Bodhigarbha
From Tsadra Commons
| Key Term | bodhigarbha |
|---|---|
| In Tibetan Script | བྱང་ཆུབ་སྙིང་པོ་ |
| Wylie Tibetan Transliteration | byang chub snying po |
| Devanagari Sanskrit Script | बोधिगर्भ |
| Romanized Sanskrit | bodhigarbha |
| Tibetan Phonetic Rendering | jangchub nyingpo |
| English Standard | quintessence of awakening |
| Dan Martin's English Term | bodhi heart |
| Ives Waldo's English Term | essence of enlightenment |
| Alternate Spellings | snying po byang chub |
| Term Type | Noun |
| Source Language | Tibetan |
| Basic Meaning | An alternative term for tathāgatagarbha found in early Nyingma sources. Though it is back-translated as bodhigarbha, this term does not seem to be found in Sanskrit sources. |
| Has the Sense of | Buddha-nature in its ultimate sense as the primordially existing essence of buddhahood present in all beings. It is treated as Tantric/Dzogchen equivalent of the more Sutra based terms tathāgatagarbha and sugatabarbha. |
| Definitions | |
| Usage Example |
Rongzompa states in his commentary on the Guhyagarbha Tantra, དེ་ལ་བདེ་བར་གཤེགས་པའི་སྙིང་པོ་ཞེས་བྱ་བ་ནི། །ཐུན་མོང་དུ་གྲགས་པ་སེམས་ཅན་རྣམས་བྱང་ཆུབ་ཀྱི་རྒྱུ་ཅན་ཟག་མེད་ཀྱི་ས་བོན་དང་ལྡན་པ་འོ།་།ཞེས་འདོད་དོ། །ཟབ་མོ་ལྟར་ན་སེམས་ཀྱི་རང་བཞིན་ཉིད་བྱང་ཆུབ་ཡིན་པས་བྱང་ཆུབ་ཀྱི་སྙིང་པོའོ། "The term *sugatagarbha is widely known in ordinary [scriptures] which claim that all sentient beings possess the cause of awakening [and] are endowed with the seed of incorruptibility. According to the profound [scriptures], it is called the ‘quintessence of awakening’ (*bodhigarbha) because the very nature of mind is awakening." -Higgins, David. The Philosophical Foundations of Classical rDzogs chen in Tibet: Investigating the Distinction Between Dualistic Mind (sems) and Primordial Knowing (ye shes). Wien: Arbeitskreis für Tibetische und Buddhistische Studien, Universität Wien, 2013, p. 177. |
