"Then how will you block the offerings that the heavenly eagles bring to the spirits of the mountain? If an eagle loses a few feathers, this will not hinder it as it soars in the heights. If you lose a few sheep, this will not affect your wealth!"
"I know of my sins! Tulku, please wash them away for me." The headman kowtowed like a chicken pecking at fragments of rice.
"Only your compassion can cleanse your sins. Look at this poor child. His clothes are dirty, but they can be washed by others. If your soul is dirty, only you yourself can clean it." Tulku Dapu dropped the shepherd's whip, turned around and departed.
He walked over to his horse, which had already been led to the spot by the lamas of the temple. It had been waiting for him for a long time.
In the evening, the headman's servant brought two bags of highland barley to Jiayang's house and they also gave Acuo a brand-new sheepskin coat. This fellow, who normally relied on his master's influence and was always itching to act greedily towards the common people, was now saying humbly to Jiayang, "Please carefully chant some sutras for my master in front of the Tulku."
2
In the era that Tibet had not seen the separation between gods and humans, compassion across the land came from the assiduous good deeds of the monks. They were the sages of the Tibetan people and they were also the guide to and bearer of worldly suffering. The Qiari Temple where Tulku Dapu resided was located on the banks of the Nujiang River and belonged to one of Tibetan Buddhism's Four Great Sects, the Nyingma sect, also known as the Red Sect[9]. The surging Nujiang river flowed in front of the temple day and night and the sutras that the monks chanted surged like the river, continuing all day long without break. On both sides were desolate mountains. If you looked at them for too long in the sunlight, your eyes would begin to hurt. There was little precipitation in the dry valley and generally vegetation did not grow there, so that the only thing towering on the red slopes of the mountain was the temple as it gave people hope and belief. In the years of good weather and harvest, people would be grateful to the lamas for reading the sutras. If natural disasters befell them, people would think that it was repayment in this life for the sins of a past life. The temple was the pillar of people's spiritual world and it also had a hold on their life and death—from birth, when a child was brought to the temple for the Tulku to bestow a name upon it, to death, when a master lama chanted sutras to redeem the soul. The power of religion surrounded a person's words and deeds all his life.
But in the mundane world, the tribal headman controlled everything. This geographical band was known as the area of the "39 clans" and altogether there were 16 tribes, with each tribe under the control of a headman. They wielded a huge amount of power over the tribesmen, controlling even life and death with ease. To them, the lives of the black-haired Tibetans were as worthless and small as dirt. However, even though their lives were difficult and poverty-stricken, the people did not fight, did not steal, did not rob and did not kill. This is because their minds were as pure as the blue sky, as clear as spring water. It was due to the successes of the senior monks who educated generation after generation of believers with benevolent compassion.
Tulku Dapu was a living buddha who possessed broad compassion and penitent tolerance. He was like sunshine after rain, like the stars shining in the night, like the light of a full moon shining down on the living beings of the grasslands. He enjoyed great prestige among the monks. It was said that he was of noble blood, but people had never seen him riding any large horse, or wearing a sable jacket and satin robes, or eating delicacies and rare foods. Indeed, his basic necessities were far plainer than that of normal monks. He was the ninth reincarnation of the Tulku in that Tulku's cycle of reincarnation. As a monk, the Ninth Tulku Dapu adhered to this precept: not only should one share the difficulties and sufferings of all people, but should also be more assiduous and patient than the masses. But, just as there is always smoke from incense winding up in front of statues of the Buddha, so a tulku always receives endless offerings and dana[10] alms from believers. However, the Ninth Tulku Dapu specified that there only needed to contain the 16 essential items for daily life, for example a kasaya[11], a monk's skirt, pockets for tsampa, a mattress, a walking stick and a wooden bowl. He also specified that he could not come into contact with gold or silver. He had somebody draw up a list of every allowed object and pasted this at the entrance. Apart from sutras, nothing else was permitted to enter the room. Even if somebody offered gold, silver, silk or jade jewellery, Tulku Dapu always said, "This item is not on my list. It does not belong to me. Go and offer it to the bodhisattvas."
These last few days, the Ninth Tulku Dapu had been perplexed by an auspicious dream and had already retreated to meditate on it for three days and nights. The day that he ended his meditation and emerged was the morning that he encountered Jiayang praying and offering incense in the temple. After he had heard the tearful lament of the herder Jiayang, he felt that he now comprehended the tutelary deity[12] that he had worshipped his whole life—the will of Padmasambhava[13].
After returning from the pasture, Tulku Dapu invited Abbot Pinsong to his room of quiet practice. The little lama serving the Tulku had barely replenished Khenpo Pinsong's buttered tea when Tulku Dapu raised a hand in dismissal. Then he said to Lama Pinsong, "Khenpo, our Tulku Jianggong has returned."
