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Cyrus Stearns is a longtime student of Tibetan language and religion, and has served as a translator for Tibetan teachers of all traditions. For many years he has studied with and translated for Chogye Trichen Rinpoche and the late Dezhung Tulku Rinpoche. Cyrus has a Ph.D. in Buddhist Studies from mostra'n més the University of Washington in Seattle, and is the author of several articles on Buddhism. mostra'n menys

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This is a fine introduction to Tangtong Gyalpo (1361-1485), known in the West as "the Leonardo da Vinci of Tibet" (if he's known at all). The book consists of a long introduction outlining Tangtong's achievements and the complete text of A Jewel Mirror In Which All Is Clear, a biography written by Lochen Gyurmé Dechen in 1609 emphasizing the mad yogi's wondrous spirituality. While the biography is a bit repetitive, episodic and hagiographic, it is fascinating for the reader to inhabit the strange world of Tibetan Buddhism with its combination of the miraculous and the mundane.… (més)
 
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le.vert.galant | Hi ha 1 ressenya més | Nov 19, 2019 |
This is a translation of the last major biography of Tangtong Gyalpo, 14th century Tibetan adept. He was also a physician, blacksmith, architect and pioneering civil engineer. The biography, Gyurmé Dechen’s "A Jewel Mirror in which All is Clear," was written in 1609, 125 years after Tangtong died. It synthesizes earlier biographies, converting previously contradictory accounts into a relatively coherent whole. Many of the earlier biographies and a Great Collected Works did not survive.

Nearly everything written about Tangton Gyalpo during the last 400 years is based on Gyurmé Dechen’s biography. Extant earlier biographies were unavailable until two were published in Bhutan in 1984.

The translated biography is the bulk of the book. It mixes accounts of ordinary life events with miraculous and visionary occurrences. This probably is due to the different emphases of the two accounts it amalgamates, but appropriately, it reflects Tangtong’s character as both eminently practical and spiritual.

At times the prose is poetic, for example: “a river flows from the right like a fluttering white silk scarf. On the left bank of the great Tachok Khabab River is a rock like a black snake slithering down, with a treasure of various precious substances in its throat” (page 95). For the most part it is more prosaic and includes the endless lists of accomplishments common in Tibetan hagiographies.

But the introduction was my reason for reading the book. Here Stearns brings Tangtong Gyalpo to life, covering in depth his multifaceted ability and heritage. Tangtong’s Chaksam (iron bridge) tradition blended the various lineages he was given with his own teachings and practices received in visionary form. The Chaksam teachings survived to the present in virtually all the major Buddhist schools of Tibet. Most are connected with the Northern Treasure tradition of the Nyingma, the Shangpa Kagyü and with the practices of chöd (severance). Tangtong practiced chöd to bring local spirits under control before beginning each of his construction projects.

Tangtong was also a patron of art, dance and construction (iron-link chain bridges and stupas) in Tibet and Bhutan. The book contains drawings and photos of bridges that were later destroyed by the Chinese Cultural Revolution in the 1960s in Tibet or have since fallen into disrepair (e.g. the famous iron bridge at Chukha, Bhutan). The bridge and boat are old symbols for liberation in Buddhism, two forms in which Buddhas might manifest to benefit living beings.

Stearns is meticulous in describing practical detail. For example, we don’t just learn that Tangtong set up factories for forging iron links, we get know how the iron was made, what the factories were like, how they worked and the raw materials were transported, and that according to Dézhung Rinpoché Tangtong’s original iron links were marked with small vajras which distinguishes them from later bridges influenced by his style.

He is less adept at clarifying the different primary sources and their dates. I found his narrative of the biographic accounts and their formation difficult to follow; it took several readings of one section to figure out the implied spiritual and biographic lineages. The book is worth reading for the sense one gains of Tangtong Gyalpo’s enormity as a Tibetan historical figure and of his lasting impact on the culture, religion and architecture of the whole region – but there is a lot of repetition and dense prose to wade through on the way.
… (més)
½
 
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AwberyWhite | Hi ha 1 ressenya més | Feb 23, 2010 |

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Obres
8
Membres
197
Popularitat
#111,410
Valoració
3.8
Ressenyes
2
ISBN
16

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