Light of Kailash 26: In the Eye of the Cyclone: A Dzogchen Cycle in the Heart of Yamāntaka? Prof. Stéphane Arguillere

With Prof. Stéphane Arguillere

Sunday September 7th

 ⏰ 1:00 PM BST 2:00 PM ROME UTC+1

Stéphane Arguillère (b. 1970) is a professor of Tibetan language and civilization at Inalco (Paris). He was a student of Nyoshül Khen Rinpoché and Chimed Rigdzin Rinpoché (C.R. Lama) and served Yongdzin Rinpoché (Lopön Tendzin Namdak) as a French interpreter for several years. He was fully trained in Western philosophy (Sorbonne) while learning Tibetan at Inalco. His research initially focused on the history of ideas among the Nyingmapas, Sakyapas, and Bönpos, before moving to a

more general history of the Nyingmapas. His doctoral thesis (2002) was on the life, work and thought of Longchenpa (1308–1364) and he is the scientific coordinator of the ANR-funded project “For a Critical History of the Northern Treasures” (2022–2026).He is the author of several translations from Tibetan into French: Nyoshül Khenpo’s poems (1999), Ju Mipham’s commentary on the “wisdom chapter” of the Bodhicāryāvatāra (2004), and Gorampa’s The Distinction of Views (2008). His most recent book (Tülku Tsullo, Manuel de la transparution immédiate, 2016, English forthcoming) is a translation of a manual of Dzogchen belonging to the Nyingma Tradition.

The lecture

In the Eye of the Cyclone: A Dzogchen Cycle in the Heart of Yamāntaka? (Mañjuśrī’s Nyingma Practices with the Fifth Dalai Lama)

The role of the Fifth Dalai Lama (1617–1682) in Tibetan political history and the elegant style of his autobiography are well known, but his voluminous works have not yet received the attention they deserve. In particular, the last four volumes of the most recent edition of his Complete Works are devoted wholly to Nyingma practices, including an entire volume (vol. 26) on Yamāntaka, a deity who was once very popular among the Nyingmapas before falling more or less into disuse in favor of other wrathful deities. In the middle of this volume, which is mainly devoted to various aspects of the Mañjuśrī Master of the Life cycle—very important, incidentally, because it is the oldest (11th century?) of the Nyingmapa termas to survive in its entirety—we find the longest of the Fifth Dalai Lama’s writings devoted purely to Dzogchen: a complete practice manual on a long-forgotten Dzogchen cycle: Mañjuśrī’s Dzogchen, revealed primarily by Sarben Chokmé (12th century). The talk will focus on the practice of Dzogchen according to this highly original cycle, on its possible (but problematic) articulation with Mañjuśrī Master of the Life, and finally on the way in which the Fifth Dalai Lama combines the proper Gelugpa views of emptiness, which he develops in the rest of his work, with the teachings specific to Dzogchen, the spirit of which he does not betray in this text.