The Short Commentary on the Tantra of Twenty-one Homages to Tārā called “The Treasure Vase of

Benefit and Happiness”

by Thupten Shedrub Gyatso.

The Perfect Pacifier

15

Introduction

Benefits

namaḥ śive śubhe śānte śānta-nirvāṇa-gocare |

svāhā-praṇava-saṃyukte mahā-pāpaka-nāśini ||

namaḥ (n/V) – adoration, homage; śive (f/V) – auspicious, propitious, gracious, favourable, benign, kind, benevolent, friendly, dear; śubhe (f/V) – good (in moral sense), righteous, virtuous, honest, pure śānte (f/V) – appeased, pacified, tranquil, calm, free from passions, undisturbed; nirvāṇa – Nirvana, [lit.] blown or put out, extinguished (as a lamp or fire), set (as the sun), calmed, quieted, tamed; gocare (f/V) – being within range or reach of, subject to, accessible, perceptible, attainable by; svāhā – [a holy sound]; praṇava – [the holy sound] Oṃ ; saṃyukte (f/V) – conjoined, joined together, combined, united mahā – [ic for mahat] great; pāpaka – [f.] bad, evil, [n.] evil, wrong, sin, [m.] wicked person, villain; nāśini (f/V) – [ifc.] destroying , removing

Homage to you, who is blissful, virtuous and tranquil,

And enjoys the domain of peaceful Nirvāṇa

With (mantra) endowed perfectly with SVĀHĀ and OṂ

You destroy all awful non-virtuous karma.

The fifteenth homage is to Rabtu Zhima,^Tib the “Perfect Pacifier”, who pacifies the obscuration of negative karma¹. She sits on blue lotus, and is peaceful. Her color is white like a crystal moon and she holds an anointing vase. She is free from the fruition of suffering, and as a result, she is blissful She has eliminated non-virtue, and as a result, she is virtuous. Her afflictions have ended, and as a result, she is tranquil. She has gone beyond the sufferings of the two obscurations and she enjoys and abides in the sphere of sublime tranquility. By her power of compassion, and power of reciting perfectly in accordance with the sādhana² her twenty-three or eighteen syllable mantras, the five heinous negative karmas³ that make beings fall into the lower realms, and other karma that generates great sufferings are uprooted and purified. The mantra includes the additional syllables, OṂ at the beginning and SVĀHĀ at the end. The ultimate meaning is that her blissfulness and other qualities are connected to the five wisdom minds: the wisdom of absolute space, mirror-like wisdom, the wisdom of equality, discriminating wisdom, and all-accomplishing wisdom.