Recording from Ani Sara at Kopan Monastery’s November course 2024.
Transcript
Yeah, so swayambhu means self-risen. So the story goes that, you know, a long, long time ago,
and we talk about them being a thousand Buddhas, and we say Shakyamuni is the fourth Buddha of this aeon,
and this valley was a lake, it was a very beautiful lake, and then it said that the first Buddha,
what’s his name, his name is, anyway, they call him in the Pali Vipashwi, I’ve forgotten the Sanskrit name.
So Vipashwi came, and he came on Chandigiri on this, one of the mountains there, one of the five mountain peaks,
and he looked over at the lake, and he took this Nagarjuna hill, it was Nagarjuna hill,
and he took this lotus seed from his robe, and he threw it into the lake.
And from that seed, they grew in the middle of the lake, this beautiful thousand petal lotus, you know, made of,
when they describe it, they describe it as made of jewels, incredibly radiant, as big as a chariot wheel,
in the center of the lake, and it was radiating light. And in the center of this lotus, they say there was this light,
which was like the, it’s like the primordial Buddha’s mind, it’s like, Rimsha used to call it the Dharmakaya,
holy mind of all the Buddhas. And it was radiating five colored lights in all directions, extremely blissful.
And then the story goes that because, you know, news got out that there was this beautiful lake,
with this beautiful lotus that was radiating light, and then many of the days, remember this is the Himalayas,
many of the Gods and Buddhas would all come to see this. And then they say that Manjushri, do you know who Manjushri is?
So Manjushri, he’s a Buddha of wisdom, and he has this sword, right? So Manjushri came, and his place is in China,
it’s called Otaishan. So Manjushri came from Otaishan, and he saw this beautiful light in this beautiful lake,
and he realized that this would be a very special place for practice. So he took his sword, and he cut four gorges,
you know what a gorges? Yeah, four slits to drain the water. Four, he sliced in four places to drain the water from the lake.
And this is actually, this is a legend, but this is also proved because you can see the four gorges.
And if you go to see Chobha Gorge, if you go to Papi, you’ll see it’s just like this. It’s just like someone took a sword and cut.
So he cut four slices, and he drained the lake. And then in the center of the valley, he built this city in the form of his sword.
And on each axis, he built this protection temple. So then it’s said that from this, the valley developed as a place for practice.
And so where the light was, that light was supported and then covered, and then gradually it got covered in the earth,
and that became Swayambhu. Swayambhu Hill. I got caught up with the city and I forgot about the hill.
So Swayambhu means self-arising or spontaneously arising. And that is the name of the hill. It’s Swayambhu Hill.
And on the top of that hill, there is a stupa. But it said that what actually is most precious is the hill,
because inside the hill, there is what Rimshe called this Dharmakaya holy relic of all the Buddhas.
And so by seeing the hill, by going to the hill, by being near the hill, that is actually representative of all the Buddhas.
You’re going to see it tomorrow. It’s quite extraordinary when we get there all around. Some of you have seen already, right?
All around, there are prayer wheels, there are stupas, there are temples, there are people constantly circumambulating,
there are huge statues, there are huge stupas. It’s just a place where there’s this constant buzz and constant practice.
So that’s Swayambhu.
So Swayambhu meaning self-arisen, Swayambhunas meaning the self-arisen hill.
Now that Swayambhu is arguably the most important place in the whole of the Himalayas.
So there are many stories about, you know, do you have Lama Atisha? Have you been talking about Lama Atisha?
So you know Lama Atisha was in India and the king wanted to invite him to Tibet, right?
And then he needed an excuse because the monks wouldn’t let him leave.
So then he said, oh, I want to go on pilgrimage to see Swayambhunas.
And he came and stayed near Swayambhunas.
So there are so many holy beings that you’ve been hearing about or studying about that are connected with Swayambhu and have been in Swayambhu.
Okay, and tomorrow what we do is first of all we go to Swayambhu and then we stop near the Buddha Park.
There’s a Buddha Park, of course. Guess what’s inside the Buddha Park?
Buddhas, three huge Buddhas.
There’s a huge Amitabha, there’s a huge Chenrezig and there’s a huge Guru Rinpoche.
I don’t know if you know who Guru Rinpoche is, but Guru Rinpoche is extremely important.
Anyway, so there’s a Buddha Park and when you come inside the park, there are places to prostrate,
there are places to offer lights, there are places to circumambulate, there are places to sit and meditate, there are places to…
It’s just a place to practice. I mean, it’s just incredible, right?
It’s like everything you need to practice.
So then what we do is we do some prayers and then we do the Korah.
So we do the circumambulation around. It takes about 40 minutes.
I’ll talk a little bit about that later.