Reviews Of Different Books

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220 REVIEWS traduction de textes aussi interessants que le Subud erike. C'est surtout de l'etude des textes que l'on peut esperer de precieux renseignements sur la terminologie, les doctrines et l'organisation du lamaisme. On doit etre reconnaissant a M. Sagaster d'avoir apporte une si importante contribution a l'etude du lamaisme. Australian National University J. W. de Jong D. L. Snellgrove, The Nine Ways of Bon. Excerpts from gZi-brid edited and translated (= London Oriental Series, Volume 18). London, Oxford University Press, 1967. vii + 312 pp. PS5.5s. Of the voluminous Bon-po literature only very few texts have been studied. The excerpts of the gZi-brjid, which are edited and translated by Dr. D. L: Snellgrove, are taken from a legendary biography of gsen-rab, the founder of the Bon religion. Of this biography three different versions exist: one long, one of medium length, and one short. The gZi-brjid comprising twelve volumes is the long version. Dr. Snellgrove enumerates the titles of its sixty-one chapters in English and Tibetan in order to give an idea of the contents of this work (pp. 5-8). The medium version in two volumes, called gZer-m(y)ig, has been partly edited and translated by A. H. Francke. The text of the first seven chapters, and an English translation of the first six chapters, were published in volumes 1, 3, 4, 5 and 6 of Asia Major (1924, 1926, 1927, 1930). A further instalment appeared in Volume I, part 2 of Asia Major, New Series (1949, pp. 163-188). The work consists of eighteen chapters, of which a survey has been given by Professor Helmut Hoffmann in his Die Religionen Tibets (Freiburg/Munchen, 1956), pp. 77-90. A complete edition and translation have been announced by him (cf. op. cit., p. 186, n. 106; Quellen zur Geschichte der tibetischen Bon-Religion, Wiesbaden, 1950, p. 216). Finally, the short version, in one volume, called mDo-'dus, seems to be unknown outside Tibet. According to oral information, obtained by Dr. Snellgrove from his Bon-po assistants, the gZi-brjid was compiled in its present form by Blo-ldan snin-po, who was born about A.D. 1360. This date is based upon a chronological work, the bsTan-rtsis of Ni-ma bstan-'dzin, published in 1964 at the Lahore Press (p. 3, n. 2). In his preface Dr. Snellgrove states that "the present work is an attempt to provide a survey of the whole range of their teachings, as formulated certainly not later than the twelfth century and may be even two or three centuries earlier". Judging from the excerpts of the gZi-brjid, presented in this book, the text must certainly have been compiled at a time when Indian Buddhism had been absorbed by the Bon-pos; but this does not allow us to say, as Dr. Snellgrove does, that the contents of the gZi-brjid bear out the tradition of its compilation towards the end of the fourteenth century. With the help of the geneaology of the lamas of Samling, from where comes the manuscript of the gZi-brjid, Dr. Snellgrove calculates its age at about four hundred years. If this calculation is correct, the gZi-brjid must have been composed sometimes between the tenth and sixteenth centuries. Perhaps Bon-po tradition is correct in connecting the name of Blo-ldan snin-po with this work, but one need not necessarily assume that he compiled it in its present form. Probably such a voluminous work as the gZi-brjid is an amalgamation of texts composed at different times by different authors. 1 It contains the translation of chapters seven and eight and the text of the eighth chapter. It is not stated here if Francke has left behind an edition and translation of other chapters. Dr. Snellgrove wrongly remarks that Francke has edited and translated the first seven chapters. In referring to Asia Major, 1939 for the last part of Francke's work, he probably repeats a misprint in Hoffman's Die Religionen Tibets (p. 191) where 1939 should be corrected to 1949.