our ordinary level of consciousness, whether conceptual or non-conceptual. The characteristics of this level are that it is non-conceptual, without disturbing emotions, and it doesn’t make appearances of self-established existence and is without ignorance. 

Non-Conceptual Cognition of Voidness 

We want to be able to get a non-conceptual cognition of voidness. This clear light mind doesn’t by itself have an understanding of voidness. Just because it is without ignorance doesn’t mean that it has the understanding of voidness. Ignorance is actually unawareness. Either we don’t know that things don’t exist the way that they appear or we view them incorrectly. Just because we don’t take things incorrectly doesn’t mean that we are aware of how things actually exist. It’s just that we don’t have confusion. There is the clear light mind of death, but that doesn’t mean that a person understands voidness. There may be no appearance of true existence, nor grasping or belief in it; however, it doesn’t mean that there is an understanding of voidness.

Just because we don’t know something incorrectly, doesn’t mean that we know it correctly. We may not know it incorrectly because we don’t know anything. This doesn’t mean that we know it correctly. For example, we might not think that a person is John, but that doesn’t mean that we know correctly that it is Dennis. It’s just that we don’t think that it’s John.

Clear Light Mind Focused on Voidness

What we want to do is access the clear-light level and get it to be focused on voidness correctly. If we can do that, it will automatically be non-conceptual. In sutra, this is what takes one zillion eons of building up positive force to accomplish. The highest level of tantra is much more efficient; however, this doesn’t mean that it’s easy. It’s very difficult. However, if we can do it, it doesn’t take a zillion eons, with that force, to get it to be non-conceptual.

This is what we try to do in anuttarayoga tantra. Any level of mental activity has some physical basis for it. The physical basis for this clear light mind, the subtlest mental activity, is called the subtlest energy. It’s from this subtlest energy that we generate the actual illusory body. It’s from that subtlest energy that we will actually get the various physical bodies of a Buddha. Once again, it’s much more efficient and closer to the result. If we can get that subtlest level of mental activity focused on voidness, and from the subtlest energy of it generate it in the form of an illusory body, eventually we will be able to sustain this forever and become a Buddha.

This concludes our discussion of many of the advantages of tantra, and why tantra is more efficient than sutra, and why if we follow it sincerely and correctly, it doesn’t take as long to attain enlightenment. Of course, there are many more details that can be given and much more explanation, but perhaps this is enough for now. 

Three Other Classes of Tantra

What are the other three classes of tantra?

They are called charya, kriya and yoga tantra. Kriya tantra accents external actions. There is a great deal of ritual cleanliness and importance of diet. Charya has a balance between external and internal. Yoga has more emphasis on the internal and has a large number of mudras, the hand gestures. Anuttarayoga tantra has this special inner method of dealing with the chakras and channels. What is most commonly practiced are the kriya tantra and the highest class, anuttarayoga tantra. The second and third classes are not so commonly practiced. One should also be aware that the yidams, each of these Buddha-figures have many different forms. There are many different forms of Avalokiteshvara, Chenrezig, Tara and so on. They can appear in more than one class of tantra, and even with the same figure and form, there will be many different lineages and practices of them. Tantra is extremely vast. 

If the Buddha body is made of this most subtle energy, how can it depend on a coarse level of our actions? You said that the amount of positive energy is the cause for the body of a Buddha. This was referring to an action on a cause and effect level. How does this work?

How can a subtle level depend on a coarse level? From a causality point of view, technically we are speaking about the five different causes that are explained in one system of abhidharma and twenty in another system of abhidharma. In this case, the type of cause we are discussing is what is called an obtaining cause. It is that form in which we obtain the result. For example, a sprout comes from a seed. When we get the sprout, the seed no longer exists. When we get the flower, we no longer have the seed state of the plant. Further, the obtaining cause of cheese is milk. When we have the cheese, we no longer have the milk. Like that, from these networks we can obtain the result but when we obtain the result we no longer have these networks. 

In reference to how we get something subtle from something coarse or gross, think of a television or a radio. We have the gross apparatus and yet we can receive from that a very subtle signal from very far away. In this way, it’s not unusual to get something subtle from something coarse. 

In that example, though, the subtle level already exists.

Similarly, just as we already have the electric current in the apparatus that is producing the signal, in that way, underlying every moment of mental activity is this subtlest level. It’s unbroken and provides the continuity. 

If that is the case, is it that we just need to get rid of the gross things and then the subtle level automatically remains?

We have to get rid of the gross things for the subtle level to become manifest. This is in terms of getting to the clear light mind. The grosser levels have to be stopped. However, just to get to that subtle level isn’t enough. It has to have the understanding of voidness. The positive force is what will provide the energy to be able to get to that understanding.

It’s not that this gross level transforms into the subtle level. In that way, it’s not exactly analogous to the milk transforming into the cheese. Take it as that from which we obtain. The seed doesn’t transform, in a sense, into the sprout; however, we get the sprout. When our body is obtained from the sperm and egg of our parents, is the sperm and egg still inside us somewhere? No. Did they transform? We need to understand what this means. It’s not so literally a transformation. It’s not that there is a sperm and egg on the table and then poof, there is an adult body transformed from it.

We can conclude that causality is very complex; it’s not so simple, and therefore we have a very complex analysis of this in Buddhist metaphysics. 

Is it like a potentiality, and out of this there is a transformation? 

There is a difference between something that is a potential and something that is the result of a potential. There’s potential energy and then there is kinetic energy. From potential energy we get kinetic energy. That may be a better way of looking at it. If there is no potential energy, where would kinetic energy come from? Let’s not get into a technical talk about physics; this is just another example to help understanding. We are talking about subtlest energy when we discuss the body of a Buddha. There is a potential energy and that can bring about the grosser energy of this human body or the very subtle energy of the body of a Buddha. This would depend on dedication, the understanding of voidness and so many different factors. 

Again, causality is very complex. We talk about things ripening from the cause, and the karmic potential ripens in the form of a rebirth. Then we have the body of the rebirth, the experiences of the rebirth. It isn’t simple to explain or understand.

The main point is that we all have the Buddha-nature factors which will allow for the transformation to become a Buddha. In this discourse on tantra, we have addressed in a very gross and general level how this happens. Of course, it requires a great deal more study and background to get a little bit more details. Don’t think of this network as being something physical. It isn’t physical at all; nevertheless, it is possible to attain enlightenment. We have the factors that will allow this as part of what goes along with the mental continuum.

To understand it more deeply we would have to delve into imputation. It starts to get very complex; so to begin, we try to keep it on a simple level. It isn’t even that there is potential energy transforming into kinetic energy. We aren’t talking about energy in that way. It’s a potential. We all have the potential to become a Buddha. We all have a mind, mental activity. We have the potential to act in a stupid and samsaric way or in an enlightened way. We already have a body, a mind and the ability to communicate and so on. The mechanism of mental activity is the same whether we are talking about ordinary thinking or the omniscient mind of a Buddha.

The working materials and the potential are all there. It’s just a matter of putting in the effort to have bodhichitta. There are the vows, as we said, so we don’t lose them. We need to work on getting the understanding of voidness and trying to access that subtlest level of mental activity because that is the most efficient. We work with these Buddha-figures in tantra because they are the most efficient. That’s what it is all about. We need to gain confidence and see that we have the potential and the ability. It’s just a matter of doing it, continuing with a great deal of patience because it will take a great deal of time. We need to sustain it.

We think whatever understanding, whatever positive force has come from all of this, may it act as a cause for everyone to attain the enlightened state of a Buddha for the benefit of all.