Dakas and Dakinis

First of all I studied with Tibetan lamas from 1980 until the present in the U.S. and India and Nepal and received the Kalachakra Tantra from the Dalai Lama in 1985 in December in Bodhgaya along with my wife and children then which is a 4 day initiation for about 500,000 people often in native dress from Nepal, Tibet, and all over India and Bhutan and other Tibetan Buddhist Enclaves in Asia. There were also 10,000 westerners from the U.S., Canada, Europe, all over north and South America, Australia, New Zealand, and places like Japan, India and China and other places as well there in 1985 in December.

A Daka is a male angel and a Dakini is a female Angel in Tibetan. Often Tibetan Lamas and monks will call female human Tibetan Buddhist practitioners Dakinis as well, especially in the Nyingma tradition but likely also other traditions as well. There are Gelukpas like the Dalai Lama and Kagyus from Marpa and Mila Repa and Sakyas which in some ways are similar to Gelukpas in some ways because the Sakyas and Gelukpas are the most formally educated Sects whereas the kagyus and Nyingmas are more likely to spend years in Caves learning to levitate and other things like that learning to do supernatural things. It's all what people are interested in doing with their lives.

Remember, the Nyingma and Kagyu Traditions go back to Marpa and Milarepa to the 11th century and the Nyingma traditions go back to Padmasambhava in likely the time of King Trisondetsun of Tibet. So, since he reigned from 755 to 794 AD this is how far back the Nyingma traditions go before most people ever learned to read on earth any language.

In the old ways of imparting wisdom it was done aura to aura rather than intellectually. It was like putting whole encyclopedias of knowledge into the auras of your most able students so when they ripened with bodhichita. (kindness and right mindful actions) then they would have the use of great power and wisdom of helping their students to enlightenment too.

There is a kindness and a power here that I haven't seen anywhere in people's lives around the world except through Grace. Grace isn't limited to Christianity by the way it is in all religions and philosophies I have studied worldwide.

Trisong Detsen - Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Trisong_Detsen

Trisong Detsen (Tibetan: ཁྲི་སྲོང་ལྡེ་བཙན, Wylie: khri srong lde btsan, Lhasa dialect: [ʈʂʰisoŋ tetsɛ̃]) was the son of Me Agtsom, the 38th emperor of Tibet. He ruled from AD 755 until 797 or 804.

Father‎: ‎Me Agtsom

Reign‎: ‎755–794

Mother‎: ‎sna-nam-bza' mang-po-rje bzhi-sting

Born‎: ‎742

‎Trisong Detsen and his ... · ‎Indian traditions · ‎Chinese traditions · ‎Debates

 

Dakas and Dakinis

During the 1980s when I met and was initiated by many Tibetan Lamas in the U.S. and India and Nepal I was told that a male Angel was called a Daka and that a Dakini was a female Angel.

However, I'm not sure now that this directly correlates to a western point of view. Just like many New Age people assume wrongly that Christian Mystical points of view correlate directly to Eastern points of view in some ways, this really isn't true either.

In fact, the best way to look at this is that people are somewhat the same around the world but they are told very different types of creation stories and often those creation stories don't resemble each other at all. So, the ways people think about this from one culture to another are quite different.

But, the other way to look at this that basically all people are the same. They all have to breathe air, eat food, go to the bathroom, have children and protect them so they can grow up etc.

To emphasize subtle differences really isn't important unless someone's life is at stake. Besides, I grew up here in the U.S. and even among Christians both secular, religious or just spiritual non-religious ones there are varying points of view and yet most of us get along fine just by accepting each other on a more secular level ongoing. But, in every group of people there are also extremists because they have been abused in one way or another in life.

I have also have heard Lamas refer to a particularly beautiful female practitioner as a Dakini too because she was beautiful both inside (spiritually gifted) and without (physically amazing) at the same time. So, maybe what they were saying is this female being was inspirational to all beings like an incarnate angel here on earth.

There is also another point that might be important to make:

The didactic materialistic point of view in the western world is:
ONLY the PHYSICAL WORLD IS REAL
Then there is the Australian ABORIGINAL point  of view:
ONLY DREAMS ARE REAL THE PHYSICAL WORLD IS THE ILLUSION
Then there is the Tibetan Buddhist point of view:
Both dreams and the physical world are both equally real and unreal simultaneously all the time.

Depending upon how you deal with all these differences you could wind up in many different kinds of definitions of reality depending upon your point of view.

However, I subscribe to what I would call a "Practical point of view" which is:
If something I'm doing doesn't keep both me and this body alive why should I do it?

So, for me still, "Dakas are male angels and Dakinis are female angels even if I walk by one on the streets. Because maybe you and I are these angels too?