The
Praise
Homage to the 21
in honour of
T.Y.S. Lama Gangchen Tulku Rinpoche
1
Wide
awake Red Tara
Has knowledge, love and power;
So she frowns a bit at the
Ignorance, confusion and fear
Which slow us down.
She has total compassion
And instant understanding
Which gives her the power to act swiftly
At all levels of existence.
We are held by absolute truth.
Which liberates us from untruth.
2
White
Than the harvest moon
Shining in a cloudless and unpolluted sky.
Her body glitters more brightly
Than a thousand stars.
How can there be sickness
In a universe pacified
By her luminous presence.
3
Golden
Like the blue lotus flower she holds by its golden stem.
We can increase all the good things of life
When we allow perfection to bloom in six ways.
Give with no holding back;
Keep going with constant effort;
Always choose right thoughts and actions;
Constantly return to that inner central point
Of wisdom and peace;
Never give up, lose patience, or let concentration waver.
This is the model of the great souls
And the blossoming of enlightenment.
4.
Golden
yellow
Is praised by the great Buddha Vairochana.
He praises her so highly he does not speak in words
But with the thoughts that issue from his crown.
Such praise, from the Buddha’s crown,
Is the reward and the motivation
Of
Which are infinite as time and space.
But she can also grant us the strength and wisdom
To overcome our own inner fears.
Others before us have relied on
And she has guided them towards
Achieving all perfections.
5
Coral
Red
Achieves great things by repeating the mantras
TUTTARA and HUM.
She offers wisdom to all of us who live in
A world full of suffering
Tortured by our greed, dissatisfaction and ignorance.
Her power extends even beyond our universe
And to those without human form.
She summons us to her wisdom
From north, south, east and west
From points in between and from above and below.
She frowns and stamps her foot
To shake off our negativity
As she showers us with compassion.
6
Deep
red Tara is honoured and praised
by Indra, king of the gods,
By Agni the fire god
By Vayu, the wind god
And other great deities.
Even those forces which we do not
Consider to be worthy of respect
Praise
She is victorious over all evil influences
And can overcome the destruction they bring
To the health of our minds and bodies.
7
Black
Frowning she hurls out the mantras TREY AND PHEY.
She has the power to destroy all
Plots and poisons and acts of terror,
Flinging weapons of destruction
At everything which harms the power of Truth.
Her posture shows this wrathful aspect of
Her left leg is extended so she can stamp on her enemies
She is invincible.
Her right leg is folded in, nothing can harm her.
She blazes with a fire whose flames
Beat back our enemies and protect us from harm
8
Dark
Red
TURE shows this swiftness of action.
Her frowning face and violent action are frightening
When she is roused up
Against the enemies of peace.
In her desire for peace
She will not spare those who,
Like demon warriors,
Threaten virtuous actions and the power of truth.
She completely annihilates
All that creates suffering in our world,
And all that creates the causes of future suffering.
9
White
Tara
Peaceful lady of the sandalwood forest.
Holding a lotus
And showing the mudra of the three jewels
At her heart.
She radiates light and thus
Illuminates the whole universe
10
Red
Brings absolute joy
And the fulfilment of all wishes.
Her tiara of precious stones
Sparkles with radiant garlands of light.
With eyes open wide and laughter
She uses the mantra TUTARA
To subdue demons
And to discipline all worldly beings.
11
Orange
Tara, the colour of refined gold,
Can call upon all
Magical beings and men of power.
All those who work to protect our Earth
And guard us from poverty and misfortune
Obey her summons.
When she is angered by our unhappiness
And the causes of our separation from inner joy
She frowns and calls out HUNG.
Then our guardians are summoned
To help us and to shower riches upon us.
12
Orange
Wears a tiara
Shaped like a crescent moon.
her body is adorned with precious ornaments
Whose dazzling brightness
Shines in all directions.
Seated within the knot of her hair
Is Amithaba, father of the lotus family.
Infinite light radiates constantly from him
Surrounding Tara with its eternal beams.
13
Flame
red
Dances in a blazing fire,
A fire as powerful as the great fire
Which could consume our whole world
At the end of this cosmic age.
Her dance shows how she
Stretches out her right leg
And folds in her left leg
Bringing us joy and destroying our enemies.
As she dances she frowns on
All obstacles and hostile forces.
14
Black
With her scowling face
And threatening gesture
She subdues those evil demons
Who hinder the power of peace.
She claps her hands
And stamps the ground with her left foot
To show her domination of the world.
Through her nose she makes the sound HUM
And thus she subdues
All evil creatures, wherever they are found.
15
White
Showing her great qualities and the five wisdoms
Which never leave her.
She brings us happiness in this life
And teaches us how virtue and positive actions
Sow the seeds of happiness in future lives.
This is the path to Nirvana where there is absolute peace
And liberation from suffering.
Tara is the pure sound of the mantras SOHA and
The perfect way to disperse evil
And so prevent the suffering that results
From harmful actions.
16
Red
Brings joy to all who follow her
And to those who practise the dharma.
Her compassion overcomes obstacles created
By those who are opposed to the dharma,
And her intelligence subdues
The confusion we create within our own minds.
The ten syllables of her mantra.
HUM is the essence of her brightly blazing action
Which brings liberation.
17
Saffron
coloured
And her essence is inseparable from the syllable HUM.
The wrathful action of her great compassion
Dissipates all negative forces,
They cannot touch us.
When she stamps her foot
She shakes the whole world
And all that is on the Earth, above and below it.
Even Mount Meru, the very centre of the world,
And Mandara and Kailash the sacred mountains
18
White
Tara
Like a Peacock
With her healing vase
Holds the disc of the moon
Which is round like the lake of the gods
Filled with clear water.
When she says the mantra
and the sound of PHEY
This calms fevers and neutralises poisons.
19
White
By all the gods and kings of the universe.
Powerful beings honour her as queen
And rely on her to overcome all problems.
Her mantras and mudras protect like armour
And bring radiant joy to body and speech,
Calming arguments and conflicts
And soothing bad dreams.
20
Orange
coloured
Her eyes radiate a pure white light
Brilliant as the sun and moon
Shining with a compassion that
Frees the world from suffering and brings life.
She says the mantra HARA twice and TUTARA
And this brings healing
Of all serious illness, cancers and epidemics
As well as the fears and negative emotions
That sickness brings
21
White
She has overcome the confusion of
Conflicting human emotions
And knows herself to be at one with all phenomena
So she exists in the clear light of absolute peace
Which is free from all obstacles.
Thus she displays the three syllables
We honour Tara who can protect us from all harm.
Swift and sublime she brings victory
Over all our suffering
Brought about by past and present actions.
She destroys all evil and raises the dead to life.
Thus
the root mantra is praised
And twenty-one homages offered