Every religion or spiritual tradition that has as its basis a force that is entirely good, has a problem when it comes to explaining the origins of what is bad in the world and in our natures. If the base is all good, how come bad has come out of it? This conundrum is shared by one of the schools of Tibetan Buddhism where the primordial buddha, the basis or ground of all, is actually called the, ‘All Good’, Samantabhadra. Portrayed as a naked blue buddha figure, often with his white consort Samantabhadri, they sit in meditative union within a circle of rainbow lights and together represent the ground of being and how out of it appearances - the entire universe - endlessly emerge.
One way out of this conundrum is to not think about it as a creation story, something like the big bang that happens at the beginning of time, but rather as something that is occurring right now in each and every moment. Approached like this Samantabhadra may be understood as the potentiality for awareness that is ever present and how within this awareness is the possibility for every conceivable thing to arise. Here the Buddhist tradition uses the metaphor of a mirror. It makes no difference what is reflected in the mirror, however beautiful or ugly, kind or cruel, the mirror itself remains unchanged. Similarly, Samantabhadra, the ground of being, the source of all, our buddha-nature, awareness itself, remains primordially pure despite whatever thoughts or emotions arises and dissolve within it. Samantabhadra remains all good. This being so, it then looks like its all about choice. If my buddha-nature is always present as intrinsic awareness, then there is a possibility to either recognise it or not. This in practice amounts to either being caught up in all the stuff that goes on in my mind or resting in the spacious awareness that may be found immediately behind or beyond it. A tiny movement of attention that nonetheless leads to two distinctly different ways of being. In a text called, An Aspiration Prayer to Samantabhadra, the very first lines pick this possibility up.
All phenomena, samsara and nirvana
Have one ground, two paths and two fruitions
Everything emerges from the ground of being and we in each instant are confronted by the choice to engage with our experience in such a way that leads to all kinds of suffering, the path of samsara, or to the comfort and ease of liberation, the path of nirvana. It’s our choice and fortunately a choice we get to make over and over again. Every moment offering the possibility to recognise and rest within our Samantabhadra nature.
With gratitude to Mindrolling Khandro Rinpoche, 9.7.23
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