Reviews Of Diffeent Books

Author(s): J W De Jong
Publisher: J W De Jong

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REVIEWS
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help of the editions by Yamada and Horiuchi many problems remain. For instance, on p. 138 Snellgrove translates: "They replied: "Let it be so, we enter into this pledge of yours."". Yamada's edition reads: ta evam āhuḥ / "evam astv iti / kin tu tava samayam [akovidāḥ]"/. Yamada remarks in a note that the word akovidāḥ is illegible. Both the Tibetan and the Chinese versions translate 'we do not understand'. Horiuchi reads: kim tu [vayam] bhagavad- (or "vataḥ) äjñā-samayam nava (or adhi) gacchamaḥ].10 Snellgrove's translation is not accompanied by philological notes and it is difficult to know how he arrived at his interpretation. It is very much to be hoped that Snellgrove will publish an edition and translation of the STTS as he has done so admirably for the Hevajratantra.
Snellgrove's translations are not always free from errors. On p. 126 he translates a passage from the Mahāyānasüträlamkara (ed. S. Lévi, p. 87, line 7): yasmad dharmadhätuvinirmukto dharmo násti dharmatävyatirekena dharmābhāvāt: "As there is no element apart from the elemental sphere, so there is no essential truth (or elemental essence, dharmata) apart from the elements." The meaning is just the opposite: "As there is no element apart from the elemental sphere because there is no element apart from the elemental essence." Snellgrove refers to Lévi's translation which he misunderstood: "Puisqu'il n'y a pas d'Idéal qui soit émancipé du Plan des Idéaux en effet, pas d'Idéal sans Idéalité." The Sekoddeśatīkā mentions a Wisdom-maiden (prajñā) from twelve to twenty years old. Snellgrove says that she is from sixteen to twelve years old (p. 263).
Chapter V The Conversion of Tibet' (pp. 381-526) describes the background to the introduction of Buddhism, the first diffusion of Buddhism during the eighth and ninth centuries and the second diffusion from about the year 1000 onwards. Snellgrove insists on the fact that Bon was not the original pre-Buddhist religion of Tibet but a heterodox form of Buddhism. He draws attention to the close relationship between Bonpos and rÑin-mapas. Snellgrove writes: "They differ from more orthodox Buddhists in their joint possession of the teachings known as the Great Fulfillment (rdzogschen), in their separate possession of groups of tantras that were excluded from the later Tibetan Buddhist Canon, and in their tardy development of monastic orders, both preserving a long tradition of noncelibate religious practice" (p. 404).
Buddhism was introduced to Tibet both from China and India. According to Snellgrove the period of Chinese influence was limited to the short period during which the Tibetans controlled Central Asia and northwest China. After the disintegration of the Tibetan empire from 842 onward India became the dominating factor. As to the famous council held either