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As long as karma is being generated, beings will continue to experience rebirth. The Wheel of Existence or, of RebirthThe explanatory diagram known as the wheel of rebirth is called in Tibetan, Shri Pa'i Korlho.
"With regard to the history of this painting, at the time of Shakyamuni Buddha, a[n] king [of outlying] Udayana made a present of a jeweled robe to the king of Magadha, Bimbisara, who did not have anything of equivalent worth to give in return. Bimbisara was worried about this and asked the Buddha what he should give. The Buddha indicated that he should have a wheel of cyclic existence with five sectors drawn accompanied by the following:
The Buddha told Bimbisara to send this to [the] King [of] Udayana. It is said that when the king received the picture and studied it, he attained realization." ~J. Hopkins translating HH Dalai Lama in The Meaning of Life.
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At the bottom is the hell realm that is sometimes shown to comprise both hot and cold forms of torment. The Sutra of Remembrance of the True Law describes 8 different hells but makes it clear that they are the product of our own mind.
Next is the animal realm where sentient beings from whales to insects are confined in fear and ignorance.
Nearing the top once more, is the realm of human beings in our varying conditions, degrees and statuses.
The in-between states are called in Tibetan, the bardo. It is also the word for the locale of consciousness while it is not embodied, as in certain kinds of dreaming.
As dismal as the situation may appear at first glance, in each of the realms is depicted a symbol of the dharma providing the opportunity for liberation from the repetitious situation known as samsara.
Buddhists believe that it is the human experience of existence that provides the best opportunity for enlightenment, liberation [Skt. moksha], nirvana . "Just as it is impossible to describe colours to a person blind from birth, or the joys of flight to a fish in the depths of the ocean, . . . the experience of nirvana is indescribable."
There are various versions of the Wheel of Rebirth. In a few, there is a buddha figure in each segment; in others there are various symbols used to represent the dharma. The pictures illustrating the "12 links" on the rim of the wheel may be somewhat different, too.
On the outer edge or rim of the wheel are twelve images. They symbolically refer to the factors that interact to determine the consequences of activity or karma. They derive from and can be related to, the Madhyamika view concerning the nature of reality. Here, too, there may be some variation depending upon the tradition or school to which the tangka artist belongs.
At top is a blind man with his stick representing spiritual blindness; this is the state of ignorance in which we can easily lose our way. Sometimes we do not even know there is a way.
At 2 o'clock is a potter at work on his own products. These are the deeds and actions we perform ~ the formations, preparations or samskaras. We are responsible for our own pots, not fate.
At the 3 o'clock position is a monkey playing in a tree. It depicts ordinary attention or consciousness which shifts continuously in the undisciplined mind. Meditation seeks to calm the monkey in order to gain access to the nature of consciousness.
At 4 is a boat with two people in it, Name and Form. [Some versions have a person and the heaps or skandhas] These act together as the conditioned way in which we experience the world. The boat is the mind moving about on 'reality'. (Some have interpreted this image as the physical and the intellectual or spiritual moving the boat of experience.)
At 5 is a house with six openings: five shuttered windows and a closed door. These are the five senses plus a sixth which is the faculty of apperception by which we interpret the input of the senses. That is, the sixth sense is apperception, recognition at the sub-conscious level.
Moving to the 6 o'clock position: A man and a woman embracing demonstrates contact, the consequence of sensual perceptions.
At 7 is a person who has been struck in the eye by an arrow. He is wounded by emotion, the subsequent feelings that can have a "fatal" effect. They create suffering.
At 8 is a woman offering a drink to a man. It illustrates desire that has been stimulated by perceptions and emotions which leads us to drink more from the world of appearances.
At the 9th position is a person picking the fruit of his tree. He receives the consequence he expects will be sweet.
At 10 is a maiden about to cross the stream. In one version of the Wheel, there is one person beckoning another to go or to come back.
At 11 is a woman giving birth. The new life is determined by the fruits of the old and is attracted to the parents accordingly, in order to be born.
Finally [?], the illustration that ends one round but begins another new life in one of the realms, is that of two people carrying a burden on a litter. This is the body, a corpse wrapped up on its way to be disposed of. Other people suffer as they bear the burden of another's death.
"If any link in the twelve-linked circle of causation (pratitya-samutpada) is broken the entire circle ceases to be operative because the root of it, the zero [Sanskrit shunya] is discovered. This origination is rooted in zero, proceeds from it, ends in it, and itself is nothing but an extension of zero." This zero is not infinite [like conceptions of God] but neither is it finite.
Whether we are meditating, dreaming, or going about our other activities ultimately we are responsible for our own experience. According to the Buddhist view, objects and beings make their appearance without an external stimulus, or any First Cause. It is said that, just as a painter can paint a portrait of a demon and then be terrified by it, so unenlightened beings paint a picture of the six realms of samsara and then are tormented and terrified by that picture.
Through the power of our own minds, we create the six realms of existence and then rotate through them. We are the ones who create the realms and the endless cycle known as samsara.
The Wheel is a depiction of existence with all its conditions and circumstances that is generally called samsara (or sangsara) -- the unsatisfactory cycle of death and rebirth that can continue endlessly unless we work to change that situation.
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Jamgon
Lodro Thaye Rinpoche's best known work is
The Torch of Certainty.
In the section called "the Four Ordinary Foundations," the fourth
topic is the 'Shortcoming of Samsara.' Here, this great 19th-century
"ecumenical" dharma teacher points out:
Three Types of Misery Common to All Samsaric Beings
"In brief, the miseries experienced by beings in the lower realms and the pain of disease, malicious gossips, etc., experienced by gods and men constitute the misery of misery itself. When you lead a wealthy, peaceful existence, life seems very pleasant. But soon, because of impermanence, the misery of change arrives. The two kinds of misery mentioned above are grounded in the fact that the five skandhas have come together. This is the misery latent in all conditioned existence.
"Finding their foothold in the five skandhas, the many kinds of misery of the three realms arise. Thus, no matter how high or low your state of birth, you cannot avoid samsara's very nature: the three types of misery! Even if your life seems happy and you possess a healthy body, a house, money, friends and servants -- these are merely misery in disguise. They are like food offered to a nauseated man or a hangman's feast for a condemned prisoner."
~ trans. Judith Hanson. Boston/London: Shambhala, 1994.
| Little children
recall being born.
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| HE Tai Situ on Reincarnation | ||||
| Extract from The Meaning of Life by HH Dalai Lama where causality is explained. |
| mantra associated with the Wheel. |
| Death in the Tibetan Buddhist Tradition |
In
1982, the Venerable Kalu Rinpoche taught extensively on the 6 realms, the 5
components and the intermediate states between rebirths [bardos]
[bar is Tibetan for interval; do means 2.]
| Symbolism of the Wheel |
| Chakra and charka in Origins of Buddhism |
| Tarot > Rota: The Wheel of Fortune, the European view. |
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Khenchen Thrangu Rinpoche. The Middle-way Meditation Instructions of Mipham Rinpoche. Boulder, CO: Namo Buddha Seminar, 2000. (Based on 19th-century "encyclopedist," Mipham's Gateway to Knowledge.)
samsara: A corruption of Skt. samskara, which currently refers to the 10 rites of Hindu males of the upper castes that mark life's turning points: (1) the conception of a child (2) the quickening (movement in the womb) (3) birth (4) naming (5) carrying the child out to view the moon (6) giving him solid food (7) ceremony of tonsure [shaving the head, leaving a bit] (8) investiture of the sacred string (9) completion of studies [ie. graduation] and (10) marriage, after which he is qualified to perform sacrifices.
[ Wheel of Life ] [ Distinctions ] [ Bodhicitta ] [ Four Maras ] [ Hells ]
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