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ASIAN VARIATIONS IN RAMAYANA
Hanumantha goes to the orchard, uproots the trees and puts them upside down in the ground. The demons surround him and try to kill him. Although he can easily escape, he lets himself be captured in order to show his great magical skill. As in Dmarston's version he explains the two ways of killing, the way of the mother and the way of the father. Hanumantha tells them that it is a bad omen if the monkeys see him die. They must hide in their houses. With his fiery tail he burns the palace of the demon king and the city Trikūta together with the iron wall. King Ramana then takes Sitä and goes home.
Some monkeys have escaped, and they pour molten bronze in the ear of Kumbhakarna, the younger brother of Daŝagriva, who is plunged in meditation. Kumbhakarna is thus awakened, inhales deeply through his nose, and Sita and all the monkeys are transformed into skeletons, but not the king or Hanumantha. The king sends Hanumantha to the snowy mountains to fetch a medicinal herb. He brings the wrong one and is sent off again. He now brings the whole mountain with him and tells Ramana to search for the herb himself. Ramaņa cures everybody with the herb and tells Hanumantha to put the mountain back in its place. Hanumantha throws it in its place. Since that time the top of the mountain has been askew. A piece of the mountain was cut off, and according to Valmiki this is the mountain of Kailasa (Tise). King Ramana returns with Sita by means of Puspaka, the aerial palace of Ravana, and is honoured by Bharata, goes back to Ayodhya and lives there happily.
The author adds that the splendour of the palace of the demon king is an example of the greatness of wealth. He refers to the story of Mandhätṛ and quotes verse 79 of the fourth pallava of the Bodhisattvävadanakalpalată:
bimbitais tridatair yatra manibhūstambhabhittişul suraloko bibharty eko 'py anekasuralokatam||
He also quotes Kavyadarsa II. 300. At the end, the author enumerates among his sources the Sanskrit commentaries on two hymns, the Visesastava and the Devätisayastotra, the commentary on the Subhäşitaratnanidhi, etc. and makes a disparaging remark about Sanghasri's version of the story. Prajñāvarman's commentaries on the two stotras mentioned were translated into Tibetan and
THE STORY OF RAMA IN TIBET
can be found in the first volume of the Tanjur. His commentaries contain several extracts from the story of Rama, for instance, the promise given to Kekeya and her request to have her son enthroned are told by Prajñävarman in almost exactly the same words. However, it has to be pointed out that according to the colophon, the text of the Visesastavațika was not translated in its entirety by Rin-chen bzañ-po (958-1055) and his work was completed by Sa-skya pandita. It is obvious that Dmar-ston's version of the Rama story has been used extensively by Rin-spuns-pa.
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The versions of the Rama story by Sanghaśrī and Rin-spuns-pa are only two of the many which can be found in the numerous commentaries on the Kävyädarśa written by Tibetan and Mongolian scholars. The later versions which I have been able to see are, in general, rather similar to Rin-chen-spuñs-pa's version but there are many differences in details which ought to be further examined. As in the case of the commentaries on the Subhäṣitaratnanidhi, I hope that Tibetan scholars will collect as much material as possible and publish it in chronological order.
This brief examination of four versions of the Rama story in Tibet may have given some idea of the wealth of material which awaits further research. The story of Rama has been popular in Tibet since about 800 A.D. upto the present day. Thanks to the efforts of Tibetan scholars very many Tibetan works have been reprinted in India and Bhutan in recent years. It has now become possible to study in much more detail the Indian stories which were known to Tibetan scholars in the past.
'An Old Tibetan Version of the Ramayana', T'oung Pao, 58 (1972). pp. 190-202. [Also published without the author's permission and without his corrections in Hindutva, vol. III, nos. 5-6 (August-September, 1972), and in Cultural Forum, vol, XV, no. 2 (January, 1973). The Tibetan text of all six manuscripts was published in Indo-Iranian Journal, 19 (1977), pp. 37-88: The Tun-huang Manuscripts of the Tibetan Ramayana story'.
A Tibetan-English Dictionary (Calcutta, 1902), pp. 1194 and 1346. Helmut Eimer, Rnam thar rgyas pa (Wiesbaden, 1979), vol. 1, p. 236;
val. II, p. 206.
Op. cit., vol. I, p. 8.
JASBeng, XXIV (1855), pp. 141-165; XXV (1856), pp. 257-291. Reprinted in Tibetan Studies (Calcutta, 1911), pp. 93-172.
CY. J. Kolma. The aphorisms (legs-bshad) of Sa-skya Pandita', Proceedings of the Csoma de Körös Memorial Symposium (Budapest, 1978), p. 189, n. 2.
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