The Third Well-Spoken Branch: An Exact Account of How All the Victorious One’s Teachings Extant Today in the Land of Snow Mountains Were Put into Print
The Virtuous Activity of Publishing the Victorious One’s Teachings

During the period of the later diffusion of the teachings, the great emanated translators continued to translate many sūtras and tantras, adding to those that were already extant. For some time, however, there was no one to collate them and assemble a catalog. Later on, Jamgak Pakṣi, a student of the scholar Chom Ralpa, sent many of the necessary materials from the land of Hor for the creation of the Kangyur.69

The source texts for the Vinaya section70 were compiled by editing and collating the collection made by Chim Chenpo Namkha Drak and consulting the vinaya scriptures housed in the monasteries of Chumik Ringmo, Runglung Shödrok, and others. Chim Chenpo Namkha Drak had brought to Narthang monastery a complete edition of the four vinaya scriptures produced by the venerable Dharma Sengé at the monastery of Latö Olgö during the lifetime of the vinaya specialist of Gya. Dharma Sengé’s collection was prepared under the supervision of the vinaya specialist Shingmo Chepa Jangchup Sengé, who scoured the many monasteries of Ü and Tsang, such as Samyé Chimphu and so forth, and found incomplete versions of The Finer Points of Discipline in twelve volumes, The Preeminent Account of Discipline in twelve volumes, and two volumes concerning vows.

The source texts for the Sūtra section were compiled by comparing a large number of well-organized sūtra collections, including the personal practice support of Drogön Chögyal Phakpa, known as The Supreme Ornament of Gods and Men; the finest among the sūtra collections housed at Chumik Ringmo monastery in Tsang, such as the collections compiled by Geshé Darchar known as The Sūtra Collection of Darchar, The Drang Tsamphuk Chungma Collection, and The Blazing Joy Collection; the finest among the sūtras housed at glorious Narthang monastery, [F.108.b] such as the practice support of Khenchen Chim, The Golden Scripture Sūtra Collection, as well as The Riches of the Victor Collection, The New Monastery Collection, and others; the practice support of Lama Drupang Tsawa called The Sūtra Collection to Adorn the World; The Sūtra Collection in Sixty-Two Parts from Shokchung temple; the sūtra collection of Pünsum temple; the sūtra collections of the golden chapel of Zhalu known as The Essential Sūtra Collection and The Mönda Dho Collection; and others.

As for The Perfection of Wisdom in One Hundred Thousand Lines, it is said that there were some six versions, which include The Red Manuscript and The Blue Manuscript at the time of Tri Songdetsen, and among others evolving from them The Long Imperial Hundred Thousand during the reign of Tri Desongtsen, Tri Detsuk’s Monochrome Imperial Hundred Thousand, Jingyön’s Innermost Hundred Thousand, Tsangma’s Demarcated Hundred Thousand,71 Ralpachen’s Six Volume Hundred Thousand, Prince Namdé’s Red-Faced Version, and Darma’s Yellow-Paper Version, as well as nineteen versions of the Hundred Thousand Lines produced by the king’s subjects.72 A great many collections descended from those without being degraded or corrupted in the intervening years. These source texts were compared and proofread by many scholars such as Üpa Losal, Lotsawa Sönam Öser, Gyangro Jangchup Bum, and others.

The source texts for the Tantra section were numerous genuine, well-arranged, well-edited tantra collections of the Secret Mantra. These included the tantra collection of the great monastery of glorious Sakya, itself based on the tantra catalog composed by the great master Chökyi Gyalpo under the supervision of the great master Jetsun Drakpa Gyaltsen, as well as the tantra catalog composed by the master scholar Rikpai Raldri, The Flower Adorning the Collection of Tantras, and others. Additionally, the Narthang Kangyur tantra collection was based on the tantra collection edited, corrected, and arranged by the great vajradhara, monk of the Śākyas Serdingpa, which was later published by Geshé Kyemé Tönshé; [F.109.a] the tantra collection of glorious Tharpa Ling temple that was published by Geshé Darchar; Lama Drupang Tsawa’s handwritten manuscripts; the tantra collection housed at Öga Pünsum temple, and others.

Additionally, source texts not mentioned above that were of excellent provenance and had been analyzed using the three kinds of reasoning were compared. In this way, at the great temple of glorious Narthang, the catalog produced by the monk of the Śākyas Jampaiyang came to be known as the Narthang Kangyur.

Using the Narthang Kangyur as the primary source text, Tshalpa Situ Gewé Lodrö produced at the Tsal Gungthang temple the collection that would come to be known as the Tshalpa Kangyur. Many scholars such as the Shöntsul Śākya Gyaltsen, Karmapa Chödrak Gyatso, the omniscient Mikyö Dorjé, Shamar Chenga Chökyi Drakpa, Gölo Shönu Pal, and others thoroughly scrutinized and examined this collection, made corrections, and added annotations. This collection thus became the supremely authoritative master copy of the Kangyur, surpassing all others in the land of Tibet. It is stored at Taktsé Palace in Chingwa.

Later, through the power of past meritorious deeds, the king of Jang, Karma Mipham Sönam Rapten, sent for the Tshalpa Kangyur and used it as the primary source text for the printing of a new edition. In particular, the tantra section for this edition was edited by the omniscient sixth Shamar, who compared it against the tantra collection from Taklung. Over time, it came to be housed at the monastic complex of Lithang Jamchen Nampar Gyalwa,73 and this [Degé Kangyur] is based on it.

Additionally, [for the production of this Kangyur,] a number of other editions were sought, such as the authentic Kangyur that was the personal practice support of Anyen Pakṣi, [F.109.b] a Kangyur with minor corrections of addition and elision made by the eminent cleric Tashi Wangchuk, who had consulted several old recensions of reliable provenance, and the Lhodzong Kangyur. The Lhodzong Kangyur is a member of the lineage that descends from the Narthang Kangyur produced by the Dharma Kings of Gyantsé, during the establishment of which the omniscient one of these degenerate times, Butön Rinpoché, on the basis of a preliminary version made corrections to the texts using the three kinds of reasoning and compiled a catalog. Later, using that as a basis, the exalted world protector, knower of human deception, Ngawang Lobsang Gyatso instructed the earthly Brahmā, Sönam Rapten, to produce an extremely accurate copy of that [Thempangma] Kangyur at glorious Thangpoché monastery, and have it sent to Lhodzong palace in Dotö. This was done to spread merit to all the beings throughout Greater Tibet and to remove the stains of mistaken judgements present in earlier versions of the scriptures.74

Once the editions mentioned above had been compared to each other, a group of learned scholars began the process of editing, by diligently making corrections in the few instances that required correction. Then, the Lord of Men issued me a firm command, as weighty as a bar of gold, and beginning on the third day of the month of Uttaraphalgunī in the year of Sādhāraṇa, the iron dog year (1730), I took up the responsibility of editing [this Kangyur edition].

The Jang print75 of the Kangyur had been analyzed by many sublime beings as described above, so it is generally an extremely accurate base text. When it was put into print, however, the omniscient Chökyi Wangchuk had not finished proofreading the collection in its entirety. Furthermore, since the Dharma must be approached with extreme care and the previous managers’ inspections were not comprehensive, minor mistakes such as misordered pages, elision, and insertion became apparent. [F.110.a] These were all corrected on the basis of the Lhodzong Kangyur. We included some authentic sūtras and tantras that were not present in the Jang edition but could be found in the Lhodzong and other Kangyur editions. Some obvious omissions in The Finer Points of Discipline and other texts were amended according to the Thempangma after taking into account their respective commentaries.

Particular to the Mantra section, we edited One Presentation of the Rites of Sarvadurgatipariśodhanatejorāja,76 the Guhyasamāja, the Caṇḍamahāroṣaṇa Tantra, The Hevajra Tantra in Two Parts, The Smaller Śaṃvara, and The Tantra of the Arising of Śaṃvara against their Indic manuscripts. In cases where there were disagreements between the Indic manuscripts, a decision was made by consulting their respective Indic commentaries. Moreover, for the majority of texts that had an Indic commentary available, any questions that arose were resolved by consulting that commentary.

For the secret mantras, those that could be found in mantra compendiums were brought into accordance with that. For those mantras that were not included in those compendiums, when they were in a language we could not definitively identify as Sanskrit, then we used whichever version was most common, whether it was in a language such as Drāviḍa, Paiśāca, Apabhraṃśa, secret symbolic language, or others. The mantras that were actually written in Sanskrit were brought into accordance with grammar treatises through our own understanding. Those that we could not discern were left as they were.

In the textual traditions of the past, there have been many dissimilar styles of orthography. It is said that Thönmi Sambhoṭa initially composed eight grammar treatises fundamental to the Tibetan language, yet during the later spread of Buddhism in Tibet only The Thirty Verses and The Application of Gender Signs remained. Later scholars [F.110.b] composed spelling treatises on the basis of those two texts and by consulting the ancient texts, but since they only had access to a trunk bare of its branches, certain topics were unclear or incomplete and they were not agreed upon in a definitive way. Instead, there were a variety of conflicting styles based on each scholar’s subjective reasoning. Within the Vinaya, Sūtra, and Tantra sections their own similar orthographic conventions were employed, but in their subsections there were also slight differences in orthography. Those variations that were deemed not to be erroneous were left as they stood. Thus, there was no attempt to create a singular uniform style. We eliminated any lapses into well-known dialects such as using mya for ma, stsogs for sa, and ral gyi for ral tri77, and so on, because these are not accepted by scholars. Even though the da-drag post-suffix was part of the system of The Thirty Verses and The Application of Gender Signs, later scholars such as Loden Sherab treated it as if it were assumed [and omitted it], in order to simplify the language.

The central Indic languages were all emended to accord exclusively with Sanskrit, while a few texts with Apabhraṃśa as their basis were left alone. When the names of places, flowers, and animals were given in Sanskrit, in some sūtras, the translators of the past had rendered Sanskrit words for ease of reading by Tibetans, for example writing go’u ta ma for Gautama, and so on. Elsewhere words were spelled precisely according to the Sanskrit. These were all left just as they appeared, though a few instances that could not be left uncorrected were corrected. In the tantric collections, that which could be analyzed was brought into conformity with Sanskrit.

In brief, the Degé Kangyur was edited in accordance with texts such as the Mahāvyutpatti, [F.111.a] The Two-Volume Lexicon, Thönmi’s Thirty Verses and The Application of Gender Signs, The Weapon-Like Gateway to Speech, and other treatises on Sanskrit grammar composed by learned scholars. The [Tibetan] prefixes and suffixes were applied according to their function and the rules for their application. Criteria such the respective gender signs, the three tenses, transitivity, the general rules and their exceptions, the euphonic connection between phonemes, case declensions and their particles, and so forth were all employed just as they are prescribed.

At this point, a number of intelligent people read the texts aloud many times as I had edited and arranged them, and they made some excellent corrections while I resolved any major questions myself. Because this scriptural collection is exceedingly large and the chief editor is of inferior intellect, like a butterfly trying to fly to the end of the sky, I am unable to say that this [Kangyur] is entirely free from misunderstandings or mistakes. Nevertheless, I do believe that it is superior in comparison to earlier editions, such as that printed in the land of China under the auspices of the great Ming emperor Yongle, and that produced by the King of Satham, which formed the basis for this, and others. Indeed, it should be considered trustworthy by discerning individuals.