The Blue Rite

The Blue Rite is also called The rite of subduing or overcoming. Sometimes it is known as the Black Rite or the Rite of Destruction, but that is in another context from the one that I am considering. This is the magical rite performed by Akṣobhya the blue Buddha of the eastern quarter, and which is related to the story of the defeat of Mara. What is being subdued are the poisons, in this context the demons, of greed, hatred and doubt as they occur within us. When we experience very strong hatred or greed then that does have a demonic feel to it. Under their influence we lose the ability to choose our actions, we may well behave in ways that we are later ashamed of.

I want to be very clear here that I do not advocate applying this, or any other, rite to other people! Unless we have a very clear understanding of, and love for, the other person; a high level of trust; and a lot of skill and experience it is not advisable to start practising any of the rites on others. In any case our own inner demons, our own greed, hatred, and doubt, give us plenty of material to work with.

One can immediately say that there might be a general approach to subduing all demons, based on the response of the Buddha to Mara, which is simply not to respond to them. If we do not respond to greed it has no power over us; if we do not act on hatred it cannot hurt us; if we are confident in our practice then doubt has no purchase on our minds. So this is the first level of defence against demons - not reacting. The story of the defeat of Mara shows how powerful not reacting can be.

Padmasambhava was a great subduer of demons. He would fight them with magic, often neutralising their magic with his own, but then he would always give them an initiation, a secret name, and a treasure to guard. In other words these demonic, or perhaps more accurately chthonic forces within us, which can threaten to overwhelm us and defeat us, are energies that can be harnessed and put to good use in other ways. The same demon that causes us to hate, can function as a protector. In a psychological sense our demons are often just adaptations to extreme situations. For instance if we grow up with a lot of violence, then we will adapt to protect ourselves from that violence, and may even become violent ourselves. The energy that protects me from violence, may have violence at it’s root. This is not a justification for violent behaviour however. It is important not to lose sight of the transformation which demons undergo at the hands of Padmasambhava - when subdued and named they become Dharma protectors, and guarders of our treasures.

Padmasambhava had a very potent weapon in his battles against the demons. He had what in Tibetan is known as a purbha – a demon dagger. The demon dagger is used to pin down demons. It has a blade or point which emerges from the mouth of a mythical beast which is a mix of a crocodile and a fish: called a makara. Above the makara is usually the head of a Buddha which has multiple faces. And finally either the head of a horse, or a the end of a vajra. The Buddha head reminds us of the purpose of the purbha – it is not a weapon designed to hurt people, but to help release us from the grip of a demonic energy. With the purbha you pin down the demon so that you can have a conversation with it. Padmasambhava took this opportunity to give the demons a secret name and a treasure to guard. This is a useful procedure with demons, and contrasts sharply with the image of the Archangel Michael, or later St George, killing the dragon - I'll come back to this in the next paragraph. So one thing we might do when we wish to work with the Blue Rite is to make ourselves a demon dagger. We can build in symbols of power and strength which resonate for us. This may help us to get into communication with our demons, to see that they really want to protect us, and to help us find better ways of going about it.

Another way of thinking about this came to me the other day. I was reminded of the scene early in the story of Peter Pan. His shadow had come loose and is causing trouble. He meets Wendy who helps him to catch his shadow and she sews it back on for him. Jung talked about those aspects of our psyche which we do not accept as being our 'shadow'. The qualities which are not accepted need not be bad. For many years I was unwilling to take on the artistic side of my self and would not give it attention. If we take this kind of view of things then we treat the expressions of greed, hatred and doubt as coming from the psychic shadow. In the Jungian view they are unacknowledged bits of ourselves which have taken on a kind of autonomy. A demon dagger helps us to pin them down, so that we can reclaim them, sew them back on. If the demon is really just an unassimilated part of our own psyche, then we don’t want to kill it, we want, like Padmasambhava, to convert this rebellious energy into some more useful form.

The main idea, then, is that the Blue Rite, is the rite of overcoming and subduing hindrances to spiritual progress; the conversion of demonic forces into Dharma protectors. It is a way of working with inner demons which block our Awakening.

Early Mandalas

One of the most distinctive features of esoteric Buddhism is the Mandala. Buddhism generally speaks of the person as consisting of body, speech and mind. The Buddha also has three aspects, although these are esoteric rather than mundane. The three aspect of the Buddha are known as the triguhya or three mysteries. These three mysteries correspond to the three aspects of the person. The mysteries of body, speech and mind in the ordinary person correspond to mudra, mantra, and mandala for the Buddha. So mandala represents the mind mystery of the Buddha.

There are many different mandalas, varying across time and text. Each however shares certain features. Mandala literally means circle, and Buddhist mandalas are typically in the form of a circle, or contain as a main feature an encircled area. At the centre of the mandala is the figure of a Buddha - who may be represented as a person, a symbol or a syllable. Surrounding the Buddha will be a number of other figures. If the Buddha in the centre of the mandala represents the cosmic principle of Awakening, then the other figures represent some aspect of Awakening.

Amongst scholars there is some debate about when esoteric Buddhism began. Some like Ronald Davidson argue that tantra proper is a feature of the 7th century. Others point to antecedents from earlier periods of both Buddhism and other religious traditions. For example the Golden Light Sutra is thought to belong to the 3rd or 4th century (it was first translated into Chinese in 414) and it contains what appears to be a mandala of four Buddhas. In the better known version of the sutra, that translated by Emmerick, the mandala appears in a Mahayana context without the usual esoteric features. There is another version of the Sutra, noted by Huntington [1], which makes it clear that the mandala is intended to feature in a meditation practice. This makes it seem more closely related to esoteric Buddhism, and adds weight to the "early tantra" theory. This kind visualisation is much older than we may think. There is, for example, a similar kind of practice in the Rig Vidhāna, a Brahminical text from fourth century BCE. [2]

We usually think of the five fold mandala - with a central Buddha surrounded by four other Buddhas - as being distinctively Buddhist. Early mandalas used a three fold symmetry. The five fold mandala emerges only in the 7th or 8th century in texts which the Tibetans call Yoga tantras. However I have discovered another five fold mandala in an unexpected place. Brhadaranyaka Upanisad III.9 describes the gods and their supports as occupying the centre and the four compass points: Agni occupies the centre, with Soma, Aditya, Yama, and Varuna occupying the north, east, south and west respectively. The list appears in a longish discussion between Yajnavalkya and Vidagdha Shakalya about how many gods there are. The Brhadaranyaka Upanisad is considered to be pre-Buddhist partly because the Buddha of the Pali Canon quotes from it, and satirises it in several places, e.g. the Tevijja Sutta, DN 13.

I think we have here a clear precedent for the type of mandala which becomes important in Buddhism many centuries later. This should come as no great surprise as we know, and I have tried to highlight this in my blog, that Indian religious traditions are quite free in adopting and adapting the practices and ideas of their 'competitors'.

What does this tell us about the origins of esoteric Buddhism? I think the best way to view esoteric Buddhism is that it was a grand synthesis of many religious traditions, with Mahayana Buddhism providing a framework, that occurred in the mid 6th century as a response to the socio-political and religious needs of the times. The fact that we find precedents may not be significant in determining the time of birth for esoteric Buddhism for this reason. To speak for instance of an Upanisadic mandala, or a Mahayana dharani as proto-tantric seems to create the wrong impression of the process. Sawn timber is not a proto-table for instance. Professor Ryuchi Abe makes a similar point in his discussion of the introduction of esoteric Buddhism to Japan. [3] Yes, many elements later incorporated into esoteric Buddhism existed before Kukai arrives back from China in 806. However Abe argues that there was no conception of "esoteric" Buddhism, no esoteric context in which those elements could exist. Buddhism in Japan up to 806 had been Mahayana Buddhism despite the widespread and frequent use of dharanis in ritual, and even translations of esoteric texts. Without the esoteric teachings such artefacts could only be interpreted through the lens of Mahayana Buddhism. This is further born out in several of Kukai's earlier works in which his main aim to establish the esoteric teachings as valid - Benkenmitsu nikyō ron, The difference Between Exoteric and Esoteric Buddhism, being one of the more important texts.

So Mandalas are quintessentially Buddhist, but have a history which pre-dates their use in esoteric Buddhism. Context is important in understanding any aspect of Buddhism.


Notes:

1. Huntington, John C. 1987. Note on a Chinese text demonstrating the earliness of tantra. JIABS 10 (2) p.88-98.
2. Patton, Laurie. 2005. Bringing the gods to mind : mantra and ritual in early Indian sacrifice. Berkeley, University of California Press. p.30
3. Abe, Ryuchi. 1999. The weaving of mantra : Kukai and the construction of esoteric Buddhist discourse. New York : Columbia University Press

image: Kyoto Journal