The Extremely Secret Dakini of Naropa: Vajrayogini Practice and Commentary

by Pabongkha Rinpoche, David Gonsalez (Translator)

The Extremely Secret Dakini of Naropa is the commentary to the practice of Vajrayogini in the Naro Kacho lineage composed by Kyabjo Pabongka as revealed to him directly by Vajrayogini herself. This text has become the basis for almost every subsequent Vajrayogini commentary in the Gehig tradition. Kyabjo Pabongkha's commentary is both very thorough in its presentation and deeply inspiring. It provides rich detail about all eleven yogas of the generation stage, the transference of consciousness, tsok offering, left-sided conduct and many other auxiliary practices, making it essential for practitioners of Vajrayogini. There is also a stunning explanation of the completion stage, providing many extraordinarily profound methods unique to the practice of Vajrayogini because of its relationship to the Six Yogas of Naropa. The second half of the book contains several sadhanas for the practice of Vajrayogini, including the extensive middling, and concise generation stage, the practice of Vajrayogini combined with six-session guru yoga, as well as two sadhanas on the transference of consciousness.

Genres: Buddhism

486 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2011

About the author

Déchen Nyingpo (Tibetan: བདེ་ཆེན་སྙིང་པོ, Wylie: bde chen snying po), the second Pabongkha Rinpoche (Tib.: ཕ་བོང་ཁ་རིན་པོ་ཆེ་, Wyl.: pha bong kha rin po che), most frequently referred to posthumously as Pabongkhapa, was an influential lama and Geshe (equivalent to Doctor of Theology) of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism. He was the principle teacher of the 3rd Trijang Rinpoche, Geshe Lharampa Lobsang Yeshe Tenzin Gyatso (1901–1981), who was in turn the junior tutor and "root guru" of the 14th Dalai Lama.

He became a controversial figure both because of his staunch pro-Gelug sectarianism, and within the Gelug for his innovations to the tradition established by the reformer Tsongkhapa at the founding of the order, making Vajrayogini rather than Cakrasamvara the central focus of practice and introducing and emphasizing the replacement of the "the traditional supra-mundane protectors of the Ge-luk tradition" with the propitiation of an arguably worldly (and also fiercely sectarian) spirit, which he received from his teacher Takpu Pema Vajra.