Human and Animal Items
in
Western Vajrayana Buddhism
Tiia:
How is the bearskin and shamanism related to modern,
Western vajrayana? How appealing is it to modern lay people? I have
had a real bear skin hanging on my wall ten years ago, my father was
a hunter and I've seen dozens of times how the animals are bleeded
and skinned. I have zero interest in that stuff anymore.
Tigers, bears and beasts represent the tamed demons, but we are still talking about the mind. For me it is enough if I feed the demons and tame the beasts on the mind level. Why should we kill animals and eat them? We all know what is the situation with wild animal life and what livestock farming is doing to the earth and climate. Is the next step using human bones as ritual objects? I understand emptiness-bodhicitta and sending the beings to the Pure Land, but why isn't enough to do it on the mind level?
I'm saying this with all the love and respect, and I'm sorry to sound suspicious and skeptic, but that's because I am, and I don't get the purpose of these things. How is loving-kindness and living as an example to others is showing in these actions?
Kim: Animal skins and bones have been and still are widely used in vajrayana practice, in some methods more than others. You can find photos of tantrics sitting on tiger skins, deer skins and others, wearing neck and wrist malas, earrings and other objects made of animal or human bone. There is a reason why skull cups, trumpets made of thigh bone etc are used. These cannot be replaced by wooden or plastic items.
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| Chatral Sangye Dorje Rinpoche sitting on a tiger skin |
I cannot speak for others how they feel about these things. I follow my own intuition and it speaks on behalf of animal and human products because having a bearskin (of a real bear) or a mala made of actual human skull bones makes the whole thing much more visceral and powerful. They are excellent bullshit cutters. They make the mind stop it's fantasies. They are reminders of impermanence and death, and that is a very important practice in any tradition, buddhist or otherwise. Even in Christian cathedrals all over Europe, you can see bones and remains of bodies of saints. Of course, like you say, we could do entirely without them too but I think there is immense dharmic power in these things which is actually beneficial for the practitioner/s in question as well as the deceased animal/s or human/s. Shamanistic traditions have known this for tens of thousands of years, hindu tantrics probably almost as long, buddhist tantrics for about 2000 years but I don't mean to hide behind old traditions. If you go to India, Tibet or Nepal and meet tantrics, you'll see them using and wearing these products, and use them to decorate their homes and places of practice. So I think you could say that there is a universal trend of using these things, although it might seem strange, scary or off putting in the eyes of modern people.
In my house I have many animal products: hides of cows as carpets, bull horns on the wall, decorative snake skin, snake head, rattle snake rattler, couch and armchairs made of leather, two leather jackets, two pairs of leather boots (another made of python), a belt made of python and a drum made of buffalo. From one point of view, there's a lot of killing in all these products. From another perspective, it's many animals delivered to Buddha Amitabha or Guru Rinpoche by myself personally.
I also eat meat because 15 years of vegetarianism didn't do me good. I don't particularly like meat but it's nutrients suit my body and energy in a way vegetarian options don't. I guess that even if there is a trend to promote vegetarianism, our or at least some of our bodies just aren't ready for it. I learned this the hard way myself. For context, read Spiritual Carnivores.
There is a way to eat meat and still live in harmony. I believe all shamanistic cultures practiced praying and showing deep respect for animals they hunted and killed, just like buddhist tantrics do. I am not a hunter myself but I could be, I wouldn't see a problem with that. Whether I kill my own meat or not, I still pray and say mantras for the deceased animals and send them to my guru or Amitabha's Pure Land. Let's consider the meaning of this.
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| Tiger skin and tantric ritual objects, incl. human thigh bone trumpet |
Whether
we are human, animals or in other types of bodies, we live within
samsaric realms and transmigrate from one life to another. The cow
that I ate and prayed for this morning, like you and me, has been
born and died, born and died countless times, without any blessings
or spiritually fortunate interruptions. Animals transmigrate too. So,
I understand that that cow might have suffered and felt fear when it
was raised and slaughtered, but when it lands on my plate, on a plate
of a tantric yogi, there is a possibility for a spiritual
interruption and change in the transmigration process from there
onwards. This interruption is no different from coming in contact
with the dharma and blssings of the buddhas that all practitioners
have made at some point of our lives. It is unique and precious.
There is life before it and after it.
This is bodhisattvic
action, compassion at play. You ask why it is not enough to do this
mentally only. My answer is that I cannot sustain my body on
vegetarian diet alone and need meat. When I eat meat, there is a
special opportunity to help the animal/s in question through dharmic
means. When you eat the flesh of another being for sustenance, it is
a very special connection and because of that connection, there is
also much more energy involved when sending them to gurus, buddhas
and their pure lands, which may or may not be there without the
personal connection.
This same principle applies to all other animal or human items. To be honest, I think that leather jackets and boots look cool too but first and foremost those are the materials I want to wear on me and have at my home. These are organic materials that have the ability to absorb spiritual energy – shakti – like nothing else. Compared to fabrics that have synthetic ingredients they don't have that ability, plus my intuition tells me not to wear them on my body. I was never told by my guru/s to start wearing leather jackets or boots but I started feeling that way myself, and now I can understand why. There is also the fact that clothes and furniture made of leather lasts much longer than newly invented materials. I can probably pass some of my clothes and animal skins to my kids or grandchildren when I pass away. This aspect is very important to me.
Finally, a word about human and animal products in Western tantra.
In our post-christian culture, we cannot get human skulls and bones, like is the case in India, Nepal and Tibet, because it is illegal to get them. We can neither get tiger or leopard skins because those species are endangered. So, we cannot get the same animal or human products that have been used for thousands of years in tantra and it's elder sibling shamanism, here in modern (Western) culture. This means that if those aspects of tantra, skins and bones, are kept in the tradition, we need to have options for replacing them that are as suitable and good for practice as their predecessors.
I am not saying that all Western tantrics should start getting various peaceful and wrathful products but personally, again lead by my own intuition, I have felt like doing so, and I got to say that having all these things at my home, it does have a very different vibe than before. It feels like a tantric temple of immense purity, loaded with fresh energy. It looks beautiful too, at least to my eye, not exactly like temples in Asia but similar in a way. I have made my home a temple and through these options got many opportunities to help sentient beings.
I was adviced to ”Be yourself. Find your own way”, years ago by mahasiddha Babaji. Through these things mentioned in this text, I have done exactly that, but again, your choices might be different to mine.
Namo Gurudev,
Kim, 5.5.2021
