Early terma as found manuscripts.
In Nepal this spring, I spent a pleasant hour on a guesthouse rooftop in conversation with Dan Hirshberg, a Harvard PhD candidate. Dan has been studying the earliest biographies of Nyang ral, the great...
View ArticleAuthors, plagiarists, or tradents?
Time and again in modern studies of Tibetan literature of whatever sort, whether histories, technical treatises, tantric commentaries or treasure texts, we find the blithe, unreflective use of words...
View ArticlePadmasambhava in early Tibetan myth and ritual: Part 1, Introduction.
When did the figure of Padmasambhava first become mythologised, when did he first become incorporated into ritual, when did his apotheosis begin? For Tibetan tradition, the answers are simple....
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Padmasambhava in early Tibetan myth and ritual, Part 2: IOLTibJ321
Let me begin this reassessment of the early sources on Padmasambhava with IOL TibJ321. One of the most remarkable finds from Dunhuang, this manuscript in 85 folios[1] contains a complete Nyingma...
View ArticleThe wonderful Orgyan Ling Manuscript Kanjur
Tibetans, especially Nyingmapas, recount numerous legends of ‘Hidden Lands’ (sbas yul). These are places of refuge where the Dharma can be safeguarded in times of political danger and religious...
View ArticleThe great Khu tsha zla ‘od
Much has been written about many Tibetan lamas in recent years, but one who has received perhaps less attention than he deserves is the great Khu tsha zla ‘od. According to Kongtrul (1813-1899), he...
View ArticleDid Vairocana have lice?
According to Pasang Wangdu and Hildegaard Diemberger’s translation of the dBa’ bzhed, [1] Pa gor Vairocana, the great translator and Buddhist culture hero of Imperial-period Tibet, might have been...
View ArticlePadmasambhava in early Tibetan myth and ritual, Part 3: ‘miraculous births’...
In her seminal work on the Padmsambhava hagiographies, Anne-Marie Blondeau (1980) has famously described how the traditional narratives of Padmasambhava exist in parallel ‘womb birth’ (mngal skyes) and...
View ArticlePadmasambhava in early Tibetan myth and ritual, Part 4: so who was Śāntigarbha?
This belated blog is, as promised, for Dan Martin, who had questions for me some weeks ago about the way Śāntigarbha is thought about in the later rNying ma tradition. So just who was Śāntigarbha?...
View ArticleEarly guru yoga, indigenous ritual, and Padmasambhava
Numerous guru yoga liturgies are found throughout the many schools of Tibetan Buddhism, far more than one can hope to enumerate. A few of them are very famous, for example, the guru yoga Tsongkhapa...
View ArticleTwelve points of clarification
In general, Cathy and I are very gratified by the positive reception of our work in critical editing, even though I am certain I do not deserve it, and remain acutely aware of the many failings in my...
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