Of all the sacred texts studied, The Tibetan Book of the Dead or Bardo Thodol (Liberation by Hearing on the After-Death Plane) is by far the most fascinating to me. The version I use has a commentary by Carl Jung which is like finding an oyster within a pearl. Also, class discussion regarding the book was so enthralling that I will probably spend the rest of my life reading this book and sharing it with everyone I can. Not only does it contain a guide through the stages of death, it provides a road map to fusing the ego and unconscious. Volumes can be and have been written about this gift from the Tibetan Buddhists, but for the purpose of this essay I will try to communicate the most concise understanding I have about The Tibetan Book of the Dead's power to bring personal liberation.
The Bardo Thodol guides the dying through the Bardo worlds but Tibetan Buddhists also feel that the information shared helps the living because we begin dying the moment we are born. Understanding that Buddhists do believe in a time-space continuum and feel our karma is reincarnated until the ego and unconscious are united, psychological study takes on a divine role. While we work in life to become mentally healthy and aware in order to tip the scales of karmic balance to the positive, we are also learning how to discontinue destructive behavior and cyclic patterns. When we see that our existence is the same as our dying through the Bardo Thodol fear lessens and our mind is freed to encounter life rather than becoming smothered by it.
The Bardo Thodol begins at the highest level of the Bardo plains, or chakra seven, where a person can immediately reach nirvana, or reincarnation cessation, if they let go of the ego and go "into the light." The light is a psychic manifestation of total mental detachment which most human beings cannot reach without devotion and dedication. The Bardo Thodol has inherent compassion, gentility and kindness in the understanding provided that everyone has difficulty so there are many helpers and angels along the way to assist. Furthermore, if you cannot attain a level immediately, once you've learned how to master that part of the self, you automatically ascend to a higher level just like hurdling every day problems in that once you master an issue, you will always have the knowledge and wisdom gained. In other words, when working on "mind stuff" trial and error is bound to occur because of our animal natures; therefore, every effort to transcend above habitual behavior is healing in and of itself.
If one does not go directly to the light, the sixth chakra or Bardo level is where we meet our savior and ironically, embracing this deity causes descension rather than ascension. The Buddhists believe that gods are projections of the unconscious which views the eternal principle of life through symbols. Our responsibility as thinkers is to address this fact and understand that we are our own god and that ultimately, we must save ourselves through self-mastery. By embracing the deity one is embracing a form of ignorance causing the next level to be reached where five "attendant deities" assist the dying, and living, by reversing negative aspects of the psyche. The negative parts of our unconscious mind manifest themselves in life and death as forms of torture and hell. According to the Buddhists, we create our own demons but if we cling to Yama Amaka, the first and last man to die who represents all of life's possibilities, then we can conquer death, or the strangling hold of the ego.
As with the preceding levels, if one attains enlightenment or maintains enough consciousness while dying to invert the negative aspects of the self then nirvana may be reached. However, if one doesn't attain enlightenment, a descension to the fourth chakra, the heart, occurs which is the last vestige for the karma to escape reincarnation as the body begins to disintegrate and the ego must be forced to retreat. According to poets and musicians, within the heart lies our emotional storehouse which can be both beautiful and deadly. Our emotions have the power to create hell and heaven depending upon our ability to recognize their purpose and to control their affects upon our minds. The Bardo Thodol symbolically portrays the emotions as naked revelers and Buddhists explain that if one stays too long within this state she will ignorantly choose passion over enlightenment causing a possible reincarnation into animal form.
The animal form is symbolic of man's animal nature which brings him suffering symbolized by the next level, chakra three, where the terrors of death reside. Here, the supreme manifestations of our ignorance and negative emotions such as lust and hate reign free and our only way out is to be reborn, both psychically and physically. If we must re-enter the world of the living we have the ability to choose our parents by discerning the wisest guides in hopes that our next earthbound stay will be our last. Although having been reborn, we take with us the wisdom gained upon our journey which can be used as a tool for seeking knowledge about the self. More than anything, I think we gain awareness of the measure of existence and once you realize this, it is more difficult to willfully allow oneself to descend into self-created hells and traumas caused by thoughtlessness.
The Bardo Thodol represents the psyche in totem. It teaches that the highest truth of all is that we are born from and return to the ultimate universe, the collective unconscious, and can only do so by mastering the ego and its unruly emotions. The collective unconscious, or nirvana, does exist within and without all things and we catch and feel glimpses of it when we or someone we know has peace of mind. These moments can be Zen, nirvana, heaven, Asgard, or the Tao but all stem from detaching ourselves from our animal natures so that we may be reunited with the collective mind, or God, that proves we are bound together. Tibetan Monks, priests, and philosophers, to name a few, choose to undertake the necessary, grueling work of self-mastery in order to show others that it is possible. Siddhartha Guatama Buddha, Jesus of Nazareth, and Osiris all descended into the underworld, the unconscious, in order to be reborn as saviors - some actual human beings and others manifestations of our own understanding of the divine within. If we can look to these figures as symbolic examples of our own abilities then there is hope for each person to attain nirvana, or peace of mind, in both life and death.
© Copyright Paula Vaughan
Not to be reprinted without permission.
References
Resources for further study
The Tibetan Book of the Dead - Versions and Interpretations
Joan Halifax - Being With the Dying
Eastern Mythology, Philosophy and Religion
Savior Figures in World Mythology
Children's Picture Book
The Mountains of Tibet by Mordicai Gerstein