Literary Source For Late 18th Century Spoken Tibetan

SR No.: 269594
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Ernst Steinkellner
Publisher: Ernst Steinkellner
Total Pages: 5
Language: English
Classification: Article
File Size: 482 KB

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E. STEINKELLNER
The Geshe Dr. Lobsang Dargyay and myself have been working together for some time on a translation and interpretation of a philosophical essay on the rnam thar ago gsum, the three doors towards liberation, written by Gun than 'Jam pa'i dbyans, also known as Gun than dKon mchog bsTan pa'i sgron me. This aGe lugs pa-scholar lived from 1762-1823. He was born in m Dzod dge smad, South-East mDo smad, Amdo. He was admitted to the mDzod dge dgon named bKra sis chos gline at the age of five, to bkra sis 'khyil (= Bla bran, Labrang) at the age of seven and went to Central Tibet at the age of seventeen in 1778. There he studied in the sGo man grva tshan of 'Bras spuns and was then installed in 1792 as the 21st in the gdan rabs of Bla bran, bKra sis 'khyil.
When Lobsang Dargyay was preparing the notes for Gun than's biugraphy and a systematical survey of his works he pointed out to me a text in order to show what playful ideas our most serious scholar was capable of having. This text caught my attention at once : it had evidently been written in colloquial language.8
It is included as Nr. XVI of the tenth volume (ña smad cha) of the Col. lected Works which were reproduced by Ngawang Gelek Demo (New Delhi 1972 ff.).
It bears the marginal title Phal skad zab chos (The profound teaching in colloquial language) and has a verse in the place of a formal title which I would translate as : «The profound teaching which is granted in the form of colloquial language for an adequate understanding by all people of simple mind in the presence of the reverend bsTan pa'i sgron me, the lord rDo rje 'chan, the father who rejoices over the dance(?) of men, is contained (herein). »10
The text consists of eleven folio-pages and is evidently incomplete. It was probably composed after Gun than's return to bKra sis 'khyil, i.e.
• The following notes on the circumstances of Gun than's life are mainly based on a short biography prepared by Lobsang Dargyay (Gun than dKon mchog betan pa'i sgron me'i rnam thar mdor bsdus) which will be published 1981 in the Wiener Studien zur Tibetologie und Buddhismuskunde.
mDzod dge smad must be the same as mDzo-dge smad-ma which according to T. V. Wylie (The Geography of Tibet according to the 'Dzam-gling-rgyas-bshad, Roma 1962, note 710) is the Dzoge area of J. F. Rock's map 3 (The Amnye Ma-chhen range and adjacent regions. A monographic study, Roma 1956, cf. G. Roerich, Le parler de l'Amdo, Roma 1958, map: Dzoge). It is situated ca. 35o latitude and 103° longitude.
• Unidentified according to Wylie, loc. cit., note 775. 7 Cf. Rock, loc. cit., 29-47.
8 That Gun than composed works in colloquial Tibetan has already been noticed by Gene Smith in his University of Washington - Tibetan Catalogue, Seattle 1969, 92. 18
Or: *(which) by the power (dban [gis ?]) of rDo rje 'chan (is granted)».
10 rDo rje 'chan dban mi yi gar rol pa'i // yab rje bsTan pa'i agron me'i żal sna nas // skye bo blo dman kun gyis go bde'i ched // phal skad tshul du gnan ba'i zab chos bzugs 80 //
Acta Orient. Hung. XXXIV. 1980