Treatise on Distinguishing Consciousness from Wisdom

Treatise on Distinguishing Consciousness from Wisdom (T. rnam shes ye shes ‘byed pa; pronounced namshe yeshe gepa). A treatise by the 3rd Karmapa, Rangjung Dorje.

Clark Johnson states:

The Treatise Distinguishing Consciousness from Wisdom was written by the eminent scholar, the Third Karmapa, Rangjung Dorje. Like most other texts on Mahamudra practice, this treatise is not in the form of a scholarly thesis, but in the form of a song of realization, or doha. A spiritual song distills the realization of the Vajrayana practitioner in verse, with each line usually having nine syllables. This particular text is very compact and comprises only thirty-six verses. In the nineteenth century the great scholar, Jamgon Kongtrul, wrote a longer commentary on this treatise to help clarify its meaning.

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Distinguishing Consciousness from Wisdom is an important text on psychology, as well as Buddhist philosophy. Rangjung Dorje arrives at conclusions about how the mind works which are far different from what modern Western psychology would suggest.

Title variations

• རྣམ་ཤེས་ཡེ་ཤེས་འབྱེད་པ rnam shes ye shes ‘byed pa, Treatise on Distinguishing Consciousness from Wisdom
• རྣམ་ཤེས་ཡེ་ཤེས་འབྱེད་པའི་བསྟན་བཅོས་, on the relationship of transmigrating consciousness (vijnana) and transcending awareness (jnana)

Sources

• Thrangu Rinpoche, Transcending Ego: Distinguishing Consciousness from Wisdom, Translated by Peter Alan Roberts. Edited by Clark Johnson. Boston: Shambhala Publications, 2001. Full text.