Tibetan Tales: Derived from Indian Sources
9781465666574
213 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
In an Appendix to his “Buddhism in Tibet,” Dr. Emil Schlagintweit has given “An alphabetical list of the books and memoirs connected with Buddhism.” Although not completely exhaustive, it occupies thirty-five pages, and contains references to more than a hundred separate works, and a much larger number of essays and other literary articles. Of those books and articles, the titles of about sixty allude to Tibet. To them may be referred readers who wish for detailed information about that country, its literature, and its religion. All that it is proposed to do here is to say a few words about the Tibetan work from which have been extracted the tales contained in the present volume; to give a short account of the enthusiastic Hungarian scholar, Csoma Körösi, who had so much to do with making that work known to Europe; and to call attention to any features which the stories now before us may have in common with European folk-tales. To do more, without merely repeating what has been already said, would require a rare amount of special knowledge; and it may safely be asserted that remarks about Buddhism, made by writers who do not possess such knowledge, are seldom of signal value. The tales contained in the sacred books of Tibet, it may be as well to remark at the outset, appear to have little that is specially Tibetan about them except their language. Stories possessing characteristic features and suffused with local colour may possibly live in the memories of the natives of that region of lofty and bleak table-lands, with which so few Europeans have had an opportunity of becoming familiar. But the legends and fables which the late Professor Schiefner has translated from the Kah-gyur are merely Tibetan versions of Sanskrit writings. No mention is made in them of those peculiarities of Tibetan Buddhism which have most struck the fancy of foreign observers. They never allude to the rosary of 108 beads which every Tibetan carries, “that he may keep a reckoning of his good words, which supply to him the place of good deeds;” the praying wheels, “those curious machines which, filled with prayers, or charms, or passages from holy books, stand in the towns in every open place, are placed beside the footpaths and the roads, revolve in every stream, and even (by the help of sails like those of windmills) are turned by every breeze which blows o’er the thrice-sacred valleys of Tibet;” the “Trees of the Law,” the lofty flagstaffs from which flutter banners emblazoned with the sacred words, “Ah! the jewel is in the lotus,” the turning of which towards heaven by the wind counts as the utterance of a prayer capable of bringing down blessings upon the whole country-side; or of that Lamaism which “bears outwardly, at least, a strong resemblance to Romanism, in spite of the essential difference of its teachings and of its mode of thought.” There is, therefore, no present need to dwell at length upon the land into which the legends and doctrines were transplanted which had previously flourished on Indian soil, or the people by whom they have been religiously preserved, but whose actions and thoughts they do not by any means fully represent. “At the present day,” says Mr. Rhys Davids, “the Buddhism of Nepāl and Tibet differs from the Buddhism of Ceylon as much as the Christianity of Rome or of Moscow differs from that of Scotland or Wales. But,” he proceeds to say, “the history of Buddhism from its commencement to its close is an epitome of the religious history of mankind. And we have not solved the problem of Buddhism when we have understood the faith of the early Buddhists. It is in this respect that the study of later Buddhism in Ceylon, Burma, and Siam, in Nepāl and in Tibet, in China, Mongolia, and Japan, is only second in importance to the study of early Buddhism.”
