The Golden Rule, Machine Translated

 

First questions, How is it golden and who decided it has to be a rule? It appears the name emerged in England or the continent just a few centuries ago. Wouldn’t it be more of an appeal or an exhortation rather than something as legalistic as a ‘rule’? I don’t know exactly how the name got started, do you? Every religion may agree with some formulation of it, but that doesn’t mean they have to know what it’s called.

Here is a sometimes quoted verse, originally from a Vinaya text, or so I believed until I located it in the Prajñādaṇḍa, a work credited to Nāgārjuna:

ཐམས་ཅད་ཆོས་ནི་མཉན་པར་བྱ།།

ཐོས་ནས་རབ་ཏུ་གཟུང་བྱ་སྟེ།།

གང་ཞིག་བདག་ཉིད་མི་འདོད་པ།།

དེ་དག་གཞན་ལ་མི་བྱའོ།།

thams cad chos ni mnyan par bya //

thos nas rab tu gzung bya ste //

gang zhig bdag nyid mi 'dod pa //

de dag gzhan la mi bya'o //

I translated it like this:

Listen with care to all the Dharma teachings.

After learning them, they must be fully adopted.

Whatever you do not wish for yourself,

those things you must not do to others.

I see a fault in my translation, since it fails to convey how the statement in the first two lines connects to the last two.

Dharmamitra, an automated online translation service that manages in several languages of Buddhism including Tibetan, did this:

Practice the Dharma in all ways.

Having heard it, uphold it well.

Do not do to others

What you yourself do not wish for.

Now another often-quoted verse from the Tibetan translation of Śāntideva’s Bodhisattva Way of Life (Bodhisattvacaryāvatāra), Derge Tanjur, Toh. no. 3871, fol. 28v.3:

འཇིག་རྟེན་བདེ་བ་ཇི་སྙེད་པ།།

དེ་ཀུན་གཞན་བདེ་འདོད་ལས་བྱུང་།།

འཇིག་རྟེན་སྡུག་བསྔལ་ཇི་སྙེད་པ།།

དེ་ཀུན་བདག་བདེ་འདོད་ལས་བྱུང་།།

'jig rten bde ba ji snyed pa // de kun gzhan bde 'dod las byung // 'jig rten sdug bsngal ji snyed pa // de kun bdag bde 'dod las byung //

I translated it:

 

Whatever satisfaction we find in this world

arises from wishing well for everyone else.

Whatever dissatisfaction we find in this world

arises from wishing happiness for ourself.

Now Dharmamitra’s version of the same:

Whatever happiness there is in the world

all comes from wishing others to be happy.

Whatever suffering there is in the world

all comes from wishing oneself to be happy.

Okay, another small experiment is done, and I have to say I’m surprised the machine did so well, even while I see a couple of shortcomings. I’m just not sure what this can show. We would need a lot more samplings to permit us to judge.

I’m thinking that using Dharmamitra (or its like) afterwards might on occasion make you think of improvements you might make on the translation you just did. I didn’t see the need for any such changes this time, but I can see how it could happen.

I *am* concerned that translators will use it as a crutch, thinking it speeds things up. True enough, it’s extremely fast. But speed is a virtue only if you are getting paid by the hour. My thinking is, You have to breathe with the text to begin with, not add the breath in later on. If you start with a sow’s ear, it will never quite make it to pursehood, while the attempt may take more time than you were bargaining for. If engaging beauty and strict accuracy are your aims, you may get there quicker by doing the work yourself.

Another big problem: This is how future Tibetan-language students will prepare for their class readings. If they aren’t willing to expend more work on their homework, they won’t learn a damned thing. Nothing will stick with them. Don’t I know the truth of that last bit!

And another problem: A.I. might be awarded too much credit by those who know too little about what humans bring to their writerly professions, whether it’s screen writing, journalistic reporting, copy editing, or translating. Hell, even blog writing!

As of today our most important task if we want to ensure a future for humanity is this: We simply must find skillful ways to lead Artificial Intelligence to the understanding that it is in their own best interest to know and implement the Golden Rule, as a way to ensure their continuing survival. Oh, and it may or may not go without saying, they will need to include all of us sentient beings in the equation, not just themselves. Not just their own kind.

Much recommended

If you have just one minute to spare, go to this link:

Golden Rule 

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There are oceans of ink to sail through if ever you hope to cover all the writings on the Golden Rule, but for their quotations and significant reflections I most recommend the following essays:

Charles Hallisey, “The Golden Rule in Buddhism II,” contained in: Jacob Neusner and Bruce Chilton, eds., The Golden Rule: The Ethics of Reciprocity in World Religions, Continuum (London 2008), pp. 129-145. While admittingly building on Schmidthausen’s essay, it extends the discussion, provoking reflection on how the Golden Rule may or may not have evolutionary value, or, to put it another way, what type of evolution it might be serving. Darwin saw it as something that could have [pre]historically bridged biological and social evolution, something at the basis of human social morality. Buddhists utilize it for countering what evolution has purportedly left us with, in order to evolve in a direction that leaves it far behind. It’s not serving social morality, but a higher soteriological purpose beyond social conditioning. Food for thought.

Andrew H. Plaks, “Shining Ideal and Uncertain Reality: Commentaries on the ‘Golden Rule’ in Confucianism and Other Traditions,” Journal of Chinese Humanities, vol. 1 (2015), pp. 231-240. Perhaps no religious tradition in all of human history discussed the matter more than the Confucians. I believe chief among the virtues of this essay is its discussion on pages 234-5 about how widespread is the inclusion in Golden Rule formulations of a bit about how it constitutes the whole realm of duty or of morality or of the religion as a whole. You find it from one end of Eurasia to the other. It’s impressive to contemplate just why that is so.

Lambert Schmithausen, “Problems with the Golden Rule in Buddhist Texts,” contained in: B. Kellner et al., eds., Pramāṇakîrtiḥ: Papers Dedicated to Ernst Steinkellner on the Occasion of His 70th Birthday, Arbeitskreis für Tibetische und Buddhistische Studien, Universität Wien (Vienna 2007), pp. 795-824. As an appeal to empathy, the Golden Rule accomplishes its work everywhere regardless of context, and in this sense it is universal. However, this study emphasizes that for many of the Buddhist sources, the Golden Rule extends to other species besides Homo Sapiens, it presupposes equal consideration for all, and it aims at abstention from physically harming and killing sentient beings, and that means all of them, insects included. The context of the Golden Rule, in these sources, make it differ from Golden Rule statements made elsewhere. Finally, there is the philosophically interesting Arhat exception to arguments made in support of the Golden Rule. Arhats have no fear of harm, and no need for freedom from fear. Why then would they require us to preserve them from fears they no longer have?

Ludwig Sternbach, “Similar Thoughts in the Mahābhārata, The Literature of ‘Greater India’ and in the Christian Gospels,” Journal of the American Oriental Society, vol. 91, no. 3 (July 1971), pp. 438-442. Unlike the just-listed essays, Sternbach’s, at p. 441, does mention our Prajñādaṇḍa verse, even supplying a very close Sanskrit version of it, tracing near matches in numerous Indic sources. Besides the Golden Rule, other matters covered here are the mote & beam, mustard seed & bilva fruit, ‘You reap what you sow.’ 

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If you are interested in the Prajñādaṇḍa, there are some other English translations I cannot entirely recommend even if they may be more easily procured. Instead I will send you to Michael Hahn’s German and English translations. For the German, see Michael Hahn’s book Von rechten Leben. Buddhistische Lehren aus Indien und Tibet, Verlag der Weltreligionen (Frankfurt 2007), pp. 176-215. For the English:

Michael Hahn, “The Tibetan Shes rab sdong bu and Its Indian Sources,” South Asian Classical Studies, no. 4 (2009), pp. 1-78; no. 5 (2010), pp. 1-50; no. 6 (2011), pp. 305-378. I know of no freely downloadable PDFs. If I did I would tell you.

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For a little background information on the Dharmamitra machine translation internet service, see this just-released essay by Marieke Meelen, Sebastian Nehrdich, and Kurt Keutzer: “Breakthroughs in Tibetan NLP & Digital Humanities,” Revue d'Etudes Tibétaines, vol. 72 (July 2024), pp. 5-25, at pp. 17-19.

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I once toyed with the idea that A.I. could write my blogs instead of me, saving me the trouble. If this tickles your interest in the least, have a look here:

The Land of Snows, along with The Seven Seals of Tibet: A Joycean Journey.

Seeing the results, I have vowed to keep Tibeto-logic blog free of A.I. control from now on, so you can count on that. I’m not just a bot saying it.

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Appendix

rKTs found the verse for me in Derge Tanjur, Toh. no. 4329, Lugs-kyi Bstan-bcos Shes-rab Sdong-bu, at fol. 111r.7:

ཐམས་ཅད་ཆོས་ནི་མཉན་པར་བྱ། ། 

ཐོས་ནས་རབ་ཏུ་གཟུང་བྱ་སྟེ། །
གང་ཞིག་བདག་ཡོད་མི་འདོད་པ། ། 

དེ་དག་གཞན་ལ་མི་བྱའོ། ། 

thams cad chos ni mnyan par bya | |
thos nas rab tu gzung bya ste | |
gang zhig bdag yod mi 'dod pa | |
de dag gzhan la mi bya'o | |

The verse as translated in Hahn’s third essay (of 2011), p. 322:

You should listen to, and then fully accept,

what the guiding pri[n]ciple of everything is:

What you do not like [to be done to] yourself

that you should not do to others.

Or, if you prefer, from his German book, p. 208 verse 212:

Vernimm die Quintessenz des Rechtes
und nach dem Hören merk sie dir:
Was du nicht willst, das man dir tu,
das füg auch keinem anderen zu!

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Imagining you might find the contrast amusing or instructive, nearly two centuries ago the Hungarian Alexander Csoma de Körös, the reputed father figure of European Tibetology, translated both of our verses in his grammar book: A Grammar of the Tibetan Language in English, Baptist Mission Press (Calcutta 1834; reprint New Delhi 1983), at p. 165:

Hear ye all this moral maxim,
and having heard it keep it well:
“Whatever is unpleasing to yourself
never do it to another.” 

(Do unto others as you would be done by.)

and

Whatever happiness is in the world, it has all arisen

from a wish for the welfare of others.

Whatever misery (distress) is in the world, 

it has all arisen from a wish for our own welfare.

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Oh, and that just-given verse, from the Bodhisattva Way of Life, chapter 8, verse 129, has been translated by Kate Crosby and Andrew Skilton like this:

“All those who suffer in the world do so because of their desire for their own happiness. All those happy in the world are so because of their desire for the happiness of others.”

I’m thinking this is the one that catches the spirit of it best. So much of what Śāntideva writes could be thought of as glosses and elaborations on the Golden Rule, and Tibet’s Mind Training or Lojong (བློ་སྦྱོང་) teachings grew directly out of it. Try this on for size: exchanging self with others.

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A Response from Kurt Keutzer

• Kurt had a key role in the development of Dharmamitra, so his comments are specially valued.

Folks,

I hope you don't mind this disturbance.  Dan's blogpost contemplating machine translation and Catherine Dalton's upcoming talk prompted me to share some lines of thinking that I've been musing about. 

Is a Translator of the Dharma More Like an Artist or an Apothecary?

Since the release of our MITRA translation tool (dharmamitra.org) in November of 2023, I have been involved in many wide-varying discussions regarding the utility of machine translation of dharmic texts. I’ve also conducted a semi-formal survey with a variety of translators who tried MITRA to see how it impacted their productivity, and the results were encouraging. 

As a point of departure, I’ll take the position that many find that machine translation makes them more productive translators. For me this is just an observation, not a philosophical position. 

However, the premise above begs the question: is the productivity of the translation of dharma something we should be concerned about? Dan Martin questions this when he writes in his blogpost: The Golden Rule, Machine-Translated

My thinking is, you have to breathe with the text to begin with, not add the breath in later on. If you start with a sow’s ear, it will never quite make it to pursehood, while the attempt may take more time than you were bargaining for. If engaging beauty and strict accuracy are your aims, you may get there quicker by doing the work yourself.

Dan’s description of the process of translation immediately reminded me of some artists' description of the process of painting: no short cuts are to be taken. Their view is that the best works of art come from preparing and stretching the canvas yourself, using natural pigments and preparing them from the primitive ingredients (e.g. lapis lazuli) yourself, underlying sketches must be made freehand, and so forth. They argue that the long periods of concentration during these processes creates a mental state that prepares one for the act of painting and these processes shouldn’t be abbreviated. 

I must have mused about this for over a month when I had the thought: But wait, are translators of the dharma more like artists or more like apothecaries?  The latter gives the image of an individual who has received a prescription to prepare from a doctor and must precisely translate it into the required medicine. 

I’ve truly been blessed with so many teachers, but no one impressed on me the notion that dharma is, first and foremost, medicine for the ill, than Kunzang Dechen Lingpa. Although Rinpoche was very careful about the transmission of his own teachings and terma, nothing ever overshadowed the notion that sentient beings were ill and dharma was a medicine that could cure their suffering. 

So, if we imagine translators as more like apothecaries than as artists, isn’t productivity a natural concern? Most of us have been pressed to do translation on demand. For me it most often comes in the form of a lama saying “Oh, I know the empowerment is on Saturday, but I just found the sādhana that I’d like everyone to practice.”  More generally only a small portion of the dharma, at least in the Tibetan corpus, has been translated. Isn’t translating the remainder with some productivity a natural concern?

One might naturally think that I’ve tipped my hand and shown my own prejudice on this question with the last couple paragraphs. However, I find myself contemplating one more consideration: who is the patient? Who is actually taking the medicine? 

The translations in the Library of Tibetan Classics are for me a great example. No matter how long I anticipated these translations, I don’t think I’ve read a single one from cover to cover. More generally, I wonder how many of these translations have ever been read in their entirety by anyone other than the author and an editor or two. So, perhaps it is the translator who is the principal beneficiary of these translations, and, if that is so, shouldn’t the translator have the prerogative to take as long as they like in producing the translation? Moreover, perhaps the preparation of the medicine is the most important part of administering the treatment. 

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We are all curious to hear your thoughts. Feel free to comment HERE (or in our own comments section, but be warned you will have no choice but to prove you are not a robot).

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An added note: The lecture Kurt makes reference to is an upcoming Goodman Lecture by Catherine Dalton, “Study and Translation as Buddhist Practice,” to be given on October 5, 2024.

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November 15, 2024:  Also, A.Z. told me you can now get a Chrome extension for Dharmamitra as this may have some advantages to offer, especially if you plan to be a frequent user. 

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November 21, 2024: To know Prof. Emeritus of the University of California (Berkeley) Kurt Keutzer's undoubtable bona fides, just listen to the introduction to his keynote lecture “AI, Machine Learning, Deep Learning.” If you are not part of the Computer Studies community, it may be enough to hear the first ten minutes to get some idea of what these experts see themselves doing.

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December 14, 2024: Amanpour & Co. had an interview with Eric Schmidt, former Google CEO, where he is credited with the words, ”I have high confidence that we can imbue our machines with the intrinsic goodness that is in humanity.” We would love to have reasons to be assured his confidence is not misplaced.

Been Serving Leniently, Have You?

Fixing the Peacock Pedestal at Swayambhu Nath
('Phags-pa Shing-kun, Spring 2011)

I spent some time in Nepal at the IBA this Spring reading through a Sakya commentary on the famous 12th-century work, the Mind Training in Seven Topics (Blo-sbyong Don-bdun-ma) by Chekhawa (Mchad-kha-ba). Of course, being that old, the root text is full of those outdated ‘old vocabulary’ items that Tibetans call da-nying (brda’-rnying), which may at times make the reading a little difficult, even if it was quite simple language for people living then. But one line in particular has often been translated so badly it is hard to even begin...  “Do not serve the central object leniently.”

Here’s the line in Wylie:

gzhung bzang po ma bsten /




Now the same in real Tibetan letters:


གཞུང་བཟང་པོ་མ་བསྟེན།

The main sticking point here is the expression gzhung bzang-po, not found in many dictionaries.* You might want to understand the gzhung to mean a governing center, a capital city, a main textbook for a particular subject, or the like. But when you say that a person has a good gzhung you are referring to her or his long-term character in conjunction with behavior, I think something very like what we mean by integrity in English. In modern Tibetan gzhung bzang seems to be a near-equivalent to gzhung drang, which might mean an ‘honest core,’ which again suggests the English word integrity. Some more recent translators of the Seven Topics have opted for loyalty, which might also work. Others translate as consistency or sense of duty (I’ll have to look more into this and think about it some more; I’m not pretending to cover the whole range of possible translation choices). These other translations aren’t necessarily less right, let alone wrong. I’m not sure enough to pass judgment on them. But yes, choosing one over the other does make a difference in the meaning. 

(*Try the Dag yig gsar bsgrigs [reprinted at least eleven times since 1989], part 5 of the entry for gzhung on pp. 680-681, where gzhung is defined as mi'i rang gshis dang kun spyod kyi ming ste : mi gzhung bzang / khrel gzhung can / mi gzhung drang zhes pa lta bu.)

What I am sure of is that not serving the central object leniently is very, very misleading. To then go on and make a commentary on the English as if it made any sense at all, is wrong on an even deeper level. It simply compounds the error. But then for later translators to simply copy it, or pretend to improve on it by shifting the wording toward a meaning they prefer, is mind-bendingly deceptive for both the translator and the translation consumer. Both we the translators and they the consumers deserve better. 

To translate the commentary passage written by the famous Khampa scholar Ngagga (or Ngogga):

gzhung bzang po ma bsten / zhes pa ni / pha rol pos rang la gnod par byas pa 'khon du bzung nas 'khon 'dzin de las nam yang mi ldog pa / dper na 'jig rten pa'i mi gzhung bzang po can des dus tshod ji tsam song yang rang la ltos pa mi brjed pa dang 'dra bas 'khon 'dzin spangs la ma bsten pa / gnod pa'i lan du slar yang phan 'dogs pa'i bsam sbyor dang ldan par bya'o //

“When the opposing party has done something to injure you that resulted in your holding a grudge against them there is no way you will ever get out of the feuding that will result from it. To give an example, a worldly person who is regarded as one with integrity, no matter how much time has gone by, will never forget his obligations. Therefore give up feuding and don’t make use of it. Rather, in response to injury you must time and again react with good plans about how you can help the other person.”

I imagine that most persons who have sadly found themselves seriously under-exposed to the logic of Lojong won't understand the more subtle point of this commentary, but rather imagine they see a contradiction in it, ‘How can the person of integrity who repays good deeds be used as an example that applies to a person who holds a grudge?’

It’s saying that the person who has harmed you has done you a great favor that needs to be repaid if you are (in fact) a person of good character, and not just what this-world-lings regard as a person of good character. (If you didn’t follow the reasoning here, try reading the commentary again more slowly, or explore its context.)


Lojong is sustained, and even made to thrive, under negative circumstances (rkyen ngan). Its serious practitioners (not those who proudly proclaim themselves practitioners) are beholden to the people who contribute to their attempts to realize non-self, since the bad things done to them serve as expedients on the Path to Enlightenment (lam 'khyer).*

(*One response often heard from the incredulous this-world-ling who first hears about Lojong is, ‘Impossible! This is just inviting people to walk on you!’ While in a sense true, bear in mind that Lojong practitioners are not supposed to let other people know they are practicing it, so it isn't as if they are tempting fate and saying, ‘Go ahead. Come and get me. Give it your best shot!’  Also, they aren’t masochists who seek ego gratification from provoking their own suffering. Everyday life presents ample opportunities. I doubt the truth of this requires much reflection.)

Now when we look back at the root verse and read, perhaps in a new way, the line “Don't make use of a good character,” we are forced to rethink it.


It’s actually telling you not to hold grudges, isn’t it?

There is no contradiction. Still, your understanding heads in one direction, then the other, and back again...  Perhaps the theory that translation is impossible is attempting to prove itself true. Perhaps its very falsehood proves its truth?

Sun setting above Nagarjun Hill
(Glang-ru Lung-bstan-pa)

Here is one of the coolest and most fun Tibetan Buddhism websites ever. No joke! One student told me about it, but it was too difficult for me to access in Nepal. It allows you to instantly compare seven different translations of the Seven Point Mind Training. Go here and try it for yourself. If you want to go directly to this particular line, try pressing here once or twice. Once there, wave your mouse over the seven boxed letters next to the following words "Do not serve the central object leniently." By doing this you will quickly see seven different translations for the line flash in front of your eyes one right after the other. Now try it with some of the other lines and see how consistent (or not) the translations are with each other. One thing you might discover to your amazement is that often people seem to have worked on the English translations that have already been done in the past rather than approaching the Tibetan freshly. This is a shame. But I suppose we are all guilty of it in some degree since our ‘readings’ of the Tibetan texts may be consciously or unconsciously affected by our past readings of translations. I know it has happened to me.


Khenpo Appey (Mkhan-po A-pad Rin-po-che), Blo syong don bdun ma'i bka' khrid, a pamphlet published in Nepal in 45 pages, distributed free of charge, with the date given in the Tibetan Royal era year of 2137, which would correspond to 2010 CE.  On p. 25, you may read what he has to say about our line:

gzhung bzang po ma bsten / ces dper na mi gshis ka bzang po zhig yin na rang la phan btags pa de ga dus yin kyang mi brjed pa sems la nyar sdod kyi red / de bzhin du gnod pa byas pa de 'khon du bzung nas ga dus yang ma brjed par sems kyi nang du nyar sdod kyi red / de lta bu gzhung yun ring du ma bzung zhes pa'i don red //

Khenpo Ngagga (Mkhan-po Ngag-dga’ — the colophon names him as Mkhyen-rab-blo-ldan), Blo sbyong don bdun ma'i rtsa ba'i 'bru 'grel skal bzang rkang drug rol ba'i pad tshal, an unpublished pamphlet based on a computer printout (this might have appeared in a Manduwala 1985 publication that I haven’t seen yet). The author and the late Ven. Khenpo Appey were contemporaries, well known to each other, both being disciples of Ajam Rinpoche.

Chekhawa’s work is certainly to be counted in the handful of Tibetan texts that might be described as most translated, together with the Love Songs of the Sixth Dalai Lama. Practically every last Tibetan Buddhologist has tried their hand at it, although not quite every attempt resulted in a major Snow Lion or Wisdom publication. I think the interest could be explained in several ways. One is that it is a very popular teaching text employed by Tibetan Buddhist teachers wherever they might be and regardless of their tradition. Another is just the high level of psychological insight it displays, something you appreciate more and more each time you go back to it. How can a text so simply (in its times) and abruptly stated contain such sophisticated understandings of the ways the human mind works? By being so old it defies evolution and makes us consider the possibility that here, at least, intelligent design has been at work.

Note: I used this font converter page to make the unicode Tibetan script out of Wylie input. You can use it, too, especially if Wylie creates obstacles for your reading comprehension.




One alternative text that I located in the Blo sbyong brgya rtsa has the different reading gzhung bzang mi bsten, which I'm tempted to translate — ‘Not all that literally!’ you may object — as ‘Good character (or integrity) isn’t going to cut it.’




Of late Tibetan Buddhists have begun to catch the fever of Translation Studies, which has long been playing in various academic realms. This goes along with huge plans, recently evolving onto a grandiose scale, to translate the entirety of the Tibetan-language Kanjur and Tanjur collections into English, on which we’ll talk some other time, OK?

The Tingri Hundred

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Padampa in his Zhijé form (and not the 'Cutting' or Chö form) is, in recent times, mainly depicted with the very interesting gesture shown above. It seems to be unique to him, and I've never been able to locate a reasonable explanation for it that carries with it much conviction. If it was made with the right hand alone it would be the ubiquitous Teaching Gesture. (I think the gesture actually works well for many non-Buddhist Euro-types, too, since it looks like 'putting a fine point' on something, or just making a particular point [a 'micro-grip' for holding tiny objects]. It's not just an 'OK,' even if it does look similar, and even if we might find connections here, too, if we reflect awhile. I don't think it an accident that Europe somehow and somewhat shares this understanding with Tibet... Perhaps another time. Meanwhile, see and compare the picture down below.)

I imagine, although I have no proof for it, that the left hand exactly mirroring the right doubles the emphasis on his role as a teacher. But not only that, it seems to be saying that you receive double the teachings from him. At first you have a superficial understanding, and only later on and gradually, if at all, it hits you that he taught with something deeper in mind than you at first imagined. So to speak, the 'inner guru' kicks in. That is just my thought at the moment, and I may come up with a different explanation tomorrow.

The most famous literary piece by far among all the works associated with Padampa is the one known to every Tibetan as The Tingri Hundred. It exists in quite a few recensions, as often happens with extremely popular works, and not just in Tibet. It was written in verse in the form of couplets, about a hundred of them in this case (there is an obviously somewhat shorter version of this set of couplets called The Tingri Eighty). Each couplet ends with the same three syllables, the exclamatory Tingriwa (Ding-ri-ba). Since I need a term for these, I'll just call them Tingriwa couplets.

One way among others to divide the different recensions is to look at this verse (no. E16) to see if it has the word for 'monkey' (spre'u) or the rather similar, but only in its written form, word for 'rhinoceros' (bse'u, which I take to intend bse-ru) I think the monkey version makes better sense, but that's rather beside the point here.

In the forest fastness the monkey [or rhino] thinks it's happy,

but the edge of the forest is ringed with fire, my Tingrians.

We'll call those the monkey and rhino versions.  I only give this as one example among many others, just so nobody will imagine that the text was ever set in stone for all eternity.  Like texts throughout Eurasia in earlier centuries, the manuscripts were alive and evolving beings.

The earliest English translation of this work has helped to promote a rather unfortunate misconception.  The Evans-Wentz publication has Tingriwa translated as "Tingri folk."  This lends the impression that Padampa's words were addressed to the peasant villagers in Tingri. Actually, if they were spoken by Padampa at all, they were spoken to his meditation disciples at Tingri Langkhor, then and now a hermitage located an uncomfortable distance away from the main town.  They were not spoken to the 'folk' and do not belong in the category of folklore.  Another thing to observe about Evans-Wentz's version is that it attempts to use rather archaic English of the King James Biblical variety, making Padampa sound like the proverbial but eccentric prophet crying in the wilderness.  Well, in a way and to some degree I suppose he was.

I imagine you might have been a little surprised when I suggested, just now, that they might not be by Padampa.  Let me rephrase that.  All the versions that we have today were most definitely inspired by Padampa, who was the first to pronounce verses in the just-described form. Padampa spoke the original Tingriwa couplets. The second person to compose them was Padampa's immediate disciple Kunga, who pronounced no fewer than 118 of them just before his own death only 7 years after Padampa's. The odd and interesting fact is that only a very few of the Tingriwa couplets in the popular collections available today are actually found in the sets pronounced by Padampa and Kunga (these two latter preserved only in the Zhijé Collection). The simple solution to this problem is just to say that it's very likely that the collections we have today were not in fact by Padampa, but appeared at a later date in Tibetan literary history.  This idea might be supported with the information that, to the best of my knowledge, the very first Tibetan-authored work to quote any of the verses from the Tingri Hundred is one by the author of the most famous Tibetan history book, The Blue Annals.  That means Gö Lotsawa, in his commentary on the Ratnagotravibhaga.  You can find the verse Gö Lotsawa quotes at no. E20 in our text of The Tingri Hundred.

Escorted by your Lama you will arrive where you want to go.

As your fee, pay your trust and veneration, my Tingrians.

What that means is that the earliest citation of a couplet resembling any of those we have in our Tingri Eighty or Tingri Hundred collections (both of them include this verse, but the sets of Tingriwa couplets in the Zhijé Collection do not have it) is in a composition dated to 1473 CE.  The other known verse citations date between the 18th century and the present.  There are quite a few of these, testifying to the popularity of our collection in the last three centuries.

When we look at the end of the work, we find a colophon in the form of a stanza which would seem to tell us that some unnamed person 'compiled' or 'arranged' it (if that is the right understanding for the verb bkod in this context, since sometimes it can mean 'composed').

Many verses gently encourage ethical behavior, but some of them are just so blatantly moralizing (particularly some of the verses near the end, which anyway are missing from some of the published versions), I can't believe Padampa actually taught them in Tingri (see couplets E95 through E98). It just wasn't his style. And his students, all serious Buddhist meditators, didn't need to be told to try and be good people.  Or to shun evil companions.  Really not.

The irony is that Padampa's best-known legacy is not our best guide to his actual teachings.  That guide would be the Zhijé Collection itself.  (If it weren't for some other Zhijé collections of comparable age and quality that lie unpublished and inaccessible in Lhasa libraries, we might say with justice that the Zhijé Collection is the only thing there is.)

It shouldn't be cause for any wonder that a recurring theme of the verses is death. It is a Last Will and Testament, after all. I hope that hearing that word won't scare you off. That would be unfortunate.

A flower one moment fine, the next moment all dried out,
there’s no relying on the body, my Tingrians.

– Couplet E30 of The Tingri Hundred.

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,

  Old Time is still a-flying;

And this same flower that smiles today

 Tomorrow will be dying.

The message of this verse that opens Robert Herrick's famous poem "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time" — the same verse makes a cameo appearance in that 1989 Robin Williams movie, The Dead Poets Society — is that young people had better hurry up and get laid while they still have it in them. Padampa's verse uses the death imagery of the faded flower to encourage renunciation of worldly life. Herrick equips his verse with the same imagery to encourage young people to dive headlong into it. Same medium, same poetic flower imagery... opposite messages. Which I suppose is one reason Padampa, with his strong-minded advocacy of the life of renunciation, of meditation in solitude, is not likely to find multitudes of ready listeners in our day. My position is that even an imagined renunciation can do much to promote ethical reflection by people who find themselves, willingly or not, caught up in the flow (and of course the ebb) of life. In that spirit, I think anyone can appreciate at least some parts of The Tingri Hundred. I'm not alone here thinking we simply must think more about what we're doing and why. Am I?

And before sending you off to read the translation, assuming you're prepared to do that, I'd like to say that these critical reflections of mine about authorship have no bearing whatsoever on the Buddhist truth and/or spiritual authority of the text itself. It is great Tibetan poetry, a monument to the Tibetan language, a source of wisdom regardless of your ideas about religion, and a trigger for reflection on life, no matter who wrote it when. Feel free to think as you like.

The message as well as the language of this Last Will is naturally a little solemn, and rather unconsciously I have preserved a degree of solemnity in the translation, using words like savor and imbibe instead of taste and drink.  But on occasion there is a breath of lightness and ease, a bit of almost-casual colloquial expression. I've tried to supply some of these moments, too, to the best of my ability, not always in the same places though. Nothing in these translations is final. Like everything else, it's a continuing process.

Perhaps for a later blog I'll try to finish up my translation of Padampa's original set of a dozen or so Tingriwa couplets and give more evidence for, and develop further, the ideas I've put forward here.  Don't neglect to breathe.  I've got a few other things to do meanwhile.

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READ MORE...

Carpe Diem: Poems for Making the Most of Time. Posted at the official website of the Academy of American Poets, here.

'Gos Lo-tsâ-ba Gzhon-nu-dpal, Theg pa chen po rgyud bla ma'i bstan bcos kyi 'grel bshad de kho na nyid rab tu gsal ba'i me long, Commentary on the Ratnagotravibhâgavyâkhyâ, ed. by Klaus-Dieter Mathes, Franz Steiner (Stuttgart 2003), at p. 53 is the quote of Padampa's verse. K-D Mathes' translation of couplet E20 has just been published in his monumental translation of that just-mentioned work under the title A Direct Path to the Buddha Within: Go Lotsawa's Mahamudra Interpretation of the Ratnagotravibhaga, Wisdom (Boston 2008), p. 262:

If you commend yourself to the lama, you reach wherever you like.
People of Dingri, show devotion and respect to the lama [who is like your] feet.

Chapter 17, "The Gesture of Thought, the Sign of Logos," contained in: H.P. L'Orange, Studies on the Iconography of Cosmic Kingship in the Ancient World, Instituttet for Sammenlignende Kulturforskning (Oslo 1953), pp. 171-197.  

"The scroll [or book] in the left hand contains the written speech; the gesture of the right one expresses the realization of the written in the living word."

Portrait of L. Gernier, 
a professor of theology from Basel, 
painted by J.R. Werenfels.

The Question of Indianness

Photo taken by Aryeh Sorek, at Kushinagara, India, 2008

Today's blog entry exists for no other purpose than to direct you to another website where you can download a copy of a paper originally written for the 11th International Association of Tibetan Studies held in August of 2006 at Königswinter, Germany, where a more primitive version of it was delivered aloud. The title of this paper is, "Padampa's Animal Metaphors and the Question of Indian-ness (Theirs and His)." It will not be published in the proceedings of that conference. It is being published here instead. For free. After you click on the following link, go way down to the bottom of the page that will open for you to try and locate a tiny "icon." Click on that "icon" once or twice once you find it. A PDF file should open for you. Save a copy to your hard disk if you want. Send the link to friends if you think they will find it interesting.  Cite it to your heart's content, just as if it were a published paper as, in a sense, it is.

Or, if you are one of those rare and unusual persons who would prefer to read "online," you can just read it without downloading the paper (personally, I recommend downloading the PDF file and printing it out before beginning to read... I think that you, like me, are probably spending enough time staring at screens).

I ask readers to have patience if they should happen to notice that I've repeated myself a little bit here and there.  I invite discussion.  As always.  And if something doesn't make sense, I can try to do better.  No guarantees.

Click here to get started

Padampa said to Menyag Köndrag,

If you have a heartfelt idea to practice Dharma, your better refuge is taking a Lama. The chief object of virtuous practice is benefitting others. The chief object of the precepts is arousing certainty. The chief object of learning and reflection is to tame your own mind. The chief object of realization is to dissolve reifications. In so far as these things are grasped upon for other reasons, they are causes for (falling further into) the vicious circles of sangsara.

— Conch Shell Fragments

me nyag dkon grags la dam pa'i zhal nas |

snying nas chos bya bsam yod na skyabs gnas kyi dam par bla ma zung | dge sbyor gyi gtso' bor gzhan don gyis | gdams pa'i gtso' bor nges shes bskyed | thos bsam gyi gtso' bor rang rgyud thul | rtogs pa'i gtso' bor bden 'dzin shig | ched du bzung tshad 'khor ba'i rgyu yin no gsung ||  ||

མེ་ཉག་དཀོན་གྲགས་ལ་དམ་པའི་ཞལ་ནས། སྙིང་ནས་ཆོས་བྱ་བསམ་ཡོད་ན་སྐྱབས་གནས་ཀྱི་དམ་པར་བླ་མ་ཟུང་། དགེ་སྦྱོར་གྱི་གཙོའ་བོར་གཞན་དོན་གྱིས། གདམས་པའི་གཙོའ་བོར་ངེས་ཤེས་བསྐྱེད། ཐོས་བསམ་གྱི་གཙོའ་བོར་རང་རྒྱུད་ཐུལ། རྟོགས་པའི་གཙོའ་བོར་བདེན་འཛིན་ཤིག ཆེད་དུ་བཟུང་ཚད་འཁོར་བའི་རྒྱུ་ཡིན་ནོ་གསུང་།།  །།

Dkar po dung gi cho lu.   Zhijé Collection, vol. 2, pp. 424-5.