The Prayer, Prophecies and
Namthar hidden by Guru Rinpoche and Khandro Yeshey Tshogyal has a Terma motif
at the end of each sentence.
Great
Tertons as per the prophecies of Guru Rinpoche along with other artifacts
revealed these Terma. Prayers with such Terma motif are not an ordinary prayer.
Guru Rinpoche himself composed these prayers and when recited on daily basis
has immense benefits to oneself and to all sentient beings.
I now
remembered when I was young my late father explained me the meaning of
this Terma motif to me. I am too eager to share the same to my friends.
In the Prayer
“Lue Duenma”, “Barchel Lamsel” etc you will find sentence ending with ༔
that means these are not an ordinary prayers, it is a Terma.
Prayers
with sentence ending with straight slash are not Terma, they were written by
great Rinpoches, Lamas, Dropthops, Khyentses etc.
According
to the vision of Terton Taksham Nuden Dorje, the two circles of the Terma Motif
symbolize ‘means’ ཐབས་ and ‘wisdom’
or ‘knowledge’ ཤེས་རབ་. The crescent moon between them represents their
indivisible unity ཟུང་དུ་འཇུག་པ།.
The
Ter-tseg used as a punctuation mark can also be written as just two ཿ circles
without the crescent moon, such as in Terma manuscripts from Mindrol Ling.
The image
of two small circles and a crescent moon shape ༔ is known in
Tibetan as a Ter-tseg གཏེར་ཚེག་. When used as a punctuation mark at the end of a line
of text or mantra, it tells us that the origin of the mantra or manuscript is a
spiritual treasure called a Terma གཏེར་མ.
Guru
Rinpoche and Yeshe Tsogyal has hidden these for the benefit of future
generations.
ཨོཾ་ཨཿཧཱུྂ་བཛྲ་གུ་རུ་པདྨ་སིདྡྷི་ཧཱུྂ༔
Treat
prayers with Terma motif with great care.
Taksham Nuden Dorje also known as Samten Lingpa,
wrote the life story (namthar) of Guru Padmasambhava according to his
manifestation as Dorje Tröllö - the Lama Dorje Tröllö Kyi Namthar.
In his day Taksham Nuden Dorje, which
means 'Powerful Tiger-skirted Vajra', was regarded as a zhig-po - a
wisdom-eccentric or enlightened madman.
He was born in the Lhorong valley of
Southeastern Tibet and, whilst being far from an academic or intellectual,
authored texts of great profundity.
According to the 'Pawo Chö-jung', a Book
of Buddhist History by Pawo Tsuglhag Gawa Teng'ar (otherwise known as Pawo
Rinpoche), it is stated that:
'A ngakpa named Nuden Dorje will appear,
who shall reveal the Térmas of Padmasambhava in Kham'.
One of Taksham Nuden Dorje's main
teachers was Chö-jé Lingpa - one of the consorts of Jomo Menmo (a great Nyingma
Yogini and Lama of whom Khyungchen Aro Lingma was an incarnation).
Taksham Nuden Dorje was the incarnation
of A-tsara Sa-lé (Gyalwa Changchub), one of the consorts and disciples of Yeshé
Tsogyel - and as such was gifted with the precise ability of discovering the
Térma of her biography, 'The Secret Life and Liberated Song-thread of Yeshé
Tsogyel' or 'Pö-kyi Jomo Yeshé Tsogyel gyi Dzèd-tshul Nampar Tharpa Gabpa
Gön-jung Gyüd-mang Dri-za'i Lu-treng'
Taksham Nuden Dorje was entrusted with
this text by the protector Hu-dag Nakpo - Düd-jé 'Barwa ('Sovereign of the
Black Waters - Blazing Lord of Devils' - who had been oath bound to deliver it
into his hands by Padmasambhava and Yeshé Tsogyel.
