The Three Levels of Spiritual Perception: A Commentary on the Three Visions

by Deshung Rinpoche, Jared Rhoton (Translator), Victoria R.M. Scott (Editor)

Overview

The Three Levels of Spiritual Perception is a revised edition of the classic guide to the Lamdre, a key system of meditation of the Sakya tradition of Tibetan Buddhism.

Written by one of the first Tibetan masters to live and teach in the United States, it is rendered in a lyrical style that entertains, inspires, and motivates the reader. A key work for all those who are eager to develop and deepen their meditation practice.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780861713684
Publisher:	Wisdom Publications MA
Publication date:	06/15/2003
Edition description:	Subsequent
Pages:	576
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 1.50(d)

About the Author

The Venerable Deshung Rinpoche (1906-87) was born in Tibet and came to the United States in 1960. As well as being a luminary of the Sakya tradition, Deshung Rinpoche was a nonsectarian master teaching all four traditions of Tibetan Buddhism. He tirelessly practiced the Buddha's teachings and was revered not only by his many Tibetan and Western students but by many great Tibetan teachers as well.

Jarden Rhoton (Sonam Tenzin) devoted his adult life to the welfare of the Sakya school of Tibetan Buddhism and its teachers, texts, and students. He was noted for his humility and his great ability as an interpreter and translator. Jared passed away in 1993 at the age of fifty-two.

Table of Contents

	List of Photographs	xv
	Foreword	xvii
	Acknowledgments	xix
	Technical Note	xxii
	Note to the Reader	xxiii
	Introduction: The Tradition, the Teachings, and the Teacher	xxvii
1	A Priceless Jewel in a Garbage Heap	3
2	Reveling in the Wine of Bliss	11
3	First Things First and Last Things Last	25
4	Climbing a Steep Ladder without Hands	31
5	The Umbrella of Refuge	45
6	Holding Fast until Enlightenment Is Won	53
7	Suppose You Own a Fine Horse	61
8	The Needle Point of Worldly Existence	69
9	Sheer Pain	75
10	The Forest of Swords	83
11	Ignoble Stinginess	93
12	From Celestial Mansions to Murky Depths	101
13	No Rest from the Dance	109
14	A Fish Cast Up on Hot, Dry Sand	119
15	Careless Craving	127
16	Ceaseless Roaming	135
17	Imagine a Blind Tortoise	143
18	A Lump of Charcoal and a White Conch	151
19	Just Somebody Dressed in Red	159
20	The Great Fisher, Death	169
21	Discarded in Some Dark Hole	175
22	A Protector, an Island, a Great, Friendly Host	185
23	Deeds, Like a Shadow, Will Follow	197
24	A Great Vessel Filled by Drops of Water	211
25	Black Pebbles and White Pebbles	223
26	As Helpless as a Worm	233
27	Giving Our Parents a Piggyback Ride	247
28	A Mind Like an Overturned Pot	257
29	The Flavor of Compassion	261
30	Rudderless on the Sea of Life	269
31	A Coiled Rope in the Gloom of Night	277
32	"Beloved Daughter" Kicks His Mother	285
33	The Hand Must Help the Foot	293
34	A Cloud of White Light or a Sudden Dawn	303
35	Turning the Wheel of the Rat Race	313
36	Doing What Bodhisattvas Do	321
37	A Protector of the Protectorless	327
38	Seeing Things Exactly as They Are	337
39	Insight Yoked with Calm	345
40	Pouring Water into a Vase with a Hole in It	351
41	A Four-Petaled Blue Flower	359
42	The Monkeys Were Perplexed	367
43	The Flame of a Lamp in a Windless Place	375
44	A Storm of Thought Processes	379
45	Ten Million Blind Men	389
46	Rebirth as a Woodchuck	397
47	Samsara Falls Apart Like a Tattered Rag	407
48	If You Think of Yourself as a Tiger	417
49	It Is "Natural" Not to Be Natural	423
50	Paying the Tax of Compulsiveness	429
51	Awakening Certitude	435
52	Tasting Sugarcane for the First Time	441
53	A Chamberpot, an Offering Bowl, a Buddha	453
54	The Dreaming Mind Deludes Itself	465
55	Tuning the Violin of Meditation	475
56	The Sharpness of a Thorn, the Roundness of a Pea	483
	Outline of the Text	493
	Notes	497
	Bibliography	511
	Tibetan Names and Terms	523
	Index	529