The Tibetan Book of the Dead · Reading 45 of 170

The Dawning of the Peaceful Deities, from the First to the Seventh Day

The Sixth Day

Reading 2 of 11

The setting-face-to-face for that is, calling the deceased by name, thus:

O nobly-born, until yesterday each of the Five Orders of Deities had shone upon thee, one by one; and thou hadst been set face to face, but, owing to the influence of thine evil propensities, thou wert awed and terrified by them and hast remained here till now.

If thou hadst recognized the radiances of the Five Orders of Wisdom to be the emanations from thine own thought-forms, ere this thou wouldst have obtained Buddhahood in the Sambhoga-Kāya, through having been absorbed into the halo of rainbow light in one or another of the Five Orders of Buddhas.

But now look on undistractedly. Now the lights of all Five Orders, called the Lights of the Union of Four Wisdoms, will come to receive thee. Act so as to know them.