Kritik am Buch „The Shadow Of The Dalai Lama ... - Neues von Shi De

which itself has eight petals. Once again the pattern of the ganachakra, which we have already
encountered in the center of the sand mandala, is repeated in this bouquet. In the middle of each of the
eight lotuses a couple sits in close embrace and on each of the eight surrounding petals we can discern
a goddess. This makes a total of eighty deities (64 shaktis, 8 female partners, and 8 male deities).
The large number of shaktis, “daughters” of the mudras “sacrificed” in the ganachakra, is an indicator
of how fundamentally the idea of the tantric female sacrifice determines the doctrine of time and its
artistic representation. At the gates which lead out from the fourth segment into the third “mandala of
enlightened mind”, we are once again confronted with the symbolic representation of “sacrificial
goddesses”. Aside from this, 36 further shaktis, who represent the root syllables of the Sanskrit
alphabet and thereby the building blocks of language, live in this building complex.
As the final and outermost segment of the mandala palace we enter the “body mandala”. There we
meet the 360 deities of the days of the year. Here too we encounter the basic pattern of the
ganachakra. There are twelve large lotuses, each with 28 petals. In the center of each flower a god
and a goddess embrace one another, all around them sit 28 goddesses grouped into three rows. Each
lotus thus exhibits 30 deities, multiplying by twelve we have the 360 day gods (five days are not
calculated). In addition we meet in the body mandala twelve pairs of wrathful deities and 36
goddesses of desire.
We have nonetheless not yet described all the grounds of the palace. The five square architectural
units already mentioned are namely bordered by six circular segments. Numerous symbols of bliss
like wheels, wish-granting jewels, shells, mirrors, and so on, rest in the arcs (quadrants) which are
formed between the last square and the first circle. The five subsequent circles symbolize the elements
in the following order: earth, water, fire, wind, and space. Cemeteries are to be found on circles three
and four, depicted in the form of wheels. In the imagination they are inhabited by ten horrifying
dakinis with their partners. From a Buddhist point of view this “ring of the dead” signifies that only
he who has surmounted his bodily existence may enter the mandala palace.
The fifth circle of space is represented by a chain of golden vajras. The whole mandala is surrounded
by a circle of flames as a sixth ring. According to a number of commentator this is supposed to
represent the wisdom of Buddha; however, if we further pursue the fate of the sand mandala, it must
be associated with the “world fire” (Kalagni) which in the end burns down the palace of the time gods.
As aesthetic and peaceful as the sand mandala may appear to be to a Western observer, it still
conceals behind it the frozen ornament of the sacrificial ritual of Tantrism. Every single female figure
which inhabits the palace of time, be she a dakini, shakti, or a “sacrificial goddess”, is the bearer of
the so sought after “gynergy” which the yogi has appropriated through his sexual magic practices so
as to then let it flow as the power source of his androgynous mystic body. The Kalachakra palace is
thus an alchemic laboratory for the appropriation of life energies. In the ritual fate of the sand
mandala we shall unmistakably demonstrate that it is a gigantic sacrificial altar. It is not just the
shaktis who are sacrificed, but the erotic couples as well, who delight the temple with their untroubled
pleasures of love, indeed the time god (Kalachakra) and the time goddess (Vishvamata) themselves.
The downfall of them all is preordained, their fate is sealed.
The construction of the Kalachakra sand mandala
The construction of the Kalachakra sand mandala is a complex and multilayered procedure which is