Mandala
Mandala and Tathagata Buddha
Tathagata watches the world from a state where the stream is flowing where Buddha moves through the void immersed in love and compassion for all.
As he moves towards the suffering man, he sees himself surrounded by a Mandala where Buddha is at the centre. This centre is surrounded by rings. Around the rings things are moving in cyclic motions. Surrounding every ring , there are many more rings that are similarly surrounded by others .... In each ring , like in the roots, stems and branches of a tree, there exist motion of the psychic stream. In each phase the rings are moving upwards from the earthly stage to the cosmic domain, from where they are reaching farther out to the realm where there exist nothing but void. From that domain the streamsare also flowing backwards. From the void it is re-entering the material universe where galaxies are spiralling, and gases are precipitating into stars, then creating the sun , the planet Earth , the mountains, the seas, the valleys , the meadows.... From there it is flowing to the plants, the trees, the animals , the human beings and thus entering itself. It is moving outward and inward - opening from itself and closing in itself. When it opens it creates waves where things come into existence as objects ascertainable by the senses. When it closes it enters a state that is beyond the sense-bound world. In closing , it opens into another world. This opening and closing are both temporal and non-temporal, where time itself transgresses time.
Garden of meditation
The journeyman can see, beyond the shores of the senses, on the surface of water, as calm as crystals, reflecting the sky, as lapis lazuli, transparent and radiantly shining inside and outside, within and without, beneath and above, in thousands of rays, breaking into spectrum of thousands of colours, in mirrors placed between Earth and Heaven, intertwined as well as divided by reality and in dream emitting and transmitting, the rays from all directions of the space. He can see the heights and the depths of the space inside or outside the Hall. He can see the flowering trees that bear the leaves that vibrate like jewels. Agates, diamonds, corals, pearls, all that he had seen as ornaments hanging around the necks of the beauties, are spread as the leaves, the stems, the branches of the trees growing beside the lake. Golden, saffron , ruby coloured, azure or pinkish rays are covering the flowers forming a garland of gems, that he had seen in the hands of the beauties, who , once came on the festive days to sing and dance in front of the altar of Apollo.
He remembers the streams and the canals flowing through the garden in front of the Hall of Mirrors. Now they appear so luminous! The colours of the jewels have all melted together and tarnsfused into the nature as melodious ripples of light. The lotus on the ponds, seem to be the bed of variegated diamonds, where the water drops are existing as drops of impermanence evaporating and merging inside, outside, below, above, and everywhere through the interior and exterior of the diamond that rests in Itself.
Journeyman can hear the birds singing after the sun blaze has died down. The soothing West wind is carrying the sounds inside the Hall. Some birds appear golden as the birds of Paradise, some with tails resembling Apollo's lyre, some are bright blue and green as peacocks made of gems; some resemble the doves in the hands of Aphrodite with feathers shinning like mother-of- pearls. By singing they are proclaiming the joy, the love and the beauty that exist amidst the suffering world. Creating ripples in the air they are generating the harmony from the lyre of Apollo.
In the pond of the lotus flower, where streamlets from many directions are flowing in and merging together, he can see that the Muses are taking their baths, the swans are wafting in the breeze, and the maidens are cleaning their blood-filled hands with which they dismembered Orpheus, the priest of Apollo, while he was meditating. Beside this lake Buddha is meditating on a lotus, while Boddhisattvas are radiating compassion and bliss to all the sentinent beings. Sky, earth, air , birds, animals, plants, stones... all are laden with music that is flowing from the blood of Orpheus.
In the Hall of Mirrors the wanderer can see meditating Tathagata, who is seeking slavation from the sufferings that had flown, and are still flowing through the innumerable innlets of blood. He is lalso Dionysius, whom the titans tore into pieces and scattered his flesh around, while he was sitting in a deep contemplation in front of a mirror. The flesh of Dionysus is floating as trees, plants, stones, canals , fountains, lakes, birds and dusts in the visible world, that is a part of the whole to whom all beings belong. In this multiplicity of the images, dismemebered and scattered on the mirror, the deity is still meditating at the centre of the mandala, the world is still passing away as an illusion, the birds are still singing the melodies and the harmonies of impermanence in the world, Apollo is still playing the music of the suffering Marsyas and his bloodshed, Orpheus with his music is still bringing love and light in the darkness of the world, Buddha is playing his lute of compassion, and Shiva is awakening the world with sounds and speechs emanating from his rattling drum.
Amidst this the journeyman feels a radiating joy of awakening inside the Hall.
Return to the realm of Orpheus