Padmasambhava

Padmasambhava also known as Guru Rinpoche, was an 8th-century Buddhist master from India. He is widely venerated as a "second Buddha" by adherents of Tibetan Buddhism.

Padmasambhava statue at Ghyoilisang peace park, Boudhanath, Nepal

Padmasambhava statue in Rewalsar in Himachal Pradesh, India

Quotes

• My father is the wisdom of spontaneous awareness.
  My mother is the Ever-Excellent Lady, the space of all things.
  ...I sustain myself by consuming the concepts of duality.
  My purpose is the act of killing disturbing emotions.
  • Quoted inThe Lotus-Born: The Life Story of Padmasambhava, (a book review) by Rebecca Radner, Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, Fall 1993

• If one does not recognize the Dasein as one’s own face, But were to search for it for aeons, one would merely become disheartened. If self-originatedness is not separated from its prop, It is (like a) hermit with his hut becoming destroyed by an avalanche. If one does not understand that (Dasein) can (unlike a totality) neither be summed up (by its parts) nor be taken apart(by separating its parts), But (expects to) find it somewhere else (than in one’s self), one is on the wrong track.
  • The teachings of Padmasambhava, Herbert Guenther, ISBN 90 04 10542 5, 1996

• If a person’s vision, imaginative cultivation of the vision, and the enactment of this vision (as his life style) is grounded, (This person) does not become the playground for spiritual death; But as long as he is not grounded, He will be the playground for the eighteen kinds of spiritual death. When vision falters and becomes ungrounded the subject-object dichotomy with its five poisons of emotional pollution arises. When the imaginative cultivation of the vision becomes ungrounded and falters Two kinds of spiritual death, depression and ebullience, arise. When the enactment of the vision (as a person’s life style) becomes ungrounded and falters, Seven kinds of spiritual death affect the enactment. When vision, imaginative cultivation of the vision, and the enactment of the vision (as the person’s life style) become ungrounded The four kinds of spiritual death affecting his dignity arise; Thus, when (a person) is ungrounded He becomes the playground for (all kinds of) spiritual death. Even if there is (Being’s) self-originated originary awareness present in such a person. This person is like a prince walking among commoners.
  • The teachings of Padmasambhava, Herbert Guenther, ISBN 90 04 10542 5, 1996

Quotes about Padmasambhava

• In the end, he 'mounted a beam of sunlight and in the flicker of a moment flew away into the sky... He turned his face to look back and sent forth a light ray of immeasurable loving-kindness...'
  • The Lotus-Born: The Life Story of Padmasambhava, Rebecca Radner, Tricycle: The Buddhist Review, Fall 1993

• Biographies of Indian saints and scholars like Nagarjuna, Dignaga, Santideva, Padmasambhava were recovered from Tibetan literary treasures. Among them the name of Padmasambhava is the most venerated one in Tibet, Nepal and Bhutan... The rediscovered books were all credited also to Padmasambhava. Hence Padmasambhava was regarded as an emanation of the primary wisdom of all Buddhas
  • Guru Padmasambhava: A Profile and His Teachings, Arya Kumar Jnanendra, Centre for Bhutan Studies, Summer 2016

• At Padmasambhava’s time all of Tibet prospered and was happy; their harvests were good and it was time without strife. All the provinces on the four frontiers were subdued. Both political and religious practices were firmly established.
  • Guru Padmasambhava: A Profile and His Teachings, Arya Kumar Jnanendra, Centre for Bhutan Studies, Summer 2016

• Padmasambhava defined the future of Tibet, planting the seeds of the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, which would come to flourish over the next millennium. Padmasambhava taught that past and present are interrelated, connected to each other in one’s present experience.
  • Seeing the Future in the Story of Padmasambhava, in Lions Roar, February 2, 2018