Customer Reviews

Brilliant Illumination of the Lamp of the Five Stages: Practical Instructions in the King of Trantras, The Glorious Esoteric Community (Treasury of the Buddhist Sciences)

5 star:		(3)
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3 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(0)

 

 

This text by Lama Tsongkhapa is a hugely important commentary for anyone seriously interested in studying Highest Yoga Tantra as taught in the Indo-Tibetan Buddhist tradition. I think that for those only curious or peripherally interested in Buddhism, this book will be somewhat inaccessible. However, if you're deeply interested in Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism, then this book will be like a wish-granting jewel--much more precious than diamonds or gold. Recently in California, His Holiness the Dalai Lama pointed out that if one wants to deeply contemplate and understand the meaning of the three Kayas (or Bodies) of a Buddha, then one should study the these Five Stages of Guhyasamaja coming in the tradition of Arya Nagarjuna. This is the first book in English to provide a complete, comprehensive, clear translation of a great commentary in this tradition. This is a tradition that comes down from Nagarjuna through Marpa the Translator (the teacher of Milarepa). In my opinion, Dr. Thurman has done a great service for Westerners sincerely interested in studying and/or practicing Highest Yoga Tantra!

Once again,the Treasury of Buddhist Sciences has given us another treasure! The first one I read was David Gray's translation,with copious annotations,of the wonderful Cakrasamvara Tantra.For ages,these works have been virtually inaccessible to Westerners. This book,along with Aryadeva's Lamp,another in the Treasury series,is a detailed look into the praxis of tantra.None of these three works,however,is easy for beginners,but don't let that deter you from an incredible read.

It seems that those less impressed with this translation are dissatisfied with Thurman's translation choices, which do indeed require work. However, there is a glossary provided, and obviously translation choices are dictated by many factors, in particular the attempt to render the sense of a word beyond its literal meaning. The Tibetans struggled with how to take polysemic Sanskrit terms and give them a single term, and it can't be done perfectly. So those who are going to tackle a work such as this, which is no beginner's manual, have to be willing to work at the meaning, and that can make one a fan or detractor of Thurman. I'm relatively certain that he is not 'on anything' except a determined attempt to make accessible such important materials to the English-speaking community of practitioners. This is a labor of love.

In any case, this work is a monumental achievement in the translation of Tibetan Buddhism to English, and it is an excellent companion to Christian Wedemeyer's translation of Aryadeva's Esoteric Community treatise. In terms of content, what can one say except that Tsongkhapa is finally getting his due as a writer of topics of tantra? We know from Mullin's translation of Tsongkahapa's Six Yogas of Naropa that he is lucid on the most esoteric topics, and from the three volumes of the Great Stages of Mantra published thus far that he is encyclopedic, to understate the fact. So it is no surprise that the material is all this and more. It is indispensible for serious students of Vajrayana, and it is worth reading and re-reading. Beginner's should be ready for difficult material, and even those of us who try to study these topics a bit more seriously will have hard work ahead of us.

Obviously it's a wonderful and important text. Thurman is characteristically exuberant; he talks about spiritual genes, dakinis and? angels, The Time Machine Tantra (i.e. the Kalachakra), etc. Reading the introduction, especially, is like taking drugs and gets exhausting. Thankfully the main body of the text is more subdued.

Okay. The major problems: 1) numerous problems with the typesetting of accented letters 2) numerous spelling errors (especially concentrated in the footnotes) and minor problems such as punctuation errors 3) poor quality paper

Pity because surely this text deserves six stars out of five.