The Snow Lion's Turquoise Mane by Das Surya

Author:Das, Surya [Das, Surya]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: HarperOne
Published: 2009-01-21T02:00:00+00:00

AT ONE TIME A DEMONIC sprite lived in a forest near Mathura. Five hundred monks and nuns meditated nearby. Through supernatural powers, the sprite assumed multifarious forms in order to distract and beguile the spiritual practitioners—seducing some by appearing as a celestial maiden, frightening others into madness through infernal apparitions.

One monk lost his memory; another seemed possessed; a third became a drunken reveler. Others began singing and dancing wildly in the middle of the meditation periods, for no apparent reason. In this way, evil prospered and virtue declined.

One elderly monk remembered a bit of advice a teacher had once bequeathed to him, regarding the panacean activity of Arya Tara, the savioress. He prayed to Tara, protector of the endangered; in a dreamlike vision, Tara revealed her numinous form and told him what to do.

The monk attached twenty-one images (one for each form of the deity Tara) to trees all over the haunted forest. From then on, whatever phantasmagorical apparitions the mischievous sprite contrived, the monks and nuns spontaneously perceived them as nothing other than the various forms of Tara. Thus they were protected from fear and harm.

Needless to say, their faith and devotion flourished. The lovely medieval hymn called “Twenty-One Praises to Tara” resounded everywhere throughout that country to the delight of one and all. It is still chanted today in all Tibetan monasteries and nunneries.

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