Palchen Düpa Recitation Manual

Recitation Manual for the Gathering of Awesome Ones (Palchen Düpa), Heart Practice of the Vidyādharas

by Jigme Lingpa

Homage to the guru inseparable from the Awesome One!

If you wish to perform the recitation of the approach phase of the Gathering of Awesome Ones’ Heart Practice, you should first, as the foundation, receive the appropriate empowerment and abide by the samayas. Then go to an auspicious and secluded place. Arrange a ten-spoked maṇḍala complete with doors made from coloured sand or painted on cloth, either one of which is fine. If not, set out a ten-spoked maṇḍala surrounded by fire mountains. If you cannot manage even this, it is permissible simply to arrange heaps [of grains] to represent the maṇḍala. Then arrange a ‘glorious’ skull that has the main deity painted on the inside and which has been consecrated. Behind that, place a kīla of sandal or teak wood, twelve fingers in length and with a black cloth wrapped around its neck. Write the mantra list[1] in vermillion or golden ink and place it in the centre of the maṇḍala. Cover it with a black canopy. Surrounding it, neatly arrange outer and inner offerings. If you do the approach and accomplishment phases solely as a means to perform activities, it is permissible to have only a glorious torma (paltor) as a practice support.

Then seat yourself on a comfortable seat. When performing the ritual, make sure you visualize properly, connecting the words with the meaning. The shrine of the boundary kings needs to be arranged according to the hands-on, practical instructions of the tradition. In particular, for the main practice of the generation phase, you need to study the commentary Stairway to Akaniṣṭha thoroughly.

Here, the heart instructions that explain the crucial points for the visualization of the approach and accomplishment alone are as follows. The practice is structured according to the three sections of the approach phase of the peaceful deities, the accomplishment phase of the wrathful deities and the application of activities. For example, when doing a one-month retreat, you would practice the approach phase for ten days, the accomplishment phase for ten days, the great accomplishment phase for seven days and the application of activities for three days.

1. The Approach Phase

Visualize yourself clearly as Mahottara and consort. Their bodies appear like a rainbow, without anything obscuring them. In your heart is the wisdom being (jñānasattva) Samantabhadra with consort. In the centre of his heart are the three seed-syllables of the three vajras of all the buddhas, standing upright. Focus your awareness unwaveringly upon them and recite the three syllables as a mental recitation.[2] If that doesn’t suit you, then recite the mantra softly.[3] Uninterruptedly meditate on the primordially pure mantra of the wind-energies: inhaling, holding and exhaling. At the same time, imagine that light rays shine forth and purify all clinging to appearances as ordinary in their own place, causing them to vanish like clouds or mist. If you wish to meditate and train with the aim of gaining supreme realization and causing an infusion of blessings, you need only practice this. Since this is the great universal ancestor of all the buddhas, whether you meditate on and recite the approach mantra of the hundred peaceful and wrathful deities, the five families, or one family alone, if you accomplish one, you will accomplish all.

2. The Accomplishment Phase 

In the heart of Samantabhadra and his consort, on a lotus and sun-disk seat, is a golden vajra with nine prongs, standing upright. In the hollow space of the central prong is the concentration being (samādhisattva), a blue syllable hūṃ, emitting five-coloured light rays. In the eight hollows of the prongs, starting with the prong in front of the hūṃ, are oṃ, guru, śrī, vajra, yakṣa, krodha, citta and hūṃ. The syllables are bright blue in colour and as fine as if written with a single hair. They all face inwards in the direction of the central hūṃ. They are unbearably vivid, as bright as the rays of the rising sun. Until you have attained a clear appearance of the deity, there is no need to meditate on the radiation and absorption of light rays. If you have a painted skull, then train by alternating between looking at it briefly and trying to picture it mentally.

To develop a clear visualization, meditate on the palanquin recitation as follows. From all the syllables, starting with oṃ, burst forth syllables of the same form, like one candle lighting another. These chains of mantra garlands emerge from the jewel-tipped uṣṇīṣa of the wisdom being, flowing out of the mouth of the male deity into the mouth of the female deity. Then, flowing through her body, they exit through her secret space and enter the jewel of the male deity’s vajra, thus entering the point of union of the wisdom deities. They circle around the concentration being (the hūṃ syllable in the central prong) and then dissolve into the hūṃ.[4] By meditating in this way, the life-force syllable also blazes with extraordinary splendour. Light rays radiate out, illuminating the palace and the deities, as when light shines into a dark room. At the tips of the light rays, in all directions, behind, in front, above and below, are beautiful, visually striking offering goddesses, as numerous as atoms in the world, who present offerings of bliss and emptiness to all the victorious ones and their heirs in the ten directions. They gather all the empowerments, blessings and siddhis, and the qualities of knowledge, love and power, which all dissolve into you. Imagine that you attain in actuality the eight common siddhis, the four vidyādhara levels connected to the path, and the supreme siddhi of the level of union beyond training. Once again, lights rays shine forth and purify all the karma and negative emotions of the six classes of beings merely by touching them. Train in transforming all conceptualisation of the environment of the world and the essence of sentient beings as impure into the pure realm of Akaniṣṭha. When the deities, the pure realms and dharmatā are no longer mentally created, but instead, without meditating, arise naturally in a non-dual manner based on the generation phase of spontaneous presence, you will swiftly attain awakening in the self-appearing, absolute Akaniṣṭha. If you grow weary with reciting the mantra, since this is a profound heart practice, it is perfectly fine to perform the hūṃ recitation at any time, even during breaks.

However many main mantra you recite, recite one tenth as many of the all-embodying, universal mantra of the wrathful deities.[5] The special feature of the palanquin recitation here is as follows. You visualize yourself as the guru Awesome One, including the wisdom being, in whose heart is a lotus, sun and moon-disk seat. Upon it is a vajra surrounded by the universal mantra of the wrathful deities, which is arranged in a clockwise direction and spinning.[6] Five-coloured rays of light radiate forth and chains of mantra garlands emerge from the mouth of the main deity. They enter the heart of Yangdak and emerge from the point of union. They then dissolve into the forehead of Yamāntaka and emerge from the point of union, entering the throat of Hayagrīva and emerging from the point of union. They then enter the secret place of Vajrakīlaya and emerge from his mouth. Then, gradually, the lights rays flow to Mamo Bötong, Vidyādhara,[7] Lokastotrapūjā[8] and Mantrabhīru,[9] entering their mouths and exiting from their secret place. While the light rays enter their mouths and exit through their secret places, the mantra garlands spin and nets of light rays cause the clarity and stability of the hosts of deities to become extremely vivid, satisfying them with the taste of bliss and emptiness. Meditate on the universal fierce mantra, roaring like a thousand thunderclaps rumbling at once. Your yogic conduct of the generation phase will become stable and the radiance of your awareness will blaze forth. Then, from the mantra garland, five-coloured light rays radiate in the ten directions.

• White light rays carry out pacifying activities—pacifying disease, famine, infernos and floods, wars and weapons, capital punishments, untimely death and the eight fears.
• Yellow light rays carry out enriching activities—increasing the six riches consisting of life, merit, glory, splendour, retinue and wealth.
• Red light rays carry out magnetising activities, and with the fourfold admiration that causes all sentient beings of the three realms to see you as their guru, their king, their chieftain and their parents, you attract disciples.
• Green light rays carry out the twelve wrathful activities such as summoning and liberating.
• Blue light rays carry out the supreme enlightened activity of all four activities together; they pacify karma, negative emotions and the obscurations of the all-ground, increase the qualities of scriptural knowledge and realization, magnetize the primordial wisdom of liberation and omniscience, and liberate your own ego through realization and others’ ego through compassion.

Thus, the light rays have the nature of all five enlightened activities. Meditating on the appearance aspect of the radiance of the chief deity’s unaltered nature qualifies as an authentic clear appearance.

When you become weary, you need to cultivate a stable pride, which will make it impossible for obstacles to harm you. If you fail to maintain the crucial points of the symbolic meaning of the appearance aspect of the yidam deities, their ornaments and attires, then if you meditate on a peaceful deity you will be reborn in the desire realm and if you meditate on a wrathful deity you will be reborn as a rudra or rākṣasa. You must therefore remind yourself of the signs, symbols and meanings of the appearance of the deity, as found in the praise section of the activity manual.[10] The symbolic meaning of the magnificent charnel-ground accoutrements is explained in the tantra sections of the Early Translation School. At this time however, I will not explain our own tradition’s special features, which set it apart from the expositions in the Cakrasaṃvara and Guhyasamāja Tantras. Nor shall I give a presentation on conquering the four demons, eliminating the three ravines and slaying the three secret enemies, since they are explained in The Words of the Awesome Ones, along with the meaning of one’ own children and the child of others. Since you must clearly understand how an individual traverses this path of the generation phase without having to rely on anyone else and attains perfect awakening, study A Glimpse of the Crucial Points, The Manual of Concealed Instructions and the commentary Stairway to Akaniṣṭha.

3. Application of Activities

The meteoritic iron vajra fills the three-thousandfold universe. In the empty space in its centre, vast and expansive, the nine Awesome Ones are clearly visualized. The upper and lower eight prongs are slightly spread apart.[11] In the [upper] central prong is the Lord of Sages,[12] in meditation posture and touching the earth mudrā, surrounded by the common fourfold retinue[13] such as Śāriputra. In the [upper] eight prongs are the eight vidyādharas of India. They summon with ja, liberate with bhyo, and with phaṭ transfer the consciousnesses to the dharmadhātu. Thus they exert themselves instantaneously in wrathful yogic conduct. In the lower eight prongs and the central prong are the Nine Gongpo Brothers, who are pierced in their hearts and cry out in anguish: ci ri ri. Surrounding the handle at the middle of the vajra is a razor wheel, which spins anticlockwise and cuts all the misleading spirits to pieces. In the spaces between [the prongs] is an emanated nine-headed scorpion with eighteen horns, which devours them all, leaving nothing behind. If you like, you can elaborate with the hand-clapping ritual of the curses of the sages. Then finish with the concluding rituals and the supplementary fire offering in the usual manner.

Here, since the guru is practiced in the form of the yidam deity, the blessings are extremely swift.  In this degenerate age, when gyalgong and damsi demons run rampant, the deities who possess the strength of the antidote are very powerful and auspicious, so you should regard them as the essential yidam deities with the power to subdue obstacles.

At the request of Mön Dzakar Lama, I, Dzogchenpa Khyentse Lha, wrote this at Tsodzong[14] Lhündrub Yangtse.

| Translated by Han Kop and edited by Barry Cohen, for the Longchen Nyingtik Project, 2025. With gratitude to Tulku Rigdzin Pema Rinpoche for his clarifications.

Bibliography

Tibetan Text

'jigs med gling pa. "rig 'dzin thugs sgrub dpal chen 'dus pa'i bsnyen yig", Derge edition (9 vols). In gsung ’bum/ ’jigs med gling pa, BDRC W27300 (Gangtok, India: Pema Thinley for Dodrupchen Rinpoche, 1985), Vol. 7: 503–511. (Derge)

______. "rig 'dzin thugs sgrub dpal chen 'dus pa'i bsnyen yig" In klong chen snying thig rtsa pod, BDRC W1KG13585 (Shechen Publications, 1994), Vol. 1: 677–688. (Tsapod)

Secondary Source

kya la mkhan po chos mchog. "bsnyen sgrub mos pa rnams la mkho gal che ba khol byung zur du bkod pa" In thugs sgrub dpal chen ʼdus paʼi zin bris. 1 vol. Gangtok: mChod rten dgon pa. [BDRC bdr:MW4CZ294455]

Version: 1.1-20250609