Pema Lingpa Lineage

Our Teacher, the Bhagavān, with skillful means and great compassion, taught inconceivable Dharma doors in accordance with the different capacities, dispositions, and karmic merits of his disciples. All these showers of nectar-like Dharma can be summarized within the gradual path of the Nine Yānas. The Nine Yānas may further be condensed into the two vehicles of cause and fruition; and this Dharma belongs to the unsurpassably supreme Vajrayāna of Secret Mantra, which takes the fruition as the path.

As it is stated in the Great Magical Net:

“Having secretly ascertained this sublime Dharma,
The Vajrayāna takes the fruition as the path.”

Secret Mantra can also be divided into the categories of Tantra and Sādhana, and this Dharma belongs to the Sādhana class. Furthermore, it is stated in the treasure teachings:

“In the cave of Yangleshö in Nepal,
When practicing the essence of true and wondrous great bliss,
All obstacles and harmful spirits were subdued by Phurba.
At that place, the supreme accomplishment of Mahāmudrā was realized.
To Vajra Skull-Garland Power, I supplicate sincerely.”

As stated above, when the great Ācārya, the Ocean-Born Vajra, was practicing in the cave of Yangleshö in Nepal in order to realize the uncommon accomplishment of the Vidyādhara, relying upon the perfect and wondrous mandala of the Nine Deities, human and non-human rākṣasas sought to disturb Guru Rinpoche’s practice. As a result, famine and epidemics spread throughout India, Tibet, and Nepal. Guru Rinpoche then dispatched the messenger Ācārya Shapahati to India to request the Dharma teachings. As soon as the scriptures arrived, all the demonic forces and harmful spirits immediately vanished without a trace.

Later, Guru Rinpoche sealed this incomparably powerful Vajrakīlaya Dharma in an indestructible small casket, made aspirations that it would be entrusted to disciples of karmic connection in the future, and concealed it in a lion-faced cave situated in the center of a triangular confluence of waters. This profound treasure teaching, capable of destroying all obstacles, māras, and harmful forces, is known as Vajrakīlaya: The Razor of Life. It was later revealed by the great Vidyādhara Pema Lingpa, one of the Five Great Tertön Kings and the reincarnation of Princess Pema Sal. This lineage has remained unbroken up to the present day, and therefore its blessings are exceptionally powerful and supreme.

The form of Vajrakīlaya: The Razor of Life, a treasure teaching belonging to the Pema Lingpa lineage, is as follows:

His body is dark blue, with three faces—blue, white, and red—and six arms. The first and second upper hands hold a nine-pronged vajra and a mass of fire. The middle hands hold a five-pronged vajra and a khaṭvāṅga. The last two hands are joined together, holding a small kīla of Mount Meru. He has four legs, standing in a wrathful posture with the right legs bent and the left legs extended. His consort is named Dharmachakra Vast Activity Mother, holding an utpala flower and a skull-cup filled with blood, and she is in union with the male deity.

If one is able to perfectly receive the empowerment within the mandala of the great glorious Vajrakumāra from the Guru, it will delight all the Dharma heirs of the Buddhas throughout the ten directions. They will offer genuine vajra songs of praise, scatter auspicious flowers like rain, and cause auspicious signs to fill all directions.