#six paramitas

[bhrm555]

Bodhisattva Samantabhadra

[objectsofdesireresearchlog-blog1]

More info on the bone ornaments

I learn from Loseries-Leick's book that "bone ornaments are the garments or armour of joyous and wrathful divinities of the highest Tantrik order", but to be more specific,

"Wrathful male deities, and semi-wrathful yidam deities, wear 6 different bone ornaments, representing the essence of the six transcendental perfections of paramitas." (318)

Huntington, John C. & Bangdel, Dina. The Circle of Bliss: Buddhist Meditational Art (Serindia Publications, Inc., 2003), p.361.

This table shows the 6 perfections (paramita) as well as the 5 Dhyani Buddhas (kula) represented by each of the 6 bone ornaments.

“The first five perfections are classified into the male ‘accumulation of method’, and the sixth perfection is classified alone as the female ‘accumulation of widsom’”, therefore, “female wrathful deities or dakinis only wear the first five of the bone ornaments, as their bodily form itself represents the perfection of wisdom”

So, actually, male yidam deities wear 6 bone ornaments, and female dakinis wear five bone ornaments. (how I always tend to skip the Tibetan words in italics, however, I went to look up “yidam” and found that its meaning is actually very profound and highly related to the significance of the rituals. I will open another blog to talk about it)

As we all know, bone ornaments “are worn as part of the elaborate ritual costumes used in Tibetan sacred dances. These dances are performed during major sacred festivals” So what dances? Here comes my long awaited answer:

“These dances are classified into the highly symbolic and slow dance movements (gar) of the yidams and dakinis, and the more forceful and dynamic masked dances (cham) of the wrathful deities.”

Gar and cham. These two are the dances that I should check out later.

And only until now do I know for peaceful deities or bodhisattvas, they wear jewel ornaments, in which the six perfections are represented as well. So obviously, the six perfections are of huge importance.

I think my next blog should be a glossary of Tibetan terms.

[buddhajourney]

The Paramitas (perfections) are a guide for the Mahayana Buddhist. They are virtues to be cultivated to strengthen our practice and bring us to enlightenment.

The Six Paramitas (Perfections) of Buddhism.

[wisdomcompassion-blog]

The Six Paramitas (Perfections)

The Sanskrit word paramita means to cross over to the other shore. Paramita may also be translated as perfection, perfect realization, or reaching beyond limitation. Through the practice of these six paramitas, we cross over the sea of suffering (samsara) to the shore of happiness and awakening (Nirvana); we cross over from ignorance and delusion to enlightenment. Each of the six paramitas is an enlightened quality of the heart, a glorious virtue or attribute—the innate seed of perfect realization within us. The paramitas are the very essence of our true nature. However, since these enlightened qualities of the heart have become obscured by delusion, selfishness, and other karmic tendencies, we must develop these potential qualities and bring them into expression. In this way, the six paramitas are an inner cultivation, a daily practice for wise, compassionate, loving, and enlightened living. The paramitas are the six kinds of virtuous practice required for skillfully serving the welfare of others and for the attainment of enlightenment. We must understand that bringing these virtuous qualities of our true nature into expression requires discipline, practice, and sincere cultivation. This is the path of the Bodhisattva—one who is dedicated to serving the highest welfare of all living beings with the awakened heart of unconditional love, skillful wisdom, and all-embracing compassion.

[buddhajourney]

The Six Paramitas (Perfections)

The Six Paramitas (Perfections)

1. Generosity: Giving: of property, of Dharma, of refuge, of active love.

2. Moral Ethics (Morality): 1) Protection of our body, speech, and mind from performing unskilful deeds., 2) protect others in the same way we protect ourselves, 3) when we perform any skillful deed, this protects us from performing any unskillful ones.

3. Patience: When we are harmed by others when we are suffering, of keeping concentration.

4. Perseverance (Energy): Energy of the mind that stops the desire for unprofitable things, energy that protects us from tiredness, confidence that we are not too small, weak, or stupid to obtain the Dharma practice.

5. Meditation Concentration

6. Discriminating Wisdom

[taostillness-blog]

Bodhisattva

A bodhisattva practices 6 perfections (paramitas); giving (generosity), morality, patience, energy (diligence), meditation, & wisdom

The Sanskrit word paramita means to cross over to the other shore. Paramita may also be translated as perfection, perfect realization, or reaching beyond limitation. Through the practice of these six paramitas, we cross over the sea of suffering (samsara) to the shore of happiness and awakening (Nirvana); we cross over from ignorance and delusion to enlightenment. Each of the six paramitas is an enlightened quality of the heart, a glorious virtue or attribute—the innate seed of perfect realization within us. The paramitas are the very essence of our true nature. However, since these enlightened qualities of the heart have become obscured by delusion, selfishness, and other karmic tendencies, we must develop these potential qualities and bring them into expression. In this way, the six paramitas are an inner cultivation, a daily practice for wise, compassionate, loving, and enlightened living. The paramitas are the six kinds of virtuous practice required for skillfully serving the welfare of others and for the attainment of enlightenment. We must understand that bringing these virtuous qualities of our true nature into expression requires discipline, practice, and sincere cultivation. This is the path of the Bodhisattva—one who is dedicated to serving the highest welfare of all living beings with the awakened heart of unconditional love, skillful wisdom, and all-embracing compassion.

[buddhistboer]

We treat ourselves badly when we make commitments to ourselves that we don’t honor. We’re sending the message to ourselves that we don’t actually value what we’re working on and it doesn’t really matter that much anyway. So, why not be flakey. We’re sending the message to ourselves that we’re not worth the follow through. This is a real problem.

A word about diligence, from http://www.gypsyink.com/2012/10/worth-fighting-for/

[om13om]

The Six Paramitas (Perfections)

Generosity (Skt. dāna; Tib. སྦྱིན་པ་, jinpa): to cultivate the attitude of generosity

Discipline (Skt. śīla; Tib. ཚུལ་ཁྲིམས་, tsultrim): refraining from harm.

Patience (Skt. kṣānti; Tib. བཟོད་པ་, zöpa): the ability not to be perturbed by anything.

Energy (Skt. vīrya; Tib. བརྩོན་འགྲུས་, tsöndrü): to find joy in what is virtuous, positive or wholesome.

Meditative Concentration (Skt. dhyāna; Tib. བསམ་གཏན་, samten): not to be distracted.

Wisdom (Skt. prajñā; Tib. ཤེས་རབ་, sherab): the perfect discrimination of phenomena, all knowable things.