55Godhuripa

Godhuripa was a bird catcher from Disunagar. One day while catching some songbirds in the jungle, he met a yogin on his way into town to beg food. When the yogin saw him with his nets filled with tiny birds, the yogin asked why he was doing such a cruel thing. Godhuripa said “I know it’s wrong. I suppose the many evils of my past lives have forced me into this violent trade in order to live. I’m ashamed of this miserable existence, but its all I know how to do.”

In reply, the yogin said he’s only making his karma worse by plying this trade. Depressed, Godhuripa sat down under a tree and began to weep. He then looked at the yogin and begged for help. He released the songbirds from his net, and the yogin granted him initiation through a transfer of grace. Then the guru instructed him in the meditation that concentrates all attention on one dominant image, and he was to visualize all the sounds in the world as his memory of birdsong, until sound and birdsong become one.

Godhuripa meditated until all sound had become one sound, inseparable from emptiness. After 9 years, all the defilements of his perception vanished and he gained mahamudra-siddhi.

He remained in the world for another 100 years working for all sentient beings, and then, with 300 disciples, he arose bodily into the Paradise of the Dakinis.

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