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Samayavajra (Tib. Damtsig Dorje), the 'commitment vajra', is a yidam
deity whose practice is essentially employed in the Gelugpa tradition as
a method for purification, and more specifically to restore broken vows
or pledges of commitment on the Vajrayana path. This practice is
performed as one of the four auxiliary components of the Lam Rim
Ngondro, or 'preliminary practices on the graduated path to liberation',
with the other three being the offering of water bowls, the molding of
small clay deity images (tsa-tsa), and the burning of black sesame seeds
within a small bronze statue of a wrathful deity known as Vajradaka
(Tib. Dorje Khadro). The purification practice of Damtsig Dorje is
similar to that of Vajrasattva, in that it involves his visualization
and 100,000 recitations of his mantra: OM AH PRAJNA DHRIK HA HUM.
The
sadhana of Damtsig Dorje describes him arising from the syllable HA
that seals the handle of a wisdom-sword that stands upon a moon disc and
a lotus, which then transforms into the deity and his consort. The
wisdoms of the Five Buddha Families are visualized as nectars in this
practice, which pour into the aperture on the crown of the
practitioner's head. One's body is thus filled with great bliss, and all
defilements and the transgressions of broken commitments are visualized
as leaving through the lower apertures and the pores of the skins as a
noxious black liquid.
Damtsig Dorje sits in vajra-posture upon a
white moon disc and a multicoloured lotus. He is green in colour, with
three faces and six arms, and he is endowed with the thirty-two major
and eighty minor marks. His three faces are green (centre), black
(right) and white (left); each face has a compassionate expression and
three bow-shaped eyes. He wears the five divine silk garments and eight
jewel ornaments of a sambhogakaya deity, and he is crowned with the
small image of blue Akshobhya Buddha. With his two principal arms he
embraces his consort, with his hands crossed in the humkara-mudra of
'sounding the syllable HUM'. His second right hand holds a golden
five-pointed vajra, and his third right hand holds a sword. His second
left hand holds a bell, and his third left hand holds an eight-petal
lotus.
His consort is light green and similar in appearance to
him, with six arms and three triple-eyed faces that are coloured green
(centre), black (right) and white (left). In sexual union she sits upon
his lap in lotus-posture, with her two legs wrapped around his waist,
and her two principal arms embracing his neck. With her other two
extended right hands she holds a vajra and a sword, and with her other
two left hands a bell and a lotus. She is adorned in divine silks and
jewel ornaments, and she is crowned with the small image of green
Amoghasiddhi Buddha.
text by Robert Beer
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