The Real Meaning Of Mahamudra (大手印的意义)

For tantric practitioners, the word ‘mahamudra’ is a meditative practice belongs to the 4^th empowerment. If we were to translate ‘mahamudra’ to general term; then it would be the ‘great seal’.

In early 80’s, there were people in Taiwan and China who made some hand gestures and claimed that those hand gestures were ‘mahamudra’. Of course this sounds to be a joke these days. Perhaps a slap on their faces would be more appropriate to call the ‘great seal’.

Actually, the word ‘mahamudra’ refers to the meditative practice that simulates the process of dying according to ‘Tibetan Book Of The Dead’. After the dissolution of 5 elements, the life energy/wind moves into the central channel (中脉). At this point, the white bodhicitta (白菩提) representing the father element falls down from the crown chakra into the heart chakra and everything turns into white. After that the red bodhicitta (红菩提) representing the mother element rises from the base chakra into the heart chakra; everything transforms into red. Both of the red and white bodhicittas meet at the centre of the heart chakra and this is known as the ‘first primary luminosity’ (第一光明).

Holding into this first primary luminosity is the ultimate aim of every mahamudra practitioner as beyond this point, the environment would become dark as if during dusk. And when the environment turns into pitch dark, the decease’s consciousness will become dull and it falls into 3~4 days of deep sleep. Beyond this point, there is nothing a practitioner can do but to depend on others to perform other deliverance rituals to save him/her.

If one misses the union of red and white. The white bodhicitta would move downwards and exit the decease’s body through reproduction organ as yellowish liquid. Likewise, the red bodhicitta exits through one’s nose, mouth ears or eyes as yellowish liquid.

At this point if a practitioner is observant, then he/she can recollect the deceased’s bodhicittas into his/her own heart chakra and perform the  ‘slow phowa’ (慢颇瓦) method; that too will save the deceased’s soul from the torment of going through the intermediate state (中有).

The duration of ‘first luminosity’ varies depending on each individual. It is somewhere between a flash of lightning for a person with bad karma to 7 days for a mahamudra practitioner. Generally speaking, for average person; the duration is about 10 minutes or enough for a person to eat a bowl of rice.

Let’s return to the discussion of mahamudra: Basically mahamudra practitioners try to force their life force energy into their central channels using vase breathing techniques. This will produce the near death experience and through repetitive exercises; the practitioner will master of the best timing when his own pure light unite with the pure light of the universe. It is through this union of lights that a practitioner achievers ‘liberation’ from reincarnation.

No Place To Go (情归何处？)

Planning for funeral service for some rich and famous guy is no easy task especially if the deceased’s family members are of various religious believes. There is a joke within funeral service community concerning funeral of a rich person happened some time ago in Ipoh:

Uncle Lee suffered from stroke and kicked the bucket a few months later. His 3 sons gathered to plan for their late dad’s funeral service. His elder son who is a follower of Taoism started to say:

“Since I am the eldest, I will make the call… I want dad’s funeral service in Taoist style!”

The second son who is an ardent Buddhist followed:

“I want dad to go to the Pure Land free from cycles of birth and rebirth!”

The third son who is a Christian then said:

“I want dad to go to heaven; so he should have a Christian funeral service!”

The three brothers argued for one night and finally a consensus was made: first a Taoist ritual, then a Buddhist and finally a Christian funeral service. All of them thought that decision was an amicable solution and their dad can have the best of the three worlds.

So, on the first night Taoists were summoned to perform the ritual and they sang:

“Uncle Lee! Please proceed to the eastern heaven to enjoy your status of immortal!”

They sang for the whole night and finally the lead Taoist said to the eldest son:

“That will be $3,800. Thank you.”

On the second night, a group of Buddhist monks were summoned and they sang:

“Uncle Lee! Please proceed to the western Pure Land to enjoy your benefits!”

The monks sang for the whole night and the lead monk said to the second son:

“That will be $3,800. Thank you.”

Finally on the third night, a group of clerical staffs were invited to sing hymn and they said:

“Uncle Lee! Please rest in peace until the day of judgment.”

After some hymns and praises, the lead person said to the third son:

“Please donate $1,000 to the church’s fund. Thank you.”

On the fourth day, as when Uncle Lee’s coffin was to be sent to the crematory, suddenly good old Mrs. Lee suddenly possessed by Uncle Sam. Before everyone could open his/her mouth to ask. Mrs. Lee started to scold:

“Wah lau eh! You guys want to kill my old bones ah? First you ask me to go to the Eastern Heaven. Then you ask me to go to the Western Pure Land… before I can touch my buttock on the lotus seat… you ask me to return to my coffin and RIP!?”

  

The Dissolution Of 5 Elements (五大分解)

The dissolution of five elements in tantric terms means our human dying process. How a person dies is described in the famous ‘Tibetan Book Of The Dead’ (西藏度亡经) or its variants. However, the description in the book did not mention that our human dying process begin at a much earlier stage. This would be a great surprise to many of people out there who treated this book as a guide for the dying only.

Tantric practitioners discovered that our human body has 72,000 channels (nadi) when we are born and we stand to lose one channel every day and when all of the channels are exhausted; the person will die. That is in a very ideal condition of course. For a normal person, he/she may exhaust two or more channels if the person does not watch his health.

In order to defer one’s dying process, a person must involve in the practice of vase breathing (宝瓶气). The theory is that if we can reduce the frequency of breathing then we can prolong our lifespan. Of course, no one can escape from dying in any way.

Likewise, the dissolution of 5 elements occurs in conjunction with the exhaustion of our energy channels. The sequence of elements resolution is as follows:

When the earth element dissolves into water, a person feels he/she becomes lethargic and weak.

When the water element dissolves into fire, the person feels thirsty and dry(1).

When the fire dissolves into wind, he/she feels cold.

When the wind dissolves into space, he/she feels breathless.

When the space dissolves into consciousness, the person is losing consciousness.

Almost everyone understands the above cycle of elemental dissolution. But what is not mentioned is that this dissolution cycle begins when one energy channel started to die; further this cycle of elemental dissolution increase in intensity when one ages.

For example, when a senior citizen feels his/her legs become too weak to walk, then this is the sign of the dissolution of earth element. Old folks tend to pee a lot and get thirsty frequently; this is the sure sign of dissolution of water element. The senior needs to put on more clothing to keep warm hence the dissolution of fire element. A senior citizen would feel breathless; again this is the sure sign of dissolution of wind element. Finally an aged person would complaint about his consciousness getting blur; this is again the sign of dissolution of space.

The above cycle keep repeating itself until all energy channels are exhausted. At this point, we say that the person is experience the actual dying process. So for a normal person, the dying/aging process is repetitive. Hence, you are warned of the approaching death. There is no reason to argue that a person dies too suddenly.

Of course, the exception is on those who die of untimely death. The question of if a person would meet his/her premature death can be predicted in astrology; or through the checking of energy flow through heart, throat, crown and naval chakras. If certain part is blocked in the blue east channel of heart chakra; then the person would die of head related injuries caused by earth elements, during year of wood for example.

Now you have no reason to say that you are oblivious of your approaching death! 

Note:

(1) When a person is experiencing actual dying process, he/she would complaint about thirsty. Now, it is very important just to use a wet towel to wet his/her lips only. If this dying person is given some water to drink, then you will KILL him/her immediately! You can drown the dying with only a very small quantity of water. I have seen this happened in many cases, so be warned!

Problems With Spirits (鬼魂的问题)

Spirits are pitiful beings yet they are best to be left alone. Once they have entangled with someone, then they would cause a lot of problems: emotionally and health wise. Even the spirits of our deceased love ones can cause problems to the livings too. Perhaps some modern theory claiming that spirits feed on energy is true. When spirits attached themselves to a person they will literary ‘suck’ the person dry by any means they can think of. Amongst other methods, there is no other way to cause a person to discharge a large quantity of energy in one time than having ‘sex’.

If you are not too afraid of ghosts, then when you really see one and you do not scramble as with others; you will notice that a ghost cannot hold its form for very long time. If you look further, you would notice that the ghost gradually becomes a blob of mist. And if you persist, then the mist would disperse and the ghost would be gone. I found this phenomenon when I was engaging in my Yamantaka meditation practice in a graveyard.

However, if you supply the ghost with energy such as shouting at it or having intimate act; then this ghost would make its presence known by moving or throwing things about. Anuttara Tantra practices require a practitioner to visualize himself/herself as the Yidam and the ghost/spirit as the sex consort. Using psychic heat and illusionary yoga practices, the practitioner can unite the ghost’s energy with his/her own in forming the perfect illusion body (完整幻化身).

Returning to our previous story, we thought our ordeal with the ‘woman in red’ was over after we spent a night in James’s house. However, we were very wrong. A week later I dreamt of a lady in red introduced herself as Elaine and she said that was abandoned by her previous master and she would make me a very happy man every night. After that without asking for consent Elaine started to have intimacy act until I woke up with wet pants. Of course, that was only a wet dream.

After a few nights of similar wet dreams, I started to feel something was wrong. So I called up Henry and his condition was no better than mine; he has developed deep and dark eye sockets and both of us looked as if living pandas.

Perhaps Henry’s condition is worse than mine as he claimed to have seen Elaine lying flat face down on top of his car protruding her extremely pale face on the car windshield while he was kissing with his girlfriend in the car. Worse of all, when Henry was sleeping with his girl, they felt as if an ice bar was sleeping in between them. When they switched on the light, they found nothing.

A series of strange things had not only made the relationships of Henry and his girlfriend to be stiff; they also couldn’t have good night sleep. Henry’s girl even dreamed of Elaine shouting at her mentioning that Henry belonged to her.

Finally Henry and I decided to visit our Mao Shan master. Our master scolded us a few rounds and he said that he would do whatever he could to help us. Because Elaine was a vengeful spirit and that it was quite powerful, there was no guarantee that our master could defeat Elaine.

Basically our master used a few more powerful ghosts to overpower Elaine. According to our master, he could only prevent Elaine from disturbing Henry and I for a short time and the rest would be up to our own.

Soon after consulting with my Mao Shan master, perhaps the luck was on my side and I accompanied a friend to attend an empowerment ceremony of Yamantaka. After the empowerment, I had a dream that a policeman dragged a woman in red away from me. Since then, I have not dreamed of Elaine or having any wet dreams.

With me engaging in Yamantaka practice, I have temporarily left Mao Shan magic alone until today. Although I did try conjuration rituals of Hikmah and other systems, Elaine had never appeared even once.

Last time I heard that Henry had married Elaine just to pacify the spirit. But I would need to ask for his permission to tell his side of the story. As for mine, my relationship with Elaine ended with Yamantaka. 

Woman In Red (红衣女郎)

Perhaps you would agree with me that the best time in one’s life is when a person earns his/her first pay; perhaps in his/her early 20’s. This is the period when one can really happy go lucky with parents around. I am of no exception. But in my early 20’s, I was engrossed with lower Mao Shan type of Taoist magic together with a few friends. In case you are not familiar, lower Mao Shan type of magic deals mainly with ghosts. So performing ghost hunting became our favorite pass times.

For those who live around Taiping, you would be familiar with the Burmese Pool situated at the foothill of Maxwell Hill. The entrance to Burmese Pool is from a T-junction opposite to the Taiping War Cemetery. There is a camp where school uniform units used to camp during school holidays.

The said Burmese Pool is believed to be haunted so it is best not to visit the area after sunsets. My friend, James who was a scout said that he has seen a figure believed to be a woman in red sat on a boulder near a bridge during one evening walk along the pool. When James tried to approach the figure, it suddenly disappeared. On hearing James’s strange story, I begun intrigued and wished to visit the place during sunset.

My pal, Henry was also practising Mao Shan was also interested, so I invited him to join the expedition to hunt for this mysterious woman in red. Another reason that I wanted Henry to join is because he had a car and that ease the transportation of things; further Henry has psychic eyes as he can see spiritual world. It was an asset indeed.

So preparations were made for the big day without first notifying our master for the fear that he would stop our naïve move.

We were at the bridge that runs across the Burmese Pool river at half passed six in the evening. So according to Henry’s intuition, we burnt some incense and talismans to call up the spirit or whatever it might be. Or course, our effort might not be fruitful if the figure James saw was indeed a tourist who happened to be there. Anyway, just for the fun of it; we pressed on with our ritual.

After a round of chanting, Henry and I sat on a boulder facing the river to meditate. The environment at the pool started to darken and around 8pm or so; Henry and I suddenly saw a red orb hovering about 10m away from us. So we tried to communicate with it hopefully to make it materialize itself. After some trying, the orb disappeared behind trees opposite the river. We decided to call it a day as we had another meeting with James to report our success.

Though we didn’t manage to see the woman in red, at least we managed to attract an orb which Henry thought to be the manifestation of the woman in red. So we returned to the car and Henry drove to James’s house to fetch him.

Soon we arrived at James’s place and Henry honked his car as usual. James was seen exited his house but he only managed to walk a few steps and then he stopped as if trying to peep into the car for something. After some effort, James finally shouted:

“Hey! Guys, who is our lady guest tonight?”

Both of us thought James was joking as he likes to joke a lot. So Henry who was a little impatient and he shouted:

“Are you kidding? Hop on…”

When James got closer, he shouted as if he had seen a ghost:

“Waaaalauuuu!”

As soon as he screamed, James retreated into his house and shut the door. Both of us felt very strange, so we stepped out from the car and went to knock at James’s door to ask what had happened.

We only managed to walk a few steps before our intuition told us to look into the car…

“Waaaalauuu!”

Both of us screamed out almost simultaneously. There in the back seat was a figure of a woman whose face was covered with long hair though we were not very sure of the color of her clothing.

What else? We ran frantically and rammed into James’s house there we stayed for the whole night. Luckily the ‘thing’ was nowhere to be seen in the car. And we had to seek our master’s help which is another long story.

  

Family That Keeps Ghost (养鬼人家)

In Japanese Onmyodo (阴阳道) a ghost servant is known as ‘Shikigami’ (式神). There are many types of shikigami and a shikigami powerful shikigami can be inherited in a family. In Omyodo, a shikigami is normally summoned using talismans or some kind of oath bound object that the spirit is bound to. In other traditions a spirit is otherwise known as jinn in Middle East, ‘gui’ (鬼) in Chinese, ‘hantu’ in Malaysia or a ‘pee’ in Thailand.

There are many ways to keep a ghost and almost all cultures having one method or two to deal with ghosts. Ghost keeping is most popular in Malaysia between 60’s to early 80’s. Of course, the ghost keeping I refer to is different from keeping a ‘kumanthong’ or Thai kid spirit. In the eyes of experts, kid spirits can be of little service and they tend to be trouble makers. In the eyes of serious, the most useful type of ghosts are those ghosts of youths died in freak accidents or suicide; best if the person is still single. A married ghost, a sick ghost or an old ghost is of no use as they are too week.

Today, it is very difficult to find anyone actually ‘keeping’ a ghost. Other more common types of ghost keeping is through the Taoist ‘yin 5 legionnaires army’ (阴五营兵) ritual. On the other hand, this type of ghost keeping ritual is the weakest through experience because they are the easiest to be exorcised. Anyone can yell: “Hallelujah!” and these ghostly pets will move out from a premise.

I had one to one encounter with a ‘family ghost’ before my involvement into Taoist magical world many years ago. Once I had to stay with a Chinese family in Singapore for one week due to some errant. The family was normal enough to me but they had this very odd altar situated beside the normal main altar. This altar was just a small table with a tablet inscribed with inscriptions: “Miss Law” (罗小姐位). Behind the tablet was a small coffin wrapped by some yellow talismans. There is a glass of plain water and some flowers in a vase. And an incense burner is placed in front of the said tablet.

Since my temporary landlord didn’t mentioned about this special altar, I dare not ask since I only temporally stayed with the family. All went well until one night when I woke up to pee. As I passed through the living room, I saw the landlord; Jason inclined his head sideway over a bucket of water as if listening to something. At that instance, Jason saw me but he continued to lean over the bucket and then utter something softly. I didn’t want to be a busybody so I went on with my business.

Another incident that I felt odd was that most of the time I went into the lift, as the lift door was about to shut; the lift door would suddenly jammed and then reopened as if someone wished to enter. At first I thought it was the lift malfunction, but after complained to the building management; the problem persisted.

The last night I put up with Jason and the family, I woke up in the middle of the night by a presence. It was the silhouette of a long hair lady standing in front of my bed. It had this Jasmine smell that reminded me of the Jasmine on the special altar. The figure stood there for a few seconds and then vanished into thin air.

The next morning, I told Jason about my strange encounters during my occupancy. Jason explained to me that my strange encounters have something to do with his special family member, Miss Law. Jason kept this spirit to watch over his family and business; and Miss Law was said to be a helpful ones too.

I had not visited Jason for about 20 years now. Perhaps Miss Law was too lonely and she wanted to talk; or perhaps she didn’t like to be ‘locked up’ and rather to be liberated… I could only imagine.

The Restless Disciplinary Master (不眠的训导老师)

Before I forget, here is another school ghost story from an old school watchman:

My late dad was a very dedicated teacher and even he was terminally ill, he still thought of his teaching duty. Of course, my dad was not the only one who was engrossed with his work. One of his colleagues; Mr. Wong who was the disciplinary master of the school my dad worked at; remains restless until today. Perhaps he still roams the classroom tonight…

Mr. Wong worked or should I say that perhaps he is still working in a primary school in upper Perak in another way. He was physically there for around 20 years or so and he was quite a straight teacher and no naughty pupils escaped his canning. So everyone was very scared of Mr. Wong.

Mr. Ong had a history of heart problems and he refused to take the doctor’s advice to take early retirement; instead he work harder and spent most of his time in the school. And one day a teacher went into his office to get his signature only to find Mr. Ong’s lifeless and stiff body lean face down on his desk. Apparently he has already passed away for quite a while unnoticed. It was quite unfortunate because it was during school holiday and only a few teaching staffs were present.

Almost everyone in the school knew about the sad news except the good old watchman who just returned from his long holiday. As I was told that it was just passed 7pm, after good old watchman, Chew locked the main gate and started his usual petrol duty for the evening…

When Chew walked pass the disciplinary office and found that someone was typing in the office. Chew thought it was Mr. Wong working overtime again. So he knocked on the door and there was a voice: “Come in!”

So Chew pushed open the door and there was Mr. Wong sat in his usual place typing as usual. Chew didn’t want to disturb Mr. Wong, so he just casually asked: “Working late?” Mr. Wong didn’t lift his head and his reply was just a ‘yup’.

Chew understands Mr. Wong well as that implied that he didn’t want to be disturbed. So he immediately shut the door again and went on patrolling…

The next evening at about the same time, Chew walked past the office again and he nearly bumped into a stranger. Chew started the conversation:

“Hello there! I haven’t seen you around!”

The stranger replied:

“Oh! Hello! I am the new disciplinary master just started my duty today.”

Perhaps Chew should just stop the conversation there but he asked what he shouldn’t ask: “What happened to Mr. Wong?”

The new disciplinary master looked at Chew with a strange look and he paused for a while before uttering:

“What? You meant you are not aware that Mr. Wong passed away last weekend in his office!?”

Chew almost fainted hearing the news. And I believed him that he said that particular night was the most horrible night watch he has ever carried out!

Since that night, the disciplinary office was said to be haunted by Mr. Wong’s ghost and at time; typing noise could be heard coming out from the office. Other watchmen claimed to see someone switched on the light in that particular office and when approached; the light would be switched off again.

A few months after Mr. Wong passed away. The school held a scout jamboree and many scouts from northern regions attended. Many tents were erected for junior scouts but the senior ones slept in the air-conditioned school library. I thought the seniors would setup good examples by showing the juniors how to survive in wilderness. This is the other way around that they took all comfortable places and let the juniors to suffer in hot tents.

With the seniors out of sight, it is not surprisingly the place was extremely noisy at night.  A group of scouts were playing hide and seek near the disciplinary office at night. Suddenly a man appeared in front of the boys and shouted to them:

“Be quiet! You are too noisy! I am the school disciplinary master, Mr. Wong. I want to talk to your person in charged.”

No one knew who the man was but they dispersed and returned to their respective tents. After sometime, the scout master came to inspect the boys and one boy asked the master:

“Mr. Wong wanted to see you!”

The scout master almost fainted because he knew that that was again the restless spirit of Mr. Wong.