Lawapa
Encyclopedia
Lawapa or Lavapa was a figure in Tibetan Buddhism
who flourished in the 10th century. He was also known as Kambala and Kambalapada (Sanskrit: Kaṃbalapāda). Lawapa, was a mahasiddha
, or accomplished yogi
, who travelled to Tsari. Lawapa was a progenitor of the Dream Yoga
sadhana
and it was from Lawapa that the mahasiddha Tilopa
received the Dream Yoga practice lineage
.
Bhattacharya in discussing ancient Bengali Literature
proffers that Lawapa composed the Kambalagītika (Tibetan: la ba pa'i glu) and a few songs of realization
in the Charyapada
.
Simmer-Brown (2001: p. 57) when conveying the ambiguity of ḍākinīs
in their 'worldy' and 'wisdom' guises conveys a detailed narrative that provides the origin of Lawapa's name:
An alternate English nomenclature for Lawapa is Kambala.
, possibly Bengal
. Tāranātha
lists Saroruha and Kampala
(also known as "Lva-va-pā, "Kambhalī", and "Śrī-prabhada") as its "bringers":
(Tibetan: deb ther sngon po): Book 9, The Contemplative Traditions of Kodrakpa and Niguma" it is narrated that Siddha khyung po rnal 'byor (Tibetan) went searching for , the sister of Naropa
(1016-1100 CE), as she had seen Vajradhara
. As Niguma had attained the 'Rainbow Body
' (Tibetan: jalus) those with a pure mind might see her Sambhogakaya
form where she had performed Ganachakra
in Sosa Island, located in East India. When at Sosa Island, Khyungpo Naljor (Tibetan: grub thob khyung po rnal 'byor) (990-1139 CE) had a dream about Niguma in which he received teachings from her:
Tibetan Buddhism
Tibetan Buddhism is the body of Buddhist religious doctrine and institutions characteristic of Tibet and certain regions of the Himalayas, including northern Nepal, Bhutan, and India . It is the state religion of Bhutan...
who flourished in the 10th century. He was also known as Kambala and Kambalapada (Sanskrit: Kaṃbalapāda). Lawapa, was a mahasiddha
Mahasiddha
Mahasiddha is a term for one who cultivates those teachings that lead to becoming perfect. They are a type of eccentric yogini/yogi in both Sanatan Dharma and Vajrayana Dharma, given by Siddhartha. Mahasiddhi are those practitioners, or tantrikas who have gained sufficient understanding and are so...
, or accomplished yogi
Yogi
A Yogi is a practitioner of Yoga. The word is also used to refer to ascetic practitioners of meditation in a number of South Asian Religions including Jainism, Buddhism, and Hinduism.-Etymology:...
, who travelled to Tsari. Lawapa was a progenitor of the Dream Yoga
Dream yoga
Dream Yoga or Milam — the Yoga of the Dream State are a suite of advanced tantric sadhana of the entwined Mantrayana lineages of Dzogchen...
sadhana
Sadhana
Sādhanā literally "a means of accomplishing something" is ego-transcending spiritual practice. It includes a variety of disciplines in Hindu, Sikh , Buddhist and Muslim traditions that are followed in order to achieve various spiritual or ritual objectives.The historian N...
and it was from Lawapa that the mahasiddha Tilopa
Tilopa
Tilopa was born in either Chativavo , Bengal or Jagora, Bengal in India. He was a tantric practitioner and mahasiddha. He developed the mahamudra method, a set of spiritual practices that greatly accelerates the process of attaining bodhi...
received the Dream Yoga practice lineage
Lineage (Buddhism)
An authentic lineage in Buddhism is the uninterrupted transmission of the Buddha's Dharma from teacher to disciple.The transmission itself can be for example oral, scriptural, through signs, or directly from one mind to another....
.
Bhattacharya in discussing ancient Bengali Literature
Bengali literature
Bengali literature is literary works written in Bengali language particularly from Bangladesh and the Indian provinces of West Bengal and Tripura. The history of Bengali literature traces back hundreds of years while it is impossible to separate the literary trends of the two Bengals during the...
proffers that Lawapa composed the Kambalagītika (Tibetan: la ba pa'i glu) and a few songs of realization
Songs of realization
Songs of realization are sung poetry forms characteristic of the tantric movement in both Hinduism and in Vajrayana Buddhism. Doha is also a specific poetic form...
in the Charyapada
Charyapada
The Charyapada is a collection of 8th-12th century Vajrayana Buddhist caryagiti, or mystical poems from the tantric tradition in eastern India. Being caryagiti , the Charyapada were intended to be sung. These songs of realization were spontaneously composed verses that expressed a practitioner's...
.
Simmer-Brown (2001: p. 57) when conveying the ambiguity of ḍākinīs
Dakini
A dakini is a tantric deity described as a female embodiment of enlightened energy. In the Tibetan language, dakini is rendered khandroma which means 'she who traverses the sky' or 'she who moves in space'. Sometimes the term is translated poetically as 'sky dancer' or 'sky walker'. The dakini, in...
in their 'worldy' and 'wisdom' guises conveys a detailed narrative that provides the origin of Lawapa's name:
...worldly ḍākinīs are closely related to the māras of India, who haunted the Buddha under the tree of awakening. In this role, they took whatever form might correspond to the vulnerabilities of their target, including beguiling and seductive forms of exquisite beauty. When that ruse failed, they again became vicious ghouls and demonesses. When the yogin Kambala meditated in an isolated cave at Panaba Cliff, the local mamo ḍākinīs plotted to obstruct his meditation. Noticing that he was particularly reliant upon a tattered black woolen blanket that also served as his only robe, they asked to borrow it. Sensing the power of the blanket, they tore it into shreds and devoured it, burning a final scrap in his cooking fire. In anger Kambala magically transformed the mamo ḍākinīs into sheep and sheared them, so that when they returned to their original forms their heads were shaven. Fearing the power of his realization, the mamos vomited up the shreds of blanket, and Kambala collected the pieces and rewove them. From that day, he was called Lvapa, or "master of the blanket".
Nomenclature, orthography and etymology
Alternate English orthographies are Lwabapa, Lawapa and Lvapa.An alternate English nomenclature for Lawapa is Kambala.
Hevajra
The Hevajra Tantra, a yoginītantra of the anuttarayogatantra class, is held to have originated between the late eighth century C.E. (Snellgrove), and the "late ninth or early tenth century" (Davidson), in Eastern IndiaIndia
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, possibly Bengal
Bengal
Bengal is a historical and geographical region in the northeast region of the Indian Subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. Today, it is mainly divided between the sovereign land of People's Republic of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal, although some regions of the previous...
. Tāranātha
Taranatha
Tāranātha was a Lama of the Jonang school of Tibetan Buddhism. He is widely considered its most remarkable scholar and exponent....
lists Saroruha and Kampala
Kampala
Kampala is the largest city and capital of Uganda. The city is divided into five boroughs that oversee local planning: Kampala Central Division, Kawempe Division, Makindye Division, Nakawa Division and Lubaga Division. The city is coterminous with Kampala District.-History: of Buganda, had chosen...
(also known as "Lva-va-pā, "Kambhalī", and "Śrī-prabhada") as its "bringers":
.. the foremost yogi Virūpā meditated on the path of Yamāri and attained siddhi under the blessings of Vajravārāhi,...His disciple Dombi Heruka..understood the essence of the Hevajra Tantra, and composed many śāstras like the Nairātmā-devi-sādhana and the Sahaja-siddhi. He also conferred abhiṣeka on his own disciples. After this, two ācāryas Lva-va-pā and Saroruha brought the Hevajra Tantra. ... Siddha Sarouha was the first to bring the Hevajra-pitṛ-sādhana
A teaching story
In the "Blue AnnalsBlue Annals
The Blue Annals completed in 1476, authored by Gö Lotsāwa Zhönnu Pel , is a Tibetan historical survey with a marked 'ecumenical' view, focusing upon the dissemination of various sectarian spiritual traditions throughout Tibet.An English translation by George de Roerich with help from Gendun...
(Tibetan: deb ther sngon po): Book 9, The Contemplative Traditions of Kodrakpa and Niguma" it is narrated that Siddha khyung po rnal 'byor (Tibetan) went searching for , the sister of Naropa
Naropa
thumb|right|NaropaNāropā was an Indian Buddhist yogi, mystic and monk. He was the disciple of Tilopa and brother, or some sources say partner and pupil, of Niguma. Naropa was the main teacher of Marpa, the founder of the Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism...
(1016-1100 CE), as she had seen Vajradhara
Vajradhara
Vajradhara is the ultimate primordial Buddha, or Adi Buddha, according to the Gelug and Kagyu schools of Tibetan Buddhism.In the evolution of Indian Buddhism, Vajradhara gradually displaced Samantabhadra, who remains the...
. As Niguma had attained the 'Rainbow Body
Rainbow body
In Tibetan Buddhism and Bön, a rainbow body is a body made, not of flesh, but of pure light.-In Dzogchen:...
' (Tibetan: jalus) those with a pure mind might see her Sambhogakaya
Sambhogakaya
The Sambhogakāya is the second mode or aspect of the Trikaya. Sambhogakaya has also been translated as the "deity dimension", "body of bliss" or "astral body". Sambhogakaya refers to the luminous form of clear light the Buddhist practitioner attains upon the reaching the highest dimensions of...
form where she had performed Ganachakra
Ganachakra
A gaṇacakra is also known as tsog, gaṇapuja, cakrapuja or gaṇacakrapuja. It is a generic term for various tantric assemblies or feasts, in which practitioners meet to chant mantra, enact mudra, make votive offerings and practice various tantric rituals as part of a sadhana, or spiritual practice...
in Sosa Island, located in East India. When at Sosa Island, Khyungpo Naljor (Tibetan: grub thob khyung po rnal 'byor) (990-1139 CE) had a dream about Niguma in which he received teachings from her:
He began to doubt that she [Niguma] was a ḍākinī of the flesh eating class, and while he was thinking so, she gazed skywards, and then numerous ḍākinīs gathered, and she created a maṇḍala, and bestowed on him the initiation of the illusory body and the practice of dreams. After that the dakini transported him to a distance of about three yojanas, and deposited him on the summit of a mountain of gold. There in a dream, rdo rje btsun mo bestowed on him the Six Doctrines, and then again personally on three occasions the rdorje tshig rkan and the sgyu ma lam rim. Further, she expounded to him numerous Tantras and sādhanas. Niguma said to him: Except myself and Kambalapada no one else knows the precepts of the Six Doctrines. Till the seventh teacher of the Spiritual Lineage, this teaching should be transmitted down a single line (of teachers). These will be blessed by me, and I shall give them a prophecy.
Principal teachers
The Tibetan Buddhism Resource Center (2006) identifies three principal teachers of Lawapa:- Anangavajra (Sanskrit; Tibetan: yan lag med pa'i rdo rje)
- (Tibetan: Deng ki pa)
- VajravarahiVajravarahiVajrayoginī is the Vajra , literally 'the diamond female yogi'. She is a Highest Yoga Tantra Yidam , and her practice includes methods for preventing ordinary death, intermediate state and rebirth , and for transforming all mundane daily experiences into higher spiritual paths...
(Sanskrit; Tibetan: rdo rje phag mo).
Principal students
The Tibetan Buddhism Resource Center (2006) identifies two principal students of Lawapa:- (Tibetan: nag po spyod pa)
- (Tibetan: indra bhu ti).