The mystic poems of the Charyapada are a collection of esoteric verse by the Mahasiddhas of tantric Buddhism, dating to 8th-12th century eastern India. This series of poetry from the masters of yore is laden with insight on the interplay of the microcosm, the macrocosm, and the great void beyond. Poems of the genre are grasped and tasted in a heart of primal symbolic awareness; read not the surface tale, taste the flow underneath!
With the heart of the mystery in the mid-stream that reveals the nature of the opposites, the tantric tradition employs rich imagery of the male-female interplay to reveal the principles of the sun, the moon, and the central pillar of fire as energetic and ontological beacons in the ocean of existence. Here's a fresh translation of the 13th poem by Kanhapada, a beautiful gloss on the enlightened human situation.
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In Siddha Kanhapada's song, a three-refuge boat is the vehicle for the journey. We have three perennial refuges (in general and Buddhist terms): [-] Negative (Dharma: Unifying Awareness), [±] Middle (Sangha: Mirror Awareness) and [+] Positive (Buddha: Specifying Awareness). Compassion (Karuna) and Wisdom (Prajna), or Compassion (Karuna) and Emptiness (Sunya), create the two flanks of [±] transparent yoga-balance. Three refuges give shelter to eight phenomenal maidens: [---] Earth, [--+] Mountain, [-+-] Stream, [-++] Wind, [+--] Thunder, [+-+] Fire, [++-] Lake and [+++] Heaven — the fundamental building blocks of the luminous eightfold path of human resolution.
The bipolar waves of the phantom dream are only witnessed in the ☯ Middle-Golden-Stream. Five Tathagatas ("thus-gone-ones") are the oars for the five pure lights, the five faculties, the four cardinals with a center — the sacred pentad of primal awareness. Here are the five Dhyani-Buddhas: 1) Buddha Mahāvairocana ["super-luminous-sphere"]: Tathatā-jñāna, "Awareness of Suchness", 2) Buddha Akṣobhya ["non-disturbable"]: Ādarśa-jñāna, "Mirrorlike Awareness"; 3) Buddha Amitāyus ["immeasurable-lifecycle"]: Pratyavekṣaṇa-jñāna, "Investigative Awareness"; 4) Buddha Ratnasambhava ["jewel-potential"]: Samatā-jñāna, "Unifying Awareness"; and 5) Buddha Amoghasiddhi ["successful-accomplishment"]: Kṛty-anuṣṭhāna-jñāna = "Accomplishing Awareness".
The ocean of existence is likened to a wire-net of phantasmagoria. The objects of the senses and the sense-faculties are exactly what they are. When left in their own nature without craving or projection, the shackles of bondage unravel, severing the steel-ropes of the material anchor with the sword of transcombinatory awareness. For the remainder of the journey, now in a state of transparent seedlessness, the phenomenal world transforms into a waking dream that holds no sway over the conscious dreamer. In effect, the world is beheld from behind a primal mirror; touched, but not touched; smelled, but not smelled; and tasted, but not tasted.
Luminosity of primal awareness is the helmsman of the boat of the body in the blessed void; and the object-streams shape the countless waves of the ocean. A journey to the highest bliss of union is fulfilled when above and below are joined in the middle without friction, reconciling and uniting the inner with the outer, reaching the pinnacle of conscious equilibrium, and ultimately, unbinding the thread of patternation altogether. That is the fullness of the bliss of union in the blessed void.
You can download a translation of Charyapada at the SySpir Central ArcHive in PDF format (98 KB) — archived from an expired website. Translator unknown. It's a fair rendering, albeit missing a good deal of nuance; as can only be expected in working through an archaic mixture of Bangla, Oriya and Assamese! Art base: "Jesus walks on water" by Ivan Aivazovsky (1888).
With the heart of the mystery in the mid-stream that reveals the nature of the opposites, the tantric tradition employs rich imagery of the male-female interplay to reveal the principles of the sun, the moon, and the central pillar of fire as energetic and ontological beacons in the ocean of existence. Here's a fresh translation of the 13th poem by Kanhapada, a beautiful gloss on the enlightened human situation.
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| It's not the eight maidens in this painting; yet the ocean and the means are the same. |
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ti-śaraṇa nābī ki'a aṭha-kumārī | ni'a deha karuṇā-śūṇame herī || 1
tarittā bhava-jaladhi jima kari mā'a suinā | majha beṇī taraṅgama muni'ā || 2
pañca tathāgata ki'a keḏuāla | bāha'a kā'a kāhni la mā'ājāla || 3
gandha parasa rasa ja̮isoɱ ta̮isoɱ | niṁda bihune suinā ja̮iso || 4
ci'a-kaṇṇahāra śūṇata-māṅge | calila kāhna mahā-suha-sāṅge || 5
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"In a three-refuge boat I captured eight maidens;
In my body, I behold compassion and emptiness.
Crossing the ocean of being as a phantom dream;
The mid-stream led me to understand the waves...
Deploying the five Tathagatas as the oars;
Kanha rows the outer form in a wire-net of magic.
Smelling, touching, tasting, as they are;
Like a dream without sleeping!
Awareness as helmsman in the blessed void;
Kanha sojourns in union's highest bliss..."
◄ ≡ ☺ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☻ ≡ ►
In Siddha Kanhapada's song, a three-refuge boat is the vehicle for the journey. We have three perennial refuges (in general and Buddhist terms): [-] Negative (Dharma: Unifying Awareness), [±] Middle (Sangha: Mirror Awareness) and [+] Positive (Buddha: Specifying Awareness). Compassion (Karuna) and Wisdom (Prajna), or Compassion (Karuna) and Emptiness (Sunya), create the two flanks of [±] transparent yoga-balance. Three refuges give shelter to eight phenomenal maidens: [---] Earth, [--+] Mountain, [-+-] Stream, [-++] Wind, [+--] Thunder, [+-+] Fire, [++-] Lake and [+++] Heaven — the fundamental building blocks of the luminous eightfold path of human resolution.
The bipolar waves of the phantom dream are only witnessed in the ☯ Middle-Golden-Stream. Five Tathagatas ("thus-gone-ones") are the oars for the five pure lights, the five faculties, the four cardinals with a center — the sacred pentad of primal awareness. Here are the five Dhyani-Buddhas: 1) Buddha Mahāvairocana ["super-luminous-sphere"]: Tathatā-jñāna, "Awareness of Suchness", 2) Buddha Akṣobhya ["non-disturbable"]: Ādarśa-jñāna, "Mirrorlike Awareness"; 3) Buddha Amitāyus ["immeasurable-lifecycle"]: Pratyavekṣaṇa-jñāna, "Investigative Awareness"; 4) Buddha Ratnasambhava ["jewel-potential"]: Samatā-jñāna, "Unifying Awareness"; and 5) Buddha Amoghasiddhi ["successful-accomplishment"]: Kṛty-anuṣṭhāna-jñāna = "Accomplishing Awareness".
The ocean of existence is likened to a wire-net of phantasmagoria. The objects of the senses and the sense-faculties are exactly what they are. When left in their own nature without craving or projection, the shackles of bondage unravel, severing the steel-ropes of the material anchor with the sword of transcombinatory awareness. For the remainder of the journey, now in a state of transparent seedlessness, the phenomenal world transforms into a waking dream that holds no sway over the conscious dreamer. In effect, the world is beheld from behind a primal mirror; touched, but not touched; smelled, but not smelled; and tasted, but not tasted.
Luminosity of primal awareness is the helmsman of the boat of the body in the blessed void; and the object-streams shape the countless waves of the ocean. A journey to the highest bliss of union is fulfilled when above and below are joined in the middle without friction, reconciling and uniting the inner with the outer, reaching the pinnacle of conscious equilibrium, and ultimately, unbinding the thread of patternation altogether. That is the fullness of the bliss of union in the blessed void.
◄ ≡ ☺ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☻ ≡ ►
You can download a translation of Charyapada at the SySpir Central ArcHive in PDF format (98 KB) — archived from an expired website. Translator unknown. It's a fair rendering, albeit missing a good deal of nuance; as can only be expected in working through an archaic mixture of Bangla, Oriya and Assamese! Art base: "Jesus walks on water" by Ivan Aivazovsky (1888).
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