Nāropa

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PeopleNāropa


ནཱ་རོ་པ་
Nāropa(1012/1016 - 1100) 
Buddhist Digital Resource Center

An Indian scholar and tantric master who holds an important place in the lineages of tantric Buddhism in Tibet. According to his traditional biography, Nāropa was a brāhmana born in Bengal, who traveled to Kashmir as a child. He was forced to marry at the age of seventeen, but the marriage ended by mutual consent after eight years. According to some sources, Nāropa’s wife (or sister according to other sources) was Niguma, who became a famous tantric yoginī. Nāropa was ordained as a Buddhist monk, entering Nālandā monastery in 1049. His talents as a scholar eventually led him to be selected to serve as abbot and as a senior instructor known by the name Abhayakīrti. In 1057, while at the monastery, he encountered an old hag (in reality a ḍākinī), who told him that he had understood the words of the texts he had studied but not their inner meaning. She urged him to go in search of her brother Tilopa. As a result of this encounter, Nāropa left the monastery to find Tilopa and become his disciple. Over the course of his journey, he encountered Tilopa in various forms but was unable to recognize him. Tilopa eventually revealed himself to Nāropa, subjecting him to a famous series of twelve greater and twelve lesser trials, involving serious physical injury and mental anguish. Tilopa eventually transferred his realization to Nāropa by striking him on the head with his shoe. Nāropa later compiled Tilopa’s instructions and transmitted them to his own disciples. (Source: "Nāropa." In The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, 576. Princeton University Press, 2014. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt46n41q.27.)

Library Items

Book
Songs of Naropa
The main practice in the Kagyü teaching system is Mahamudra. The lineage of Mahamudra chiefly comes through Marpa Lotsawa's two root gurus, Naropa and Maitripa. The texts explained here — A Summary of Mahamudra and The View, Concisely Put — were spoken by Naropa.
      Naropa's songs are very important for practitioners of Mahamudra, pithy words, rich with meaning. This is why I chose to teach them during my courses. The songs and my explanations are now translated by lotsawa Erik. These teachings are about essential meditation training. I consider them very important for future students to pay attention to and study. Doing so will greatly benefit one's understanding of the key points of Mahamudra. (Thrangu Rinpoche, foreword, 7)
Thrangu Rinpoche. Songs of Naropa: Commentaries on Songs of Realization. Translated by Erik Pema Kunsang. Edited by Marcia Binder Schmidt with Kerry Moran. Hong Kong: Rangjung Yeshe Publications, 1997. https://archive.org/details/songsofnaropakhenchenthrangurinpochemarciabinderschmidtkerrymoran_755_F/mode/2up.
Text
Nāropa: Dṛṣṭisaṃkṣipta
A brief song on the view of Mahāmudrā attributed to the famed Indian master Nāropa.
Text
Tilopa: Ājñāsaṃyakpramāṇanāmaḍākinyupadeśa
The text, Instructions of Ḍākiṇīs entitled Validity of the True Word (བཀའ་ཡང་དག་པའི་ཚད་མ་ཞེས་བྱ་བ་མཁའ་འགྲོ་མའི་མན་ངག) is one of the primary sources for Mahāmudrā meditation and six yogas of Naropas passed down through the Kagyu tradition. In this text, one finds the six dharmas of Tilopa (ཏི་ལི་ཆོས་དྲུག་) which are fundamental techniques for meditation to cultivate single-pointed concentration and non-conceptuality, and account of the six yogas of Naropa in some detail. The text is said to be teachings received by Tilopa from Vajradhara and then passed down through Naropa and Marpa who translated it into Tibetan.

Other names

  • nA ro paN chen · other names (Wylie)
  • nA ro pa paNDita · other names (Wylie)
  • nā ro ta pa · other names (Wylie)
  • nA ro chen po · other names (Wylie)
  • mkhas grub chen po nA ro tA pa · other names (Wylie)
  • mkhas pa nA ro paN chen · other names (Wylie)
  • Naropa · other names
  • Nāropapada · other names
  • Naropapada · other names
  • Nāropa Pandita · other names
  • Nāropa paNDita · other names
  • Nadapada · other names
  • Nādapāda · other names
  • Nāropa paṇḍita · other names
  • Naḍapāda · other names
  • Nāropā · other names

Affiliations & relations

  • 'jigs med grags pa · teacher
  • Tilopa · teacher
  • Mar pa chos kyi blo gros · student
  • ma na ka shrI · student
  • pra dznyA raksi ta · student
  • atiśa · student
  • rin chen bzang po · student
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