The Thunder Diamond and The Chalice
Expand Wisdom and Boost Courage
with Amanda Raby
Tired of feeling stuck in your shadow work practice? By the end of this 2-part series, you’ll know how to use two powerful ritual tools in your go-to, surefire, Tantric technique to expand wisdom, deepen self-awareness, and boost courage in your shadow-work practice.
In Part 1 of this series, you'll learn about the 2 powerful ritual tools, their backstories, and the technique so watch that first to get the DL. This is psycho-magic genius at its best.
The Part-2 meditation is an essential practice where you can put the tools to use in a guided meditation. Save it to your YouTube Meditation Playlist so you can watch it again and again.
Ancient artifacts representing the Thunder Diamond (Dorje) or (Vajra)
The Chalice or Bell, Ghanta in Sankrit, represents the Perfection of Wisdom (Prajna Paramita, in Sanskrit)—wisdom, which directly realizes emptiness. This is the divine feminine principle.
The Thunder Diamond or Dorje, Vajra in Sanskrit, is the bell’s inseparable consort. It represents compassion, form and means (or method). This is the divine masculine principle.
They are inseparable implements because, together, they represent indivisible emptiness and form, or wisdom and compassion. In Mahayana Buddhism, both wisdom and compassion—together—are the path to Enlightenment.
The symbolism of the traditional implements is inspiring.
A nine-pronged Ghanta and Vajra set with copper case and Mahakala face. This is a specialized set, with particular symbolism, handcrafted by artisans in Nepal.
There are many different types of Vajra. They basically fall into two broad categories. Those with “closed prongs” are suitable for all practices, while the “open prongs” are only meant for specialized practices, given out by a qualified teacher, and generally wrathful.
Another representation of the Vajra (Dorje)
This esoteric Tantric technique comes from Vajrayana Buddhism and the ritual tools predate Buddhism and can be traced all the way back to the mysterious Indus culture. Advanced Tantric practitioners are rarely seen meditating without these two powerful implements. This video may seem like a parody but this technique is actually a mega-manifesto manipulator of self awareness.
This video series really just scratches the surface of these tools. There are many ways to use these implements. Leave a comment and let us know if you would like us to go deeper into the Tantric Magic Arts with more videos.
Here, you can see why it may be significantly influential to get your hands on a real Ghanta.
The Ghanta and Vajra, Bell and Thunder Diamond, a.k.a. Dorje, represent multiple concepts from various sources including:
Indivisible Emptiness (Chalice) and Form (Thunder Diamond)
Wisdom realizing emptiness (Chalice) and Compassionate Action (Thunder Diamond)
Personal meditation, ‘Yidam’, deity (Thunder Diamond), and your deity’s mandala (the Chalice).
The six perfections: the Perfection of Wisdom (Chalice) and the five perfections of generosity, morality, patience, perseverance, concentration (the five prongs of the Thunder Diamond)
The path to Enlightenment: Wisdom (Chalice) and Compassion (Thunder Diamond)
Thunder Diamond and the Chalice, together, symbolize the penetrating wisdom and compassion of the Heart Sutra.
Wisdom (Chalice) and Means (Thunder Diamond)
Sounds of Emptiness—sacred music and mantras—from the Bell and the forms of Enlightenment from the Thunder Diamond, including manifested Buddhas (five prongs representing five Wisdom Buddhas)
Bell representing Dharmakaya Truth Body and Dorje representing both the Sambhogakaya “Enjoyment Body” and “Nirmanakaya” Transformation Body
Great Mind (Bell) and Great Realization and Purity (Dorje)
LEARN from a
master
use the union to practice The 6 Perfections
The five prongs on the classical five-pronged Dorje is said to represent the five “male” perfections (male=method) of:
generosity | morality | patience | perseverance | concentration
The mouth of the bell, the open dome that generates the sound of emptiness, represents the sixth —and “female”—perfection of wisdom.
Inspired by this article? Subscribe to our YouTube Channel, coming soon, and join our Facebook Group, #YouAreTheSpell to co-create psycho-magic and trade magic secrets in community.