Timeless Rapture: Inspired Verse from the Shangpa Masters

The Shangpa Masters and Their Lineage 229
This wisdom dakini was born the daughter of the great Brahmin
Shantivarma [Zhiwé Gocha] and the Brahmini Shrimati [Palgyi
Lodrö]. Her name was Shrijnana [Palgyi Yéshé]. She was pandit
Naropa’s sister and a member of the Brahmin caste. 28
During three previous incalculable eons of time, she actualized
her training on the spiritual path. In the continuity of that path,
during this lifetime she received a little instruction from a few
accomplished spiritual masters and, based on their teaching,
directly saw the truth of the nature of reality. Her illusory body of
obscuring emotions appeared as a pure body of enlightenment.
Having reached awakening’s three pure stages, she actually met the
great Buddha Vajra Bearer and received from him the full four
empowerments of Great Way tantra within an emanated sacred
circle of deities. The wisdom of her understanding of every sacred
teaching, such as Buddha’s discourses and tantras, profound
instructions, and treatises, flowered to include direct [knowledge
and sight] of the nature and multiplicity of all phenomena. She
reached awakening’s tenth stage, Cloud of the Doctrine. Her
obscurations of knowledge became finer and finer until no veils
remained; she became one with enlightenment, an epitome of the
three bodies of enlightenment. She reached perfection in renunciation
and realization, the achievement of her own goal. Her
enlightenment’s two form bodies appear for the benefit of others
until the end of existence and bring benefit to beings in ways that
can purposefully guide them. In particular, she watches over those
who preserve her lineage with a compassion that knows no distance;
she blesses them and ensures the success of their enlightened
activity. (The Collection of Shangpa Masters’ Biographies, pp.
40-42)
These few paragraphs indicate her extraordinary realization but do not
satisfy some meditators’ yearning for a good read. Naropa’s search for his
master and the twelve arduous years he spent following him have been
well documented. Has Niguma suffered at the hands of male historians? I
think not. Kyungpo Naljor treasured her teaching as well as that of
Sukasiddhi. He related Sukasiddhi’s story in full, and there is no reason to
believe that he didn’t do the same for Niguma. Her “story” may be as simple
as this: she was born in Kashmir, met some accomplished masters, and,