Minor Tibetan Texts: 1. The song of the Eastern Snow-mountain

by Unknown

C. The Variants.

The texts used were two small blockprints, nearly identical A 1 and A 2, and a large blockprint B.

On the whole A furnishes a good text and it may be used as the basis for the edition. Two curious cases of the use of བ་ for པ་ (7. 45) seem more than mere negligence of the wood-cutter [[11]]in connection with the badly printed པའི་ in l. 13 (which looks also like བའི་) and also a པ་ like བ་ in l. 23. Inversely there is a clear པ་—ཐཔས—in l. 37 and a བོར་ for པོར་ in l. 48. A 2 twice lacks the hook in རྩ (20, 24) and the naro ོ in lines 29, 47. These two latter variants may be due to deterioration in the blocks or the roughness of the paper, or defective inking. Otherwise A 1 and A 2 are practically identical, and except for the last pages (the last two of A 1 are condensed into a single one in A 2) the two copies may have been printed from the same blocks.

In 5 B writes ལྡིང་ for བའི་ as authorized by the Dicts. But the question of final particles is still far from being satisfactorily settled. The Dicts. are on the whole much at variance on this point. Desg. gives as a rule a greater variety of them than J.

Some differences in the tenses of the verb are presented by the two copies of A on one side and B on the other. In l. 2 སྙེག་ is the present tense as against the past form བསྙེག་ in A. As to the sense both would do, and though the past form in Tibetan is better rendered in English by the present we may understand the past form as ‘has begun to rise.’ In verse XI B gives imp. forms, making the sense one of command whereas A has present forms giving a mere statement. The final ས་ in སོམས་, however, is not recorded in the Dicts., nor the form སྦྱོངས་; ཐུལ་, however, is a regularly recognised imp. form.

འཁྲུགས་ in l. 35 is a correct past tense. The form ཁྲུག་ (without an initial འ་) as in B is not recorded, though འཁྲུག་, present, might do equally well. འཁྲེལ་, l. 32, is not authorized by the Dicts. which all omit the initial འ་. The substitution of འཆད་ for བཤད་ (38) seems to lack sufficient urgency, [[12]]though J. records a འཆད་ ‘to listen to an explanation’ from Sch. A འཕུང་, l. 29, is correct according to the Dicts., not ཕུང་ of B, though J. and S. Ch. D. give the alternative spelling.

In the treatment of grammatical particles A is superior to B. པར་ (10) is correct, not པ་ B. It is an adverbial construction. In 18, པར་, and 22, བར་, equally so. In 24 པར་ is a terminative dependent on བགྱིད་.

The remaining variants are all in the nature of equivalents for or against which nothing (or the same!) can be said, and which would do as well as the readings we have adopted. Many of them are, however, curious for this reason, that they are not homonymous variants at all and consequently substitutions for, not corruptions of, the text. We have to leave the question alone whether those in A or in B are likely to be the original ones.

In 7, དྲིན་, very kind, is as good as རིན་, very precious; in 17 དུས་ means practically the same as དུས་, ‘from this moment’, and ‘from this very day.’ In 19 གཞན་ ‘in another’ seems even a trifle better than གཞན་ ‘from another.’ གྱིས་ seems better in 32 than ཀྱང་ in B, ‘even, indeed!’ བྱེད་ ‘to perform,’ in l. 34, is as good as བསྒྲུབ་, also ‘to perform, accomplish,’ and the future form of the latter would be better if changed into a pf. form བསྒྲུབས་ or pr. སྒྲུབ་. In l. 40 གཏོང་, ‘the sending, throwing,’ seems as good as སྐྱེལ་, ‘(as silly) as the conveying.’ In 41 the article པ་ means the same as plural རྣམས་ B. In 44, བདག་, ‘egotism, selfishness,’ is substituted for ཉོན་, [[13]]‘sin’; similarly in 45 and 49 ཀུན་ ‘all,’ for རྣམས་ ‘many.’ Lastly, the difficult construction ལྷུང་, in 46, is replaced in B by the easier ལྷུང་, ‘not allowing (letting, making) it [the soul] (to) fall’ instead of ‘letting it remain fallen when once it has done so.’

All these examples seem to point out that one of the blockprints (probably the larger one) was derived from a version which was not actually copied from the original but rather written down from memory. The variants are no cutting or copying mistakes except ངེས་ and ངས་ l. 16, and དྲིན་ and རིན་ in l. 7.

In l. 26 we find an erroneous ཅིང་ for ཞིང་.

The two ༈ at the end of lines 16 and 48 in B (or rather at the beginning of the following lines, for that is where they must be put if the Tibetan text is printed line for line like English verse) do not agree with my conception of the structure of the poem as indicated by my typographical arrangement of it. I would not have expected a ༈ after line 16 but after lines 12, 24, 36 and 48. The occurrence of the sign after line 48 may, however, be taken to indicate that the next two verses have to be regarded as appendices to the body of the poem proper.

It must be mentioned that in the title, in both copies of A., the final word is བཞུགས་. In B., as the poem occurs in the body of the volume, there is no equivalent title. I have written བཞུགས་ without prejudice to the question whether the form བཞུགས་ is legitimate or not. My teachers say that before a ༎ the སོ་ is required.

The only reading taken from B is ངེས་ for the incomprehensible ངས་ of A 1 and 2, in line 16.

It may be, finally, remarked that the three copies from which this edition was prepared, show once more that textual [[14]]correctness and perfection of typographical execution are not necessarily related in Tibet. The two small prints which are, but for the single omission of a dengbu in line 16, quite correct, are small, badly printed on bad paper, and not carefully or neatly cut. The larger copy is neat, well printed on good paper, very legible, but not nearly so satisfactory as a text.

[a]Contents]]

D. Translation.

The Song of the Eastern Snow Mountain.

OBEISANCE TO THE TEACHER.

I. (His Teachers).

1. On the peak of the white snow mountain in the East

A white cloud seems to be rising towards the sky.

At the instant of beholding it I remember my teacher

And, pondering over his kindness, faith stirs in me.

2. To the East of where that cloud is floating,

In that entirely victorious Virtue Solitude,

There resided the precious ones, difficult to be invoked,

Father Famous Goodheart, the Sire with (his two spiritual) sons.

3. The yoga and other (teachings) of the two stages of the road

Relating to the profound Doctrine, they preached most fully.

To the pious of snowy Tibet

Your grace, O protectors, was ineffable.

II. (Himself).

4. Especially that this ease-loving Clergy-Perfection

Has turned his mind a little towards the Doctrine

Is (thanks to) the kindness of these noble father and sons.

Truly your kindness is great, O father and sons.

5. From now onward till (I reach) the heart of saintship,

Whilst, except in you, noble father and sons,

I will not place my hope for protection in anyone else,

I pray you to drag me along with your mercy-hook.

6. Though I cannot repay you in proportion to whatever your favours have been,

I pray that, with my soul not enslaved by attraction or repulsion,[[15]]

I may hold fast to your teaching, O protectors,

And may always put my best energy into the endeavour.

III. (His Contemporaries).

7. However, nowadays, in this snow mountain solitude,

(There are those who) whilst promising to follow the teaching themselves,

Regard others, who (equally) follow the teaching, as their veriest enemies.

Such conduct calls forth the deepest sorrow.

8. With thoughts wishing the ruin of others

And with souls fettered by fierce ambition,

They nevertheless promise to dwell on the high road.

If we consider this (carefully) it is a matter of shame for all concerned.

9. These malignant beings,

Angry because they find themselves in their old age in the wrong road,

And raging from the bottom of their hearts

Against those persons who have (duly) acted conform to the Doctrine,

Has not a demon entered their minds?

IV. (His Pupils).

10. Not to take steps to conquer the enemy, sin,

But yet after mere reproach to flare up in reply,

That is as silly as,

When an evil spirit is at the Eastern door,

To throw the ransom towards the Western door.

11. Those virtue-friends who understand that this is so,

Think of all embodied beings in general with kindness,

But saintly thoughts especially of all who devote themselves to the Doctrine.

And they subdue the enemy residing within, sin.

12. O, my followers and friends,

Whilst not letting your souls remain fallen after a lapse,

But whilst examining (yourselves constantly) whether your minds keep to righteousness,

To remain on the straight road, that surely is good.

V. (Final Prayer).

13. May all those who believe in these words,

With a mind bent on the drawing on of all beings by means of love and mercy,[[16]]

Through the (direct) vision of the actionless state of (pure) knowledge,

Speedily obtain (that) glorious, supreme saintship.

VI. (Final Blessing).

14. He, whose body blazes with the marks and beauties (as of a Buddha),

Whose speech is adorned with the sixty branches of melody,

Whose deep and wide mind, indeed, is a treasury of omniscient love,

May that glorious teacher’s blessing be on us.

The above was composed by the Great Omniscient Clergy Perfection Good-Glory as a song in loving memory.

Blessing.

[a]Contents]]

E. Glossary and Notes.

(Lexicographical, Syntactical and Material.)

ཀུག་ see ཀྱུ་.

ཀུན་, 32. Not so much ‘a matter of shame to all’ (= all the people who look at or into the matter, the beholders, the general public, or even humanity in general), but rather ‘a matter of all (of them) being ashamed,’ i.e. the people doing the shameful acts, the people concerned, engaged in this conduct, not the public in general.

ཀུན་, 29. Here thought, conception, wish (cf. D. opwelling). (Desg. ‘all-enveloping,’ i.e. ‘natural corruption or sin,’ p. 8b, but ཀུན་ = ཉོན་, ‘excitement of passion’ on p. 1044a). See also S. Ch. D., p. 29b, समुत्पाद, but Schroeter, p. 2b, ‘approbation, assent, the consenting to any proposition.’

ཀོ་ see གླུད་. [[17]]

ཀྱང་, 30. Here equal to ཡིན་, ‘yet, however, nevertheless.’

ཀྱུ་, 20. Not as a separate word in J., who gives ཀུག་ and ཀྱོ་, the latter after Schmidt. This is the word occurring in the compound ཞབས་ the Tibetan u-vowel, the ‘foot-hook’ (not merely honorific of ཀྱུ་ as Hannah seems to suggest in his Grammar of the Tibetan Language, p. 4), which J. has under ཞབས་, on p. 472a, together with a queried meaning ‘spur’ (of the foot: ‘ein Sporn’), taken from Csoma. This latter meaning is unknown to my informants. Bell gives: hook ཀུག་; fishhook ཉ་, but iron hook ལྕགས་. Henderson gives both ཁུག་ and ཀྱུ་ for hook, and also ལྕགས་ alone for iron hook. My informants deny the correctness of ཁུག་. Desg. knows ཀུག་ (པ་) only as a verb, not as a subst.; he mentions ཀྱུ་ as a separate word, subst. hook, and does not mention ཀྱོ་. The various articles in the three Dicts. sub ཁུག་ are interesting but the meaning hook is not given in any of them. S. Ch. D. translates ཀྱོ་ with ‘अङ्कुश, a pointed iron hook, a large pin to pierce with,’ whilst Macdonell in his Sk. dict. translates the Sk. word as ‘hook, goad, stimulus, remedy.’ (See below s.v. འདྲེན་.) J. under ཀུག་ gives also ལྕགས་, an iron hook, and ཉ་, a fishing hook, but my informants say that the colloquial for fish hook is rather ཉ་ (or པའི་) ལྕགས་ or simply ཉ་ (pr. nyendzin), just as a meat hook (to hang up meat on) is ཤ་ (pr. shendzin). The ཡ་ in [[18]]the above represents the pronunciation of the more illiterate people.

One of my informants is, however, of opinion that ལྕགས་ does not mean an iron hook at all, but hook in general even though it might be made of silver, copper, gold, etc. He compares it with the word wall, ལྕགས་, which is not necessarily made of iron, and though of stone or earth is still called ‘iron-mountain.’ Women’s ornaments such as earrings, chains, or necklaces (སྐེ་, pr. kenthang, not in the Dicts. or Bell. As a colloquial word the dengbu might perhaps be left out in writing) may have golden or silver hooks, གསེར་ or དངུལ་. Example: སྐྱེ་, this woman has a very fine necklace which has four golden and silver hooks (or clasps). Schroeter’s dict., p. 361b, already gives ལྕགས་ as hook only. The expression ལྕགས་ in the sense of mineral, given by Desg., 307a, would make us think that ལྕགས་ might perhaps mean metal hook, but see below. S. Ch. D. adds to the confusion. Under ལྕགས་ he gives: (1) iron pin to guide and punish elephants; fish-hook; (2) name of a plant. (His next entry seems improbable, elephant driving and elephant driver for one and the same word). But under ཀྱུ་ he defines ལྕགས་ as ‘iron hook, an angle, a fishing-hook.’ J. has ལྕགས་ under ལྕགས་ and gives ‘an iron hook, esp. fishing-hook, angle; often fig.’ and in his illustration he translates ཆོས་ simply as ‘hook of grace.’ [[19]]He marks the word as belonging to the book language. It is curious to note that Schlagintweit in his Rgyal-rabs (title, or introductory verse) translates the word ལྕགས་ with ‘eisernen Hacken’ (p. 25), whilst Schiefner renders the same word correctly on the next page by ‘Hacken’ alone. But in his new translation of the Rgyal-rabs, H. A. Francke (J.P.A.S.B., Vol. VI, n. 8, p. 397) writes again ‘Iron Hook.’

There is still another compound with ཀྱུ་, namely མཐེབ་, the name for a component part of the elaborate torma cake structure. It indicates a small piece of dough in the form of the top of the thumb. From all these examples it might be hazarded that the element ཀྱུ་ means primarily ‘curve, curved’ or ‘curvature,’ and has no substantial meaning like ‘hook’ or the like. My teachers, however, think that ཀྱུ་ by itself is a substantive ‘hook.’ So it is not clear whether J. is right as against the other Dicts. in not entering the word separately. The above discussion is in any case better entered under the word ཀྱུ་, whether this is really an independent word or not. The fact that S. Ch. D. gives a Sk. equivalent for ཀྱུ་ alone, pleads for its separate existence.

My teachers opine that ཀྱུ་ as a separate word may occur alone, but their nearest approach to framing a sentence illustrating such a use was one in which they spoke of a wooden hook (made by a jungleman to fish or hunt with) as ཤིང་ or more briefly ཤིང་. So the example was not decisive.

Additional Note—Cf. the example in Csoma’s Grammar, p 109: གསེར་, golden fetters or chains, lit.: golden iron ropes. See also Ramsay, ‘Western Tibet’, p. 62:

‘To hook—ngiákuk táng ches, properly applicable only to a fish caught with a hook, but also used generally’, and:

‘Hook—ngiákuk (fish hook), kuk kuk (a hook of any kind).…’ [[20]]

Query: Is the use of ལྕགས་ merely conventional in several words, as in ལྕགས་, cage (Bell, Walsh ‘Tromowa Dialect’), ལྕགས་ (iron) bridge, etc.? And is the use of ལྕགས་ perhaps analogous to that of honorific prefixes? Cf. the Dutch guilder (gulden) which is made of silver, though its name is derived from ‘gold.’

ཀྱོ་ see ཀྱུ་.

དཀའ་, 7. Difficult, but here rather with some of the meaning of the English ‘hard’ (hard lines?), the French ‘dur’, perhaps L. ‘arduus.’ The meaning is somewhat that the invocation should not be undertaken lightly (God’s name should not be spoken ‘in vain’). Conceptions like: grave, serious, weighty, not lighthearted, or commonplace, or flippant, suggest themselves here. It is ‘a serious matter’ to invoke these teachers.

བཀའ་, 42. To think with kindness of or towards, or about (ལ་).

སྐལ་, 11. We have taken this word in the general sense given by J. ‘the pious,’ though it may equally well be rendered by ‘the fortunate ones,’ i.e. those who were fortunate enough to hear Tsoṅ kʽa pa’s preaching or that of his two pupils. One of my informants suggests, however, that སྐལ་ should here be taken more literally as ‘sharers’, ‘share-havers’ in Tsoṅ kʽa pa’s message and consequently should here be understood as his ‘followers.’

སྐུ་ see གླུད་.

སྐེ་ see ཀྱུ་.

སྐྱབས་, 19. May either be taken as two separate words ‘protection and hope’ or as a compound ‘hope for protection,’ ‘protection-hope.’ More accurately ‘the spot (place = persons in this case) in whom I place my hope for protection, to whom I resort or go, in whom I trust, for protection.’ (cf. D. heul, toeverlaat). [[21]]

སྐྱིད་ see མགུར་.

སྐྱེ་ see སྒོ་.

སྐྱེ་, 4. This is an illustration of the meaning of སྐྱེ་ under J.’s 4th sub-heading, 1st division. དད་ ‘faith has been born,’ but here rather ‘becomes active,’ ‘sprouts,’ ‘waxes strong,’ or ‘grows, flames up, intensifies, awakens, arises, stirs.’ The idea is not, as in a case of Christian conversion, of a state of previously non-existent faith, suddenly arising, but of an existing faith becoming strongly energised, leaping up (‘an outburst of faith’). The colloquial དད་ can be suitably translated by ‘to inspire faith to.’ For instance བླ་ (མི་) འདུག་, that lama inspires me with (no) faith. A free translation of དད་ is consequently ‘to have faith in,’ but in our passage the additional meaning of ‘renewed’ is implied. Therefore we may also render ‘they call up my faith’ or ‘renewed faith comes up in me.’ See the use of this expression in the Tibetan Primer III, p. 7, 1. 8. དེ་ (read ཁོས་) རྒྱལ་ Then he, recognising that the king was very good, and having gained faith in him, and having prostrated himself numberless times, (asked) how can I request (i.e. take, accept) such (gifts) given by the king.

སྐྱེད་ see སྒོ་.

སྐྱེད་, 50. To generate, the generation, production. སེམས་ ‘that which has been produced in the soul,’ ‘the (completed) productions of the soul’; with དང་ = with; ‘with thoughts of, assuming, observing an attitude of, with a mental attitude of or disposition to.’ འགྲོ་[[22]]པའི་ (དང་) is one elaborate substantive, a ‘the-beings-with-kindness-having-drawn-soul-disposition.’

སྐྱོ་, 28. Here not in J.’s sense ‘to be weary,’ but as Desg. and S. Ch. D. have it ‘sadness, grief, sorrow,’ or adj. ‘sad’, etc. In seeing a half-naked beggar, it may be said: མི་. Here the word is adjective: ‘that unhappy (unfortunate, wretched, miserable) man has not even a coat.’ [དུག་ (Bell) = J. དུག་ = གོས་ = ཆུ་ = Desg. ཆོ་, coat, garment, dress; not alone ‘man’s coat,’ as J. has it, but for both sexes—J. s.v. ཆུ་. ཆུ་ and ཆོ་ both missing in S. Ch. D. གོས་ is pronounced both golak and gölak. Walsh, Vocabulary Tromowa Dialect, s.v. coat ‘go’ and ‘golag.’ My teachers do not know a word དུག་ for coat in Tibetan. Desg. has a དུགས་, overcoat. S. Ch. D. དུག་༌ or དུག་ ‘old coat or garment patched up and mended.’]

ག་ see གདན་.

ཁ་ see གཤགས་.

ཁ་ see གཤགས་.

ཁུག་ see ཀྱུ་.

ཁོ་, 45. My followers and friends (cf. citizens and compatriots), i.e. followers who are also my friends; the same people under two qualifications, not two different groups of people, the friends and the followers. See རྗེས་.

ཁོ་ see གླུད་. [[23]]

ཁྱེད་ 18, ཁྱོད་ 12, 23. The difference in form is not accidental. མགོན་ is a stereotyped ལབ་, manner of speech, expression. ཡབ་༌, l. 18, is a normal honorific form. The form ཁྱོད་ was described to me as one of intimacy, of utter confidence, as distinct from familiarity and lack of respect. This seems an almost exact parallel to the use of (thou), tu, du in (English), French and German in addressing parents, God, and relations. The following example was given, a quotation from the བླ་, a little ritual gelukpa book, leaf 12a: ཁྱོད་ ‘As thou art our lama, our yi-dam, our ḍākinī, our dharmapāla …’ (prayer addressed to Tsoṅ kʽa pa). Likewise, in the little prayerbook རྗེ་ (to Tārā) we find a few cases of ཁྱོད་ (e.g. p. 5b) amidst many cases of ཁྱེད་. In the term ཡབ་ the hon. form of the first two syllables of course determines the hon. form of the last. The ‘intimate’ form ཁྱོད་ was further described as ‘the language of religious transport, ardour, fervour,’ དད་.

ཁྲེལ་ (རྒྱབ་) see ཁྲེལ་.

ཁྲེལ་ see ཁྲེལ་.

ཁྲེལ་, 32. According to the Dicts. ‘to be ashamed.’ Desg. and S. Ch. D. do not support J.’s meaning ‘piety’ and his third meaning ‘disgust, aversion.’ My oral information rejects these second and third meanings, yet see below. ཀུན་, freely translated ‘is a matter of (cause for) shame to all,’ literally ‘a-by-all-shame-feeling-cause,’ i.e. all should feel ashamed. The shame, it should be understood, must be felt, not by all who behold the bad behaviour, but by all who [[24]]are guilty of it. The exact meaning of the root ཁྲེལ་ from which the verb is derived is not yet satisfactorily dealt with in the Dicts. which are supplementary as well as contradictory in their data. The compounds exhibit a great variety of shades of meaning. That of ཁྲེལ་, for instance, may perhaps cover so wide a range as ‘shameless, impudent, self-willed, stubborn, stiff-necked, arrogant, insolent, ungrateful, loveless, heartless, harsh, cruel, wanton, ruchlos, frech.’ Some of the compounds and applications clearly indicate that ཁྲེལ་ must also mean ‘sexual modesty, chastity,’ others that it must mean ‘bashfulness, shyness, timidity’ (in this sense ཁྲེལ་ ‘brazen, forward, unabashed, saucy, bold, audacious’). ཁྲེལ་ seems to come very near to the D. ‘schroom’ which is more ‘diffidence’ than ‘scruple,’ but ཁྲེལ་ may in some cases mean ‘unscrupulous’ or ‘without a conscience.’ In this sense it comes near to ‘impious.’ The German subst. ‘Scheu’ may be also compared. It is also averred that in certain combinations a positive statement with ཁྲེལ་ is practically identical with the English exclamation: how dare you! how can you!

A compound, difficult to define exactly, is ཁྲེལ་ in which གཞུང་ has the meaning, not given in the Dicts. of straight, straightforward, honest, true, dependable, the French ‘droit’ (cf. rectitude). The whole expression may mean ‘abandoned,’ or simply ཁྲེལ་. Example ཁྲེལ་, ‘the lives of these abandoned (shameless, etc.) men are useless.’ An old sweetheart who has cast off her lover may be called ཁྲེལ་ ‘the brazen, perfidious girl.’ Desg. gives གཞུང་ in this sense as equal to བཟང་, ‘good, just, generous.’ This may be Schmidt’s གཞུངས་ ‘sincere, orderly.’ In the sentence ཕ་[[25]]པ་, ‘to render your parents kindness in this way shows a lack of gratitude,’ my teachers explain the word as ‘ungrateful, loveless, harsh.’

As far as the further meanings of ཁྲེལ་, as given in J. (see above), are concerned, Pʽun Tsʽogs maintains that ཁྲེལ་ = ཆོས་, ‘pious,’ but Karma denies it, and the former also states that ཁྲེལ་ = ཞེན་, which latter expression Desg. and S. Ch. D. know as ‘to be disgusted with.’ But J. and the others render the former expression with ཁྲེལ་, as ‘chaste’ or ‘modest,’ or as ‘to be chaste,’ etc. Both of my teachers are at one about the expression ཞེ་ ‘to be weary, tired, sick of.’ Examples: ལྟོ་, I am tired of this food. (ལྟོ་, pr. tobché, see Henderson’s Manual, Voc., p. 48, s.v. food; there written ལྟོབ་.) མི་, ‘I have got tired of this man.’ The sentence ཆོས་ was explained to me as: Having understood the doctrine, and having been delivered (saved), I am now weary of the world, have renounced the world, know the world for vanity, have turned away from it. For J.’s ཁྲེལ་, ‘scornful laughter’, the synonym ཁྲེལ་ was given to me, as well as the explanation ‘a laugh to make the other feel ashamed,’ ‘to make another feel small.’ We may therefore think of ironic, sarcastic, malicious laughter, or of derision and Schadenfreude. ཁྲེལ་, to laugh at another, at the expense of another, in order to make him ridiculous. This word ཁྲེལ་ furnishes a very striking test of the present state of Tibetan lexicography, the word གདན་ will furnish another. [[26]]

For words like these a comprehensive collection of authentic illustrations is imperative before finer shades and the exact range of meanings can be fixed. ངོ་, commonly translated as ‘shame,’ a synonym for ཁྲེལ་, is a similarly uncertain word. Compare the translations in J. and S. Ch. D. of this same sentence: ཁྲེལ་, J.: ‘he has no shame nor dread’; S. Ch. D.: ‘he has no shame or modesty.’

ཁྲེལ་ see ཁྲེལ་.

ཁྲེལ་ see ཁྲེལ་.

ཁྲེལ་ see ཁྲེལ་.

ཁྲེལ་ see ཁྲེལ་.

ཁྲོད་ see གངས་ and འབྲོག་.

མཁྱེན་ see མཁྱེན་.

མཁྱེན་, 55. J.’s queried མཁྱེན་, quoted from Gyal-rabs: ‘prob.: omniscient-merciful,’ cannot with any certainty be decided from this passage.

Desg. has མཁྱེན་༌ = ཐུགས་ = ‘knowledge of the heart, i.e. pity, mercy.’

S. Ch. D. ‘omniscient mercy.’

According to my teachers these are two different words here, knowledge and mercy; not a compound. མཁྱེན་ is here hon. form of ཤེས་ to know. But a subst. མཁྱེན་ is not recorded in the Dicts. Desg. has a མཁྱེན་ = ཤེས་ = རིག་ ‘science, knowledge,’ and S. Ch. D. also gives མཁྱེན་ as ‘knowledge.’ In compounds མཁྱེན་ has usually the verbal value of ‘knowing.’ The entries s.v. མཁྱེན་ in the Dicts. need careful comparison and deserve close study. [[27]]

མཁྱེན་ is often used in an emphatic sense, to know all, to know through and through, to know with supernatural knowledge (as, for instance, to know what happens from a distance), cf. the English adj. ‘knowing.’

The shades of meaning: wise, learned, intelligent, sensible, careful, cautious, clever, need further analysis.

འཁྲུག་, 35. The value of this word is clear from the Dicts., but there is a difficulty in choosing suitable English words to fit each case in rendering. Such words as the following may be found useful under various circumstances: to be disturbed, upset, disordered (cf. disordered brain), unbalanced, deranged, convulsed, in turmoil, tumultuous (a soul in tumult), in revolt, turbulent, wild, seething, in uproar, in the throes of (passion, etc.).

And even so none of the above expressions furnishes an easy, idiomatic and close rendering for རྒྱུད་, the man whose very character is an utter chaos.

འཁུར་, 21. Ordinarily to carry, but here to carry back, i.e. to repay, render, return.

Example: ཕ་, You must render your parents their kindness. The verb འཇལ་, primarily ‘to weigh’, is equally so used; see J. s.v. 4. For the above example the word ལན་ would ordinarily be inserted, ཕ་, but this would lessen the force of the illustration for our purpose as ལན་ means here ‘return,’ and དྲིན་༌, ‘a kindness in return.’ The above sentence can be expressed in three ways: ཕ་ (with or without ལན་), འཁུར་ (or འཇལ་, or ལོག་), དགོས་.

གངས་, title. Mother Snow Mountain. The affixes to རི་ are according to J. བོ་ and ག་; Desg. adds ངོ་; S. Ch. [[28]]D. only བོ་; Bell and Henderson no affix. Of these བོ་ gives a definite sense of greatness to the mountain. (See S. Ch. D., Grammar, Introduction, p. 18). Here the particle མ་ is not an inherent part of the substantive, but is added to give a feminine sense to the word, which here means something like ‘Mother Mountain,’ the big mountain being as it were the mother of all smaller hills and heights around it. My informants were definitely of opinion that, here, ‘Mother Mountain’ and not ‘Lady Mountain’ was meant. So we should not understand the expression as ‘Her Majesty or Ladyship the Snow Mountain.’ The meaning though grammatically important remains better neglected in the translation.

གངས་, 25. In this snow-mountain-mass, i.e. monastery. རི་ as monastery in J. s.v. རི་ but not s.v. ཁྲོད་. Bell has རི་ as ‘cell (of hermit).’

Here the expression seems rather to indicate Gendundub’s own monastery (be it Daipung, Tashilhunpo or Namgyalchöde) than Galdan, spoken of in the second verse. See Schulemann, Gesch. der Dalailamas, pp. 92 fll. See འབྲོག་ and ཤར་.

གོ་ see སྐྱོ་.

གོལ་, 33. J. འགོལ་, error, mistake. In Desg. འགོལ་ or འགོལ་, solitary spot (s.v. འགོལ་) and ལམ་ (s.v. གོལ་), ‘has lost his way’; and also འགོལ་ to put apart; འགོལ་, a separate road, a side road (route détournée). According to Desg. only the past form of འགོལ་, i.e. གོལ་, means to have erred, gone astray, both physically and morally. S. Ch. D. copies J., but adds to J.’s འགོལ་, the place where two roads separate: ‘so as to create doubt in the mind regarding the right path.’ Schroeter (p. 451a) has two entries འགོལ་, ‘remote,’ and འགོལ་, ‘a closet.’ J. has the latter expression as ‘a hermitage,’ [[29]]and Desg., as above, ‘solitary spot.’ In our passage ལམ་ does not mean ‘the mistake as to the road,’ or Anglice ‘the error of his ways.’

In our passage ལམ་ has to be taken together in the sense of ལོག་ = ལམ་ = ལམ་, the wrong road (in a religious sense, in contrast to the ལམ་ of l. 31). ལམ་ is here to be understood as a ‘wrong-road-place,’ as the spot or place (ས་ = ས་) which is, or proves to be, the wrong road, i.e. the place where one realizes that the road on which one is, is the wrong road, or, perhaps better, that the road is a wrong road (= place) to be in, a wrong-road-spot, indeed.

The meanings, recorded in the Dicts. for compounds with or without initial འ་ of འགོལ་, seem logical, as one who has separated himself from the road, is astray, is mistaken, is (in moral or intellectual matters) in the wrong, in error.

Note this example of the use of the verb: ལན་, answer very carefully otherwise you will make a mistake.

[རིག་, ‘having twisted, squeezed, screwed up your brains??’ = adv., carefully, attentively.]

གོས་ see སྐྱོ་.

གླུ་ see མགུར་.

གླུད་, 40. Ransom. Is here rather གླུད་, well defined by S. Ch. D., s.v. The meaning of གླུད་ is probably ‘the ransom (which is thrown to the evil spirit) as a substitute for, representative of (the person on whose behalf the offering is made),’ J.’s མི་ ‘a man’s image which in his stead is cast [[30]]away in the གཏོར་༌,’ a ransom in effigy. There are, however, uses of གླུད་ in which the primary sense is perhaps rather ‘effigy’ than ‘ransom.’ In a ritual describing the construction of the torma cake it is said that the སྐུ་ (together with many other moulds) must be imprinted on the dough or paste. Here the word seems to mean no more than ‘a mould constituting an effigy of the body.’ Though all the torma-cake material is thrown away after it has served its purpose, these imprinted effigies do not seem to serve specially as ransoms like the གླུད་ and མི་ quoted above.

As to J.’s queried ཁོ་ (and the slightly different མི་), this is explained as follows. The first phrase means: he is a lü in human form (a man-lü, cf. werwolf; D. een lü in menschenvorm, menschelijke gedaante). མི་ means ‘that man, there (with a pointing out by word or finger).’ For instance: that man John, that king ཀོ་. ‘That man’ alone would be མི་. But the second phrase would mean: ‘that man so-and-so is a very devil.’ J.’s rendering of the first phrase as ‘he is a curse, an anathema, one deserving to be cursed’ seems too strong. Rather ‘an unmitigated nuisance,’ for, though harsh, it may be said by a mother of her own child when it is naughty and unruly. The sense seems to be ‘devil’ (as may also be applied to children or wicked grown-ups in English ‘they are true devils,’ D. ‘een paar baarlijke duivels’) and seems to be a case of meaning-shifting from result to cause (pale death!), the lü being the ransom thrown to the evil spirit, Anglice devil. The association does not seem to be that of worthlessness, hatefulness, something good for nothing, only fit to be thrown away like a lü.

As to the above King Koko, this is a facetious name applied (something like thingumbob) to such Tibetans as ape Chinese manners in dress and in other ways. ཀོ་ is said to be a Chinese word for Tib. ཨ་ or ཇོ་, elder brother. A Tibetan, strutting about in Darjeeling with Chinese cap and [[31]]coat may hear the sarcasm addressed to him: ཀོ་ ‘Well Mr. Chinaman (or John Ch., Uncle Ch.) where are you going to?’ (‘Mossioo’ of the mid-Victorian Punch and music hall ditties).

གླུད་ see གླུད་.

དགའ་ see དགེ་.

དགེ་, 6. Clearly printed in both copies, not དགའ་. This name, ‘the virtuous,’ seems to refer to the Gelukpa sect, though the monastery which is here meant is usually called དགའ་. The relation between the two terms is not quite clear. Grünwedel, in his ‘Mythologie des Buddhismus,’ etc., p. 72, speaks of ‘das Kloster dGa-ldan oder dGe-ldan.’ Günther Schulemann in ‘Die Geschichte der Dalailamas,’ p. 65, speaks of the ‘Schule, die zuerst dGa-ldan-pa, dann aber dGe-ldan-pa oder dGe-lugs-pa, ‘die Tugendsekte’, genannt wurde.’ Modern Tibetans seem to know only the name དགའ་ for the famous monastery.

དགྲ་, 37. This is an apposition. The enemies, the sins; the enemies who are the sins; ‘these enemies of sins’ as in ‘these rascals of boys.’ See ཉོན་.

མགུར་, title. Its hon. form is གསུང་. As a single word the affix མ་ is required, which may disappear in compounds. Bell gives as meaning of མགུར་ ‘religious song,’ Henderson ‘hymn.’

As J. points out, the profane song is གླུ་ and the religious song མགུར་. A synonym for གླུ་ is གཞེས་ (not in the three Dicts. but in Bell and Henderson s.v. song).

S. Ch. D.’s གླུ་ ‘sportive song’ is not supported by the data in J. or Desg., nor by my informants. They take the [[32]]second part of this compound as a misprint for གཞེས་ and hold that གླུ་ is a double-form with the meaning of either of its parts: song. The word མགུར་ has one honorific form, གསུང་. The words གླུ་ and གཞེས་ have each various hon. forms: གསུང་ (recorded in Bell) and གསུང་. Desg. has a གསུང་, pleasant song, but my oral information does not support this special meaning.

Note the difference between J. སྐྱིད་ (s.v. སྐྱིད་), ‘song of joy,’ and Desg. id. s.v. གླུ་ ‘chant érotique.’

In Redslob’s translation of the Psalms into classical Tibetan, the word གསུང་ is used for psalm.

The following table may be useful.

Ordinary	མགུར་	= hon.		གསུང་
Ordinary,,	གླུ་	= hon.,,		མགུལ་
				བཞེས་ (sic.) གླུ་ (??)
				གསུང་
Ordinary,,	གཞེས་	= hon.,,		གསུང་
				མགུལ་ (rare) ??

འགོལ་ see གོལ་.

འགོལ་ see གོལ་.

འགྱེ་ and འགྱེད་, 38. Attention must be drawn to the fact that Desg. identifies འགྱེད་ with འགྱེ་ as against J.’s distinction between the two forms as neutral and active. Also that Desg.’s explanation of གཡུལ་ etc., as ‘to put (the [[33]]enemy) to flight in battle,’ seems more probable than J.’s ‘to fight a battle,’ etc. The explanation of འགྱེད་, by འཕམ་ in the note on གཤགས་, q.v., seems to support this supposition. S. Ch. D. gives as a meaning of འགྱེད་ ‘to institute, set going’ and translates accordingly འཐབ་ as ‘to start a combat,’ as against J. ‘to combat’ alone. Also གཡུལ་ ‘one who gives battle.’ Desg. s.v. གཡུལ་ (p. 923): གཡུལ་ or གཡུལ་ ‘to fight in battle, to combat.’ Cf. also J. s.v. གཡུལ་. S. Ch. D. copies J. as against Desg. གཡུལ་, ‘to fight a battle.’ These words འགྱེ་ and འགྱེད་, again, need further investigation supported by quotations (as well as the word གཡུལ་ with which they are used).

རྒ་, 33. To be old, the state of being old, old age. Example སྐེ་, ‘the being born, growing old, being ill, dying are sorrows,’ or ‘birth, old age, illness and death are sorrowful.’ Cf. the treatment of the first four words in J. རྒས་, with following verb, to be translated as ‘of old age,’ literally: of (belonging to, attendant on) having become old; for instance, the joys, sorrows, etc., of the state of having become old (of old age) = རྒས་ (or སྡུག་). This is not the subst. རྒས་ or རྒས་ of Desg. J. treats རྒ་ as a verb with རྒས་ as a past tense, taking རྒད་ and རྒན་ as adjectives from which the usual substantives in པོ་, མོ་, etc., are made. Desg. gives the four forms རྒ་, རྒད་, རྒན་ and རྒས་ [[34]]as substantives and has no verb ‘to be old.’ J.’s analysis seems the more accurate one. J.’s རྒས་ ‘old age’ is absent in Desg., whilst this latter has a རྒས་ without affix as ‘old man,’ ‘old age.’ This word S. Ch. D. has as = རྒ་ ‘old, ripe’; whilst he adds རྒས་ = རྒད་ ‘aged, old; exhausted, infirm; an old man.’ This group needs proper quotations for final settlement.

My oral information on some of these points is as follows: The use of རྒས་ alone, as ‘old, ripe’ is denied. རྒས་ does not mean རྒད་ ‘old,’ because རྒས་ requires a ལོ་ ‘grown old in years’ in that sense. As an independent adjective, however, it means ‘worn out, exhausted, thin, lean, aged, grown older,’ and is in that case an equivalent for རྒད་. Troubles make a man རྒས་ ‘age him’; make him as if old. Age makes a man རྒད་, old, i.e. really old. For the use of རྒས་ the following two illustrations were given: རྒས་ ‘don’t do such work (or things: or don’t behave in that manner) in your old age;’ རྒས་, ‘don’t think bad (evil) thoughts in your old age when (whilst) death is drawing near.’

རྒད་, རྒན་, རྒས་ see རྒ་.

རྒྱ་ (or རྒྱལ་) སྒོ་ see སྒོ་.

རྒྱན་ see རྒྱན་.

རྒྱན་ see རྒྱན་.

རྒྱན་ see རྒྱན་. [[35]]

རྒྱན་ and བརྒྱན་, 54. The treatment of these words in the Dicts. seems unsatisfactory. None of the Dicts. give a passive verb རྒྱན་ or བརྒྱན་ ‘being adorned, being decked out, embellished,’ etc. J. has only རྒྱན་ as a subst. ‘ornament, decoration,’ and a verb བརྒྱན་ ‘to adorn, decorate, provide with.’ According to this his own example ཉ་ should not mean, as he says, ‘the letter nya (ཉ་) being provided with an S above it’ (= སྙ་), but rather something like ‘to adorn the letter nya with a sa as a topletter.’

Desg. knows a verb རྒྱན་ or རྒྱན་ (or བྱེད་ or བཀོད་) with the meaning of ‘to adorn,’ with a past tense བརྒྱན་, ‘ornavi, ornatus, orné,’ whatever that means. He and J. quote also a རྒྱན་ ‘adorned,’ in which the རྒྱན་ has clearly a substantival value, like in རྒྱན་, ‘without adornment, unadorned.’

S.v. བརྒྱན་ Desg. says: ‘praet. verbi རྒྱན་, ornatus, et v. act. ornare, orné, orner,’ and he adds བརྒྱན་ or ཆ་ ‘ornament.’ Bell has རྒྱན་ for ornament. But J. knows no བརྒྱན་ or ཆ་ as substantives and refers expressly to the unprefixed རྒྱན་ for the substantives. He further equates རྒྱན་ and རྒྱན་ ‘ornaments’ (plural). Under འདོགས་, ‘to put on,’ we find further རྒྱན་, to put on gay clothes, finery (s.v. རྒྱན་, the same expression is translated as ‘to adorn one’s self,’) and རྒྱན་, ‘beautifully attired’ (Mil.). If these translations are idiomatically true we should expect [[36]](བ) རྐྱན་ to have a wider sense than the English ornament, rather anything beautiful or fine, whether ornaments (in the sense of trinkets) or not. The word adornment would fit better. (Cf. D. tooi, G. Schmuck.)

Desg. gives no example of རྒྱན་ with a clearly active value of the verb ‘to ornament,’ but both in J. and Desg. such examples are given under བརྒྱན་. Desg. gives as synonyms ལེགས་ and མཛེས་ and it is a question whether in these expressions བྱེད་ can have the neuter sense of ‘to act as’ = ‘to be’ (like in རྒྱལ་). S. Ch. D. (who has several misprints in his syns. for རྒྱན་) quotes s.v. འགོད་ (292b) a བརྒྱན་, ‘to arrange ornaments (tastefully); to decorate, adorn, to construct or adjust grammatical forms, sentences, (Zam.).’ This latter use of བརྒྱན་ is evidently the clue to the expression, quoted elsewhere by Desg. and S. Ch. D.: རྒྱན་, अलंकारपण्डित, one versed in rhetoric, a clever orator. The equation རྒྱན་ = བཞག་ (in the modern language, v. Bell, to put, place), given by S. Ch. D. is denied by both my teachers, though confirmed by Desg.; they know of no Tibetan word of this spelling and sound with the meaning bejewelled, adorned, decorated, as is the correct translation of the Sk. equivalent cited, मण्डित. Yet may རྒྱན་ (པ་) perhaps mean ‘an ornamented object’, hence ‘die, dice’; hence again Desg. ‘objets mêlés pour tirer les sorts’, and lastly ‘stake’ (in gambling) and ‘lot’? This first meaning is not in the Dicts. but would settle the question discussed a few lines lower down, and explain those combinations with རྒྱན་ which refer to gambling and divination. In connection with the immediately following articles in S. Ch. D., རྒྱན་༌, ‘one who joins in a wager, gambler’ [one who puts up his jewels, ornaments for [[37]]a stake?], and རྒྱན་ or བཞག་, ‘a dice-rogue, a gamester, one who throws dice,’ etc., it should be ascertained whether there is a Tibetan word with རྒྱན་ which means die, dice, or whether the combinations refer to the staking of ornaments and jewels in gambling.

S.v. བརྒྱན་ S. Ch. D. gives no news, treating this word, however, as a verb, and referring to རྒྱན་ for the subst.

As a result of this little investigation we come to the conclusion that it is legitimate to inquire whether there is not a Tibetan verb རྒྱན་ (more likely than བརྒྱན་) with the passive or neuter sense of ‘being decked out, being ornamented or adorned, showing gaily.’ What would render such a word exactly in English is difficult to see, unless we coin a verb ‘to splendiferate,’ but D. pronken (pronken in vollen luister) comes near to it. Other related words would be: to blaze forth, to shine out, to cut a dash, or else to swagger, to swank, to preen, to strut, or again to be graced with or by, to show forth, etc., but especially ‘to display’ in the technical zoological sense.

An instructive illustration in this matter is furnished by the following two sentences, both with the same meaning: ཐང་, or ཐང་, of which the best idiomatic translation is: O, what a fine picture!; how fine is the painting (drawing) of (in) (this) picture!

But the psychological translation is in the first case: ‘This picture is by-lines-(fine)-displaying’, and in the second case: ‘To this picture there is a by-the-lines-(drawings)-ornamentation (or display).’

རྒྱལ་ see སྒོ་.

རྒྱལ་, 6. According to J., III, also ‘superior, excellent, eminent.’ རྣམ་, ‘most excellent, illustrious.’ This may be the meaning here. Whether there is a connection between the word as used here and the རྒྱལ་ title of the Dalai Lamas may be left undecided. [[38]]

རྒྱུད་, 30. Here character, heart, disposition, etc. It is curious that this meaning, given by J. and Desg., is absent in S. Ch. D.

སྒོ་, 39, 40. Door. Though the average Tibetan house (if it be not a mere hut) has two doors, a front door and a back door, they are not on a principle located in the eastern and western sides of the house. For the text the words east and west have no special significance; they are simply used དཔེ་, by way of speech, as an example, illustration or comparison.

The front (main, public) door is called གཞུང་ or རྒྱ་ (or རྒྱལ་) སྒོ་. The first word is interpreted as the ‘main,’ ‘public,’ or ‘middle’ door; the second as the ‘wide’ or ‘royal’ door. The back door is called ལྟག་ (in J. s.v. ལྟག་), which is explained as ‘the door for horses and cattle.’ The སྐྱེད་ quoted by J., p. 29b, is unknown to my informants. They only know a སྐྱེ་, ‘the door leading to birth, or re-birth.’

སྒོ་ see གསུང་.

སྒྲིམ་ see གོལ་.

བརྒྱན་ see རྒྱན་.

ངེས་ (དུ་) see ཅིས་ and ངེས་.

ངེས་, 16. With terminative: ‘there is certainty for’ = ‘it is certain’ = ‘I am sure of’, ‘I know for certain that’, ‘it is surely, truly so.’ A has ངས་ for ངེས་ in B.

Here, however, ངེས་ = ངེས་ = ངེས་ = ངོ་ = ངོན་ = ‘indeed, truly, really, forsooth.’ Compare also ཅིས་. [[39]]

ངོ་ see ཅིས་.

ངོ་ see ཅིས་.

ངོ་ see ཅིས་ and ངེས་.

ངོ་ see ཅིས་.

ངོ་ see ཅིས་.

ངོ་ see ཁྲེལ་.

དངོས་ see ཅིས་.

མངོན་ see སྤྲོས་.

ཅི་ see མྱུར་.

ཅིས་, 48. (Also ཅིས་). Here rather with the meaning ‘without fail, for sure, indeed, surely’ in addition to J.’s ‘anyhow, by all means.’ It is said to be synonymous with ངེས་ and colloquial ངོ་, as, for instance, in: ངོ་, ‘I ask (you) to come without fail, indeed, surely, for sure, so that I may count on it.’ Also རྟེན་. Cf. Desg. in addition to J.—J. (p. 129b) has the spelling ངོ་. Bell s.v. ‘certainly’ ངོ་ (syn. རྟེན་); s.v. ‘indeed’ (syn. རྟེན་); s.v. ‘surely’ ངེས་; s.v. ‘actual’ ངོ་; s.v. ‘real’ ངོ་ (syn. དངོས་); s.v. ‘really’ ངེས་. Desg. ངོ་ ‘natural, not manufactured,’ but ངོ་ (next article) ‘certitude’ = ངོ་, ངོ་ or ངོ་. S. Ch. D. ངོ་ ‘true, genuine, really.’ རྟེན་ and རྟེན་ are not in the Dicts. ངོ་ and ངོ་ are not endorsed by my authorities. See also ངེས་. [[40]]

ཅེས་, colophon. According to J. = ཅེས་, ‘that which has been spoken,’ i.e. ‘speech, word,’ etc. Corresponds very closely to D. ‘het gesprokene, het gezegde’ or L. ‘dictum.’ Here, however, the meaning may be extended to ‘piece of writing’ (D. ‘het geschrevene,’ L. ‘scriptum’) or perhaps even more generally ‘the above, the foregoing.’

The other use of the expression, as an abbreviation for ཅེས་, ‘the so-called,’ is here, of course, not applicable.

གཅིག་ (or པོ་) see དྭངས་.

ལྕགས་ see ཀྱུ་.

ལྕགས་ see ཀྱུ་.

ལྕགས་ see ཀྱུ་.

ཆགས་, 22. In J. ‘love and hatred,’ but here better ‘attraction (for the pleasant) and repulsion (for the unpleasant),’ in other words: ‘non-attachment (to weal and woe), indifference (to the ups and downs of life),’ or again ‘bondage’ (to emotions, impressions, etc.). S. Ch. D. has ‘passion for, passionate attachment.’ It is the German ‘Lust und Unlust.’

ཆུ་ see གཏེར་.

ཆུ་ see སྐྱོ་.

ཆོ་ see སྐྱོ་.

ཆོས་ see སྤྲོས་.

ཆོས་, 34. To be construed: ཆོས་ + ཚུལ་ (པ་ or དུ་), and not as ཆོས་ + བཞིན་, etc.

ཆོས་ (མཁན་), 43. Here most likely in the stricter sense those who have devoted, given, themselves (entirely) to the religious life, i.e. those who have entered the order, the དགེ་ or even གྲྭ་, learners, pupils, lay-brothers. Cf. however, [[41]]J. s.v. ཆོས་, p. 163a, and Desg. who has a subst. ཆོས་, ‘lamaist dignity, rank,’ p. 333b.

ཆོས་, 10. Stands here for ཟབ་, or ཆོས་, ‘the deep, profound, doctrine, teaching, religion.’ Perhaps an allusion to the ཟབ་, the ‘profound doctrine of Buddhism as explained in the Tantras’ (S. Ch. D. s.v. ཟབ་). J. renders it ‘a term of Buddhist mysticism, doctrine of witchcraft,’ whilst Desg. translates the term as ‘doctrina magica.’ ཆོས་ instead of ཟབ་ perhaps for metrical reasons; in ordinary speech the inversion seems not usual. See also ཟབ་.

ཆོས་ see ཁྲེལ་.

མཆོད་ see གདན་.

འཆང་, 46. ‘To hold, to keep, to stick to, adhere to.’ མ་ ‘not keeping (it) so, not preserving, maintaining (it) in that (the same) state, not letting (it) continue in the same way, not keeping up the state of, not persisting in (the same way)’ etc.

Freely translated by its reverse: rectifying, redressing, correcting, changing (one’s attitude, condition, action, etc., previously referred to).

འཆད་ see བཤད་.

མཇུག་ see རྗེས་.

འཇུག་ see རྗེས་.

རྗེས་, 45. Not in the Dicts., lit. ‘after-track,’ is here, ‘followers, pupils, disciples, adherents.’ Though འཇུག་ is sometimes used for མཇུག་, see J. 177a, last line, the word [[42]]རྗེས་, ‘affix, final consonant,’ a grammatical term, is of course different, as well as J.’s adj. ‘following, coming after.’

The word has also the meaning ‘orphan’ (those left behind). See also under ཁོ་, etc.

བརྗོད་ see མཚན་.

ཉ་ see ཀྱུ་.

ཉོན་, 37. Here ‘sin’ or ‘vice’ are to be understood as either the three sins, or vices, or failings, or defects, or frailties, ཉོན་, ‘lust, anger and stupidity’ (in the conventional rendering), འདོད་, ཞེ་, གཏི་, or the five sins, ཉོན་, namely the three mentioned above with the addition of ང་ ‘pride’ and ཕྲག་ ‘envy’ as fourth and fifth.

See also དགྲ་.

མཉེན་ see བཤེས་.

སྙིང་ see བྱང་.

སྙིང་ see བརྩོན་.

སྙོམས་, 13. Equals སྙོམས་ (or དྲན་) པ་ = ‘to be ease-loving, indolent, lazy.’

གཏིང་, 28. ‘From the bottom’ (sc. of the heart), hence expressions like སྐྱོ་ may be simply translated ‘a deep pity (or sadness) arises, I become very sad, I am very sorry.’ See also སྐྱོ་.

གཏེར་, 55. Here perhaps better ‘treasure heap’ than mere ‘treasure,’ or perhaps even ‘treasury.’ S. Ch. D. gives as [[43]]meanings: ‘treasure’ and ‘store-place,’ in this deviating from J. and Desg. S. Ch. D.’s example ཆུ་, ‘the repository of water, the ocean’, seems to prove his additional explanation.

རྟག་ see རྟོག་.

རྟེན་ see ཅིས་.

རྟེན་ see ཅིས་.

རྟེན་, 49. (Pf. and ft. བརྟེན་). Has here simply the primary meaning ‘to adhere to,’ more colloquially, ‘to stick to,’ or ‘to keep to, hold fast to, to heed, to observe.’ May, however, here be also taken as Desg.’s ‘to believe in, to trust’ (in the sense of ‘to rely on’) according to his example ཁྱེད་, ‘I believe, trust (in) your words’ (p. 420a), or otherwise: to put reliance on (what another says, states, preaches, teaches).

རྟོག་, 32. (Pf. བརྟགས་). May almost be translated here as ‘to contemplate, to consider’ (‘if one comes to think about it’ or ‘if one looks into that matter’), but not merely as ‘to behold, to see.’

རྟོག་, 47. Evidently the same as J.’s. བརྟགས་ ‘examination, trial’ (214b). J. has a verb བརྟག་ (or རྟོག་) གཏོང་, occurring in the Padma tʽaṅ yig and in Milaraspa, with the meaning ‘to examine, search into, see whether or whether not.’ J. has also the forms རྟོག་ and བརྟག་, both subst. ‘examination,’ s.v. དཔྱོད་, ‘to examine,’ p. 329a.

Desg. gives རྟོག་ as syn. with རྟོག་, ‘to consider, test, judge’; བརྟགས་, ‘examination, judgment.’ [[44]]

S. Ch. D. རྟོག་ (= བསམ་, or མནོ་) ‘consideration, examination, trial,’ and (558a) བརྟག་ (= ཞིབ་), ‘examination, careful weighing of all the details of a case, deliberation.’ S. Ch. D. seems to treat རྟོག་ and བརྟག་ as two quite different words. S.v. དཔྱོད་ he has further རྟོག་, ‘to examine anything,’ and བརྟག་, ‘investigation, inquiry.’

རྟོགས་ see སྤྲོས་.

ལྟ་ 51. This word seems here to mean ‘vision, illumination, (direct mystical) contemplation, the seeing face to face.’ In our passage it is the direct vision (the ‘vision direct’), proper to, inherent in, characteristic of, belonging to, the knowledge pertaining to the actionless (or undifferentiated) state, the ‘passive-state-knowledge-vision.’ See also སྤྲོས་.

ལྟག་ see སྒོ་.

ལྟོ་ see ཁྲེལ་.

ལྟོ་ see གདན་.

ལྟོབ་ see ཁྲེལ་.

སྟོང་ see སྤྲོས་.

བརྟག་ see རྟོག་.

བརྟག་ see རྟོག་.

བརྟགས་ see རྟོག་.

བསྟན་ (གཉིས་) see ལམ་.

བསྟན་, 23. ‘To follow, to keep to the teaching; to be or remain true, faithful to the teaching, to hold fast to it, to stick to it.’ See also རྟེན་. [[45]]

ཐབས་ see འདུལ་.

ཐམས་, lit. ‘Great-all-knowing-clergy-perfection-good-glory,’ corresponds to a Sk. Mahā-sarva-jña-saṁgha-siddhi-shrī-bhadra. See for literature about him: Schulemann, Geschichte der Dalailamas, pp. 91–92, note 11, and S. Ch. D.: The Hierarchy of the Dalai Lamas, J.A.S.B., Vol. LXXIII, Pt. I, extra No., p. 81.

ཐུགས་, 55. This is here, in my opinion, not a sort of Hottentotten­potentaten­tanten­attentater-like formation. I take the ཟབ་ to refer to the ཐུགས་, a profound and wide mind, whilst the མཁྱེན་ only refers to the གཏེར་, the treasury of omniscient mercy. It is not likely that the qualities of width and depth form part of an enumeration of which the remaining items are love and knowledge or even (as a compound) omniscient-mercy. See the various component words in this glossary.

ཐུགས་ see མཁྱེན་.

ཐུགས་ see བློ་.

མཐེབ་ see ཀྱུ་.

མཐོན་ see ལམ་.

འཐབ་ see འགྱེ་.

དག་, 43. J.’s entry under this entry is as follows: “དག་ (པའི༌) སྣང་ (བ་) Schr. ‘good opinion’ (?), prob.: a pure, sound view or knowledge Glr.; in Mil. it has a similar meaning.” He adds an oral sentence: “*dhag-náṅ jón-wa* C. to lead a holy life.” (sic. jón = jóṅ?) Schroeter has (135b): “དག་, a good opinion, a good conception of any thing, a conceit, a thought.” [Based on an Italian ‘concetto’?] He has two further entries ‘དག་, to form a good [[46]]opinion of any individual,’ and ‘དག་ (read: སྦྱོང་) བ་, to form a good opinion, or to conceive well of any one.’

In our passage we are inclined to take སྣང་ as སྣང་, as ‘view, thought, idea, conception,’ etc., and སྦྱོང་ = ‘to exercise, practise, perform’, or even ‘to entertain, cherish (thoughts).’ དག་ we take as དག་, ‘pure’—the connection with thought not the opposite of false, erroneous, but of bad, cruel, unkind. So here the expression seems to mean ‘to think with goodwill, with kindness (of others),’ not the colloquial ‘to have a good opinion of, to think well of.’ To think ‘good’ is here the opposite of to think ‘evil,’ but the idiomatic value of the expression ‘to think well of’ (as the opposite of ‘to think poorly of’) would make the latter rendering misleading. The real value, then, of the expression as used in this passage, seems to be: ‘to think good, kind thoughts of,’ i.e. purely, or saintly in the sense of kindly, lovingly, benevolently, in a friendly manner, with sympathy, but not, as J. seems to suggest, intellectually correct. We may expand the rendering into ‘with a holy mind, with thoughts of saintliness, thinking saintly thoughts.’ Compare J.’s colloquial phrase quoted above. So, as to the interpretation of the line in which the compound occurs, we take it that it means to enjoin, in contrast with the previous line in which it is said that beings in general must be thought of with kindness, that religious people (instead of the mere laymen) must be thought of in a still better, higher manner, namely with holiness and saintliness.

One of my informants was first inclined to take དག་ as ‘to teach, to preach the true knowledge.’ Though he later on sided with the explanation adopted above, the opinion should be recorded, but it should be added that a second informant rejected this view of the first one.

Attention should be drawn to the meaning of སྣང་, ‘the soul’ (with spellings སྣང་ and ནང་; དག་, རྟགས་, བརྟག་, སྟག་, s. J.). Also the curious expression ‘to be indifferent’ སྣང་, S. Ch. D.; and སྣང་, Bell. These expressions not in Desg. [[47]]

དག་ see དག་.

དང་ see དཔེ་.

དྭངས་, 27. Adverb: ‘purely, first class, first rate.’ Not in J. but in Desg., yet here in a slightly different application. About S. Ch. D.’s ‘gravy’ and ‘relish’ see below. དྭངས་ with the genitive seems to mean ‘acme’, ‘essence’, the typical embodiment of something, like in expressions as ‘a first class liar, a thief pure and simple, the very devil, satan himself, nothing short of an angel, a saint in propria persona.’ དགྲ་, ‘the very enemy.’ In the colloquial དྭངས་, ཡང་ and ཨང་ may have the same meaning. The latter is something like pidgin-English ‘number one’ or the kitchen Malay equivalent ‘nommer satu.’ Other equations are གཅིག་ (or པུ་), also རང་, the Anglo-Indian ‘pukka.’

The word དྭངས་ may mean soup or gravy in the following case, when there is question of singling out the liquid portion from a mixture of broth and liquid. The primary meaning seems in that case rather to be liquid as contrasted to solid. ང་ = give me (only) the liquid (not the solid stuff), pour out to me (only) the liquid. But this དྭངས་ has no final མ་. A common word for soup which is not in the Dicts. is ‘rü thang’, probably རུས་, or ཐང་ alone. This latter word is in J. with the meaning of ‘potion’, a medical term, and in S. Ch. D. as ‘potion, plain decoction, or mixture to be drunk after a medicinal pill has been taken.’ The word རུས་ means originally bone-soup, but has acquired also the more general meaning ‘soup.’ ཐང་ can be applied to meat-soup, ཤ་, but ཤ་ cannot be used. It might be that ཐང་ and དྭངས་ are really the same word. [[48]]

དད་ see སྐྱེ་.

དམ་, 30. Might here, in connection with ambition, be translated as ‘fierce,’ an extension of its primary meaning ‘strong.’

དུག་ see སྐྱོ་.

དུག་ see སྐྱོ་.

དུགས་ see སྐྱོ་.

དུས་, 24. For ever, always.

དུས་ see མྱུར་.

དོན་ see དོན་.

དོན་, 40. ‘Exceedingly stupid, meaningless, useless, silly, senseless.’ The particle རེ་ has an emphatic value, but it is difficult to define its precise scope in English. Oral information is vague on the subject, and seems to point towards a possibility that the རེ་ is a syllable of exclamation or turns the expression, of which it forms part, into an exclamation. དོན་. ‘Oh, how silly!’ An equivalent is དོན་ = དོན་. དོན་ alone is not used, and དོན་ demands a final རེད་ or ཡིན་.

S. Ch. D. (502a) translates ཁྱོད་ as: ‘I pity you, ye Tibetans’; perhaps better ‘What a pity, O ye Tibetans.’ Compare the list of words with wedged-in རེ་ in J. s.v. རེ་ p. 533b.

དྲིན་, 16. Also དྲིན་, adjective ‘kind.’ According to S. Ch. D. also ‘very kind, great boon, and the great or greatest benefactor.’ S. Ch. D.’s wording is unsatisfactorily indefinite and his examples, taken from J., fit the text badly. [[49]]J. does not define the combination དྲིན་ though he has an example བཀའ་ with the meaning ‘greatest benefit.’ Two colloquial examples are: དྲིན་, ‘the two (very) kind parents,’ and མི་, that man is (very) kind.

In form དྲིན་ is a comparative, ‘kinder.’ ཆེན་ is one of those adjectives which have a comparative and superlative of their own as:

	Great.	Many.	Good.	Small.	Bad.
positive	ཆེན་	མང་	ཡག་	ཆུང་	སྡུག་
comparative	ཆེ་	མང་ (or ང་)	ཡག་	ཆུང་	སྡུག་
superlative	ཆེ་	མང་	ཡག་	ཆུང་	སྡུག་

In practice, however, as shown by the above examples, the form is used for an ordinary quality in the positive degree though implying an amount of abundance or fullness of the quality referred to. Bell (p. 33) and Hannah (p. 129) have described these degrees of comparison. Short and partial notes in S. Ch. D.’s grammar (p. 31) and Henderson (p. 23). See J. Dict. s.v. ཤོས་, p. 564. དྲིན་, J. 262b (as equal to དྲིན་) is not acknowledged by my informants.

དྲིན་ is objected to by my teachers because they say it never occurs alone but requires a final བ་, except in the superlative form དྲིན་ which, of course, is another thing. See, however, S. Ch. D. བཀའ་, p. 654, J. p. 13. As to the ཆེན་ or ཆེན་ in many Tibetan adjectives, this is better regarded as an enclitic particle, exactly corresponding to the English termination -ful. As little as the English -ful really [[50]]means ‘full’, does the Tibetan ཆེན་ (པོ་) as a termination of adjectives really mean ‘great.’

Bell has དྲིན་ for ‘kind.’

The word དྲིན་ and its uses merit a separate inquiry. In this place we shall limit ourselves to stating that the entry gratitude (S. Ch. D., Ramsay, Schroeter) seems incorrect. The confusion has most likely come about because a དྲིན་ is an answer to kindness (return gift, etc.) and so betokens gratitude.

དྲིན་ (པོ་) see དྲིན་.

དྲིན་, 21. Ellipse for: according to (or, in the measure of) whatever kindness (you have shown to me).

དྲིན་ see དྲིན་.

དྲུང་ see བརྩེ་.

གདན་ see བྱང་.

གདུག་, 35. The three Dicts. are not at one as to the exact shades of meaning of གདུག་.

J. has, subst.: ‘anything hurtful, or any injury, mischief, harm, done.’

Desg., subst.: ‘dommage, perte, mal.’

S. Ch. D. no substantive.

J., adj. (= གདུག་༌), ‘noxious, mischievous, dangerous.’ Desg., adj. only གདུག་, not གདུག་ alone: nuisible (noxious), and a གདུག་ = གདོག་, deteriorated.

S. Ch. D., adj.: གདུག་, vicious, mischievous, deleterious, poisonous.

In J. and S. Ch. D. further applied meanings as: wild, hideous (screams); ferocity (in beasts), deleterious (smell), fierce (woman). [[51]]

In our passage the expression གདུག་ may be rendered by malign, wicked, evil, evil-minded, spiteful, with sufficient correctness.

གདུག་ see གདུག་.

གདུག་ see གདུག་.

གདུག་ see གདུག་.

གདུང་ see གདུང་.

གདུང་, Colophon. J. renders this word as ‘a song expressive of longing or of grief, an elegy (Mil.)’; but this definition is not quite typical of our present poem. S. Ch. D. has ‘a song of longing grief.’ J.’s example མོས་, where གདུང་ means (spiritual) love, seems to point out to a meaning more apposite here. So we would prefer a translation: paean, hymn of praise (D. lofzang), or psalm instead of elegy. Other words to be considered: song of thanksgiving, memorial song, lament, plaintive song (jammerklacht?), memorial verses, an in memoriam, a memorial, etc. See also དབྱངས་.

The dge rgan, however, explains the word indeed in J.’s manner, but states that the longing and grief are not the worldly sentiments but religious ones. The longing and grief are concerned with the sorrows of the world and a yearning after spiritual realities, but not with the memory of the three teachers mentioned in the poem. If this is true, the above hypothesis is likely to be a wrong one and in my translation of the colophon the words there used should in that case rather run ‘as a song of yearning for the higher life’ (cf. the G. ‘Weltschmerz’).

གདོག་ see གདུག་.

འདུལ་, 37. Steps, measures, to subdue or tame, etc. འདུལ་, to take such measures. [[52]]

འདོགས་ see རྒྱན་.

འདྲེན་, 20. (Fut. དྲང་). If the ལྕགས་ (see ཀྱུ་) is here to be thought of as a goad (like the one of the mahout) then the verb should be understood as sub J. 2, ‘to conduct, lead, guide’ (by prodding). My teachers take it as ‘to draw,’ or ‘pull.’ Pictorial representations might decide the point. My teachers think rather of a rod with a hook at the end, like the episcopal staff, and not of angling with a fishhook or prodding with a goad.

སྡུག་, 33. Or simply ཡུས་, here: ‘the loss of temper, wrath, angry explosion or outburst.’ This sense is not given in the Dicts., though J.’s 4, ‘ardour, fervour, transport’ comes near it. སྡུག་ is the same as ཡུས་, but for the fact that the former word shows the cause, an outburst on account of trouble, vexation, worry, pain, sorrow. (སྡུག་) ཡུས་ (སྟོན་ or བྱེད་) པ་ = to show (or to lose) one’s temper, to flare up, to burst out, to break loose, to explode in anger, wrath. ཕ་, ‘don’t show temper to your parents.’ དཔོན་, ‘don’t lose your temper before (or with) the master.’ དེ་, ‘to-day he has entirely lost his temper before (or to) me.’ It is synonymous, in this sense, with the word འུ་ which is also dealt with inadequately in the Dicts. q.v. མི་, ‘don’t lose your temper to anyone, to whomsoever.’ ཁྱོད་, ‘there is no reason (no need, or it is senseless) to lose your temper.’ (Cf. D. uitvallen, uitvaren, uitvoeteren, opstuiven, uitbarsten.)

གནམ་, 2. Either ‘as if rising towards the [[53]]sky,’ in which case འདྲ་ refers to all the previous words, or: as if rising whilst in the sky, in which case the འདྲ་ would only refer to སྙེག་.

གནས་ see བློ་.

མནོ་ see རྟོག་.

རྣལ་, 9. I have not received an explanation of the ‘etc.’ (སོགས་) in this place and I ignore what kind of category is alluded to here. It seems not probable that the ’18 classes of science’ can be meant, which, in the Mahāvyutpatti (Ed. M.A.S.B.), form group XXIV, p. 20. Group L, (p. 59), furnishes more likely material, but Yoga is missing in it.

སྣང་ see དག་.

དཔལ་, 56. ‘Glorious, noble,’ also ‘having abundance.’ Twice mentioned in J.’s article but not translated, perhaps because the meaning is so evident. Curious that neither Desg. nor J. specially cite this compound to which S. Ch. D. gives 7 lines, besides mentioning several combinations.

དཔལ་, 52. Is this one word?

དཔལ་, 53. ‘Glory- or splendour-burning,’ i.e. ‘to blaze with glory,’ or, more tamely, ‘to be famous, renowned, celebrated’; the latter quoted by J. from Cs. s.v. འབར་ (It may also be taken as glory-spreading, i.e. getting more famous). Desg. quotes a geographical name དཔལ་, Chinese Pienpa. The expression is not in Desg. or S. Ch. D., and in J. only as taken from Cs., so that the latter’s explanation needs verification. The literal translation ‘to blaze with glory’ fits here better.

Colloquially འབར་ is ‘to thrive, to prosper, to do well.’ འབར་, ‘he is doing well, is well-to-do, thriving.’ འབར་[[54]]སོང་, he has become rich, has made a success of his life, has come out top dog, has made good, has become wealthy, opulent, is safe, got his ship home, has ‘got there,’ made his pile, is now a man of position. (Fr. est arrivé. D. is binnen, heeft zijn schaapjes op het drooge.)

དཔེ་, 53. Here དཔེ་ = དཔེ་ or དཔེ་, technically ‘the eighty symmetrical parts, proportions, or points of beauty’ (Cs., Mahāvyutpatti); or beauties, lesser signs (de Harlez); proportions (Schiefner). See the references under མཚན་ and མཚན་. J. (s.v. དཔེ༌, p. 327b) gives the full expression ‘the eighty physical perfections of Buddha,’ དཔེ་, and དཔེ་ alone ‘proportion, symmetry, beauty.’ J. has the entry དཔེ་ ‘symmetry, harmony, beauty (in certain phrases)’ but S. Ch. D. omits this. Our passage is an example of this use, but the syllable དཔེ་ is really an abbreviation here and not a full and independent word. Desg. seems to be mistaken in saying: དཔེ་ (sic, misprint for བྱད་) or མཚན་, ‘proportion, symmetry, the 80 marvels of the body of the Buddha.’ So དཔེ་ means indeed ‘symmetrical, showing 80 marvels,’ but these meanings would not be applicable to མཚན་ which could only mean ‘showing the 32 signs and 80 beauties.’

For the rest Desg.’s 2nd article s.v. དཔེ་ adds to J.’s data, and his དཔེ་ and དཔེ་ ‘custom, rule, example’ are new. In Desg. ‘custom, rule’ tally with S. Ch. D. ‘way of doing, method’ which J. has as ‘pattern, model,’ but which he translates more freely in his examples. J. s.v. བྱད་ ‘proportion, symmetry, beauty,’ quotes a དཔེ་ from the Dzl. in the same [[55]]sense. According to this དཔེ་ would be equal to བྱད་ which seems improbable and is denied by my informants. An example of the use of དཔེ་ is the following: དེ་, the new year’s dance of now-a-days in the monastery is in imitation of the old way, is after the ancient pattern, the old manner, follows the old example. དཔེ་ is here not exactly ལུགས་ ‘custom’ but rather: ‘(with) the (ancient) method (as) an example.’

Note the use of དང་ in the above example as ‘old, ancient.’

དཔེ་ see སྒོ་.

དཔེ་ see དཔེ་.

དཔེ་ (= བྱད་) see དཔེ་.

དཔེ་ see དཔེ་.

དཔེ་ see དཔེ་.

སྤྲི་, 2, 5. The white cloud is a figure often occurring in Tibetan poetry. If used as an emblem of holiness or spiritual loftiness in connection with eminent persons, this expression may perhaps contain a stereotyped allusion to the name of the tenth and supreme bhūmi or stage of the Bodhisattva, the dharma-megha, ‘cloud of virtue,’ ཆོས་. See Mahāvyutpatti, ed. A.S.B., p. 11. Here evidently not J.’s (336a) ‘emblem of transitoriness,’ though the point might be argued on the basis of the final remark s.v. གདུང་, see above.

སྤྲོས་, 51. This word corresponds according to S. Ch. D. to a Sk. nishprapañca (or apañca, aprapañca) which in Macdonell’s Sk. Dict. is rendered by ‘unevolved, exempt from [[56]]multiformity.’ We may, therefore, think of expressions like ‘the undifferentiated, homogeneous, absolute.’ The word dhātu being the Sk. equivalent for Tib. དབྱིངས་ the whole expression དབྱིངས་ must correspond to a Sk. aprapañca dhātu. The same Sk. Dict. translates the word dhātu as ‘layer, component part, element.’ In Tibetan དབྱིངས་ means, according to J.: (1) ‘the heavens’; (2) ‘height’; (3) ‘extent, region, space, in metaphysics an undefined idea.’ According to the etymology སྤྲོས་ should mean ‘passive, actionless, quietistic, inert,’ but according to the etymology of its Sk. prototype rather ‘undifferentiated, monadic.’ One of my informants compares it with ཆོས་, dharma dhātu, and སྟོང་, shunyatā, the void, the absolute. In this connection one should compare J.’s statements (215a) that in modern (Tibetan) Buddhism the term མངོན་ (अभिसमय), ‘clear understanding or perception’ means the same as སྟོང་, and further (259b) that དོན་, originally परमार्थ, has, in later times, also become equivalent to སྟོང་. It seems that the old metaphysicians reached regions and distinctions where their followers could no longer join them, and hence the process became ‘omne ignotum pro སྟོང་.’ For practical purposes the rendering ‘absolute,’ or ‘motionless’ might be used for སྤྲོས་, whilst the word དབྱིངས་ might be rendered by ‘principle, state, region.’ If occurring in a specimen of the more technically and theoretically philosophical literature of Northern Buddhism, a more precise rendering and more careful definition might be required. Taking the following རྟོགས་ as ‘knowledge, perception, cognition,’ then the whole expression becomes in English ‘the knowledge of the motionless state (or [[57]]region, or principle)’ or—more pedantic but perhaps truer—‘the knowledge of (that is: pertaining to, inherent in) the monadic state.’ Other equivalents: ‘a state of stillness, the still state’ and, mystically, ‘the wisdom of the silence.’

One of my informants, the dge rgan, knows of a colloquial use of སྤྲོས་ = རེ་ = ‘hopeless,’ but my second authority ignores this use. The following two examples were given: འདི་, ‘it is labour lost (hopeless) to [try and] know this.’ You cannot hope to know this. (N.B.—Note the elliptic construction ‘hopeless to know’ for ‘to try to know, to study and so come to know.’) ཡི་, ‘As he does not even know how to read well (or properly), it is hopeless (lost labour), for him to (or: how can he?) study grammar’ (Not: how can he pretend to know grammar?).

N.B.—The Tibetan does not ‘read’ but ‘reads books’; he does not ‘write’ but ‘writes letters,’ he does not ‘go’ but ‘goes to the shop.’ In short, he is a very objective being.

ཕ་, 8. ‘Father.’ It is not clear why in the same line the same person is referred to by the ordinary ཕ་ and then by the honorific ཡབ་, unless ཡབ་ is a standard expression which cannot be changed whilst the first ཕ་ is used for the sake of variety in expression.

The same double use of the honorific and ordinary terms for father occurs in Laufer’s ‘Ein Sühngedicht der Bonpo’, line 41.

ཕྱོགས་, 5. In expressions like ལྡིང་ the བའི་ is explained as equivalent to སའི་, ‘of the place where.’ So the phrase མི་ should be understood as ‘towards where the man has gone, to the place where the man has gone,’ འགྲོ་. [[58]]

ཕྱོགས་, 14. Here verb, infinitive, connected with Gendundub in instrumental (agentive) or genitival relation: to turn, move towards, to tend to.

ཕྱོགས་, 46. Lit. ‘to fall aside,’ but here, as applied to the mind (ཡིད་), simply to be deflected, to go astray, to fall, sin (mentally), to deviate from the right path (religion, the right), to lapse (from virtue), etc.

འཕུང་, 29. ‘To wish the ruin, the undoing, destruction of, to be bent on the perdition of, to wish evil to’ = མེད་.

བྱང་, 17. The bodhimaṇḍa, according to the Dicts. historically and geographically Gaya, where the Buddha attained nirvāṇa. Here, however, it means rather the state implied by the locality, ‘illumination, the essence of purification, final sainthood’ literally ‘the quintessence of bodhi.’ In Christian language Golgotha (or the Cross) is similarly used in a metaphorical sense. In living Tibetan བྱང་ (bodhi) is not understood as ‘wisdom’ but as ‘saintliness, purity.’ There is, it seems, a confusion in the group of Tibetan [and Chinese!] renderings of bodhimaṇḍa (bodhi-essence) and bodhi-maṇḍala (bodhi-round), and their synonyms, a confusion which may already have its origin in India itself. The treatment of these words in the Dicts. is not satisfactory. J. and S. Ch. D. give s.v. བྱང་ this word as synonymous with རྡོ་, Vajrāsana, but under སྙིང་ S. Ch. D. has the entry: ‘བྱང་, the spirit of the Bodhisattva, i.e. Buddhahood.’ This is the sense meant in our passage, though it may be doubted whether བྱང་ really stands here for བྱང་ as S. Ch. D. interprets it instead of only for bodhi. The Mahāvyutpatti (A.S.B., p. 44) has Bodhimaṇḍa = བྱང་, and Cs. translates, ‘the essence of sanctity [[59]]or holiness (name of the holy place at Gaya).’ I yet believe that here a confusion of maṇḍa and maṇḍala must be thought of. J. has, s.v. སྙིང་ (p. 198b) ‘snyiṅ-po-byaṅ c̀ʽúb- (or byaṅ-c̀ʽub-snyiṅ-po)-la mc̀ʽís-pa, to become Buddha Thgy.’ Rockhill, Life of the Buddha, p. 35, mentions the form byang-tchub-kyi-snying-po as the equivalent for bodhimaṇḍa, and though Foucaux in the alphabetical index to his translation of the Lalita Vistāra gives only the form without ཀྱི་, yet in his text, in the places I verified (p. 239, five times), there is the ཀྱི་ as with Rockhill.

In mentioning the word རྡོ་ a special reference must be made to the element གདན་, commonly translated as bolster, cushion, seat, rug, etc. J. is very detailed about it. He has: ‘a bolster, or seat composed of several quilts or cushions, put one upon the other (five for common people, nine for people of quality).’ Desg. simply ‘stuffed cushion.’ S. Ch. D. more general ‘a low seat, a divan, cushion, a bolster.’ As to J.’s definition my authorities declare that this may be so perhaps ‘on the Ladakh side,’ but is certainly not so in Tibet and in the Darjeeling district. They do not know about the details of five and nine cushions. They take the meaning far wider than bolster or cushion. They say that anything used to support anything or to seat anybody may be called གདན་, it may be a sheet of cloth, a carpet, a blanket, a cushion, a bolster, a seat in general, anything used for lying or sitting down on. The word has a meaning exactly opposite to the English ‘cover’ and can consequently be used in as many varied senses as the latter. Etymologically—if the root of གདན་, as seems probable, means ‘to support’—the word would mean something like ‘bearer,’ ‘basis,’ ‘bed,’ ‘floor,’ ‘upholder.’ We might think of ‘underwear,’ though in English that particular word is used with quite another association of ideas. In typography there is a word ‘underlay’ which corresponds exactly to the meaning of གདན་. The word ‘bedplate’, used in engineering, comes also near to it. It will be easily seen how an applied meaning as ‘cushion, bolster,’ if given as the general sense of the word, would in many cases be totally inadequate. The line of associations to which ‘cushion’ belongs, and the line of associations to which ‘seat, support, underlay’ belong, intersect at only one [[60]]point and for the rest have nothing in common. A table-cloth may be called གདན་ because the food rests on it (ལྟོ་ is used in this sense; lit. something like ‘food-sheet, that on which the food rests’). In a ritual it is prescribed that the གདན་ for the offerings should be a spotless piece of white cotton or other cloth, called མཆོད་, ‘offering sheet,’ ‘that on which the offerings rest.’ Bell has ས་ for ‘carpet’; small cushion, placed on chair ཁ་; large cushion on ground འབོལ་. This is a most interesting example illustrating the fact that it is strictly necessary first to find out the root-idea of a Tibetan word before translating it by words representing the incidental applications of that root-idea. Whoever has handled Chinese dictionaries knows how specially necessary this is in studying Indo-Chinese languages. The Sanskrit equivalent, āsana, is derived from the root ās, to sit or lie, but the Tib. root seems different.

Further notes on གདན་. Cf. J. མ་ (pr. magdàn), ground, basis, foundation, p. 409a. Bell, apron པང་. Cs., Grammar, p. 170, l. 10, translates གདན་ as couch (stuffed seat). Lewin, Manual, p. 123, first word last line: ‘mat, seat’, in the same sentence taken over from Cs.’s Grammar. Two synonyms for J.’s མ་, quoted above, are རྨང་ and གཞི་. Bell also has ‘mat.’

བྱམས་, 50. Seems simply an amplified form for ‘love.’ Difficult to be translated exactly, Sk. maitrīkaruṇā, may be treated as a compound, loving-kindness, love and kindness, or pity. On the question of karuṇā, especially, the learned have descanted profusely.

བླ་ (ན་) མེད་ (པ་), 52. Sk. अनुत्तर, unsurpassed, unexcelled, unrivalled, supreme, incomparable, most high, highest. Not specially entered in J. but illustrated by an example s.v. བླ་. [[61]]Altogether absent in Desg. S. Ch. D. བླ་, ‘to those who are supreme, or to the followers of the Anuttara school.’ A curious entry! See S. Ch. D. also s.v. བླ་.

བླ་, 3. Here perhaps better ‘teacher’ than ‘priest’ or ‘superior.’ The word may be here equally well taken in the singular as in the plural, but the latter is perhaps more likely.

བླ་, see བླ་.

བློ་, 47. ‘Straight, upright, righteous mind.’ J.’s entry is a little vague. I think he takes ཐུགས་ in his example ཐུགས་ as an indication that གཟུ་ is also a honorific form. That, however, is not the case. Compare also the quotation from Cs. in S. Ch. D., གཟུ་ ‘to be impartial and straightforward, to be on the side of honesty.’ I don’t find this example in Schmidt. Desg. ‘straight, upright, (élevé,) just, honest.’ According to the above the word is an adj. and the translation of the passage becomes ‘whether you persevere in a straight (righteous) mind.’ The verb གནས་ has then to be taken as ‘to hold, adhere to, persevere in (an opinion, etc.).’ If however, we should find that གཟུ་ can also be sbst. ‘righteousness,’ ‘straightness,’ (not in any Dict.), then གནས་ would have the other meaning of ‘to dwell, reside’ and the phrase would have to be rendered ‘whether the mind (continues to) dwell(s) in righteousness.’ S. Ch. D. renders ཐུགས་ as ‘honest mind,’ but the sense honest versus dishonest seems not quite applicable in our passage. J. is vague here. My informants gave the above definition ‘straight, upright’ as their own but felt afterwards vague about this example which, though they had framed it, they could not vouch for: མི་, ‘see whether the man keeps straight or not.’ The framer honestly confessed that whilst we were discussing the word he had been influenced by S. Ch. D.’s Dict. in coining the sentence; a [[62]]confession so instructive for idiom-verifiers that I think it worth while to record it here.

Finally, Desg. supports S. Ch.’s second meaning ‘witness’ for གཟུ་. He, however, does not give S. Ch.’s form གཟུ་. The ordinary word for witness is, of course, དཔང་ (པོ་). It is characteristic of S. Ch. D. that he copies J.’s extract from Sch. under གཟུ་ ‘witness, mediator,’ but then immediately adds his own individual interpretation which not only is likely to be correct, but which also nullifies and contradicts the previous entry which he copied immediately above. He himself says, ‘an honest and truthful witness.’ It often occurs that S. Ch. D. brings modifications, extensions and even corrections to J.’s statements, but at the same time he copies J. far too slavishly and so contradicts himself in the pages of his own dictionary. Whether meanings like ‘reliable, straightforward, correct, proper,’ etc., have to be attached to གཟུ་ is as yet uncertain.

བློ་, 8. In Sk. Sumatikīrti. According to the Sk. dictionaries the primary sense of ‘sumati’ is ‘benevolence.’ In present-day Tibetan བློ་ is rather ‘good-natured, kindhearted,’ as against དྲིན་ ‘benevolent.’ So the Tibetan name has to be rendered as Good-nature-fame, or Famous good-nature, the personal name of Tsoṅ kʽa pa.

དབང་ (མ་) སོང་, 22. (Not) fallen under the power (of).…

དབྱངས་, 54 and colophon. This word seems here hardly to mean ‘song, singing tune,’ but rather ‘melody, melodiousness, sweetness,’ etc. This tallies to a certain extent with Csoma’s translation of the title of list LXI (p. 86) of the Mahāvyutpatti, ‘Names of the 60 sorts (or divisions) of melody or melodious voices (or vocal sound).’ I take it that this list refers to what is mentioned here in our text. How these 60 branches of melody are exactly to be understood I have not been able to ascertain. The opinions of Pʽun Tsʽogs on the point are as follows. The Buddha’s voice had such a [[63]]variety of (magic?) qualities, sixty in number, that they made him understood by all beings, whatever their own languages. The Buddha was in this way simultaneously understood by men, devas, nāgas, etc. In proffering this explanation Pʽun Tsʽogs takes ཡན་ to mean rather ‘kind’ than ‘branch.’ As an alternative he suggests that དབྱངས་ is an adjective synonymous with རིང་༌, ‘high’ (as applied to voice or rather tone) [or perhaps long, lengthened?] and that then དབྱངས་ would mean a ‘variety’ of tones or modulations. I myself am inclined to think that if the Mahāvyutpatti list is not referred to, we have here to do with some scholastic scheme of rhetorics, though if so understood the exact value of དབྱངས་ is not clear and certainly not sufficiently defined in the Dicts.

(Cf. S. Ch. D. s.v. ཟབ་ (p. 1092a), ཟབ་ = मन्द्र, मन्द्रक, ‘a deep voice, a musical tone.’ See also གདུང་.)

དབྱིངས་ see སྤྲོས་.

དབྱིངས་ see སྤྲོས་.

འབར་ see དཔལ་.

འབོལ་ see བྱང་.

འབྲོག་, 6. Here ‘solitude, wilderness’ and so = རི་ = དགོན་, ‘monastery.’ Not associated with any of the meanings connected with ‘pasturing.’ Cf. S. Ch. D. འབྲོག་ s.v. འབྲོག་.

The famous Galdan monastery was erected on a site called འབྲོག་. See S. Ch. D., The Monasteries of Tibet, J.A.S.B., Vol. I, N.S. (1905), p. 108.

མི་ see གླུད་. [[64]]

མི་ see གླུད་.

མི་ see གླུད་.

མིག་ see ཡངས་.

མིག་ see ཡངས་.

མེད་ see འཕུང་.

མྱུར་, 52. J. མྱུར་ adj., and མྱུར་ adv., ‘quick(ly), swift(ly).’ In Mil. adj. མྱུར་. Desg. མྱུར་ and མྱུར་ (ཉིད་), subst. ‘promptness,’ and མྱུར་ ‘swift.’ As adv. མྱུར་, or དུ་, or གྱིས་. S. Ch. D. མྱུར་, verb, ‘to hurry by, to pass on swiftly,’ (example དུས་, ‘time quickly runs away.’ [= tempus fugit]), and adv. quickly. Further adv. མྱུར་. Some interesting compounds in S. Ch. D.: མྱུར་ ‘a dancing woman,’ etc. Note the expression ཅི་ ‘as speedily as possible,’ J.

According to my informants S. Ch. D.’s example དུས་ is not good Tibetan. It should either be དུས་ (or བ་) ཡིན་, lit. ‘time is quick,’ or with another meaning also ‘the time is near’ (i.e. at hand, coming quickly), or again དུས་, ‘the quick time.’ Time quickly runs away, they say, should be expressed thus: དུས་.

Cf. also J., Desg.: སྨྱུར་.

མྱུར་ see མྱུར་.

ཙམ་, 38. Here: ‘after only, as a result of only, in consequence [[65]]of only, mere, simple.’ But ཙམ་ has also the meanings: as soon as, simply on (hearing), on the slightest (reproach, etc.) with a more prominent stress on the time element, instantaneousness.

རྩེ་ see བརྩེ་.

རྩེ་ see བརྩེ་.

རྩེ་ see བརྩེ་.

རྩོད་ see གཤགས་.

བརྩེ་, 55. བརྩེ་ = བརྩེ་, vb. ‘to love’ sbst. ‘love, kindness, affection,’ etc. Desg. has also a བརྩེ་, ‘acidity,’ which is also known to my informants. His བརྩེ་ ‘bodyguard of the Dalai Lama’ is held, by one of my informants, to be a mistake for རྩེ་ (pronounce tsī-dung), the monk-employees of the Tibetan government (and in a narrower sense: the clerical staff, the clerks and secretaries amongst them) as contrasted with the lay-employees of noble birth (not officials in general as with S. Ch. D. 656a, but only those belonging to the nobility) who are called དྲུང་. The word རྩེ་ in the compound is said to be derived from the designation of the Potala palace where many of the government offices are located, and which is called རྩེ་, the Potala peak, but most commonly, by the people, briefly རྩེ་, the peak. This explanation of tsī-dung as a general class of lama government-employees is wider than that given in Waddell’s table in his ‘Lhasa and its Mysteries,’ p. 165. See also རྩེ་, ‘chief clerk or secretary’ in S. Ch. D. s.v. རྩེ་ (1013b), the latter being the special name of the former’s hat.

བརྩེ་ see བརྩེ་. [[66]]

བརྩོན་, 24. Equals བརྩོན་ (or གྱུར་) ‘to apply oneself, exert oneself, put one’s best energy into something’ = སྙིང་, ‘to be zealous, diligent.’ Also བརྩོན་ (བྱེད་, རྩོམ་).

ཚུལ་, 28. Here ‘conduct, behaviour’ pure and simple, without allusion to the ཚུལ་, ‘religious law, discipline, monastic rules.’

ཚུལ་ see ཆོས་.

མཚན་, 53. Here technically the (thirty-two) characteristic signs or marks of a ‘Great Man,’ the mahāpurusha. Mahāvyutpatti (Ed. A. S. B.), LXIII, p. 92. De Harlez, ‘Vocabulaire Bouddhique Sanscrit-Chinois,’ no. 3. Schiefner, ‘Triglotte,’ no. 3. See de la Vallée Poussin, ‘Bouddhisme,’ pp. 241 et seq.

The transition of meaning of the word མཚན་ in modern Tibetan in such expressions as མཚན་, ‘a holy lama,’ or མཚན་, ‘a woman of good appearance and virtues’ (S. Ch. D.) should not be overlooked in the interpretation of our passage for its psychological value. See also དཔེ་.

མཚན་ see མཚན་.

མཚན་, 53. This is a compound substantive of an elliptic nature, and means: ‘the [well known 32 primary] characteristics [and the 80] beauties [of Buddhas]’ = མཚན་ (བཟང་). See also མཚན་ and དཔེ་.

མཚན་, 30. མཚན་ is here hon. of མིང་ ‘name,’ and the compound, literally ‘name grasping,’ means ‘ambition, thirst for fame, glory,’ etc. (D. eerzucht, roemzucht), perhaps even ‘vainglory, pride, conceit, egotism,’ i.e. the hugging of one’s own name and fame. [[67]]

མཚན་, 7. To invoke by name, to address a prayer to by name. Applied to both spiritual and human beings. རྒྱལ་, ‘to address the king, speak to the king, direct, appeal to the king,’ but always by calling him by his name. ‘O king help me’ is not a proper example of མཚན་, but ‘O, thou, King George, help me!’ would be one. To spiritual beings their names may be expressed in a paraphrase, metaphor or symbol, but they must be expressed in some way. The prayers to superhuman beings may be twofold, either an address containing requests, etc., or a mere litany of names without any further subject matter attached to them. The one is a recitation of names, the other a direct address by name; the one a litany proper, the other an invocation or prayer.

འཚོལ་, 19. The form མི་ was paraphrased to me as འཚོལ་ = འཚོལ་ = simple future, ‘not going to seek’ (D. niet zullende zoeken).

ཞིབ་ see རྟོག་.

ཞེ་ see ཁྲེལ་.

ཞེན་ see ཁྲེལ་.

གཞན་ (པ་) འཛིན་ see རང་ (པ་) འཛིན་.

གཞུང་ see ཁྲེལ་.

གཞུང་ see སྒོ་.

གཞུངས་ see ཁྲེལ་.

གཞེས་ see མགུར་.

བཞག་ see རྒྱན་.

ཟབ་, 10, 55. ཟབ་ = ཟབ་. J. vb., adj., subst. and adv. ‘to be deep, deep, deeply, depth’; adj. ཟབ་ and མོ་. Desg. [[68]]ཟབ་ and མོ་ adj. only. S. Ch. D. ཟབ་ vb. ‘to make deep, to deepen,’ also adj. and sbst.; further in པོ་ and མོ་ only adj. Note the additional meaning ‘dense’ (also ཟབས་ ‘thickness’) in S. Ch. D., not in the two others. My teachers deny that ཟབ་ can be a verb ‘to deepen,’ or ‘to make deep.’ ཟབ་ must also be understood as ‘profound’ (wisdom, teaching, etc.). See ཆོས་, also དབྱངས་, also ཐུགས་, etc.

ཟབ་ see ཐུགས་, etc.

གཟུ་ see བློ་.

གཟུ་ see བློ་.

གཟུ་ see བློ་.

འུ་ see སྡུག་.

ཡང་ see དྭངས་.

ཡངས་, 55. = ཡངས་ or པོ་, ‘wide, large.’ Desg. also ‘ample, abundant.’ S. Ch. D. only ཡངས་. Note J. ‘*mig-yaṅ*’, C., W. liberal, generous, bounteous,’ but Desg. མིག་ ‘wide-eyes: envious, covetous, greedy.’ In S. Ch. D. ཡངས་ = विशालाक्षी, ‘large-eyes, a handsome woman, name of a Goddess.’ Cf. also in the same dict. མིག་, ‘beautiful-eyes, a very handsome woman, a nymph’s name.’ As to J.’s mig-yaṅ, one of my teachers holds with him as against Desg., the other does not know the expression.

ཡངས་ see ཡངས་.

ཡན་ see དབྱངས་.

ཡབ་ (གསུམ༌), 8, 15, 16, 18. ‘Father (and) sons,’ or, as Csoma already has it in his Grammar, p. 28, ‘teacher and [[69]]pupils.’ With the addition གསུམ་ ‘three,’ and also as here without this addition, a very well known appellation of Tsoṅ kʽa pa and his two pupils (his spiritual sons). It is likely that to the Tibetan mind the expression means something like ‘spiritual family (of three),’ namely of one father and two sons. See introductory remarks. Free renderings like ‘spiritual trio’ or ‘teacher triad’ and the like are apt enough for practical purposes. Cf. an expression like the following: ཁྱོད་, ‘where have you two, father and son, come from?’ (But the sentence has also the second meaning ‘where do you live? where is your home?’).

In the light of the above, has the note on p. 98 of the J.A.S.B., Vol. II, N.S., no. 4, 1906, in Satis Chandra Vidyābhūṣana’s article on ‘the Gyantse rock inscription’ to be rectified? My informants do not think that the expression is used among the Sakyapas in the sense given in that note.

ཡིན་ see ཀྱང་.

ཡུས་ see སྡུག་.

གཡུལ་ see འགྱེ་.

གཡུལ་ see འགྱེ་.

རང་ see དྭངས་.

རང་ (པ་) འཛིན་, 26. This expression must here not be understood as ‘to follow one’s own teaching.’ རང་ is here not one compound word. The meaning is: they who themselves follow the teaching, as against the གཞན་, the others who (also) follow the teaching. See གཞན་ (པ་) འཛིན་, 27.

རི་ see འབྲོག་ and གངས་.

རི་ see འབྲོག་ and གངས་.

རིག་ see མཁྱེན་. [[70]]

རིག་ see གོལ་.

རིང་ see དབྱངས་.

རུས་ see དྭངས་.

རེ་ see དོན་.

རེ་ see སྤྲོས་.

ལན་ see གཤགས་.

ལམ་ see གོལ་.

ལམ་ see གོལ་.

ལམ་, 31. ‘The high, elevated road,’ has a religious connotation, the proper road that leads to heaven after death, the ‘narrow’ road of Christianity. See below.

ལམ་, 48. The straight road (metaphorically), the road of righteousness, of straightness of mind. Cf. S. Ch. D. s.v. དྲང་, p. 649a. The meaning of this expression and that of ལམ་, in line 31 (see above), are quite different. The other is the highroad (towards heaven), the road of a high standard of moral conduct.

ལམ་, 9. ‘Steps on the path,’ ‘degrees of advance,’ ‘steps towards perfection,’ is the short title of many mystical writings and especially of one by Tsoṅ kʽa pa, to which the words may allude here without specially designating it. In this place the meaning does not seem to be a specific work but merely ‘(religious) instructions, teaching in general.’ The ལམ་ are here, according to my oral information, to be taken as the two halves or divisions of the Kandjur which is commonly divided into མདོ་ and སྔགས་, sūtra and tantra (or mantra, or dhāraṇī). In this division the རྒྱུད་ or tantra section is called སྔགས་, whilst all the rest, properly subdivided [[71]]in six divisions, is taken together as མདོ་, of which the real མདོ་ or sūtra-division (the 5th in sequence in the Kandjur) is only one. Concerning Tsoṅ kʽa pa’s study of the ‘Sūtras and Tantras’ see S. Ch. D., ‘Contributions, etc. on Tibet,’ VI, in J.A.S.B., 1882, Vol. LI, Part I, no. 1, p. 53. J., s.v. བསྟན་, quotes a བསྟན་: ‘with Urgyan Padma, etc., the same as mdoi and sṅags kyi lam, v. mdo extr.’ This is seemingly the same as our expression.

ལུས་, 42. J. has = སེམས་, ‘beings, creatures,’ but may not the idea rather be all embodied creatures; with the etymological sense still potent in connection with the Buddhist reincarnation theory? S. Ch. D. gives a ལུས་ = གྲོང་ = ‘town, city,’ which seems rather to point to the meaning ‘man’ for ལུས་. My informants don’t feel quite certain whether to include the five other classes of beings (including animals) amongst the ལུས་, but are somewhat inclined to interpret the word as མི་, ‘man,’ in general.

ཤ་ see ཀྱུ་.

ཤར་, title, 1. The author writes his poem in a place to the west of a snow-capped mountain, to the east of which the Galdan monastery is situated. See notes on འབྲོག་, དགེ་ and གངས་. Which mountain or mountain chain is meant must be left undecided, even if granting that modern cartography could show it if identified. Local tradition, however, would most likely be able to point out a particular mountain.

ཤེས་ see མཁྱེན་.

ཤོས་ see རིན་. [[72]]

གཤགས་ see གཤགས་.

གཤགས་, 38. This expression cannot yet be explained with certainty. It may be taken here to mean, literally, ‘to send out (distribute, give, put forward) justice, right,’ but the exact idiomatic value of the phrase remains to be determined. It is not in the Dicts., and unknown to my informants. We may take the possible values of the expression as three, viz.: 1. གཤགས་ = རྩོད་ = གཤགས་ = ‘to dispute, argue, contend with words.’ This seems the same expression as S. Ch. D.’s ཁ་ ‘to hold controversy,’ p. 1248. (Perhaps also ‘to challenge, to be challenged to dispute.’) 2. = ལན་ ‘to be defeated in argument, in dispute, to be silenced in dispute.’

3. = ‘To make observations to, to remonstrate with, to use plain speech to, to speak straight to, to rebuke, to reproach, to tell one the truth.’ (Cf. the entry in J.’s *kʽa kye-c̀e* to abuse, to menace’ (p. 97b.)) This seems the sense required here and would be a logical development of the primary meaning of the expression: ‘to spread out the justice (right) of the case before someone,’ i.e. ‘to submit the truth about it.’

S. Ch. D. has s.v. ཁ་ = ཁ་ ‘using rough language, controversy, discussion, dispute.’ The other Dicts. lack this word.

The above is the result of an exhaustive discussion of the expression with my teachers. Lexicographically (with a view to the entry quoted from S. Ch. D.) the first explanation seems the best, but with reference to the context, the last one deserves preference, and this is the one chosen for the rendering.

It should be noted that in modern Tibetan there seems to be taking place a shifting of the meaning of གཤགས་. Instead of as ‘right, justice’ it seems to be understood by some modern Tibetans as ‘the arguing about right or justice’ as in a court of law, and hence simply as ‘dispute, argument, pleading.’ Example: ‘This is not the place to argue your rights,’ ཁྱོད་ (or པའི་) ས་, lit. ‘to hit out [[73]](རྒྱབ་) for the right,’ the verb meaning ‘to do (རྒྱབ་ for verba loquendi) arguing (གཤགས་).’

བཤད་, 38. Literally ‘speak-listen,’ has two meanings. The first, quoted in J. from Schmidt in the form of འཆད་ (s.v. འཆད་ pf. and fut. བཤད་), is endorsed by my informants, ‘to listen to an explanation (also, to a sermon, discourse, etc.)’. The second is, ‘to answer upon hearing,’ i.e. ‘to answer (in invective, hotly, in remonstrance or dispute) upon hearing (reproaches or unpleasant words).’ If a mother chides her son for some fault, he may, instead of taking the rebuke in humility, try to argue or to be impudent in return. The mother then may say: ང་, ‘Don’t argue, dispute, bandy words with (don’t be impudent to, “no words with me!”) your mother, but (འདི་, ‘rather, on the contrary, instead of this’) listen to me.’ The expression may be rendered as ‘to flare up in answer (to a reproach), to retort angrily (after admonition), to snap, yap back.’

བཤེས་, 41. ‘Friend’ and, as J. has it, abbr. for དགེ་ = कल्याणमित्र = virtue-friend.

Here interpreted by my informants as ‘true, genuine priests or monks, monks who come up to the mark, worthy of the name,’ but not technically as ‘spiritual adviser’ as J. has it. Desg. s.v. བཤེས་, quotes only a form with མཉེན་ and gives it the meaning ‘doctor, a lamaistic title.’ Under གཉེན་, however, he has བཤེས་, ‘ad scientiam adjuvans, monastic dignity, teacher.’ S. Ch. D. adds ‘pious or holy friend, spiritual friend or adviser.’ Compare also J. for the semi-homonym དགེ་.

ས་ see ཕྱོགས་. [[74]]

སེམས་ see བསམས་ and བཀའ་.

སེམས་ see སྐྱེད་.

གསུང་, 54. Here ‘speech’ in general, not ‘a speech,’ a slight extension of J.’s meanings, unless his use of the definite article in ‘the speech’ is a lapsus. The dicts. differ slightly and need co-ordination in details. About the meaning there can be no doubt as the word is here used in the series (hon.) སྐུ་, གསུང་, ཐུགས་, for ordinary ལུས་, ངག་, ཡིད་, body, speech and mind, the so-called ‘three doors,’ སྒོ་.

གསུང་ see མགུར་.

གསུང་, 10. Here is the sense of ‘to preach, to explain, to give an exposition of, to expatiate on, to exhibit, to lecture on.’

བསམ་ see རྟོག་.

བསམ་, 12. Inconceivable, unthinkable, unimaginable, not to be grasped by or in thought, beyond comprehension, realisation.

བསམས་, 4. The repetition of the verb softens the meaning into ‘quietly thinking’ or from སེམས་ ‘to think,’ into ‘to muse, to ponder’, etc.

ཨང་ see དྭངས་. [[75]]

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