WSW 5: Homage to Yamantaka – Outer, Inner and Hidden Yamantakas

The text begins with an introductory verse:

The name of this work is The Wheel of Sharp Weapons Effectively Striking the Heart of the Foe. I pay heartfelt homage to you, Yamantaka; your wrath is opposed to the Great Lord of Death.

The text is called Wheel of Sharp Weapons. There are actually many different levels of what this can mean. A wheel of sharp weapons, in one sense, can refer to our karma: we act in negative ways, and it comes back to us. It’s like a wheel that we ourselves have set into motion that can hurt us. But also, we can think of a wheel of sharp weapons being the understanding of voidness that helps us to get rid of our self-cherishing and so on, which then effectively strikes the heart of the foe – that is, which is going to eliminate the foe. “For” means “enemy” here – an enemy which would be our self-cherishing, our suffering, our problems and limitations. Remember, we want to be able to get rid of that, to get out of that. In order to destroy that enemy, one needs to be able to hit the enemy right in the point which will basically kill it, get rid of it. That point is, on the one hand, the self-cherishing attitude, and on the other hand, the grasping for solid “me.” This is when we think of ourselves and conceive of ourselves and others as existing as autonomous, independent entities – just by ourselves, all alone – which then makes us think of ourselves as being the most important ones, and others as being totally unrelated to us and others. Then of course we get the self-cherishing attitude, and this is the heart of our enemy: problems, samsara, and limitations. We want something which is going to be able to get rid of that. This is what is being discussed here with the wheel of sharp weapons: negative karma, negative things that are returning on us to hurt us. We want to be able to transform that; this is an attitude training or mind training. We want to transform that so that, instead of having a wheel of sharp weapons of karmic problems that come to us, we have a wheel of sharp weapons of an understanding of voidness, and this exchange of self and others that we do here – the tonglen practice – which is going to effectively strike the heart of the enemy, which is our problems.

That’s the title of the text. In the beginning of a text, one always pays homage (respects) to a figure, and here the figure is Yamantaka. Yamantaka is a figure coming out of Indian way of thinking. “Yama” is the Lord of Death, and “antaka” is the one that puts an end to it. “Anta” is “end” – it comes from the same root as our English word “end;” and “ka” is the one who brings it to an end – the one that brings Yama – the Lord of Death – to an end. This is a very forceful figure; it’s very strong. It has 34 arms, and 16 legs, and nine faces, and it’s really a very strong figure – and with flames and so on. It is the forceful form of Manjushri. Manjushri is the embodiment of the wisdom of all the Buddhas: the clarity of mind – the understanding of voidness, basically – that would allow us to understand voidness non-conceptually and fully. Manjushri himself would be what’s often translated as “peaceful form,” and Yamantaka is sometimes translated as the “wrathful form,” but I find those translations not the most helpful. Rather, we have a gentle form which is pacifying – in other words, one wants to quiet down the disturbing emotions, the problems and so on, and you have a quiet, gentle way of doing that. That’s represented by Manjushri. But sometimes the problems are so strong and so difficult that you need a very forceful energy to be able to put down dangerous situations – especially when we’re acting dangerously – or to put down very difficult situations, where just a gentle method is not really sufficient. So, when it speaks about “your wrath,” the wrath here is this furious form – very fierce form – and it is opposed to this Great Lord of Death. 

Yama or the Great Lord of Death can be understood on several levels. We speak of an outer, inner, and hidden Yama, the Lord of Death. The outer level is the actual external Lord of Death. This is a personification of death, which is like a butcher coming and wanting to destroy our lifespans, and all the suffering and things that come with that. This is speaking here about our ordinary, samsaric type of death, when we have this limited type of body that just by its very nature is going to attract sickness, old age, and death, and just go on, and on, and on with more types of limited bodies that continue to do that. Well, death is a final thing that comes with this type of samsaric body, and continuing to take this type of samsaric body is due to our grasping when you die. Here often the image is like a rat that’s thrown into a big bin of water. The rat just struggles to grab on to anything in order to stay afloat. Likewise, when we lose this body, because we are grasping for a solid “me” – to have some security for a solid “me” – then we just grab on to any type of body that we can find. It’s then from our karma – karmic winds – that a certain type of body will appear. 

Now, obviously we’re talking about the sperm and egg that would produce such a body, if it’s going to be a type of body that grows from a sperm and egg. So, one just sort of grabs on to it, which is based on a grasping for a very strong solid “me” that has to be secure. Then we have this whole continuing cycle of samsara: of a type of body, a type of life that is going to always be filled with the basic types of problems that we all have – sickness, old age, death, and so on. So, this understanding of voidness is what puts an end to Yama. Yamantaka is the understanding of voidness that would help us and enable us to realize that there is no such thing as a solid “me.” I exist, of course, but not as the solid, autonomous entity that has to be made secure by grasping for another body. If we can understand that, then this puts an end to the samsaric type of death because then, when we die, we’re not compelled to have to take some body out of karma. We have more choice in terms of seeing where we can appear, what form we can appear in to be able to benefit others as much as is possible. This is what we’re aiming for: not to be reborn in this compulsive, samsaric type of way, but to continue to appear and take birth in a conscious type of way, with this motivation to always be in a form and in a circumstance in which we can help others as fully as is possible.

Where is the choice going to come from – if we have the understanding of voidness – to appear in a form which is going to be of best help to everyone? I think in terms of some of these great lamas. For example, my own teacher, Serkong Rinpoche, passed away in a very conscious Dharma practice of this giving and taking in the valley of Spiti in India, on the border of Tibet, and he was born again in a family that he knew. Whether he actually consciously chose that family or not – I think there is no way of us knowing that, but he certainly knew the family and it was very easy to find him. I think that this is one of the things that are involved here in terms of choice. In order to appear as a Tulku – a Tulku is one of these reincarnate lamas – you need various things. You certainly need a certain level of competence in the Dharma practice; specifically, you need to have very strong bodhichitta – a very sincere aim to continue to appear to help others to reach enlightenment; and you have to have a lot of prayers. You have to want to be able to continue to appear and have people find you. The prayers are very important, in terms of having a strong intention. Then you need to be able to do certain practices in the highest class of tantra – anuttarayoga tantra. 

The first stage of this practice is called the generation stage. During that generation stage, what you do is certain visualizations in which you visualize what happens when you die: the stages of dying, the bardo period (the in-between-period), and then rebirth. You practice going through those stages with the understanding of voidness so that, then when it actually happens, you’ll be prepared and be able to keep the understanding of voidness during these experiences. If you have those things, and in addition there are people who want to look for you – you have to have people who want to look for you – and there are some needs, some purpose, that could be accomplished by your appearing and people finding you, then I think the mental continuum is just naturally drawn to a situation which will fill all those requirements: a family that will be open to your being trained again, people who will know to look in this area to find you – this type of thing. 

Also, I don’t know how much astrology has to do with this, but one thought about astrology that I recently had, which has to do with both karmic type of rebirth as well as perhaps this type of rebirth by choice, is that actually it has more to do with karma. This is because if it is by choice, what you want to do – particularly with the Kalachakra teachings – is get over the influence of astrology, so that you’re not really affected by that. But in any case – because I know this – if you look at his Holiness the Dalai Lama’s astrology chart, it’s the most unbelievable chart, which no one can ever imagine. So, I think that there is still something there with the astrology, but my point is with astrology is that the configuration of the planets is a mirror of a karmic situation. 

If you have a certain karma – I always think in terms of regular karma – we have so many karmic configurations to be born in so many possible different rebirths, even during our life, as well for so many different things to happen. So, which one happens? We know clearly the mechanism of what activates the karma: the aftermath of things that are left over from karma, the karmic tendencies, and these sorts of things. What activates it is basically this grasping for true existence. But why does it activate this karmic cluster and not that one, for this rebirth and not that rebirth? I think that has to do with the astrology configuration – that it will ripen something that fits with what’s going on with the planets. I think also, in terms of which rebirth you’re going to take, that there’s the karmic connection with the parents, with the area, the people who are going to find you, the circumstances that’ll be there. I think the time of the birth will likewise be affected by the astrological configuration as well. I think it happens like that. I must say, it’s very difficult to understand and it’s not, I think, like some autonomous “me” standing and looking down from heaven and seeing what person you want, then choosing this one, and then jumping down, diving down into this womb. It certainly isn’t like that. I think it has to arise dependently on many different factors that are all going to be conducive for that life in terms of being able to benefit others – at least on the level of bodhisattvas who are not yet totally liberated beings. I think it must be a little bit like that. 

But in general, if we think in terms of our own practice, the main thing is prayer, actually, and as much bodhichitta as possible – that I really want to continue having a precious human life to be able to continue on the spiritual path to be able to benefit others as much as possible. May I quickly and easily meet with the Dharma again, and become the foremost disciple of the foremost teachers, and everything becomes conducive and easy for following the spiritual path, whatever the circumstances might be – this family, that family; this country, that country. I think it’s more important to think in those general terms rather than thinking specifically, “May I be reborn as a Tibetan” or as whatever. 

Then, of course, if we’re doing anuttarayoga tantra practice to familiarize ourselves more and more with this whole death process – so that we don’t freak out when it actually happens – we can know what’s happening and we can stay aware of the voidness of all the steps and maintain this bodhichitta motivation throughout. That’s very important. Whether or not you can do the detailed visualizations that go with it – I don’t think it’s so crucial because there are so many different tantra practices and each of them has a slightly different visualization, so it can’t be that the actual the form of the visualization is the most important thing. It just helps you to be mindful, to keep focused. It’s an aid. 

So, we have the outer Yama – outer Lord of Death – and then we have the inner Lord of Death. The inner Lord of Death is referring to the disturbing emotions themselves. These are disturbing emotions and disturbing attitudes like attachment, longing desire, greed, hostility, anger, naivety, pride, jealousy, envy – all these sorts of things are the inner Yama, the inner Lord of Death. This is because within our minds, these are the ones that destroy us, just as the outer Yama takes our life in terms of the physical life of this lifetime. Likewise, with the inner Yama, these disturbing emotions take the life of our liberation from samsara. They kill our chances of gaining liberation because they imprison us. When we have this grasping for a solid “me.” “Grasping” – what that word means actually – it’s not the best translation but there is no easy translation of the word – is that the mind makes an appearance of a solid “me.” In other words, it’s a feeling. You feel as though there is a solid “me” inside my head talking – the author of this voice that goes on in my head. It seems as though I could know it without having to know anything else. In other words, it is existing independently of a body or a mind or anything like that; I could just know it. “I’m going to try to find myself,” “I’m going to express myself,” “this is the real me” – this type of feeling of a “me” that could be known all by itself. “I know myself,” “be true to myself” – we have all these different ways of formulating our general outlook, in the West, in terms of this autonomous “me” that can be known. “Grasping” refers to how the mind makes this appearance automatically; it feels like it. To make this appearance doesn’t mean literally that you see something, but it feels like that, and so we experience it like that. That’s one phase of grasping. 

Then the second phase of “grasping” is that we believe it’s true. We believe that it corresponds to reality. That’s what grasping for a solid “me” means – that we have this feeling of a solid “me” and we believe it’s true. Although one could also conceive of it as a more active grasping out for a solid “me” – that’s impossible; such a thing doesn’t exist. You have to be a little bit careful in not making it too strong so that we lose sight of what is just the basic underlying mechanism of it, what really is happening. Now, when we have that grasping for a solid “me,” this autonomous “me” – it feels like that, and we believe that – how do we experience that? We experience that with insecurity. Basically, we experience it with “I feel insecure,” because we are identifying with an impossible “me” that could never be made secure, so how could it possibly feel secure? Because we feel insecure, then we get these disturbing emotions like greed and desire. “I have to get this certain things to me, hold them, belong to them, own them, or belong to somebody else, and that’ll make me feel secure.” “If I can only have you, if I only have enough money, that’ll make me feel secure.” Or – the other way around – “if you will have me, then I will feel secure;” “If you will give me a job” or “If you will marry me,” “then I will feel secure.” Another mechanism is anger and repulsion: “If I can just get this away from me, then I’ll feel secure.” It could be things that I don’t like. It could be dirt or chaos: “If I can just get my house clean enough and in order enough, then I will be secure.” Or this myth that this solid “me” could be in control: “If I can just be in control of everything, then that will make me secure.” 

These are the disturbing emotions, the disturbing attitudes, and they are the inner Lord of Death – the inner Yama – because they destroy our chances to be free. They just create more and more problems, because then we act on that desire, or greed, or attachment – “I don’t want to let go.” We act on that anger, and how do we act? We act destructively, we say stupid things, we do stupid things, and it just produces more and more suffering. This is the inner Yama, the inner Lord of Death. 

If we really think about it, what destroys my ability to help others? On an external level, it’s getting sick, getting old, and dying – certainly. If we have trained a lot in this lifetime to be able to help others, we’ve learned a lot, so either we’re able to be a teacher, or we’ve trained in some profession in which we can help others. We have a lot of experience – when you get older, more experience helps you to be able to help others more – and what destroys that? Getting sick, old, and dying. We have to start all over again with training. On an inner level, what destroys it? Getting angry; getting attached to the people that I’m trying to help; getting greedy – wanting something from them; being arrogant – wanting to show off; being jealous if they go to somebody else for help; getting annoyed if they don’t take our advice; getting really fed up if they have too many problems. So, these disturbing emotions, on an inner level, destroy our ability to help others. We need this understanding of voidness in order to be able to overcome these two levels. 

Now, the third level of Yama is called the secret or the hidden Yama (Lord of Death) and this is referring to very subtle levels of mind – a conceptual mind – which are involved with making appearances of true existence. Yamantaka is a figure that appears in the highest class of tantra, anuttarayoga tantra. In this type of teaching, they speak very much about the clear light level of mind or the clear light level of mental activity. This is the subtlest level of mind. It provides the continuity from moment to moment is what actually does continue from lifetime to lifetime. It doesn’t have any of this grasping for a true existence. It doesn’t make an appearance of true existence; it doesn’t perceive an appearance of true existence – it doesn’t feel it, and it doesn’t believe in it; and it doesn’t have any disturbing emotions or anything like that. It is non-conceptual, so it’s not knowing things through categories, or mental pictures, or anything like that, but is just a very most subtle level that is naturally very pure. 

We can impute on this, of course, the tendencies and habits and so on that would go on into a future life, but this clear light mind itself is by nature not stained by any of these things. What happens though is that this clear light level of mental activity, when it gets grosser, when it starts to come in contact with grosser elements, then because of the habit of grasping for a true existence, it makes an appearance of true existence. It’s not that the clear light level itself is making this thing, but you get these grosser levels, and these grosser levels of mental activity make an appearance of true existence, and this is in three steps. These three steps, these three levels of this very subtle mental activity – not this clear light but the ones little bit more gross than that – are the three appearance-making minds, levels of mind, and it’s conceptual – very subtly conceptual. This is what the secret Yama is, the hidden Yama.

What are these three steps? Sometimes it is translated as the “black appearance,” the “red appearance,” and the “white appearance.” It has that type of appearance – that’s one way of describing it. But the way that I like to think of it is that first you have a threshold – like a doorway, stepping out of this clear light level. So, comes out as a little bit dark. Then you have the light diffusion level. Light diffusion is not actually light like a light bulb, but it’s what would make an appearance; that type of light starts to diffuse, so it goes out. Then you have appearance congealing – it’s a stage in which it congeals like gelatin – into an appearance of true existence. And then, based on these three steps, you have an appearance of true existence, solid existence. True existence is solid existence.

This is always for absolutely everybody. This is what is underlying your every moment except when you are only having clear light mental activity, which normally you’d only have at the moment of death. But at all other times, you have this appearance making of true existence – or if you’re non-conceptually cognizing voidness, you don’t have that either. This is the mechanism that makes this appearance of solid existence and that’s the secret Yama, the hidden Yama. So, if you can stay with non-conceptual cognition of voidness – or particularly if you can stay with it with this clear light level of mind, which is the hidden Yamantaka – then you would get rid of this secret or hidden Lord of Death, which would be these very subtle minds that actually are the mechanism that makes the appearance of true existence. Because when we have that appearance of true existence, then usually we believe that it’s true, that it corresponds to reality. 

This is not very easy at all. This is very advanced level of teachings. We have a feeling of solid existence – that everything exists solidly by itself out there. This is a table from its own side, this is Silvia from her own side sitting there. I know Silvia, I can just know Silvia by herself without knowing her body, or her mind, or her personality, or her name, or something like that. We have this appearance and this feeling that everything is solidly real as if it had a solid line around it, as if it were coated in plastic – there sitting all by itself, independently. Well, I often describe as things existing as if they were ping pong balls – separate plastic things. It feels like that. This hidden Yama is the mechanism – a very subtle mechanism – that creates that feeling. It is described in great detail in the tantra teachings. As one dies and gets closer and closer to just having this clear light level of mind then, you become aware step by step of these three levels. It’s very important to understand voidness at that time and apply it, so that it gets rid of it so that it won’t recur. That’s the deeper level of Yamantaka – to get rid of that. 

So, we have these three levels of Yama that Yamantaka gets rid of, which the author here, Dharmarakshita, is paying his respects to or homage to. On this external level, we can’t help others because we are dying, so we can’t continue to help others. The difficulty in helping others is because we have disturbing emotions, and we have difficulty in helping others because the mind makes appearances of this solid existence. We can put this together with the three levels of motivation that we were speaking about. We want to continue to have a precious human rebirth – a better rebirth. It’s because of the Lord of Death – the external one – that we’re going to die, we’re going to lose this body; and we want to gain liberation from all the disturbing emotions that cause samsara – that’s the inner Yama we want to get rid of. But even if we become liberated, still the mind makes these appearances of true existence, and when the mind makes appearances of true existence, then we really aren’t able to become a Buddha. 

We are not able to know everything – the interrelatedness of everything – to be able to know what the cause is of everybody’s current situation, of their problems, and what the effect will be of teaching them this or that. When our mind makes things appear like ping pong balls – solid – we’re limited, we’re just looking through a periscope, as I describe it. Periscope is when you have a U-boat, a submarine, and you have this pipe, and you look through it and you can only see a little bit. We have limited hardware. This type of body is a limited body; it has limited hardware. You can only see out of the holes in front of your head; you can’t see what’s behind you. We don’t know; we’re very limited in terms of not being able to know past lives, and future lives, and the effects of things, and so on. The reason for this limitation is that this type of mind, this grosser mind, makes appearances of true existence. It makes things appear in these isolated plastic bubbles; it makes them feel like that and appear like that. We don’t know the interconnectedness of everything. The interconnectedness of everything – when you know that, you know everything. Then you know all the background of why this person is like this, what really is going on with all their disturbing emotions and so on; and if I teach them this, what effect it will have on all their future lives and on all the people they meet and interact with, and so on – not in isolation but in connection with everybody else. 

If we want to gain better rebirth, we have to work with overcoming the outer Yama. If we want to gain liberation, we have to work with overcoming the inner Yama, the inner Lord of Death. If we want to gain enlightenment, to become a Buddha, we have to overcome and get rid of this hidden Yama. Yamantaka is what’s going to help us to overcome all of that. We can understand Yamantaka as this figure, with all the arms and the legs and so on, but actually what Yamantaka is referring to is the non-conceptual understanding of voidness, done with the most subtle level of mind – the clear light mind – and with a blissful awareness. This is going to be discussed in various ways here, but this is what is a specialty in this highest class of tantra. What the text is always referring to is that if the mind is very blissful – we’re not talking about ordinary bliss but based on all sorts of manipulations with this subtle energy system – then the mind automatically becomes more subtle. And if it becomes more subtle, then it’s easier to get to this clear light level of mind. What we want to have is the understanding of voidness with a blissful mind, blissful state of mind, and that’s what the deepest level of Yamantaka is: a blissful non-conceptual awareness of voidness with this clear light mind – and, of course, bodhichitta in all of that. It’s represented in a physical form by this figure, Yamantaka – and all the arms, and legs, and faces, and so on represent different things, on the spiritual path, basically. So, this is the verse of homage. 

The homage is: 

The name of this work is The Wheel of Sharp Weapons Effectively Striking the Heart of the Foe. I pay heartfelt homage to you, Yamantaka; your wrath is opposed to the Great Lord of Death.

This forceful understanding, strong understanding, of voidness, with this blissful mind is a strong method for overcoming the outer, inner and hidden Yama, hidden Lord of Death.

Let’s end here with the dedication. We think whatever understanding has come from this, may it go deeper and deeper, and act as cause for reaching enlightenment for the benefit of all.