The Sun, Moon, Planet and Stars Instruction

The Sun, Moon, Planet and Stars Instruction

by Longchen Rabjam

oṃ āḥ hūṃ. Homage to Padma Tötreng Tsal and consort.

If someone possesses the karma and fortune
To accomplish the body of radiant light,
They should be granted instructions in stages
In the manner of sun, moon, planet and stars.

Here, should you wish to apply the guiding instruction on the Heart-Essence of the Ḍākinīs which liberation simultaneously upon completion, both teacher and students should sincerely abandon worldly activity and travel to an isolated location—a forest, island, charnel ground or vast uninhabited valley. There they should sever any craving for food or clothing, and train in extracting the vital essence of stones and the practice of inner heat (tummo).

The guru then instructs the students to spend one month cultivating intense disenchantment by contemplating the impermanence of one’s own life and the certainty of death, based on the external changes of the four seasons, internal changes related to the four elements, and secret changes that occur with each passing moment.

They should then train the mind for a month by reflecting on the trials of saṃsāra and the sufferings of each of the six classes of beings, beginning with the human realm.

Then they spend one month on what should be accepted or rejected, in the knowledge that non-virtue is the cause of saṃsāra while virtue is the cause of nirvāṇa.

Then reflect on the difficulty of gaining the freedoms and advantages, and spend a further month on the supreme means of purifying obscurations, the recitation of the hundred-syllable mantra and accompanying visualization.

Then they train for a month in the outer, inner and secret forms of maṇḍala offering, as an aid to gathering the accumulations.

Next, they spend a month on the heart-practice of Padma Tötreng, the primary entrance-way for blessings.

Then, instructions are imparted together with their related empowerments. First, having bestowed the ḍākinī empowerment, let the students train in the related practice for three months.

Then confer the elaborate vase empowerment and let them train for six months in the outer and inner practices of the five families. They should then spend twenty-one days training in the physical practice of rushen (separating the domains of saṃsāra and nirvāṇa) and ten days on the vajra posture.

Then confer the unelaborate secret empowerment, and let them spend twenty days on the speech-related practices of rushen. They should spend twenty days on each of the practices of sealing external appearances, sealing the internal aggregates, the two forms of strengthening (rtsal sbyang), making flexible (mnyen btsal), and setting out upon the path (lam gzhug). They then spend a month and ten days on the recitation of the three syllables as the inner preliminary, one month meditating on tummo, and three months meditating on the wind-energy.

Then grant the knowledge-wisdom empowerment, with or without a physical support, and introduce the space of the consort. Let the students spend twenty days on the mental practices of rushen. They should investigate emergence, presence and departure for nine days, spend three days on settling (rnal 'bebs), and three on revitalizing (sor 'jug), by means of which they will be introduced to tranquility (śamatha). Then they should meditate for a month on neutral wind-energy, and train for two months in vajra-drinking and drawing liquid. Using their own body or the body of another, they should spend three months and ten days training in bliss and emptiness.

Then, once the highest word empowerment has been conferred, the students spend three days on the initial phase of probing to the root of thought, three days on the intermediary phase of seeking mind’s hidden flaws, and three days on the final phase of investigating emergence, presence and departure. Following this, they are introduced to Trekchö, the wisdom of insight (vipaśyanā). They then devote twenty-one days to the practices for enhancement and strengthening that combine the physical, vocal and mental.

Then, for three days, students relinquish activities of the three doors. They spend three days training in the three postures. Then, having conferred the expressivity empowerment, introduce the directly manifest. They should spend six months training in the visions of luminosity during the day and the luminosity of bliss and emptiness at night, uniting sun and moon. Through this, experience will develop and, by meditating for eleven months, awareness will reach its full measure. Eleven months thereafter, they will see the vision of exhaustion into dharmatā, capture the ground of primordially pure freedom, and, half a year later, fade into a body of light and become awakened.

During the phase of the direct realization of dharmatā, bliss and emptiness fades into luminosity. During the phase of increased experience, luminosity fades beyond fixation. During the phase of awareness reaching full measure, unfixated awareness fades into freedom from limitations. During the phase of exhaustion into dharmatā, freedom from limitations fades into the original state of primordial purity. By remaining in the inner luminosity of the primordially pure vase body, there is spontaneous realization of the enlightened intent that is unchanging throughout the three times.

To put it simply, it is certain that in seventy-two months or six years you will reach awakening in the primordial state, with the tainted aggregates no longer visible.

Thus, the essential meaning, unsurpassed and utterly clear,
Like the rising and setting sun, moon, planets and stars,
Guidance on the precious essence of the union of clear light,
Came to Pema Ledrel Tsal as a mind treasure
In glorious Chimphu at an auspicious time,
During the full moon of Caitra, in mid-spring of the female Wood Rabbit year.

Additionally, in the mid-autumn of the previous year,
I dreamt of the protectress Sokdrupma on a white lotus,
Who gave me directly the texts of the mind treasure.
From which point on, the treasure-guarding ḍākinīs,
Have accompanied me like a shadow.

Now here, in the Orgyen Dzong in Gangri Thökar,
An isolated and delightful place of vidyādharas,
During the third part of autumn, when flowers and fruit ripen,
I set out this secret instruction of sun, moon, planets and stars
On a side of paper for the sake of posterity.

Through the virtue of this, may all beings in existence
Attain the luminous body within this very lifetime,
Perfect the qualities of abandonment and realization,
And, through great transference, accomplish others’ welfare.

This instruction manual for the Heart-Essence of the Ḍākinīs entitled Sun, Moon, Planet and Stars Instruction, composed by Pema Ledrel Tsal in Gangri Thökar, is hereby complete.

| Translated (provisionally) by Adam Pearcey with the generous support of the Tsadra Foundation, 2025.

Bibliography

Tibetan Edition

klong chen rab 'byams pa dri med 'od zer. "khrid yig nyi zla gza' skar" In snying thig ya bzhi. 13 vols. Delhi: Sherab Gyaltsen Lama, 1975. Vol. 7: 311–316 (3 folios)

Version: 1.0-20250312