The Cult of Tara

APPLICATION
contemplation of the mantra they sleep only about four hours a day
and awaken with real enthusiasm for continuing the recitation; they
eat little but feel great bodily vitality. I was told that some young
monks who enter the solitude of the hermitage only reluctantly are
equally reluctant to stop reciting at the end of their stay.
This ritual service is performed during the solitary contemplation
mentioned in chapter i, and many rituals have an accompanying
handbook of instructions upon the requisites of a solitary rather than
monastic performance, giving details on the particular visualizations
that must be performed during the recitation, the number of times
one should recite the particular mantra, and so on (such a ritual
service is examined in detail in chap. iii). But always the greatest
importance is attached to the accumulation of the proper number of
recitations, and these too must be properly performed: one must
avoid the "ten faults in the recitation of the mantra," consisting of
five "faults" and five "interruptions." The faults are to recite too
loudly, too softly, too quickly, or too slowly, or to mumble indistinctly.
The interrruptions are to cough, to sneeze, to stumble, to
fall asleep, or to have one's mind wander from the recitation. And
should one stumble, fall asleep, cough, yawn, sneeze, spit, or break
wind, says Ngawang lozang, then one should lay down the rosary
with which one has been keeping count of the recitations, bathe oneself,
and wash out one's mouth before returning to "count out" the
mantra. Moreover, he says, the following numbers of recitations
must be subtracted from the total number: for falling asleep, fifteen;
for sneezing, ten; for breaking wind, seven; for stumbling, five; for
coughing, five; for yawning, three; and for spitting saliva or mucus,
ten. If one's mind has wandered in other ways, one must make
offerings and recite praises to the deity, mentally confess one's fault
and pray for forbearance before one may return to the mantra. 21
MAGICAL ATTAINMENTS AND FUNCTIONS
The aim of all the preliminary recitation is the capacity to direct
the divine power, to evoke and employ it, and to effectuate and
apply the mantra that is its sonic form. All the many varieties of
this capacity, and all the uses to which it is put, are subsumed by the
Tibetans under the rubric of magical attainments. This cover term
is very widely used in a broad range of contexts, and it is difficult
to isolate a semantic nucleus; but a magical attainment is basically
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