Heart Essence of the Vast Expanse: A Story of Transmission

4/5 ( ratings)

Beautiful, evocative, and eminently useful, this rich array of texts chants on CD and images handsomely fills out the practices of the Heart Essence of the Vast Expanse tradition. The foundational practices from the Heart Essence transmission that was revealed by Jigme Lingpa have for over three centuries been one of the most widely practiced and beloved gateways to Dzogchen in Tibet. Like most Tibetan practices, these are chanted in solitary practice or in groups, their words supporting the vision, emotion, and understanding being cultivated. The compilation of texts, story, history, music, and commentaries in this book helps the practitioner more fully understand the elements of practice. And the included chantable English translation matches the meter of the Tibetan original and thus can be sung to the traditional Tibetan melodies that are also part of its transmission. The Heart Essence remains a living tradition. A contemporary lama of this tradition, Adzom Rinpoche, widely regarded in Tibet as an incarnation of Jigme Lingpa, prepared a condensed version of Jigme Lingpa's famous text also included here. The accompanying CD contains the Tibetan and English chanting of both his and Jigme Lingpa's practice texts. In addition, three color-picture sections show images of land and objects sacred to the Heart Essence tradition and also of deities and lamas in the transmission including a section on Adzom Gar, a major twentieth-century seat of this teaching in Kham. This is the first-ever chantable English translation of one of the most beloved and widely used practice texts, the Longchen Nyinthig.