[Considering what are the Five Buddha Families].
This is a subtle point because the language of the Five Buddha Families comes primarily from Highest Yoga Tantra. Je Tsongkhapa for example is careful to ground all tantric practice upon the Madhyamaka view of emptiness, bodhicitta, and the Lamrim stages of the path.
From a Tsongkhapa perspective, one should be cautious about becoming overly attached to the idea:
“I am a Vajra Family person.”
“I am from the Ratna Family.”
“I belong to the Lotus Family.”
Such identification can easily become another form of grasping at an inherently existing self.***
Tsongkhapa would ask:
Who is this person who is inherently of one family?
Can such a self be found under ultimate analysis?***
The answer remains no.
What Are The Five Buddha Families?
In tantric presentations, the Five Buddha Families are not five permanent identities.
Rather, they describe five aspects of awakened qualities and five transformations of afflicted consciousness.
For example: the Buddha families (representative symbols on the relative, conventional level), are direct realisation of non-dual awakened consciousness, of empty awareness wisdom light). For this reason guidance from realised holy beings/masters is sought. The Buddha Dharma has clear systems, the Bodhisattva levels for example, to support clear practice and recognition.
- Vairocana transforms ignorance into the Wisdom of Dharmadhātu.
- Akṣobhya transforms anger into Mirror-like Wisdom.
- Ratnasambhava transforms pride into the Wisdom of Equality.
- Amitābha transforms attachment into Discriminating Wisdom.
- Amoghasiddhi transforms jealousy and envy into All-Accomplishing Wisdom.
The key point is:
The poison is not destroyed and replaced by something else.
Rather:
The very energy appearing as affliction is purified into wisdom.
This is why Vajrayāna speaks of transformation rather than suppression.
Does It Matter Which Family One Is?
Conventionally, it may matter. [Considered in terms of the student, level, certain conditions, situations, in relation to the causes, effect and conditions and aspirations. It is relative reality].
Ultimately, it does not.
Conventionally, certain practitioners may display stronger tendencies:
- attachment,
- anger,
- pride,
- jealousy,
- dullness.
A qualified guru may observe these tendencies and recommend practices corresponding to particular Buddha families.
This can be useful skillful means.
But from the Madhyamaka view:
No one is inherently a member of any family.
The designation exists dependently.
It functions conventionally.
It cannot be found ultimately.
Thus Tsongkhapa would likely regard attachment to a family identity as contrary to the purpose of the teaching.
The purpose is liberation from grasping, not acquiring a more spiritual form of grasping.***
The Five Families Upon Awakening
From the standpoint of Buddhahood, the families are inseparable.
The Five Buddha Families are not five separate wisdoms residing in five separate places.
Rather they are manifestations of one indivisible awakened wisdom.
Likewise:
Compassion and emptiness are not separate.
Appearance and emptiness are not separate.
Method and wisdom are not separate.
A Buddha does not alternate between wisdom and compassion.***
The two are completely unified.
Just as the sun simultaneously gives light and warmth.
The enlightened mind simultaneously knows emptiness and benefits beings.
How Does This Affect Perception?
Ordinary consciousness perceives through duality.
There appears to be:
- observer,
- observation,
- observed.
There appears to be:
- self,
- other,
- experience.
From this dualistic appearance arise the two graspings often discussed in Madhyamaka:
Grasping to Self
The belief:
“I inherently exist.”
Grasping to Phenomena
The belief:
“Objects inherently exist.”
Tsongkhapa teaches that both are misconceptions generated by ignorance.
A Buddha still perceives appearances.
Mountains appear.
People appear.
Compassionate activity appears.
Yet nothing appears as inherently existing.
Thus perception becomes utterly free from distortion.
The world remains visible.
The hallucination of intrinsic existence does not.
Awareness of Awareness?
This requires precision.
Some Buddha Dharma traditions speak about awareness recognising itself.
Tsongkhapa is careful not to reify awareness as an ultimate substance.***
The mind is not a hidden Self.
The mind is not God.
The mind is not an eternal consciousness.
The mind itself is dependently arisen and empty.
Therefore the culmination of the path is not:
“I discovered the ultimate awareness that truly exists.”
Rather:
“Even awareness lacks inherent existence.”
This is one of Tsongkhapa’s most clear and distinct points.
The knower is empty.
The knowing is empty.
The known is empty.
Yet all three function conventionally.
Actor, Action, and Acted Upon
Reconsider the earlier reflection.
Conventionally:
- a meditator practises,
- meditation occurs,
- awakening is realised.
Ultimately:
- no inherently existing meditator is found,
- no inherently existing meditation is found,
- no inherently existing awakening is found.
This does not destroy the path.
It liberates the path from conceptual fabrication.***
As Tsongkhapa repeatedly emphasises:
Because things are empty, they can function.
Not despite emptiness.
Because of emptiness.
The Final Realisation
Tsongkhapa expounds, awakening is not discovering a cosmic entity hiding behind appearances.
Nor is it entering into union with an inherently existing divine consciousness.
Rather, the yogi directly realises:
Whatever appears is dependently arisen.
Whatever is dependently arisen is empty.
Whatever is empty functions through dependent origination.
At that point the distinction between the wisdoms symbolised by the Five Buddha Families is no longer experienced as separate.
The mirror-like wisdom, discriminating wisdom, wisdom of equality, all-accomplishing wisdom, and dharmadhātu wisdom are recognised as facets of one indivisible awakened knowing.
The relative question, “Which Buddha family am I?” eventually realises:
Conventionally, different dispositions appear.
Ultimately, neither family nor individual possesses inherent existence.
The nature of all phenomena is emptiness.
The expression of that emptiness is boundless compassion.
The union of the two is Buddhahood.
In that realisation, the vajra sun of wisdom and the moon of compassion shine as one sky, while the mindstream is freed from grasping at self and grasping at phenomena, revealing the inseparability of dependent origination, emptiness, and enlightened activity.