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Hartmann re-examines a 108-folio palm-leaf manuscript photographed by Rāhula Sāṅkṛtyāyana at Sa skya Monastery in 1936, previously catalogued as an Arthaviniścaya-dharmaparyāya. Close analysis of the foliation and punch-hole pattern shows that only the final leaf (numbered "10," with a single dividing punch-hole) actually belongs to an Arthaviniścayasūtra manuscript, preserving text from mahāpuruṣalakṣaṇa 29 to the sūtra's end. All 107 preceding folios instead belong to a separate manuscript of the ''Samādhirājasūtra'' (confirmed by faint traces of its alternate title, "Candrapradīpa"), datable on paleographic grounds to around the 11th century—making it, after the 6th-century Gilgit manuscript, the second-oldest known witness to this sūtra, predating other Nepalese exemplars. Though incomplete (breaking off partway through chapter 37, with no final colophon), the manuscript is well written and largely follows the Nepalese recension, while sharing certain features—such as the division of chapter 22 into two chapters—with the version underlying the Tibetan translation. The article lists chapter colophons with folio references and, via comparison with Christoph Cüppers's synoptic edition of chapter 9, catalogues numerous textual variants and scribal errors, along with several proposed corrections to Cüppers's edition. +
A Paleographical Study on a Palm-leaf Manuscript of Prajñākaramati's Bodhicaryāvatārapañjikā (ZX0617-ZB20) +
In recent years, a palm-leaf manuscript (ZX0617-ZB20) version of Prajñākaramati’s (c. 10–11th century) Bodhicaryāvatārapañjikā (BCAP) preserved in the TAR became available to scholars worldwide. While it has since received considerable attention, this newly discovered palm-leaf manuscript remains something of a mystery. We have, for instance, considered issues such as manuscript’s unorthodox pagination, the seemingly arbitrary insertion within manuscript ZX0617-ZB20 of a leaf taken from the Saṃghāṭasūtra. We are also interested in the fact that the script seems to not have been written by one hand, but by various scribes. This paper concentrates on the latter issue, concentrating on the paleographic features of the manuscript to conduct an examination of the varied characteristics of the handwriting. Using these paleographic methods, this piece seeks to attribute these ascribed script variations to their respective sources so as to extrapolate some further conclusions on the processes involved in the manuscript’s transcription. ([https://www.academia.edu/145015634/A_Paleographical_Study_on_a_Palm_leaf_Manuscript_of_Praj%C3%B1%C4%81karamatis_Bodhicary%C4%81vat%C4%81rapa%C3%B1jik%C4%81?sm=b&rhid=41544837681 Source Accessed July 23, 2026]) +
A two-part article from ''Tricycle'' titled "A Perfect Balance." Gil Fronsdal explores the Pāli terms ''upekkha'' and ''tatramajjhattata'', presenting equanimity as an inner stability and balance that protects against the eight worldly winds rather than a state of cold detachment, and offers seven supports for cultivating it. Sayadaw U Pandita approaches equanimity from a Theravada vipassana perspective, emphasizing moment-to-moment mindfulness as the primary method, and outlines five practical supports including cultivating balanced attitudes toward beings and things, avoiding those with excessive attachment, and inclining the mind deliberately toward balance. +
This Buddhist monk's plea may change the way you think and feel about animals. +
Every cow just wants to be happy. Every chicken just wants to be free. Every bear, dog, or mouse experiences sorrow and feels pain as intensely as any of us humans do. In a compelling appeal to reason and human kindness, Matthieu Ricard here takes the arguments from his best-sellers ''Altruism'' and ''Happiness'' to their logical conclusion: that compassion toward all beings, including our fellow animals, is a moral obligation and the direction toward which any enlightened society must aspire. He chronicles the appalling sufferings of the animals we eat, wear, and use for adornment or “entertainment,” and submits every traditional justification for their exploitation to scientific evidence and moral scrutiny. What arises is an unambiguous and powerful ethical imperative for treating all of the animals with whom we share this planet with respect and compassion. (Source: [https://www.shambhala.com/a-plea-for-the-animals-15041.html Shambhala Publications]) +
A presentation of selected verses from Khunu Lama's text ''The Jewel Lamp: In Praise of Bodhicitta''. +
The present paper attempts to show how the term ''bodhicitta'' appeared in Śāntideva's ''Śikṣāsamuccaya'' (SS) and Nāgārjuna's ''Ratnāvalī'' (RA). +
A Preliminary Report on Newly Identified Text Fragments in Śāradā Script from Źwa lu Monastery in the Tucci Collection +
In the summer of 2007 I had the opportunity to participate in Francesco Sferra’s course on Kamalaśīla’s First ''Bhāvanākrama'' at the University of Hamburg. For his lectures Sferra kindly provided us with digital images of Tucci’s photographs of the Sanskrit manuscript of this text. The 27 extant folios of the ''Bhāvanākrama'' (fols. 2–28), which were used by Tucci for the ''editio princeps'' of the text,<sup>1</sup> have been photographed in three successive multi-folio images together with nine extra folios that appear in two photos only, namely those labelled MT 41 II/01 and MT 42 II/02. My attention was caught by these folios since while the ''Bhāvanākrama'' manuscript is written in Magadhi script, these nine folios are written in Śāradā script — a rather rare phenomenon among the corpus of Sanskrit manuscripts preserved in Tibet. They and the rest of the ''Bhāvanākrama'' manuscript were originally preserved at Zwa lu Ri phug.<sup>2</sup> The manuscripts preserved there were probably taken to Beijing (The Cultural Palace of Nationalities) in the 1960s, but were returned to Lhasa sometime after 1990 (first to Nor bu gliṅ ka and then to the Tibetan Museum).<sup>3</sup><br>
Of the nine folios, Tucci photographed both sides of seven of them, while he photographed only one side of the remaining two (here labelled 7.2 and 9.2). The two sides not filmed were probably blank or contained title pages (unfortunately, Tucci did not photograph title pages). Some images are out of focus and barely legible, and thus a complete diplomatic transcription is almost impossible. If Rāhula Sāṅkṛtyāyana photographed the same folios, this would be very helpful in deciphering them; however, I have yet to find evidence that he did. Therefore, I have only been able to go through the folios haltingly, and so identify a limited number of them. (Kano, introductory remarks, 381–82)
<h5>Notes</h5>
#The reproduction of these folios will appear together with a new critical edition of the Sanskrit text, a new edition of the Tibetan translation and an annotated English translation in a new issue of Manuscripta Buddhica which is being prepared by Francesco Sferra and Iain Sinclair.
#It should be noted that in the introduction of the ''editio princeps'' of the First ''Bhāvanākrama'', Tucci states: "The manuscript is preserved in the monastery of sPos k’aṅ on a side valley to the right of the Myań c’u, between Gyantse and Shigatse" (Tucci 1956: 6-7). However, this information is most probably wrong for the following reasons: ''a)'' the same manuscript was most likely seen by Sāṅkṛtyāyana in Źwa lu Ri phug in 1936 (1937: 39); ''b)'' the envelope itself containing the negatives of Tucci’s photographs are labelled "Zha lu" (see above, p. 46); ''c)'' in Źwa lu Ri phug there were other manuscripts in Śāradā script, in particular a manuscript containing Sajjana’s ''Mahāyānottaratantraśāstropadeśa'', which might be connected with the ''Sūtrālaḿkārapiṇḍārtha'' reproduced together with the first ''Bhavanākrama''.
#Cf. Steinkellner 2004.
No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:
As Gāndhārī and Sanskrit fragments have come to light within the past few years, there has been an increasing interest in the ''Bhadrakalpika-sūtra'' (''=BKS''). Surveys of the primary and secondary materials have previously been provided by Inokuchi Taijun, Jan Nattier, Daniel Boucher and Peter Skilling.[1]. However, they overlooked some materials of great significance, and other new sources have been discovered since then. The present paper, in addition to the papers mentioned above, isi ntended to offer several new primary source documents to the study of this sūtra.[2]
<h5>Notes</h5>
# Cf. Inokuchi 1960, Nattier 1991: 21–14, Boucher 1996: 261, Skilling 1992, 2010, and 2014.
# For more secondary sources, cf. Li forthcoming. +
The ''Bodhicaryāvatārapañjikā'' (BCAP) composed by Prajñākaramati (c. 10–11th century) is the only officially published Sanskrit commentary on Śāntideva’s renown ''Bodhicaryāvatāra'' (BCA). Since the critical edition of BCAP was published in the early 20th century by Louis de La Vallée Poussin (1914), it has been carefully studied by many scholars. However, this early critical edition of BCAP is far from perfect. According to de La Vallée Poussin's "Introduction," the critical edition is based on two Sanskrit manuscripts, noting that: "The first is in the Nepalese character and contains (with several large lacunae) the whole of the work; the second, in the Maithili character, contains only the commentary on the ninth chapter." This means that the first eight chapters of his edition of the BCAP are based only on a problematic Nepalese manuscript. There are therefore significant lacunae in the commentaries to the BCA's verses: 1.1, 3.22–33, 4.1–45, 8.18–22, 8.24–25, 8.40–47, and 8.108–186, as well as many smaller textual lacunae and unreadable passages scattered throughout the whole text which ultimately have hindered the exhaustive study of the text as a whole.
With the recent discovery of a BCAP Sanskrit palm-leaf manuscript in the Tibetan Autonomous Region, further study of the BCAP has become possible.[1] This newly discovered palm-leaf manuscript measures around 32.1*6.2cm in size and is catalogued as ZX0617–ZB20 in the facsimile edition. Each page generally contains six or seven lines in black ink with space for a string hole slightly left of the center. Its scripts are mainly written in the Proto-Bengali style. Even considering that the same scribe would write in a different hand depending on circumstances—e.g., the script would change if he was in a hurry to finish the day’s transcription, etc.— we can identify the handwriting of at least three scribes in this palm-leaf manuscript. One of them would have copied the leaf of a ''Saṃghāṭasūtra'' manuscript (folio 71ab) that was inserted—probably by accident—into the BCAP. The other two scribes who copied the BCAP differ not only in the neatness of their writing as well as in the embellishment of ''akṣaras'', but also in their unique choice of fonts. For example, Scribe A who copied the majority of the manuscript tends to use ''la'' in the typical Proto-Bengali style, although sometimes with a transitional form, while Scribe B tends to write ''la'' (91A1) in the ''Nāgarī'' style. The ''ca'' of the former is in the ''Nāgarī'' style, while the ''ca'' (92A1) of the latter is generally in the Proto-Bengali style. A closer study of their paleographical features will be done in the future. (Wang, et al., introduction, 97-98)
A Preliminary Survey of Sanskrit Manuscripts of Madhyamaka Texts Preserved in the Tibet Autonomous Region +
A preliminary survey of the Sanskrit manuscripts of Madhyamaka texts preserved in the TAR. Includes information on Śāntideva's ''Bodhicaryāvatāra'' and ''Śikṣāsamuccaya''. +
A Prolegomena to the Śrīmālādevī Sūtra and the Tathāgatagarbha Theory: The Role of Women in Buddhism +
This dissertation is a study and English translation of the ''Śrīmālādevīsūtra'' by Diana Paul from the Chinese editions by Guṇabhadra (T353) and Bodhiruci (T310(48)). +
This article by Paul Harrison investigates the relationship between the Sanskrit and Tibetan texts of the ''Śikṣāsamuccaya'' in a systematic fashion. +
In this article, Wayman argues that the ''Akṣayamatinirdeśasūtra'' is a reworking of the earlier scripture ''Bodhisattvapiṭakasūtra''. He notes that Takasaki, by contrast, concluded that the ''Bodhisattvapiṭakasūtra'' is the later of the two texts. Wayman's own reasoning runs the opposite way: the ''Bodhisattvapiṭakasūtra'' is large, rambling, and loosely knit because it is the earlier text and took a long time to reach its present form, whereas the ''Akṣayamatinirdeśasūtra''— a tightly-knit, sharply organized treatment of the same material—is the later composition, produced in a relatively short span of time. (see Wayman, ''Untying the Knots in Buddhism'', 84n36) +
This is Paul Williams's response to John Pettit's review of Williams's book ''Altruism and Reality'' published in the ''Journal of Buddhist Ethics'' 6 (1999): 138-154. +
A critical edition of the [Kṣaṇika-Parivarta] chapter of the ''Laṅkāvatārasūtra'' by Jikido Takasaki. It makes use of 17 Sanskrit manuscripts, Nanjio's and Vaidya's editions, Tibetan translation, and all the three Chinese translations. +
A Sanskrit critical edition of the Kṣaṇika-parivarta of the ''Laṅkāvatārasūtra'', edited by Jikido Takasaki. Published in ''Collected Papers on the Tathāgatagarbha Doctrine'' by Motilal Banarsidass, 2014. +
An analysis of Buddhism and free will that looks at Śāntideva's use of ''upāya'' (skillful means) and his position on free will. Also examines primordial wisdom as a hypothetical construct. +
No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:
The reign of the King Ṭhi-sroṅ-deu-tsen (Khri-sroṅ-Idehu-btsan, VII century) represents a period of the greatest importance in the early history of Tibet in general and of the spread of Buddhism in that country in particular. The activity of the great Śāntirakṣita ("Ācārya Bodhisattva") and of Padma-sambhava. the selection of the first seven Buddhist monks of Tibetan origin (''sad-mi mi bdun''), the foundation of numerous sites of Buddhist learning in Tibet, and the intense literary activity of the Tibetan learned translators (''lo-tsa-ba'')—Pal-tseg (dPal-brtsegs) and others by whom a great number of Buddhist canonical and scientific works were rendered into Tibetan,—all this has been described by Bu-ston in his History of Buddhism and in other Tibetan historical works<br> There is, however, one subject relating to the spread of Buddhism in Ṭhi-sroṅ-deu-tsen's reign, to which the Tibetan historian devotes his special attention and on which he dwells in detail. This is the strife between two parties into which the Buddhists of Tibet were at that time split. One of these parties consisted of the pupils and followers of Ācārya Śāntirakṣita who professed that form of Mahāyāna Buddhism which was generally acknowledged in India and Nepal, ''viz''. the teaching of the Path to Enlightenment through the practice of meditation connected with the dialectical analysis peculiar to the Mādhyamika school of the Buddhists and with the practice of the six Transcendental Virtues (''pāramitā'').<br> The leader of the other party was a Chinese teacher (''hwa-śaṅ'' or ''ho-shang'') known by the Sanskrit name Mahāyānadeva, who preached a doctrine of complete quietism and inactivity. According to him every kind of religious practice, the meditative exercises and all virtuous deeds as well were completely useless and even undesirable: the liberation from the bonds of phenomenal existence was to be attained merely through the complete cessation of every kind of thought and mental activity,—by abiding perpetually in a state analogous to sleep. Bu-ston[1] relates how this party grew very powerful and found numerous adherents among the Tibetans, how the followers of Śāntirakṣita suffered oppression from it, and how the king who was an adherent of Śāntirakṣita's system, invited Śāntirakṣita's pupil, the teacher Kamalaśīla in order to refute the incorrect teachings of the Chinese party. The dispute between Kamalaśīla and the Chinese Ho-shang in which the latter was defeated is described by Bu-ston[2] in detail. We read that the leading men of the two parties[3] assembled in the presence of the king, that the Ho-shang was the first to speak in favour of his theory of quietism and inactivity and was answered by Kamalaśīla who demonstrated all the absurdity of the theses maintained by the Ho-shang and showed that the teachings of such a kind were in conflict with the main principles of Buddhism and were conducive to the depreciation and rejection of the most essential features of the Buddhist Path to Enlightenment. We read further on how the chief adherents of Kamalaśīla[4] likewise refuted the theories of the Ho-shang, how the latter and his party acknowledged themselves vanquished and were expelled from Tibet by order of the king who prescribed to follow henceforth the Buddhist doctrines that were generally admitted,—the teaching of the six Virtues as regards religious practice and the Mādhvamika system of Nāgārjuna as regards the theory.[5]<br> Thus the influence of the Chinese Ho-shang’s teachings over the minds of the Tibetans suffered a complete defeat and with it perhaps some political influence of China.[6] This is certainly a most important event in the history of Tibetan Buddhism which has been duly appreciated by Bu-ston. It is therefore quite natural that we should be interested in finding out the sources of Bu-ston's historical record. But the text of Bu-ston's History which, as a rule, contains references to the works on the foundation of which it has been compiled, does not give us any information here. At the first glance the account of the controversy looks like the reproduction of an oral tradition and there is nothing that could make us conjecture the presence of a literary work upon which the record could have been founded- The following will show that it has now become possible to trace out this work, to compare with it the account given by Bu-ston and to ascertain its historical importance. (Obermiller, "A Sanskrit MS. from Tibet," 1–3)
[https://ia801608.us.archive.org/2/items/in.ernet.dli.2015.277506/2015.277506.1105_W_O_text.pdf Read more here . . .]
<h5>Notes</h5>
#Cf. my ''Translation'', Vol. II. p. 192
#''Ibid'': pp. 192, 193.
#Known by the Chinese names Tön-mün (sTon-mun, the party of the Ho-shong) and Tsen-min (rTsen-min, the adherents of Kamalaśīla).
#Śrīghoṣa (Tib. dpal-dbyaṅs) and Jñānendra (Tib, Ye-śes-dbaṅ-po).
#Henceforth the Mādhyamika has become the predominant school in Tibet.
#Kamalaśīla was subsequently murdered by the Ho-shang's adherents.
This PhD dissertation by Warren Lee Todd compares the ethical theories of two 8th century Indian philosophers, Śāntideva and Śaṅkara. +
