When the Clouds Part Quotes

“Mind precedes phenomena, Mind is their chief, from mind they spring. Those who speak or act with a pure mind Happiness will follow like their shadow.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“Mahāyānottaratantraśāstra is “A Treatise on the Ultimate Continuum of the Mahāyāna.”449”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“The commentary by Rongtön Shéja Günsi (1367–1449) also explains that tantra means “continuous flow,” but that this refers to the primary subject matter of this treatise—the tathāgata heart—being a continuous flow throughout all phases of the ground, the path, and the fruition.438 Or, the term is similar to tantra in the vajrayāna sense: the basic element is similar to the causal tantra; the three conditions that purify the stains of this basic element (the vajra points of awakening, its qualities, and activity), to the method tantra; and the result that consists of the three jewels, to the fruitional tantra (note that this explanation of the term uttaratantra accords more with the nowadays more common understanding of uttaratantra as “supreme continuum” in the sense of the changeless continuity of buddha nature itself).”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“Gyaltsab Darma Rinchen’s commentary says that since tantra means “continuous flow” it refers to the scriptures that teach the means to purify the stained mind, while uttara means “later” or “latest,” thus referring to the latest mahāyāna scriptures.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“The Karmapa’s unique approach to presenting the tathāgata heart is to skillfully combine the teachings of Yogācāra, Madhyamaka, and the Uttaratantra. The tathāgata heart is mind’s luminous ultimate nature or nondual wisdom, which is the basis of everything in saṃsāra and nirvāṇa. Its essence is empty, its nature is lucid, and its display is unimpeded (this is also how the nature of the mind is presented in the Mahāmudrā tradition, and the Karmapa’s commentary on the Dharmadhātustava indeed equates the tathāgata heart with Mahāmudrā).”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“Since the tathāgata heart is lasting, it is the basis for everything unconditioned that is connected to it and cannot be separated from it as well as everything conditioned that is not connected to it and can be separated from it. When this tathāgata heart is not realized, it is suitable to be called “saṃsāra,” and when it is realized as it is, it is suitable to be called “nirvāṇa.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“Praśāstrasena’s Āryaprajñāpāramitāhṛdayaṭīkā comments on the Heart Sūtra’s phrase “all phenomena are without arising, ceasing, purity, impurity, increase, and decrease” by using the notion of buddha nature (sangs rgyas kyi ngo bo), which exists without any change in all beings, is naturally pure, and is only obscured by adventitious stains: As for [the sūtra’s] saying “without arising, without ceasing,” the subsequent existence of what did not exist before is called “arising.” The subsequent nonexistence of what existed before is called “cessation.” Since this buddha nature—the dharmadhātu, ultimate emptiness—has no beginning point, an endpoint is not to be found. Therefore, [the sūtra] says, “without arising, without ceasing.” Even when sentient beings cycle on the five paths [of rebirth in saṃsāra], buddha nature does not become stained. Therefore, [the sūtra] speaks of “purity.” Even when awakening to unsurpassable completely perfect awakening, there is no superior purity than buddha nature. Therefore, [the sūtra] says, “without purity.” Despite manifesting in the bodies of ants and beetles, buddha nature does not become smaller. Therefore, [the sūtra] says, “without decrease.” Despite manifesting as the dharmakāya, buddha nature does not increase. Therefore, it is without becoming full. Why? Because it is beyond thought and expression and thus not within the confines of measurement. Since the dharmadhātu does not arise in two ways (through karma and afflictions), it is unarisen. Being unarisen, it is without perishing and therefore is unceasing. Since the dharmadhātu is naturally pure, it is not pure and thus is without purity. Though it is naturally pure, it is not that it becomes impure [through] adventitious afflictions. Therefore, it is pure. Since there is no decrease in the dharmadhātu through the relinquishment of the factors of afflictiveness, it is without decrease. At the time of the increase of purified phenomena, the dharmadhātu does not increase. Therefore, it is without increase.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“As for the ontological status of mind, his Prajñāpāramitopadeśa says that it does not exist as apprehender and apprehended, but the existence of the sheer lucidity of experience cannot be denied.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“Gö Lotsāwa’s GC continues that, in terms of the tathāgata heart’s being explained as the luminous nature of the mind (the basic element of awareness), Uttaratantra I.63ab says: The luminous nature of the mind Is unchanging, just like space. Therefore, it explains the tathāgata heart as suchness.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“Thus, all Indian Mādhyamikas (except for Nāgārjuna in his Dharmadhātustava) and virtually all classical Yogācāra masters up to the tenth century were not willing to openly embrace the tathāgatagarbha teachings as anything other than emptiness, obviously being very concerned about not getting anywhere near the non-Buddhist notion of an ātman. Interestingly, the exceptions in this regard among early Indian Yogācāras all “went into exile,” teaching and translating in China, with their works being preserved only in Chinese. The most prominent among them are Guṇabhadra (394–468), Ratnamati, Bodhiruci (both fifth–sixth century), and especially Paramārtha (499–569), all of whom extensively translated and taught Yogācāra and tathāgatagarbha materials. In India, it was only later Yogācāras, such as Jñānaśrīmitra and Ratnākaraśānti, who interpreted the tathāgata heart along the lines of mind’s luminous nature (see right below).”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“According to GC, Āryavimuktisena (sixth century) and Haribhadra (mid-eighth–early ninth century) explain the emptiness that is a nonimplicative negation as the disposition and the svābhāvikakāya.177 Jñānagarbha (early eighth century) even explains it as the dharmakāya, thus implicitly asserting it as the tathāgata heart.178 GC also adds the position of Ngog Lotsāwa and his followers that the tathāgata heart is the emptiness in the sense of a nonimplicative negation that is taught in Nāgārjuna’s “collection of reasoning.”179 They explain the statement that all sentient beings are pervaded by the dharmakāya as sentient beings’ being suitable to attain the dharmakāya.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“One should know that since [the ālaya-consciousness] follows the nature of all entities, it is nothing but emptiness that is taught through the term “ālaya-consciousness.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“[The expression] “possessing the tathāgata heart” is [used] because emptiness, signlessness, wishlessness, and so on, exist in the mind streams of all sentient beings. However, it is not something like a permanent and all-pervasive person that is the inner agent.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“Buddha is neither a person Nor the skandhas but uncontaminated wisdom. Having familiarized with it, it is always peacefulness— In it, I take my refuge.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“Aṅgulimālīyasūtra says that the inconceivable pure dharmadhātu is the ultimate single refuge that is unborn, unceasing, permanent, eternal, everlasting, and peaceful, that there is only a single yāna (the one that leads to the realization of the tathāgata heart), and that the tathāgata heart is nothing but the natural purity of the mind.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“Further crucial notions in the tathāgatagarbha teachings found in the Śrīmālādevīsūtra include linking tathāgatagarbha with emptiness in a particular twofold way—the tathāgata heart (or naturally luminous mind) is empty of adventitious stains but not empty of its limitless inseparable qualities. This is said to be the correct understanding of emptiness, and to understand tathāgatagarbha means to understand emptiness. Those who cling to everything’s being purely empty are those whose minds are distracted from emptiness’s being understood in a proper manner (śūnyatāvikṣiptacitta).55 Also, the sūtra speaks of the fruition of tathāgatagarbha being the dharmakāya that consists of the four pāramitās of purity, self, bliss, and permanence.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“This dharmadhātu is the sphere and the great nirvāṇa of buddhas, which cannot be perceived even by śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas, let alone ordinary beings. Still, buddhas, bodhisattvas, and sentient beings are not different in essence since they are nothing but three different states of the dharmakāya in terms of its being more or less unobscured by adventitious stains. The dhātu of sentient beings is ultimate reality and the tathāgata heart, which is also identified as the dharmakāya, fully endowed with the inseparable, innumerable, and inconceivable qualities of a buddha, just as the radiance, color, and shape of a jewel are inseparable. The three states of buddhas, bodhisattvas, and sentient beings are nondual, being neither the same nor different.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“The central and repeated message of the Tathāgatagarbhasūtra is that all beings bear a fully perfect buddha within themselves. However, these beings are not buddhas yet because they are not aware of the buddhahood that lies within them, which is obscured by the cocoons of afflictions and needs to be pointed out. Still, the true nature of all beings is not different from that of a buddha, and beings will manifest as buddhas once the obscuring afflictions have been removed.”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra

“I pay homage to and take refuge in the pure ground that is empty and devoid of the bearers of the nature of phenomena, the nature of phenomena, suchness, the great bliss of self-arising wisdom—the final purity, self, bliss, and permanence—that is the partless omnipresent pervader, the single blend of expanse and wisdom without any flaws of contradiction and beyond mundane examples, dependent origination, dialectics, and consciousness, the sphere of personally experienced wisdom, the ultimate sugata heart resembling the eight mirror divinations, the inseparability of [saṃsāric] existence and peace in which the many are one taste and that incorporates all ultimate buddhas, dharmas, saṃghas, deities, mantras, tantras, maṇḍalas, and mudrās, the natural luminosity that is the inseparability of saṃsāra and nirvāṇa, as well as the inseparability of the two realities, and in which there is nothing to be removed or to be added, natural connateness, natural changelessness, great nirvāṇa, great Madhyamaka, Mahāmudrā, profound prajñāpāramitā, and the other-empty dharmakāya that pervades all of space. Among these profound words of the Buddha that clearly teach those [topics], here the five tathāgatagarbha sūtras are . . .”
― Karl Brunnholzl, When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and Its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sutra and Tantra