Comparing rBa and dBa'

Some preliminary notes from the comparison of the two manuscripts. For the sources, see the previous post.

 

a). 

The man copying rBa does not know the notations in dBa' except in two places. This means we are dealing with an exemplar with only the lowest strata of dBa' annotations, i.e. most of those found in dBa' don't yet exist or are unavailable. Now I've dated most of the annotations in dBa' after 1200 in my article published in Trading Religions, ed. Volker Rabens and Peter Wick, published by Brill. So rBa text looks earlier than this, i.e. before 1200. It shows, however, even from just these two indications, that rBa is later than dBa', representing a recension that breaks off from dBa' at an early stage.

b).

rBa is seriously redacted by a hard-nosed intellectual. That's how I see him anyway. He wants no fluff and fancy talk, gets rid of the honorific forms, and shows off his Sanskrit words. He also takes the emperor down a notch, calling him rGyal po. What's the political agenda I wonder? He will also not have the narrative as བཀའ, a word that is expunged. So some are glorifying the narrative, others are taking a harsh reductive view towards it. This is surely defined by the purpose the historical story is meant to serve. 

c).

rBa knows sGam po as a current and accepted title, and mentions it most times, unlike dBa', where it is carefully explained and then used. I guess this shows rBa is later.

d). 

Both dBa' and rBa have problems with the portion giving the account of the visit of the monks from Khotan. The start is flawed in both. This means, to my mind, that the manuscript source of the Li Yul story is damaged as found: the front folio is torn and unclear, thus the slightly garbled sentence in both. I think this is going to tell us something about the recensions of dBa' and rBa. Maybe there are 2 copies of the original story? Unlikely. My guess is that dBa' and rBa already represent two recensions, albeit at an early stages. The rBa recension we see through the lens of a strong redaction. Our scribe of rBa will not sanction, or does not know, the name of the text with the Khotan story.

Notes arising from the collation of dBa’ (2000) and rBa (2011.1)

Sources

In my study, the following sources have been used. In this list I give the title of the manuscript or version, followed by the place and date of first publication. In this listing we do not seek to priviledge any particular copy chronologically apart from the first three.

Dunhuang fragment, London 2008
This is a manuscript fragment from Dunhuang now in the collections of the British Library, London. It is the oldest surviving text giving a recognisable portion of the narrative. It was published first in Sam van Schaik and Kazushi Iwao, “Fragments of the Testament of Ba from Dunhuang,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 128 (2008): 477-88. This will be referred to in this book as the BL fragment.

དབའ་བཞེད་ Vienna 2000
This is the oldest known version of the text known so far and the focus of the present study. It was first published in Pasang Wangdu and Hildegard Diemberger, dBa’ bzhed: The Royal Narrative Concerning the Bringing of the Buddha's Doctrine to Tibet (Vienna: Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2000). The text, casually but correctly written in a cursive hand, was reproduced photographically. The same manuscript was reproduced as a photo-lithograph facsimile in volume 36 of Bod gyi lo rgyus rnam thar phyogs bsgrigs gnyis pa published from Ziling in 2011 (see TBRC W1PD153537).  This will be referred to as dBa’ (2000).

རྦ་བཞེད་ Ziling 2011
This version was reproduced as a photo-lithograph facsimile in volume 36 of Bod gyi lo rgyus rnam thar phyogs bsgrigs gnyis pa,  published from Ziling in 2011 (see TBRC W1PD153537).  This text is closely related to dBa’ (2000) in paleographic terms and the narrative also corresponds up to folio 6v, after which the text turns to events in the life of the Buddha. This will be referred to here as rBa (2011.1).

སྦ་བཞེད་ Paris 1961
This version appeared in R. A. Stein, Une chronique ancienne de bSam-yas (Paris : Institut des hautes études chinoises, 1961). The publication consists of a facsimile of a hand-copy of an old manuscript made for Hugh Richardson, the well-known pioneer of Tibetan studies. Stein collated this with a second manuscript in the possession of G. Tucci. The Richardson version will be referred to here as sBa (1961.1), while the Tucci manuscript used for collation by Stein referred to as sBa (1961.2).

སྦ་བཞེད་ Pecin 1982
This version, published by mGon po rGyal mtshan under the title sBa bzhed, was issued from Pecin in 1980 and 1982 (see TBRC W20000). The text presented is based on three allied manuscripts not otherwise know. In this book, this version is referred to as the sBa (1982). In time, as the three copies behind this version become know, it may be possible to refer to the three manuscripts as: sBa (1982.1), sBa (1982.2) and sBa (1982.3).

སྦ་བཞེད་ Pecin 2009
This version was published as part of the <rBa bzhed> phyogs bsgrigs edited by bDe skyid and issued from Pecin in 2009 (pp. 80–158). It consists of an edited transcription of a source resembling sBa (1982) and this source may turn out to be one of the three manuscripts used by mGon po rGyal mtshan, i.e. sBa (1982.1, 2 or 3). This version, in any event, will be referred to here as sBa (2009.1).

ཆོས་འབྱུང་གི་ཡི་གེ་ཞིབ་མོ་ Pecin 2009
This version was also published as part of the <rBa bzhed> phyogs bsgrigs edited by bDe skyid and issued in 2009 (pp. 159–236). It consists of an edited transcription of a source resembling sBa (1961.1-2) but since a transcription of that is also included in the phyogs bsgrigs, this source comes from elsewhere, and may also turn out to be one of the three manuscripts used to create sBa (1982). This version, in any event, will be referred to here as sBa (2009.2).

རྦ་བཞེད་ Ziling 2011
This version was reproduced in a photo-lithograph facsimile in volume 36 of Bod gyi lo rgyus rnam thar phyogs bsgrigs gnyis pa published from Ziling in 2011 (see TBRC W1PD153537).  This copy, neaty written in a dense cursive hand, stands in the same Zhabs btag ma recension as sBa (1961.1-2) and sBa (2009.2). It is referred to in this book as rBa (2011.2).

Concordance of text sources and abbreviations

BL fragment            Dunhuang fragment, London 2008
dBa‘ (2000)            དབའ་བཞེད་ Vienna 2000   
rBa (2011.1)            རྦ་བཞེད་ Ziling 2011
sBa (1961.1-2)            སྦ་བཞེད་ Paris 1961
sBa (1982.1-3)            སྦ་བཞེད་ Pecin 1982
sBa (2009.1)            སྦ་བཞེད་ Pecin 2009
sBa (2009.2)            ཆོས་འབྱུང་གི་ཡི་གེ་ཞིབ་མོ་ Pecin 2009
rBa (2011.2)            རྦ་བཞེད་ Ziling 2011

TBRC                Tibetan Buddhist Resource Center

 

 

UNIVERSITY OF CEYLON REVIEW (here refered to as UCR)

The UCR describes itself as being "founded in order to make contact with scholars in literary subjects, to provide a medium of publication for the research in those subjects conducted in the University, and to provide a learned review for Ceylon."

The result is a heterogeneous assortment of contributions, ranging from early history to biology and public policy. Nonetheless, there are valuable contributions that merit the attention of historians.

LIFE DATES: Vol. 1, no. 1 (1943)-v. 25, nos. 1 & 2 (April-Oct. 1967)

SUPERCEDED BY: Ceylon Journal of the Humanities later the The Sri Lanka Journal of the Humanities; Modern Ceylon Studies

ONLINE PDFs: This is provided by the University of Peradeniya

The UCR is available online, with free PDFs, via this link: UCR Index

 

The problem for researchers is that external search engines do not penetrate the online version. Moreover, the search tool provided by the University requires an exact entry, otherwise searches will not return a result. The browsing tool is helpful, but you still have to know what you are looking for, either the subject or the author.

INDEX TOOL:
The following list provides links to some of the key authors and articles.
This is not included in Wikipedia because the policy there is not to list the journal content. For this policy matter: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Academic_Journals

NOTABLE AUTHORS:
Articles by A. P. Buddhadatta
Articles by R. A. L. H. Gunawardana [from The Sri Lanka Journal of the Humanities]
Articles by C. W. Nicholas
Articles by S. Paranavitana [but be warned!! Paranavitana biography and problems]

NOTABLE SUBJECTS:
Tamil inscriptions
Inscriptions dealing with endowments (1)
Inscriptions dealing with endowments (2)

dBa' bzhed British Library Fragment

This is the link to the folio fragment in the British Library collection:
http://idp.bl.uk/database/oo_scroll_h.a4d?uid=-7388728257;bst=1;recnum=15039;index=1;img=1

Spelling of a word in the dBA' BZHED

In folio 3r and elsewhere in the dBa' bzhed, བརྫངས is consistently spelt bsdzangs.
My question is whether anyone has seen this spelling in other documents or sources.

Here is the text from folio 3r (lines 1-2) which you can see the PDF sent round to the group. 
Princess Mum shang ong co and her royal entourage, numbering three hundred, were sent up (to Tibet)
མུཾ་ཤང་ཨོང་ཅཱོ་རྗེ་འབངས་སུཾ་བརྒྱ་ཡར་བརྫངས།

Bell at dPa' ris

In 2010 a new Tibetan inscription on a bell was found at dPa' ris, in the county of the same name, south of Wuwei city, Gansu. The bell is cast in iron with a Tibetan inscription. The bottom of the bell has projecting tongues or lobes on each of which is a small lion-like face. The inscription and lion faces appear as lines raised in relief, having been included in the design of the bell when it was cast.

The inscription is in three lines in dBu can. It has been published by Lha mchog skyabs, a Professor at North West Nationalities University, Lanzhou, with photographs, in Bod ljongs zhib 'jug (Tibetan Studies) 1 (2011).

The inscription's main historical interest is the mention of the Tibetan king Khri gtsug lde brstan (circa 704-55). The record, however, does not appear to belong to the time of the king it mentions because the paleography is mature Tibetan, with none of the archaic features seen at bSam Yas. This is therefore an anachronistic record, made to celebrate or construct an earlier king's association with a particular place. Iron Buddhist objects are known especially from the 10th century, see the Buddha head in the British Museum with the number 1943,0215.1 (visible online via the Museum's website). It is likely that the motivation for making the inscription was to confirm, through historic precedent, the privileges or properties of the temple mentioned.

TEXT:

bod kyi lha btsan po khri gtsug lde brstan mched kyi sku yon du bsngo ste zhang rgya sgra rgyal slebs spad kyis jag rong dga' ldan byin cen gtsug lag khang gi rkyen du dril chen cik pul ba'i yon bdag dang sems can thams cad bla na myed de byang cub kyi ryub bar smon to | drill 'di lcags kong gis yi ge bri ste dge slong chos prin gyis blugso |

བོད་ཀྱི་ལྷ་བཙན་པོ་ཁྲི་གཙུག་ལྡེ་བརྩན་མཆེད་ཀྱི་སྐུ་ཡོན་དུ་བསྔོ་སྟེ་ཞང་རྒྱ་སྒྲ་རྒྱལ་སླེབས་སྤད་ཀྱིས་ཇག་རོང་དགའ་ལྡན་བྱིན་ཅེན་གཙུག་ལག་ཁང་གི་རྐྱེན་དུ་དྲིལ་ཆེན་ཅིཀ་པུལ་བའི་ཡོན་ཀྱིས་ཡོན་བདག་དང་སེམས་ཅན་ཐམས་ཅེད་བླ་ན་མྱེད་དེ་བྱང་ཅུབ་ཀྱི་རྱུབ་བར་སྨོན་ཏོ་༑དྲིལླ་འདི་ལྕགས་ཀོང་གིས་ཡིགེ་བྲི་སྟེ་དགེ་སློང་ཆོས་པྲིན་གྱིས་བླུགསོ༑

Pasang Wandu offered this translation at a conference in Vienna in 2011.

As a religious for the god, btsan po of Tibet, Khri gTsug lde brstan and his brother, The zang lha sgra rgyal slebs spad, mad and offer this big bell to the Jag rong dg's ldan cen gtsug lag khang, in order to wish donor and all living beings will be perfected in the highest enlightenment. The inscription of the the bell was written by lcags kong, it was cast by dge slong (monks who have taken the highest monastic vows) chos prin.

The statement of Sang shi at the bSam yas debate

Following my last post, I here give the remarks by Sang shi in the dB'a bzhed. This comes immediately after the statement of Kamalaśīla. Please refer to the previous post for introductory remarks. This portion is characterised by an abbreviated rhetorical style, giving a sense, in my view, of a strongly asserted argument set out in a debating context.

folio 22r
༦    ཅེས་བཀའ་སྩལ་པ་དང༴ སང་ཤིའི་མཆིད་ནས་རྒྱའི་ཅིག་ཅར་འཇུག་ཅིང་རིམ་གྱིས་སྦྱོར་བ་མཆིས། ཕ་རོལ་དུ་ཕྱིན་པ་དྲུག་ཀྱང་འཛིན་པ་མ་མཆིས་པའི་ཕྱིར་སྦྱིན་པར་
༧    མིང་བཏགས་ཏེ༴  ཁམས་༣་ཡོངས་སུ་བཏང་སྟེ༴ བདག་དང་བདག་གི་འཛིན་པ་མ་མཆིས་ན་སྦྱིན་པའི་ནང་ན་ཐཾད་བཏང་བ་ཡིན། སྒོ་༣་གྱི་ནོངས་པ་འགོག་པ་ནི་ཚུལ་ཁྲིམས་
folio 22v
༡    ཏེ༴  རྣཾ་པར་མི་རྟོག་པ་ལ་ནོངས་པ་མ་མཆིས་ན་ལྷག་པའི་ཚུལ་ཁྲིམས་བསྲུང་མི་འཚལོ༎ ཆོས་གང་ལ་ཡང་བཟོད་པ་དང་མི་བཟོད་པ་མེད་ན་བཟོད་པའི་མཆོག་ལགས།
༢    ལེ་ལོ་ཡོད་པས་བརྩོན་འགྲུས་སུ་མིང་བཏགས། བརྩོན་པ་དང་མི་བརྩོན་པ་མེད་ན་བརྩོན་འགྲུས་ཀྱི་མཆོག་མི་ཤིགས་པ་སྲ་བ་ཞེས་བྱ་སྟེ་བརྩོན་འགྲུས་ཀྱི་མཆོག་ལགས་།
༣    སེམས་གཡེངས་པ་ཡོད་པས་བསམ་གཏན་དུ་མིང་བདགས། སེམས་གཡེངས་བ་མེད་ན་བསམ་གཏན་དུ་མིང་འདོགས། ཆོས་ཉིད་མི་ཤེས་པས་ཤེས་རབ་དུ་མིང་བདགས། ཆོས་རང་དང་
༤    སྤྱིའི་མཚན་ཉིད་མ་ནོར་བར་ཤེས་ན་ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་མཆོག་ལགྶ་སྟེ་སྟོན་པ་མྱ་ངན་ལས་འདས་ནས་རིང་ཞིག་ཏུ་ལྟ་བ་མི་མཐུན་པ་ཡང་མེད་ན། སླད་ཀྱི་རྒྱ་གར་གྱི་དབུ་
༥    མ་རྣཾས་༣་མ་མཐུན་པ་དང༴ རྒྱའི་ཏོན་ཙེན་ཞིག་པར་གྱུར་ཏེ་མ་མཇལ་བ་ཀུན་མ་རྟོགས་པ་ལས་གྱུར་གྱི། འཇུག་པའི་སྒོ་ཐ་དད་ཀྱང་དོན་མི་རྟོག་མི་དམིགས་པར་༡། འབྲས་
༦    བུ་མྱ་ངན་ལས་འདས་པ་འཚལ་བ་ཡང་༡་ཅེས་སྤྱི་འཐུན་པ་སྐད་དུ་གསོལ།

folio 22r (line 6)
... whereon Sang shi commented: “There is the application through gradual stages and the instantaneous entrance of the Chinese. Because you (followers of the instantaneous path) do not apprehend even the Six Perfections, by totally abandoning the world (of form, the formless and desire) in the name of charitable giving, (it follows that) under the rubric of charitable giving everything is abandoned since there is no sense of self and belonging to self.

Preventing faults in body, speech and mind constitutes moral conduct,
folio 23v
but since (you hold that) there is no fault when there is no conceptualisation, (it follows that) abiding by higher moral conduct is not at issue.

Since (you hold that) forbearance and lack of forbearance do not exist whatever the circumstance, (it follows that neither forbearance nor the lack of forbearance) has to be the best of forbearance.

Diligence is named so because of laziness, but since (you hold that) effort and non-effort do not exist, (it follows that neither effort nor non-effort) has to be the best form of diligence which, by your definition, is firm and unchanging.

One-pointed concentration is so named because of distraction, but since (you hold that) distraction does not exist, (it follows that) concentration cannot be defined as such.

Wisdom is so named due to an inability to comprehend the intrinsic nature of phenomena. If you properly understood the difference between the reality of phenomena and their visible characteristics, that would be the best wisdom.

The context (of these misunderstandings) is that after the Teacher had passed beyond sorrow, there were no doctrinal differences for a long time. Later, there were disagreements in the three Indian schools of Mādhyamika and there also appeared the gradualist and instantaneous paths in China. All emerged due to misunderstandings after (the Buddha) was to be seen no more. Otherwise, even though the approaches vary, the state of non-conceptualisation and non-observation are one. The result also, the striving for nirvāṇa, is one. This is universally agreed.”