The Celestial Buddha Opame (Amitabha) looked down on the world from
his Pure Land, and saw the suffering of all beings. Opame felt great compassion for them.
From this thought of compassion Chenrezik (Avalokiteshvara) was born:
the embodiment of compassion; the Lord of Compassion. The mountains opened, and
water poured forth over the land and flowed into the
Indian Ocean. Chenrezik appeared on an island in the middle of Lhasa,
and seeing the suffering of all beings, vowed that he would help
all beings to realize nirvana, the ultimate reality, peace.
Chenrezik vowed that he would never withdraw from the world until all
living beings, right down to the last blade of grass, attained to peace.
In the lake there were many beings, and they all cried out for bodies.
Chenrezik, hearing their cries, gave the beings the bodies they asked
for, but they were all the same, and so the beings all begged to be
different from one another. Chenrezik then gave each of them a
different body, each distinctive and unlike any other.
Chenrezik, the Lord of Compassion, preached the dharma, the
teachings of the buddhas, that all beings in the lake, countless
numbers of them, could attain nirvana. Many beings did attain
the peace of nirvana, but every time Chenrezik returned to
the lake, there were many more beings, far more than he had already helped.
Again he preached the dharma, and again many beings attained nirvana.
When Chenrezik looked into the lake for the third time and saw so
many beings needing help, he grew full of despair. Realizing
what an impossible task he had set for himself, he cried to
the Celestial Buddha Opame that he wanted to give back his noble
vow, for the task was too great for him alone to fulfill. In
his despair and compassion Chenrezik's body shattered into innumerable pieces.
Opame, seeing his plight, reformed his body, giving him even
more power to help all living beings. Chenrezik now had eleven heads,
surmounted by Opame's own head, and a thousand arms, and an all-seeing
eye in the palm of each hand. Still Chenrezik saw his task as
impossible: even with a thousand arms and eleven heads, there
were so many beings and their minds were so clouded with impure thoughts.
Chenrezik cried, and from a crystal teardrop on his cheek,
Dolma (Tara) was born to help him.
So there is no being, no matter how insignificant, whose suffering
is not seen by Chenrezik or Dolma, and who cannot be touched by their compassion.
CULTURE