Pure Ore
Mounted on Wind

Short Summary

The introduction to Pure Ore Mounted on Wind (2024) is a reflection on the epistemic, soteriological, and ontological foundations of the Buddhadharma, critically juxtaposed with both Western religious traditions and contemporary materialist science. The work unfolds as a textual distillation of core Buddhist insights, emphasizing the existential and experiential nature of Buddhist practice over scriptural dogma, and stressing the direct phenomenology of meditation as central to liberation from suffering.

The term “Buddhism” itself is critiqued, tracing its invention in the 18th century and arguing that the term inadequately captures the multiplicity and divergence of views found across its traditions. The Buddhadharma is not text-based in the manner of Abrahamic religions, nor is it reducible to a philosophy or psychology. Instead, it is an experiential path that resists reification, grounded in meditative praxis and the rejection of blind faith.

The uncritical alignment of modern Western Buddhism with scientific discourse, particularly its adoption of an outdated positivist epistemology, is criticized. The warning is against instrumentalizing Buddhism as a “science of mind,” arguing instead that its soteriological telos—namely, the cessation of suffering—cannot be assimilated into empirical science without distortion. In a parallel critique, the limitations of both ontological materialism and idealism are exposed, advancing instead a process-based ontology consonant with Buddhist nominalism.

Four Dzogchen texts are introduced and provided with commentary.

1. Three Vital Points

Garab Dorje’s testament is given in three verses :

“Directly introduced to the original face.
Once and for all, deciding upon this unique state.
Confidently continuing with self-release.”

The accompanying commentary emphasizes that these cannot be intellectualized. Supreme yoga is “too good, too close, and too easy,” yet language inevitably falls short. The intellect—rooted in reflective, conceptual thought—cannot grasp the reflexive knowing that is rigpa. Thus, while poetic pointers may hint at the nature of the mind, true recognition arises only when the “clouds shielding the Sun of Wisdom” disperse, allowing direct awareness to shine forth unobstructed.

2. Nine Touchstones

This section lists nine evocative terms :

Nonreferential · Spontaneous · All-Inclusive · Identity · Pristine Awareness · Nonaction · Pure Pleasure · Nonduality · Boundlessness · Natural Dispensation

The commentary makes clear that these are not definitions, but rather “suggestions, intimations, and metaphorical doorways” into the non-positional experience of awareness. They are deployed precisely because any denotative, academic description merely reinforces distraction. By presenting these nine “verbal indicators,” one aims to incite synchronistic recognitions of rigpa, ungluing the practitioner from conceptual fixations and pointing instead to the mind’s reflexive self-knowing.

3. The Cuckoo’s Song

Rendered here as a six-line poem attributed to Vairochana (“The Song of the Cuckoo”), its verses celebrate the ever-present nonduality of phenomena and liken the sudden cry of the cuckoo—announcing spring—to the awakening of rigpa. The commentary recounts how, in the 8th century, Vairochana smuggled these “Six Vajra Verses” into Tibet. They are “the synthesis of the entire supreme yoga teaching.” Hearing this song is likened to entering nirvāṇa amid saṃsāra, for once the mind’s luminosity is recognized, “nowhere does any fixation happen, and rigpa prevails.”

4. Always Already

The text enumerates four “vows” or samayas that rigpa inherently fulfills the moment it is recognized—solemn pledges that need no cultivation :

No Ego

This samaya marks the end of the reified, isolated “I.” With no fixed ego to uphold, there is “no imposed, fabricated, contrived pledge. There is no discipline to be kept, no rules to be accepted and held. … This absence is the ground of the other three nondual pledges.” In other words, self-liberation begins by dispelling the substantialist fiction of a permanent self.

Spaciousness  

Contingent on the absence of ego, spaciousness evokes śūnyatā. It “signifies the lack of inherent existence, a never-interrupted, ubiquitous, and limitless state” and is likened to the sky—“the zero-matrix of the living present in which all possible objects arise, abide, and cease. Space itself remains the same and knows no coming and going.” This all-encompassing openness is celebrated as the wisdom of space.

Oneness

Here, Dzogchen’s “two-in-oneness” is distinguished from unqualified monism : “all objects, albeit illusory, appear in the one ultimate mirror of consciousness,” yet “dualistic … phenomena” continue to display within that mirror.“ Ultimate oneness does not hinder the dualistic, conventional display of valid or invalid objects. True nonduality thus accommodates the play of appearances.

Natural Flow

Upon recognizing the “face,” rigpa’s fruition is “a natural outflow, an effortless display without actor, identifications, purpose, or object, except fulfilling the perfection of the present moment … and a natural, relaxed way of conduct.” The first two samayas (absence and spaciousness) open the ground ; these last two describe its spontaneous unfolding.

Together, these four samayas depict rigpa as ever-present (no ego), boundlessly open (spaciousness), inherently nondual (oneness), and spontaneously expressive (natural flow)—not practices to be achieved but the self-liberating qualities of awareness revealed the moment it is recognized. 

The commentary insists that these samayas are not practices to be undertaken, but rather the natural “glow” of rigpa itself. Once the “face” of awareness is recognized, every moment—from the simplest action to the wildest storm of emotion—already embodies these four samayas. Thoughts, feelings, and perceptions “self-release” precisely because they unfold within the space of unbroken awareness. Thus, there is no future attainment of compassion, conduct, or freedom ; they have “always already” been present wherever rigpa shines.

The Q&A commentary underscores that intrinsic awareness “is our present home, whether we realize it or not,” and that even the darkest afflictions are saturated by its backdrop. Once recognized, thoughts and emotions “self-release,” unwinding effortlessly. There is no secret method to validate this ever-present luminosity ; authority is supplanted by the incontrovertible “fragrance of a rose” that rigpa itself discloses.