Presentation of the different fields of Unity in Duality Education
Abstract
UD Education has its basis in universal wisdom, drawn from the ancient texts of India and Tibet. UD is neither a study of Buddhism as a religion, nor is it a prerequisite to being a Buddhist student.
Tarab Tulku Rinpoche has drawn essential and universal insights from the Buddhist tradition. The knowledge that has been treasured for thousands of years within Eastern traditions. According to Tarab Rinpoche, these are part of our inheritance and should be available to humanity at large. Presented here for modern audiences and cultures through, Inner-science, Personal Development, Art-of-Relating and Spiritual Application.
Introduction
The founder of Unity in Duality Education, Tarab Rinpoche XI, said in one of his lectures:
“I was able to explore this ancient universal knowledge through the Indo-Tibetan Buddhist tradition, in which I grew up. I feel privileged having grown up in this old tradition as this experience offered me very favourable circumstances for my studies and research during a period where the tradition was still very much alive. It appeared as an immense treasure of theory and methods. But at the same time, I am now sure that in principle I could have reached the same insight from any given culture”.
Nowadays in our modern education, the emphasis is mainly on exploring matter’s existence and developing the intellect. The education provides little concern in strengthening one’s inner presence or developing the tools that would enable us to master our reality. In this way, outer circumstances and projecting our experiences on what exists become the determining factors. Often seeking outer support for confirmation and subsequently becoming more sensitive. Under these circumstances, this condition may result in stress, depression, loneliness, feelings of worthlessness and accompanying fears, leading to the manipulation of others to uphold and assure one’s identity and integrity. It seems like an almost closed loop, which can be witnessed every day in our modern world.
Inner science
Strengthening the inner presence
In the Ancient Inner-science emphasis was on strengthening the inner presence and developing mental abilities for the individual to take responsibility for and to a great extent mastering inner existence and also mastering one’s reality.
Being able to extract the universalities of this tradition, beyond cultural and religious boundaries and with an insight into modern science, Tarab Rinpoche XI envisioned how this inner-scientific view and its integrated life approach together with modern science, could help establish respect for one another, creating harmony between people, and between man and nature.
The UD Education does not aim to propagate Buddhism as a religion. To study or practice UD it is not necessary to be or become a Buddhist.
Tarab Tulku Rinpoche wants to make available the universal understanding and insights that have been passed down through centuries via the Buddhist Tradition, that has been treasured for thousands of years within the Eastern traditions. According to Tarab Rinpoche, this is part of human heritage and should be made available to humanity at large.
Through the UD Education, we are offering knowledge and methods to take responsibility and determine our state of being and experiences; both for the sake of one’s wellbeing and relations to others and nature, as well as for the sake of one’s fellow human beings.
In this way, the Unity in Duality Education is reflected as an integral system in the fields of:
I) Inner Ancient Science of Mind and Reality
II) Personal Development
III) Application in Art-of-Relating
IV) Spiritual Application
Praised by Dalai Lama
This Study and Training Programme is open to all who are open to becoming acquainted with the universalities of the Ancient Eastern Cultures, as extracted by Tarab Tulku.
The Unity in Duality Education is based on the genius of Tarab Rinpoche’s lifework. His Holiness the Dalai Lama has highly praised Tarab Rinpoche, calling him one of the greatest Buddhist Scholars and Masters of our time. His Holiness has also said publicly that we should know that late Tarab Tulku Rinpoche was not a normal Lama, he was a very special being and that it was a great tragedy for all of us that Rinpoche should die so early, as Rinpoche’s teachings are most important for us in this time.
Tarab Tulku Rinpoche has used his life to pinpoint and draw out the universalities from the Sutras and Tantras, concerning the analysis of the mind, experiences and what exists in their mutual interrelationship. Drawing out universalities with methods for developing ourselves personally as well as spiritually, which he managed to present in a way that would take us beyond cultural and religious boundaries.
Tarab Rinpoche has been doing this work for several reasons. One of the main reasons is that Tibetan Buddhism is a bearer of ancient knowledge, evolving at least 5.000 years ago. Concerning the heritage from the Indus Valley as well as to the shamanistic traditions, many aspects of this are no longer available as a living tradition other than within the Tibetan culture.
Rinpoche did not believe that Tibetan culture as such would necessarily survive the chances of meeting with the Chinese and other modern cultures.
Tarab Tulku XI felt it important for the future to extract the universalities, allowing this ancient knowledge to be adopted into modern culture, despite its cultural and religious belief systems and, in this way, assure its survival as a living tradition.
His Holiness the Dalai Lama has recognised the same importance of Rinpoche’s work. When Rinpoche invited His Holiness to the Tendrel Unity in Duality Conference in Munich in Oct. 2002, on learning what Tarab Rinpoche has been doing these years in western exile, His Holiness expressed his gratitude to Rinpoche, telling that he (His Holiness) had been searching for a Tibetan Lama capable of developing a modern approach as Tarab Rinpoche had done. His Holiness realised it was only Tarab Rinpoche capable of this. No one else had his deep, broad knowledge, plus the insight and investigative curiosity going beyond dogmatic attachment, allowing a new modern development, while still maintaining the essence and respect for the ancient knowledge.
The aim of the four-year Unity in Duality Education
The aim of the four-year Unity in Duality Education, developed by Tarab Tulku Rinpoche XI, is through its theoretical basis as well as through its practical application to give back to the individual the knowledge and the means to reclaim power in themselves and over their experiences. To this end, the Unity in Duality Education comprises an integral system of Science of Mind, Experience and Existence in their mutual interrelation, Personal Development as well as Spiritual Application.
The philosophical knowledge of Pratītyasamutpāda (tendrel), the interdependent nature of all that exists, has been expressed by Tarab Tulku XI in the form of the three interrelated polarities and unities of ‘subject’-‘object,’ ‘mind’-‘body’ and ‘energy (potential fields)-matter’. These three interrelated unities, at the same time, comprise the central Unity in Duality paradigm basic to the Unity in Duality Education. The Unity in Duality Education refers to the knowledge presented by traditional Buddhist Inner-scientists as contained in the Sutras and respective commentaries.
In its exposition of the interrelated nature, Pratītyasamutpāda (tendrel), Buddhist inner-science of mind, experience and what exists is systematically built up, thereby developing an increasingly subtle understanding of nature of existence as interrelated-arising. Out of his deep understanding of this basis of Buddhism, Tarab Tulku Rinpoche has extracted essential aspects and is presenting them in a way, that fundamental structures and interconnections become evident without previous Buddhist knowledge or training.
In modern cultures, as our reality is mainly based on the intellect, if we cannot understand something intellectually, we might find it interesting, but it won’t ever become part of our living reality. To give a solid foundation to the development of the individual, there needs to be an integrated understanding of the basic tenets relating to questions such as: “What exists?” “What is the subject’s experience of what exists?” and “How is one related to the other?”
integrated as a living knowledge within one’s experience
According to Tarab Tulku XI, this philosophical inquiry should not stand alone as abstract theoretical knowledge but must be integrated as a living knowledge within one’s experience. In short, the UD inner-science of mind, experience and existence is an integral understanding of the view of the interrelated nature of existence, Pratītyasamutpāda (tendrel), whether related to the ‘subject’ and ‘object’, ‘body’ and ‘mind’ or ‘matter’ and ‘energy (potential-field)’, or for that sake to any of the Eight Pratītyasamutpāda (tendrel) of Nāgārjuna (becoming and cessation, the finite and infinite, localisation and delocalisation, part and whole) or any other pair of polar relationships.
It was Tarab Rinpoche’s view that any of these pairs of opposites are only opposites at a surface level, whereas at a subtler level they are united. Realising and implementing this understanding in our everyday life would make a great difference to our way of experiencing what exists and thereby deal with our life as expressed at the end of Rinpoche’s Tendrel paper:
“Implementing the understanding of the integral nature of existence of these Four Pairs of Opposites – Unities, or even better, if we could embody the experience of these, many of our problems in life would decrease and instead give rise to a positive impact in terms of harmony and insight, which could carry us far beyond our present condition, both individually, inter-culturally, inter-nationally as well as in our connection with nature. And in order to integrate the oppositions and the unities for transcending the connected problems, insight into the Unity in Duality nature of existence by means of the three unities and polarities of ‘body’-‘mind’, ‘subject’-‘object’ and ‘energy’-‘matter’ seems to be very beneficial”.