Some verses you'll hear again and again. Not a definitive list – there ain’t no such thing. But if you know these by heart and can join the recitation at the drop of a hat, you will achieve one great thing: you will look good! The "Three Jewels" (I don't know who to credit - it's all over the 'net) The Refuge formula: Lama la kyab su chi o ‘I go for refuge to the lama.’ Sangye la kyab su chi o ‘I go for refuge to the Buddha.’ Chö la kyab su chi o ‘I go for refuge to the Dharma.’ Gendün la kyab su chi o ‘I go for refuge to the Sangha.’ Some words or phrases you might want to look up: Bodhicaryāvatāra Śāntideva #Buddhism #Vajrayana #DoubleDorje #Refuge #Bodhicitta
bread and butter bread and butter sounds a bit boring but we can keep going back to it Hello dear listeners, thank you for listening in today to this episode of the Double Dorje podcast. I'm Alex Wilding and today I thought it might be nice to look at some extremely common prayers.
These are prayers that it's really nice to know off by heart, partly because if you can join in their recitation at the drop of a hat, you will look as if you know what you're doing. Before getting into the real stuff, the usual quick reminders. First, please pause, if you will, for a moment to like this episode. Even better to subscribe, and better still to share it with your friends.
And secondly, I almost always do include some extra material, such as words you might like to look up. These are never essential, but this week they'll be particularly helpful. So if you don't find it on your listening platform, do take a look at Podbean, where the episode is first hosted.
There is no definitive list of such prayers, so I have just picked a small enough number that learning them off by heart isn't too difficult, and also they are sufficiently popular that, as far as I know and believe, you'll find them in all various traditions of Tibetan Buddhism. Well, I say that there is no definitive list. If you are attached to a well-established and organised centre,
that centre may well have printed up in some relatively polished form a number of the prayers that they use in precisely the version that they recite. That's great, of course, and if you are in that position, you should definitely get hold of that text and use it.
But don't be surprised when at some other centre the prayers used are different or that they are recognisably the same but in a different version. Like I said, they can pop up at various stages of a group's hardener, and if you can drop straight into the flow and start swimming, it not only does look good, but it's actually very helpful for your internal flow, so to speak.
In private, you can use them at times such as when you wake up, you're waiting at a bus stop, and many, many other occasions. So, let's take a look at what they mean and how to chant them. We'll start with refuge. Taking refuge in the three jewels is, as many of you will know, the number one step in actually practicing Buddhism. It's the gateway.
I don't want to come over all prescriptive and say, you must do this, you must do that. But I think it is fair to say that any and every Buddhist of whatever stripe should be able to recite a suitable version of the refuge prayer. Most importantly, of course, it's in your heart that you take refuge in the three jewels. Taking refuge formally is just an expression of that.
You can do this for that matter yourself, although when you have taken refuge formally with a preceptor or teacher, it does go up another notch. In an earlier episode, actually I've just seen it was episode 28 about karma, I referred to a book with the title of A Lamp Illuminating the Path to Liberation by Kenpo Jeltsin.
I said the title as clearly as I could then, because you can find it on the net as a PDF file, free to download, and that was pretty much the intention. I don't think it was done as any sort of profit-making exercise.
This will give you some solid, if simple, rules about what, as people who have taken refuge, we are expected to avoid, and what we are expected to observe, and briefly what the meaning of the three refuges is. These are indeed the three R's of Buddhism. We go for refuge to the Buddha rather than gods or worldly sources of power. We go for refuge to the Dharma for our understanding.
I'll just make a quick mention here that while the body of canonical Buddhist literature is enormous, not to say ginormous, it's not a religion of the book where one central text is held to be infallible. Thirdly, we go for refuge to the community rather than to companions who are a bad influence on us. Now, there's a lot to unpack in these ideas, but that's not the subject of today's episode.
In addition to an understanding in our hearts, so to speak, and in addition to taking refuge as a more or less formal ceremony, a beloved Buddhist practice is that of repeating a refuge formula again and again. And again. Perhaps three times, or perhaps going on and on and on. Back in the damp, grey early spring of 1974, at what was then called Kam Tibetan House near Saffron Walden,
I remember sitting in the little tea room learning this, my first bit of proper Buddhist chant. The version I'm talking about in fact has four lines. The three refuges or three jewels remain three, but as is in fact common in Vajrayana Buddhism, the Lama represents a combination of them all. I'll start by looking at the words fairly closely. My guess is that the majority of refuge prayers are
just focus on the three jewels, but here we start with LAMA LA, which means to the lama or to the guru. CHAP means refuge, while CHAPSU makes for refuge. CHI is to go, and the O is something like the end of a sentence. So our first line comes out as Well, excuse my pronunciation. It's a bit exaggerated and it's not very good in the first place. But this means I go for refuge to the Lama.
That's just one line, but the other three have the same structure, so there's not a lot to learn. We just need to insert Sanje, meaning Buddha, in the place of Lama. For the third line, we insert Chö, meaning Dharma. And in the fourth line, we insert Gendun, meaning Sangha, in the fourth line. Putting this all together, we end up with this.
I will put these words in the comments for those who want to follow it up. The tune that was used for this was also extremely simple. It's only got two notes, and it goes something like this. I used the wonders of technology there to fade out. You can yourself imagine this being done three times or however many, many, many you like. Now, refuge is something that we do for our own sake.
It's the attitude that we set up as we set out on the path away from the cycle of suffering. As is well known for the whole of Mahayana Buddhism and for Vajrayana Buddhism, which is of course a part of Mahayana Buddhism, this personal self-focused refuge is looked on as incomplete. It's okay, but it just doesn't go far enough.
And it's complemented by the enlightened mind or enlightened attitude, bodhicitta, being the Sanskrit version or jamsim in Tibetan. As we pass this point in the explanation, you should see a big flashing warning sign at the side of the road. Bodhicitta is an enormously complex term, with a wide range of meanings.
But here it has its usual relatively straightforward meaning, which is that of aiming at enlightenment in order to be able to release all sentient beings from the cycle of suffering. This thought is so important that refuge and bodhicitta are often rolled into one prayer. So now let's look at a very common version of that. I think
It may be the most common version, which is why I thought to include it here, but I can't claim to be widely enough read to be absolutely certain. So here is the one I know. First line goes... You might perhaps already recognise a couple of these words. Sanje for Buddha, Chö for Dharma, and Sok, which means assembly, and here refers to the Sangha.
Chok being supreme, Nam is a pluralizing syllable, and La means two. So we have, to the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Supreme Sangha. The chant continues, where Jangchok means enlightenment, while Bardo means until. You might note the connection there with the famous Bardo, which means in between, between now and attaining enlightenment.
The dāgni is mainly grammatical, meaning that this is something that I do, while we met chyap sun chi, above meaning going for refuge, so this all adds up to I go for refuge until enlightenment is reached. On the third line, we have dāgi jinso jīpe sonam jī. Dāgi effectively has the meaning of by me, and jinso equates to generosity and so forth. Why do we say so forth?
Because generosity is the first of the famous six liberating virtues. So, altogether, we have through the merit of practicing the liberating virtues. On the fourth line, we then have Drona Panjshir Sanjay Drupal. Drona is two or four sentient beings. Panjshir is for their benefit.
Sanje, I hope you do recognise by now, meaning Buddha or Buddhahood, and Drukpa Shor gives us the sense of may be attained, or may it be attained. This line then adds up to may I attain Buddhahood for the benefit of all beings. The first two lines, therefore, are lines for personal refuge, the second two lines for Bodhicitta, and the whole set of four lines
which I think is what we call a quatrain to be fancy, then comes out as, To the Buddha, the Dharma and the Supreme Sangha, I go for refuge until enlightenment is reached. Through the merit of practicing liberating virtues, may I attain Buddhahood for the benefit of all beings. Once again, I'm going to torture you with a tune, which once again is really rather simple. Here we go. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Once again, I have used this magic technology in my computer to fade that out and save you a bit of time. It would be very normal in reality to sing this three times very close to the beginning of a formal practice. Bodhicitta is so important that, unsurprisingly, it also has its own very, very popular verse.
The verse comes from the Bodhicaryavatara, which is a famous, famous, famous work by Shantideva, dating to the beginning of the 8th century. To the best of my knowledge, this verse is happily chanted by all schools of Tibetan Buddhism. Here we go. means May the Supreme Mind of Enlightenment.
be born where it has not been born before where it has already developed may it not reduce shock but grow from height to height I think I've probably done enough word-for-word explanation for one episode so here is simply a tune for this one Once again, three times would be normal, but once is enough for now.
A verse that often comes up in similar positions, quite often in the introductory stages of a liturgical practice, is one that speaks of the four immeasurable virtues, namely loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity. Again, a huge amount to unpack about what those four are, but this is not the episode to do that. This verse starts with sem chin tam chi and goes on.
But I'm not going to cover this one here, because even in my own little snapshot of experience, I've come across at least three versions. So you need to check with whatever text you might actually be using, or with whatever the people at your Buddhist center, always assuming you have one, of course, lots of us don't, whatever version they are using.
There is, however, a four-line verse often used at the end of practices and well worth knowing. Here we need to understand that it has a placeholder, which I'm going to call XXXX, standing for four syllables that name the practice concerned. It's essential at the end of any practice whatsoever to dedicate the merit to all sentient beings, and that's the purpose of this verse.
Here is one version, it's the one I've heard most often, but I do know there are many versions and others may be popular in other circles. First, as one of my dreadful stabs at pronouncing the Tibetan, meaning By this virtue may I quickly attain the state of XXXX, and then lead every sentient being, without exception, to that level.
It is, as you have no doubt spotted, the first four syllables of the second line that can be swapped around for the purposes of different practices. So here it is with Ujjian Pema, a name for Guru Rinpoche. By this virtue, may I quickly attain the state of Arjun Pema, and then lead every sentient being, without exception, to that level.
For a number of reasons, some of them probably just tradition, but it also is highly appropriate. Verses like this are more often recited just once when we get to the end of the practice. At the end of a Chenrezig practice, what you might hear is The thing here is that Chenrezig only has three syllables.
So to fit the rhythm, wang, meaning something like powerful, is tacked on as an honorific adjective for Chenrezig. The merit of many, many other practices can be dedicated in this way. All that's necessary is to give it a four-syllable name. So there you have it for this week. I can only hope that you find that these things help you in one way or another.
They might help you to feel more comfortable in a group practice. but they are also powerful when you chant them on your own. And I hope that they are short enough that they are not too difficult to learn. So, once more, please, please remember to share, subscribe, like, and remember... Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.