The Secret Doctrine Volume 3.pdf

and he places
the origin of the primitive Buddhist books which are common to the Northern and Southern
Buddhists before 246. B.C.
Since Tibetans accepted Buddhism only in the seventh century A.D., how comes it that they
are charged with inventing Amita-Buddha Besides which, in Tibet, Amitâbha is called
Odpag-med which shows that it is not the name but the abstract idea that was first accepted
of an unknown, invisible, and Impersonal Power—taken, moreover, from the Hindu “Adi-
Buddhi,” and not from the Chinese “Amitâbha.” [The Chinese Amitâbha (Wu-liang-sheu) and
the Tibetan Amitâbha (Odpag-med) have now become personal Gods, ruling over and living
in the celestial region of Sukhâvati, or Tushita (Tibetan:Devachan): while Àdi-Buddhi, of the
philosophic Hindu, and Amita Buddha of the philosophic Chinaman and Tibetan, are names
for universal primeval ideas.] There is a great difference between the popular Odpag-med
(Amitâbha) who sits enthroned in Devachan (Sukhâvati), according to the Mani Kambum
Scriptures—the oldest historical work in Tibet, and the philosophical abstraction called Amita
Buddha, the name being passed now to the earthly Buddha Gautama.
SECTION XLIX
Tsong-Kha-Pa—Lohans in China
(Page 409) IN an article, “Reincarnation in Tibet,” everything that could be said about Tsong-
Kha-pa was published. [See The Theosophist for March, 1882.] It was stated that this
reformer was not, as is alleged by Pârsi scholars, an incarnation of one of the celestial
Dhyânis, or the five heavenly Buddhas, said to have been created by Shâkyamuni after he
has risen to Nirvâna, but that he was an incarnation of Amita Buddha Himself. The records
preserved in the Gon-pa, the chief Lamasery of Tda-shi-Hlumpo, show that Sang-gyas left
the regions of the “Western Paradise” to incarnate Himself in Tsong-Kha-pa, in consequence
of the great degradation into which His secret doctrines had fallen.
Whenever made too public, the Good Law of Cheu [magical powers] fell
invariably into sorcery or “black magic.” The Dwijas, the Hoshang [Chinese
monks] and the Lamas could alone be entrusted safely with the formulæ.
Until the Tsong-Kha-pa period there had been no Sang-gyas (Buddha) incarnations in Tibet.
Tsong-Kha-pa gave the signs whereby the presence of one of the twenty-five Bodhisattvas
[The intimate relation of the twenty-five Buddhas (Bodhisattvas) with the twenty-five Tattvas
(the Conditioned or Limited) of the Hindus is interesting.] or of the Celestial Buddhas (Dhyân
Chohans) in a human body might be recognized, and He strictly forbade necromancy. This
led to a split amongst the Lamas, and the malcontents allied themselves with the aboriginal
Bhons against the reformed Lamaism. Even now they form a powerful sect, practising the
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