Chöd

The Sacred Teachings on Severance: Essential Teachings of the Eight Practice Lineages of Tibet, Volume 14

By: Jamgon Kongtrul, Sarah Harding

Narrated by: Tom Pile

Length: 18 hrs and 33 mins

Publisher's summary

The Treasury of Precious Instructions by Jamgön Kongtrul Lodrö Taye, one of Tibet's greatest Buddhist masters, is a shining jewel of Tibetan literature, presenting essential teachings from the entire spectrum of practice lineages that existed in Tibet. In its 18 volumes, Kongtrul brings together some of the most important texts on key topics of Buddhist thought and practice as well as authoring significant new sections of his own.

In this, the 14th volume, Kongtrul compiles the teachings on Severance, or Chöd. It includes some of the tradition's earliest source scriptures, such as the "grand poem" of Aryadeva and numerous texts by the tradition's renowned founder, Machik Lapdrön. Kongtrul also brings together the most significant texts on the rites of initiation, empowerments for practice, and wide-ranging instructions and guides for the support of practitioners. Altogether, this quintessential guide to Severance offers vast resources for scholars and practitioners alike to better understand this unique and remarkable tradition - the way of severing the ego through the profound realization of emptiness and compassion.

Cover design by Tsadra Foundation.

©2016 Tsadra Foundation (P)2017 Audible, Inc.

Not happy with the poor pronunciation :

It is a shame that Tom Pile did not inform himself from a genuine Tibetan Lama on how to pronounce the Tibetan words in the text properly.
He does not even know how to pronounce such key words like
"Chöd" or "Phat" !

Better in Print

The material in this book is too dense for a listen.
And the narration doesn’t help.
Got it in print as a reference
Will return the Audio book as it is pretty useless.

Well translated and performed

A clear and thorough translation with precise pronunciation. The word "Phat" is actually pronounced correctly – as it is suppose to in Sanskrit. It is the Tibetans who have gotten the pronunciation wrong :) It does not matter at all. It is just funny to see how people without knowledge of classical Sanskrit or various earlier dialects get their thread of thoughts twisted. Hope this clears it.

This text records an ancient oral practice originally transferred via royal and noble lineages in Northern India – and recorded in the late Classical age of India, based on the Six Perfections and the Bodhisattva path, which in itself are one of the earliest texts.

Excellent content, challenging naration

How did the narrator detract from the book?

The narrator is clearly not a practitioner and pronounced many Tibetan and Sanskrit words. In particular the word "phet" which is crucial to this text, and appears hundreds of times, is pronounced by the narrator as "faat", it really takes away from the teachings.

Great

It’s a tough listen without a background on these things. I had to buy the physical book to understand better (:

I honestly couldn't tell if he was just repeating

You is great to hear pet instructions mantras in the way ritual tantric and vaudrec ceremonies involved rituals skulls and instruments made out of bones. I will definitely listen to it again. I just didn't hear very much mindfulness for the use in my everyday life as of now.Bardot your work in dream yogaIs much more insightful to me at this point in my practice. Odd thing is the books in strikingly familiar as if I was doing the Odd thing is the books in strikingly familiar as if I was doing the The ritual ceremonies or they seem too familiar. Amazing amount of in depth information I will listen to 2 more times in full before I make my decision to keep the book or not.

An excellent resource

I just wish he knew how to pronounce ‘phat’ properly, among other Tibetan and Sanskrit terms.