Page:The Tibetan Book of the Dead (1927).djvu/61

Rh ‘Divine Body of Incarnation’ (Tib. Sprul-pahi-sku—pron. Tül- pai-ku).

The Dharma-Kāya is symbolized—for all human word-concepts are inadequate to describe the Qualityless—as an infinite ocean, calm and without a wave, whence arise mist-clouds and rainbow, which symbolize the Sambhoga-Kāya; and the clouds, enhaloed in the glory of the rainbow, condensing and falling as rain, symbolize the Nirmāṇa-Kāya.

The Dharma-Kāya is the primordial, formless Bohdi, which is true experience freed from all error or inherent or accidental obscuration. In it lies the essence of the Universe, including both Sangsāra and Nirvāṇa, which, as states or conditions of the two poles of consciousness, are, in the last analysis, in the realm of the pure intellect, identical.

In other words, the Dharma-Kāya (lit. ‘Law Body’) being Essential Wisdom (Bodhi) unmodified, the Sambhoga-Kāya (lit. ‘Compensation Body’, or ‘Adorned Body’) embodies, as in the Five Dhyānī Buddhas, Reflected or Modified Wisdom, and the Nirmāṇa-Kāya (lit. ‘Changeable Body’, or ‘Transformed Body’) embodies, as in the Human Buddhas, Practical or Incarnate Wisdom.