Dudjom Rinpoche's Re-presentation of Pema Lingpa's Ultra Secret Razor Lifeforce Vajrakīlaya (yang gsang srog gi spu gri)
Dudjom Rinpoche's Vajrakīlaya Works - A Study in Authoring, Compiling, and Editing Texts in the Tibetan Revelatory Tradition - Cathy Cantwell
Cathy Cantwell [+ ]
University of Oxford and University of Kent
Cathy Cantwell is an Associate Faculty Member at the Oriental Institute, University of Oxford, and an Honorary Research Fellow at the School of Anthropology and Conservation, University of Kent. She has specialized in Tibetan and Himalayan tantric rituals of all periods from the tenth century CE, including text critical and historical analysis, as well as ethnographic study of contemporary rituals. She was President of the UK Association for Buddhist Studies, 2015–2021.
Description
Dudjom Rinpoche compiled a number of ritual practice texts for the Vajrakīlaya revelation cycle of Bhutan’s national saint, Pema Lingpa (padma gling pa, 1450–1521), also writing commentarial instructions on them. Here, two of his compilations are examined in detail. In assessing Dudjom Rinpoche's two texts, various aspects of the productive process are highlighted, such as: the 'blessings' of a current generation high status lama connected with the tradition; the needs of the ritual community for familiar textual structures and liturgies; beautiful metrical verses for chanting; the integration of materials from the broader tantric heritage, but also the preservation of some highly individual elements of the revelation.