The Expanse of Enlightened Intent: Dgongs pa from the Sanskrit Sūtras to the Treasures of the Ḍākinīs
The Expanse of Enlightened Intent: Dgongs pa from the Sanskrit Sūtras to the Enlightened Treasures of the Ḍākinīs
Prologue: A Single Word
At the close of the Ḍākinī Ngöndro, the treasure known as the Excellent Path of Great Bliss, the Tertön Gyurmed Ngakrabtsal tells us how the text came into the world. He does not say that he composed it, nor that he found it beneath a rock or within a lake. He says that in the uncontaminated expanse of wisdom, in the very instant that awareness’s own radiance arose unceasing and just as it is, he set it down with certainty from the expanse of intent, dgongs pa’i klong nas.
Everything turns on that one word: dgongs pa. It is usually translated as “enlightened intent”, sometimes as “realisation”, “wisdom mind”, “intention”, “contemplation” or “the state”. None of these is wrong, and none is enough. The word has travelled a long way to reach that colophon. It began in the Sanskrit of the sūtras as the hidden purpose behind the Buddha’s words. It deepened in the Mahāyāna into a whole science of reading. It became, in the tantras of the Secret Mantra, the secret meaning that only the initiated can hear. In the Great Perfection it was transformed once more, into the living realisation of Samantabhadra himself. And in the terma tradition it became the vault in which the teachings were hidden for centuries, and the expanse from which they are drawn again.
To follow this one word through its journey is to follow the whole of the Buddhadharma, from the first discourse to the last revelation. And to arrive at the end of that journey, at the colophon of a Ngöndro revealed in our own time, is to discover that the word was never really describing the Buddha’s mind from the outside. It was always pointing to the place where the Buddha’s mind and our own are not two.
I. The Sanskrit Roots: What the Buddha Had in Mind
When the great translators of the Tibetan empire sat with their Indian paṇḍitas to render the sūtras into Tibetan, they needed a word for something that had multiple layers of meaning: the meaning a speaker holds in mind behind the words he actually speaks. They chose dgongs pa, and they used it for a whole family of Sanskrit terms.
The first is abhiprāya: intention, purpose, what one aims at in speaking. When the Buddha says one thing to one listener and something that seems to contradict it to another, the abhiprāya is the single purpose that unites both teachings. The second is saṃdhi and its close relative saṃdhā: literally a joining, a juncture, and hence a hidden connection between what is said and what is meant. The third is āśaya: the resting place of the mind, the deep disposition from which an action or a word arises. And beside these stands mata, what is thought or held, a considered view.
To these the Tibetan language added a dimension that Sanskrit does not have. Dgongs pa is an honorific. When an ordinary person thinks, Tibetan says bsam; when a buddha, a guru or a king thinks, it says dgongs. The same word thus came to mean both the intention behind a teaching and the very mind of a realised being. It is the thinking of those whose thinking is no longer ordinary.
From the very beginning, then, dgongs pa held two things together that the later tradition would never allow to separate: the meaning of the teaching and the mind of the teacher. To understand what the Buddha intended is to touch, however faintly, the state from which he spoke.
II. The Mahāyāna: The Art of Hearing the Unspoken
In the Mahāyāna, dgongs pa became the key to a problem that every serious student of the Dharma eventually meets. The Buddha taught for forty-five years, to beings of every capacity, and his words do not all say the same thing. In one place he teaches that there is a self that wanders from life to life; in another, that there is no self at all. In one place he teaches that all things exist; in another, that nothing exists in the way it appears. How can the same Buddha say both?
The answer of the Mahāyāna is: by intention. A sūtra stands at the heart of this answer, and its very title carries our word. In Tibetan it is called dgongs pa nges par ’grel pa’i mdo, the Saṃdhinirmocana Sūtra, the Sūtra that Unravels the Intent. In it, the bodhisattva Paramārthasamudgata asks the Buddha directly what he had in mind when he taught in apparently contradictory ways. The Buddha answers by setting out three successive turnings of the wheel, and by showing that each was spoken from a single intention: to lead each being, by the means that being could receive, toward the one truth.
The great masters of the Mahāyāna built on this. Asaṅga, in the Ornament of the Mahāyāna Sūtras and the Compendium of Abhidharma, distinguished four kinds of intention (dgongs pa bzhi) and four kinds of indirect intention (ldem por dgongs pa bzhi). The four intentions concern what the Buddha has in view: the sameness of all buddhas, another meaning hidden behind the words, another time when the teaching will bear fruit, and the particular disposition of the listener. The four indirect intentions concern how he speaks in order to lead: speaking to bring a hearer in, speaking of the characteristics of things, speaking of the antidote, and speaking in a way that transforms. When the Buddha seems to say what is not literally true, he is not deceiving; he is speaking from intention.
This gave the Mahāyāna one of its most beautiful insights. The words of the Buddha are not a fixed doctrine to be memorised; they are medicine given by a physician who knows each patient. To read a sūtra rightly is to read it the way it was spoken, with the intent of the speaker in view. The Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra puts it in its own way: the teachings are like the finger that points to the moon, and whoever stares at the finger misses the moon.
And here dgongs pa begins to show its depth. If every teaching springs from a single intention, then that intention is prior to all the teachings. It is not one more doctrine among others. It is the silent place from which the doctrines arise. Vimalakīrti answered the bodhisattvas’ question about nonduality with silence, and Mañjuśrī praised that silence as the true teaching. The Mahāyāna was already pointing toward a dgongs pa that no words can contain.
III. The Secret Mantra: The Language of Twilight
In the tantras of the Secret Mantra, the word took on a new and mysterious colour. The tantras do not merely contain teachings spoken according to intention; they are written in a language deliberately veiled. The Hevajra Tantra calls it saṃdhyābhāṣā, which the Tibetans rendered dgongs pa’i skad, “the language of intent”, and which is often called twilight language: speech that lives between day and night, between the obvious and the hidden. When the Hevajra speaks of wine, it means the nectar of great bliss; when it speaks of flesh, it means the deeper reality of the aggregates; when it speaks of union, it means the inseparability of method and wisdom. Read with the eyes of the uninitiated, the words mislead. Read with the key of intent, they reveal.
The Guhyasamāja cycle has an explanatory tantra whose Tibetan name is dgongs pa lung bstan pa’i rgyud, the Tantra that Prophesies the Intent, the Saṃdhivyākaraṇa. Its whole purpose is to disclose what the root tantra had in mind. And the commentators of the Guhyasamāja, above all Candrakīrti in his Illuminating Lamp, built their exegesis on the distinction between what is spoken with an underlying intent (dgongs pa can) and what is not, one of the six limits by which every tantra must be read.
In the Ancient Translations, the word rose higher still. The root scripture of Anuyoga is called sangs rgyas thams cad kyi dgongs pa ’dus pa’i mdo, the Sūtra of the Gathering of the Intents of All Buddhas. Here dgongs pa is no longer only the meaning behind a teaching. It is the realisation of all the buddhas, gathered into one: the very wisdom from which the whole of the Dharma springs.
And so the Nyingma tradition names the first and highest of its three lineages the rgyal ba’i dgongs brgyud, the mind-direct transmission of the Victorious Ones. In it, nothing is spoken and nothing is shown. The teacher, Samantabhadra, and the retinue are of one realisation, and the transmission happens in that realisation itself. Beneath it come the symbolic transmission of the Vidyādharas, in which a gesture or a sign is enough, and the hearing transmission of persons, in which the teaching is finally spoken in words. The word has reached its summit: dgongs pa is now the medium of transmission itself, the space in which the minds of master and disciple are not two.
IV. The Great Perfection: Intent as the Nature of Mind
In the Great Perfection, the word undergoes its final and most radical transformation. It no longer means the intention behind a teaching, nor even the realisation of an exalted being seen from afar. It means the nature of mind itself, recognised.
In the Kunjé Gyalpo, the All-Creating King, the root tantra of the Mind Class, the teacher is Samantabhadra, the primordial buddha, and he speaks as the bodhicitta itself, the luminous ground that creates all things. What he teaches is his dgongs pa: not an opinion, not a doctrine, but the state of primordial awareness in which everything is already perfect and nothing needs to be accomplished. When the tantra speaks of this dgongs pa, it is not describing something in Samantabhadra’s mind that we lack. It is describing the nature of our own mind, which has never been other than his.
The Seventeen Dzogchen Tantras speak in the same voice. In them, the dgongs pa of Samantabhadra is the space in which the whole of the Great Perfection unfolds: the ground before confusion, the path of recognition, and the fruition in which the ground is fully known. The Reverberation of Sound, the root of the Seventeen, presents the teaching itself as arising from this space, as sound arises from silence.
The Omniscient Longchen Rabjam gave the word its fullest expression. In his Treasury of the Dharmadhātu and his other treasuries, dgongs pa is the uncontrived, self-arisen wisdom that is the ground of all, and to rest in it is the whole of practice. He distinguishes it sharply from the ordinary mind, sems, with its grasping and conceptual movement. Sems moves, thinks, constructs; dgongs pa is the open, unwavering knowing within which all movement arises and dissolves. When the practitioner is “in the dgongs pa”, he is not thinking about the nature of mind; he is that nature, awake to itself.
The treasure of Rigdzin Gödem known as the Unobstructed Intent of Samantabhadra, kun tu bzang po’i dgongs pa zang thal, carries the word in its very title, and from it comes the Aspiration of Samantabhadra. That aspiration is spoken entirely from within dgongs pa: from the ground in which buddhas and beings have never been separate. When Samantabhadra prays there that all beings may recognise their own nature, his prayer is his intent, and his intent is the recognition he prays for.
Here the circle closes. What began in the sūtras as “what the Buddha had in mind” has become, in the Great Perfection, the mind of the Buddha as our own mind. To understand the Buddha’s intent is no longer to interpret his words correctly. It is to recognize the same awareness from which he spoke.
V. The Terma Tradition: Intent as the Vault of Treasures
The terma tradition takes everything that dgongs pa has become and makes it the very mechanism of revelation.
The treasure tradition speaks of six transmissions. The three common ones are those already named: the mind-direct transmission of the Victorious Ones, the symbolic transmission of the Vidyādharas, and the hearing transmission of persons. To these the treasures add three of their own. The first is the prophetic empowerment, in which Guru Padmasambhava foretells who will reveal the teaching and when. The second is the empowerment of aspiration, by which he seals the teaching into the mindstream of the future revealer. The third is the ḍākinī’s entrustment, by which the treasure is placed under the protection of the ḍākinīs until the time is ripe.
The heart of this process is dgongs pa. When Guru Rinpoche entrusted a teaching to his disciple at Samye or Chimphu, he did not simply recite it. He placed it into the disciple’s dgongs pa, into the depth of that disciple’s realisation, through the power of his aspiration. There it remained, through death and rebirth, hidden not in the earth but in the indestructible essence of mind. When the disciple was reborn in a later age as a tertön, the right conditions, a sign, a yellow scroll of symbolic script, a vision of a ḍākinī, would awaken what had been sealed, and the teaching would rise up from the revealer’s own realization.
This is why the tradition speaks of mind treasures, dgongs gter: treasures discovered not in a cave or a lake but directly in the dgongs pa of the revealer. Rigdzin Jigme Lingpa’s Heart-Essence of the Vast Expanse is the most celebrated example. It arose not from a physical find but from visions of the Omniscient Longchenpa and from the symbolic script that the ḍākinī entrusted to him, unfolding from the expanse of his realization. In a mind treasure the vault and the key are the same: the realization of the revealer, which is at once the place where the teaching was hidden and the awareness that recognizes it.
Here dgongs pa reaches a final depth. It is not only the realisation of Samantabhadra, nor only the realisation of the tertön. It is the point where the two meet: the place where the realisation of the Lotus-Born, sealed long ago, and the realization of the revealer, awake now, are found to be one. The treasure is not brought from the past into the present. It is recognised in a realisation that was never bound by time.
VI. The Colophon of the Excellent Path of Great Bliss
With this long history in view, we can now read the colophon of the Tertön Gyurmed Ngakrabtsal’s Ḍākinī Ngöndro as it asks to be read: slowly, line by line, each word carrying the weight of the whole tradition behind it.
The seal
ཅེས་ཤིན་ཏུ་ཟབ་པོ་ཨཏི་རྒྱ་རྒྱ༔ Thus is the utterly profound Ati. Seal, seal!
The text names itself at once: it belongs to Ati, the Great Perfection, the summit of the nine vehicles. A Ngöndro, a set of preliminaries, could easily be thought of as the lowest rung of the ladder. The Tertön says the opposite. This preliminary practice is itself Ati, utterly profound, and it is sealed. The double seal, rgya rgya, marks the text as a treasure that comes from the realm of the ḍākinīs and must not be treated as ordinary writing.
The prophecy
དེ་ཡང་ལུང་བསྟན་ལས༎ པད་འབྱུང་མཚོ་རྒྱལ་ལབ་ཀྱི་སྒྲོན༔ བྱིན་རློབ་ཉེ་རྒྱུད་རྙེད་པའི་བུ༔ སྐལ་ལྡན་རིག་པ་འཛིན་པ་ཞིག༔ མདོ་ཁམས་ཤར་གི་ཕྱོགས་སུ་འབྱུང༔ སུ་འཕྲད་བདེ་ཆེན་རིག་འཛིན་ཤིང༔ ཐོགས་པར་མེད་པ་བསྒྲོད་པར་འགྱུར༔ Moreover, it is said in the prophecy: “A fortunate Vidyādhara, a son who has found the close lineage of blessing of Padmasambhava, Tsogyal and Labkyi Drönma, will appear in the eastern region of Dokham. Whoever meets him will become a Vidyādhara of Great Bliss, and will travel the path without obstruction.”
Three names form the source of this lineage: the Lotus-Born, Yeshe Tsogyal, and Labkyi Drönma, the great yoginī of Chöd. Each represents a dimension of the feminine wisdom that runs through this Ḍākinī Ngöndro. The key phrase is “the close lineage of blessing”, byin rlabs nye brgyud. A long lineage passes from master to disciple across the centuries; a close lineage passes directly, from the realisation of the source into the realisation of the recipient, without intermediaries. This is dgongs pa as transmission: the realisation of Yeshe Tsogyal reaching the tertön not through the slow stream of time, but directly, mind to mind.
The prophecy also promises something to everyone who meets the revealer: they will become Vidyādharas of Great Bliss, and travel without obstruction. The treasure is not for the tertön alone. Its purpose is that his realisation should open into the realisation of others.
The vision
ཞེས་གསུང་པའི་ལུང་གིས་བསྔངས་པ་ལྟར། མ་གཅིག་ཡེ་ཤེས་མཚོ་རྒྱལ་གིས༔ བདག་ལ་དངོས་ཞལ་བསྟན་པ་ལྟར༔ དེ་ཉིད་སྒྲུབ་ཐོབ་ཇི་ལྟར་བར༔ སྔོན་འགྲོ་འཇུག་པའི་ལམ་ཟབ་སྤེལ༔ In accordance with these words of prophecy, just as the Sole Mother Yeshe Tsogyal revealed her actual face to me, so, as the means to accomplish that very state, I set forth this profound path of entry, the Ngöndro.
Yeshe Tsogyal does not appear in a dream or a symbol. She shows her actual face, dngos zhal. This is the meeting of the two realisations of which the terma tradition speaks: the realisation of the ḍākinī who received the teachings from the Lotus-Born, and the realisation of the one destined to reveal them. And the purpose of the revelation is stated plainly: to accomplish “that very state”, de nyid, the state of the ḍākinī herself. The preliminaries are not a preparation for something else. They are the path of entry into the realisation of Yeshe Tsogyal.
The expanse of intent
རིག་རྩལ་ཟག་མེད་ཤེས་རབ་ཀློང༔ འགགས་མེད་ཇི་བཞིན་ཤར་མ་ཐག༔ དགོངས་པའི་ཀློང་ནས་གཏན་ལ་ཕོབ༔ In the uncontaminated expanse of wisdom, the dynamic radiance of awareness, in the very instant that it arose, unceasing, just as it is, I established it with certainty from the expanse of intent [and revealed this terma.]
Here is the heart of the colophon, and every word in it comes from the language of the Great Perfection.
Rig rtsal, the dynamic radiance of awareness: rigpa is not static. Its nature is empty, its character is luminous, and its energy is unceasing display. The treasure arises as this radiance itself.
Zag med shes rab klong, the uncontaminated expanse of wisdom: the space in which the revelation happens is free of all defilement, untouched by the grasping of ordinary mind, sems.
’Gags med ji bzhin shar ma thag, in the very instant it arose, unceasing, just as it is: the revelation is not constructed. It is not thought out, edited or composed. It arises whole, ji bzhin, just as it is, in a single instant, and its arising never stops.
And then the decisive phrase: dgongs pa’i klong nas gtan la phob, from the expanse of intent, it was established with certainty. Gtan la phab pa means to bring to a definitive conclusion, to settle beyond doubt. The text was not settled by reasoning or by comparing sources. It was settled from within dgongs pa, the very realisation that is at once Samantabhadra’s, the Lotus-Born’s, Yeshe Tsogyal’s and the tertön’s own.
This is everything the word has gathered on its long journey. It is the intended meaning of the sūtras: the teaching springs from a purpose prior to words. It is the language of intent of the tantras: what is revealed carries a meaning that only realisation can unlock. It is the mind-direct transmission: nothing passes between minds, because the minds are not two. It is the nature of mind in the Great Perfection: uncontrived, self-arisen, unwavering. And it is the vault of the treasure: the place where the teaching was sealed, and the awareness that recognises it.
The aspiration
འགྲོ་དོན་ནམ་མཁའ་མཐའ་རྒྱས་ཤོག༔ May the benefit of beings extend to the limits of space!
The colophon ends where all dgongs pa ends: in compassion. Enlightenment has never been a private possession. Its intent, from the first turning of the wheel to this treasure of our own time, has always been one: that every being should come to recognise the same awareness. The expanse of intent and the expanse of space are the same expanse, and the aspiration is that the benefit of beings should fill both.
Epilogue: Intent as Invitation
What does this mean for the one who takes up the Excellent Path of Great Bliss and begins to practise?
It means that the practitioner is not reciting a text that someone wrote. Every line of the Ngöndro arose from the expanse of intent, and every line returns there. When the practitioner takes refuge, arouses bodhicitta, purifies with Vajrasattva, offers the maṇḍala, receives the empowerments, and merges with the Wisdom Dakini Yeshe Tsogyal as the Teacher, they are not following instructions from outside. They are entering, by stages, the very realisation from which the instructions came.
This is why the colophon says that whoever meets this teaching becomes a Vidyādhara of Great Bliss and travels without obstruction. The obstruction was never the difficulty of the path. It was the sense of separation between the practitioner and the realisation the path describes. In the expanse of intent there is no such separation. The realisation of Samantabhadra, of the Lotus-Born, of Yeshe Tsogyal, of the tertön is one realisation, and it is the nature of the practitioner’s own mind.
The word dgongs pa began as the question of what the Buddha had in mind. It ends as the discovery that what he had in mind was always this: awareness, open, luminous and unceasing, just as it is. The Ngöndro is the path of entry into that discovery.
