 It's my great pleasure to be able to introduce you to a lecture which has been organised by the SOAS China Institute and the speaker tonight is actually a SOAS person, just on loan at other places, but Dr. Charles Manson is a librarian, works for the libraries of the Bodnian library in Oxford and also the British library a few steps away from here and is thoroughly familiar with our own library collection, not least the event materials which get me looking at. I'm extremely happy to be here this evening. I know that some of you have an interest in studies which refer to in Asia and then also the empires of surrounding China and China itself, so they'd say this is something that of course over time changes and those of you who have experience or have a professional interest in it will know that it changes also country over time, but I'm going to not say much more than this and I would like to remind you that any questions that you have, unless they're immediate questions concerning would be the deal or anything, we should discuss at the end and I am sure that there will be many questions. I already have a few just haven't looked at the book yet, of course I should say to a couple of words about the book as well, which is, it's been authored by Charles Manson, which is copies of which can be inspected here at the desk, which are probably available at our workshop too, if not I'm going to make sure that it will. I think you have to correct me if I'm mistaken, did you do an introduction to a Tibetan document which is available on YouTube or the British Library website? Yes. Yes, because I came across that some weeks ago, but I wasn't sure, I wasn't 100% sure about it. Okay, so do search the British Library website and you will find a wonderful introduction to have a Tibetan manuscript. So, having said this, I will say anything more until the end and I would like to pass the word to Charles Manson for the lecture. Good evening. Thank you for the invitation and for the introduction as well, for the current introduction. Yes, so the Genesis of the living Buddha tradition that I hope you know, and where it begins. And we're going to look at that today, because it's, although Kamapashi is often called the first reincarnation in terms of the reincarnate dramas. It's not entirely accurate, but it serves as a good marker. If you have to find somebody who you could say is the first reincarnation of the Tibetan tradition, then Kamapashi is as good as any of them. Yes, going to look a little bit at the context. The biography of Kamapashi, a little bit of his writings and his legacy. The biography, the writings and his legacy are in the book, some of the writings anyway, just extracted some and a bit about his significance as well. So firstly, the geographical context. He operated from this area initially for the first half of his life, went into central Tibet, then up here, right into, well, into West China, and then up to Mongolia, across to Almadik over here, and then right across again to Shandu or Sanadu. So, and then back to Tibet. So that was quite a lot of traveling and quite a lot happened in the time. It was born near Degi here, spent the first half of his life, went into Saupul, near Vasa, and then went to see why, shortly, went up to West China, northeast Tibet, and then went up to Karakoram, across to Almadik, I think sometime, and then back along the Silk Route, and then was imprisoned. Well captured, should we say, they tended to execute him before he worked, and then he was putting exile near Sanadu, Shandu, and then later was released and came back to his homeland, and then to Saupul, where he eventually died. So the historical context, just very briefly, some of you will know it very well, but you may not, some of you may not know. Tibet had an empire, began really in, this is just taking it as a sort of apogee in the 20th of the common era, began in the 7th century, 630 is a good enough date. So lasted for about 200 years, and then began to collapse with the assassination of Langdama in 842, and during that time of the Tibetan Empire, they became certainly from the first emperor, became interested in Buddhism. Buddhism had not come, as far as we know, to Tibet, until the 7th century. It got to China in the 2nd century, they went round the mountains, and round the Tibetan Plateau, came to China, but it didn't really get into Tibet until the 7th century, they had no writing until the 7th century. And some of the emperors were interested in Buddhism, and some weren't. So it's not all Buddhist situation in the empire all the time. But then in 842, Langdama was assassinated, and there was a collapse of central authority. And as far as we know, there wasn't nearly as much interest in Buddhism. It may have just gone down to the village level, perhaps being preserved that way, but certainly it wasn't a court religion anymore. And then there was a revival in the late 10th century, the rekindling of the embers, so to speak. So famous quote, where you get amongst other monks coming from northeast Tibet to revive the monastic tradition, would you get translators going south to India and then coming back with texts and teachings. It's a huge project that not very well organized. It was individual translators, but they were interested in transferring Buddhism at the time in India into Tibet. And a certain degree of what are called termos, rediscovered literature from the imperial period as well. Because you have between the decline of the empire, 842 until the late 10th century, got about 150 years period. It used to be called dark period, but it's now called the intermediary period. And then the monasteries start to be established in the 11th century. And in the meantime, so we go forward another 200 years to when Kamapakshi actually lived in 1204 to 1203, you've got the invasion of Northern India by Islam. So Buddhism rapidly declining in Northern India. So this transfer had occurred for about 200 years of Buddhism into Tibet just before it disappeared or almost disappeared from India. So it was quite fortuitous, but it was the particular type of Buddhism that existed in the 10th, 11th and 12th centuries. And we have in the 13th century the death of, for the north of Tibet, Genghis Khan, Genghis Khan. So you've got this sort of world and you've got the two Song empires as well, the two Song divisions, China. This is the world which Kamapakshi was born into. So here just a sample of some of the monasteries that start to be created in this rekindling period from 1000 until Kamapakshi's birth. So the rekindling probably, it is here, I guess. The other one that's very important to Kamapakshi's circle and kathol at some education. There are also some lesser monasteries in this area that were also important to him. This is the area, there's kathol again. This is the area that he grew up in and stand the first half of his life. And these monasteries here, Karna Gern, Kapodinay now in Bangkok, were important to him much later on once he'd become established. He would have helped revive from his previous incarnation, which it had been quite a long time since the previous incarnation had died. And so the monasteries have become somewhat dilapidated. And Markong is put in there because it's important where his teacher died. And if you just remember that for that. And the Mount Kaur Kapo, that's as far south as he went this area. It's a sacred mountain. He did a circumambulation of pilgrimage there at one time. And we haven't got there yet. And I'm just giving the geography, so we get the idea of this is all huge mountains here. The main rivers of Asia, several of the main rivers of Asia. And then about time near there just northeast of it is where he spent many years in retreat as well. So if you just try to just geographically. So there is his dates 1204 to 1283. Sometimes his date is getting us 1206. This personally go for 1204. The person, the historical writer who gave 1206 tended to get his right dates. But that was in the 76. This is an idea of where he was born on the banks of the Yangtze River. And by the age of six, he was able to read without being taught. So unusual to be able to read in those times. One would imagine. And very shortly, he was able to read what is scriptures, not the easiest reading. And he actually became, he would be employed, so to speak, or there would be exchange of goods. He would go around houses and read scriptures. It was a virtuous activity to have scripture read in your house. And you'd then receive food. So he was part of that economy. But by the age of 11, he decided to go to Central Tibet to gain some learning. He didn't get very far. Just south of Chandor, if you remember where he was, and then you start going in towards Central Tibet. And then just south of Chandor, he met on a hillside, a person called Pondra, the teacher of the area. And they, for some reason, you know, he decided to, well, just met him. And then that evening, Pondra gave an initiation. And after the initiation, he called this child to him, 11-year-old, and said, during that initiation, I had several visions of you being surrounded by the figure of this painting, the figure of Dusan Kempa, who died quite some years earlier. We're in about 12, 10, sorry, 12, 15, because he's 11 years old. So he died 20 odd years ago. And he said, you must have some karmic connection. I didn't use the word karmic, but you had a karmic connection there. And he said, stay, can you stay with me? And so Karm actually decided to stay with him. And I take some teaching on meditation, so forth, rather than go into central Tibet. So this is a picture of Pondrakpa. Now, Pondrakpa, as far as I know, never actually met Dusan Kempa. But he was the disciple of Dragan Retchen, who was the disciple of Dusan Kempa. So you've got a sort of grandson deciding, saying to Karmapakshi, this child, you are the reincarnation, or you have a karmic connection to my sort of grandfather, Guru, in a way. So there's quite a distance in terms of time, anyway. And I think that... We can say that, well, I would say that this is the first stage of the reincarnation development within Karmapakshi's life. There are three stages. You will see them come up. And this is the recognition of the karmic connection to the predecessor. So Dusan Kempa is now called the first Karmapa. But he was never called Karmapa in his lifetime. Karmapakshi refers to himself as Karmapa quite a few times. And then later on, well, even the third Karmapa was not called Karmapa. It was only when the fourth came along that it became an institutionalized name. But they retrospectively assigned the name Karmapa to Dusan Kempa. So this is the first stage during his life when he was a child. Now, the teachings he received from Pabdrakpa were on Saraha is Doha, the Doha of the king, Doha of the queen, and the Doha of the people, which are basically songs of instruction. They were really quite popular in Tibet. And he also received the Mahamudra instruction of Gampopa. So this is in the Khakyum tradition, the oral lineage tradition. Gampopa, the student of Milarepa, some of you know Milarepa. And he also received a teaching on the introduction to the three kais, which does involve a certain amount of yoga as well, very little, but it's mostly a guru yoga. And this was the teaching that later Karmapakshi would use quite a lot. He taught both Kubla Karm and Mangan Karm this teaching. It was very popular. He was very keen on it. And he would give it publicly as well. One of his travels. It was his main teachings. It's really the only one that he mentions. I gave this teaching to people. He gave various initiations as well. So a bit later on, roughly when he was 20, 18 or 20, he went for, don't know the exact date, but he went for ordination and further training, more intellectual training in Kathak. Remember where Kathak was on the map. And this is not a Khakyum monastery. It's a Ningma monastery. So they have connections back to the Tibetan Empire time and it's actually the Great Kindling. And actually Karmapakshi was, seemed to be fairly easygoing about the differences between the two. He refers to Mahamudra and Dzogchen as being two different names, but the same meaning. Dzogchen relates to the Ningma. It's sort of the ultimate state of the Ningma. So Karmapakshi refers to Mahamudra for the Khakyum and he's saying that they're two different names, but the same meaning. And in fact, in one of his longer works, which details hundreds of, refers to hundreds of Tantras, roughly half of the Tantras would be Khakyum, half of the Tantras and half Ningma Tantras. So it doesn't seem to have made much distinction in those terms. He was very much a Khakyum later on when he took over the monasteries too. So he spent some time there and then see up in Kathak here and then he went back to his teacher in this area and they decided to go down to Marka. And it was because Mongols, they were escaping or avoiding, should we say, a Mongol invasion. Now it's not clear where the Mongols were, the Fossis, but they may have been coming down the east side of Tibet, west China, perhaps trying to get into China further down by going along the, where the mountains meet the plain. Anyway, they went down to Marka and unfortunately Pondrak, by his teacher, then died. And he seems come up actually to have been somewhat despondent at this time and a little bit unsure about what to do. And after a while, he had several visions at the time and one of them told him to go east. And much of his life was governed by visions. He would have a vision and tell him to go somewhere and do so. And he went actually up to near Batang here and found a spot just northeast of it. And this purports to be the ruins of the buildings that he initiated when he retreated there. And he spent some years there, 11 years there, and after a while, he began to collect students, as many as 500 people would of his miraculous powers. There was a great yogi living on the top of the hill. You can see here, it's up on top here, here's another angle of the ruins there. And this is where you see Batang there. And it's actually just up there. He turned over here. Now, while he was in retreat, he had a vision, a dream, well, a vision, a dream, and he, his Vakini's came to him. Vakini's are like female spiritual beings. And they sort of challenged him to say, can you sing the Mani mantra, the Om Manipemio, the mantra of Avalokiteshvara, which is the God of compassion, the love of compassion, to put it simply, Om Manipemio. And so he sang it to them, and they said, no, no, no, no, you're not singing it right. And so they actually sang it to him in a particular tune. And he apparently memorized it and then would tell people, they told the Vakini's told him that it would be very beneficial for people. And so he, it was another one of the things that he spread about. Now it did seem to, and we have references to it in the 16th century, that it was quite widespread amongst communities. People do communally sing this mantra. And he, but it doesn't seem to have made its way into modern times very well. But I found that there was a Lama Mola who said that he knew the tune. It was quite a good, quite a reputation for being a good Chantan. And he in the 2000s, 2007, I think, 2006, he sang it and I recorded it. And then our illustrious composer transcribed it for me. And then I asked a medieval musician, it's no connection, but he plays it on a Western instrument, but just to give you an idea of the tune. So we say, uncle. So he spent several years in Hungary up here. And then after retreat, he decides to leave retreat. He got all the students surrounding him, so to speak, engaged with him. He decided to start going around several of Dusim Kemper's monasteries, which had been, this is when they were founded. So it's quite a long time. It's 100 years later that he starts, 80 years in some cases, but he starts 120, sorry, or 80, starts going around and repairing. So it's almost as though he's taking on the responsibility of the, what Dusim Kemper had established in his lifetime. And the monasteries were, which we say ravaged during the Great Cultural Revolution and they've since been restored. But that gives you an idea of what they might have looked like back in the day. But, and he did do quite a lot of restoring monasteries. He didn't necessarily make new monasteries very much. He did few, but he was quite keen on restoring buildings. And also when he did his travels further into Mongolian areas, quite a few Buddhist thing, structures had been damaged as well, and he would repair, too. So while he was at Kama Gern here, which if you remember was sort of north-westish a bit of the earlier map, two young monks from the Shangxung area in west Tibet came to him and asked him to come to Serpu, which was the main monastery that Dusim Kemper had established in central Tibet near Lhasa. He'd established it in 1189 and then he died in 1193. And he agreed. So it's even further taking over in the mantle of the monastery. Now here we have a picture before destruction in the 60s by Hugh Richardson and the, it's not necessarily the size that it might have been but it gives you some idea of the building and actually as we'll see later Kama actually built a statue that was 60 feet high. That's six stories high. And it indoors. So it must have been quite a tall building already or perhaps he extended it to make it tall. So when he got to Serpu, he actually found it somewhat dilapidated. It had been quite a while since Dusim Kemper had died and not only that, but the Sangha had become somewhat loose. They'd started drinking and so he both revived the buildings and the Sangha and he was there for about six years. Meanwhile, over in China, Kubla Khan, North-West China, Kubla Khan had decided to lead an expedition down the east side of Tibet down into the Dali kingdom and it was quite a rapid expedition because he didn't meet much resistance. He got down to Dali, the king, the local ruler immediately, almost immediately surrendered and then Kama actually started going back up to his homeland, sorry, not Kama, Kubla Khan started going back up to his homeland. So in the journey down and up, somewhere along the way, he heard about this unusual, miraculous yogi and he issued, he sent a messenger right across into central Tibet who managed to find Kama actually and invited him to come to his court. Kubla Khan was not emperor then, he was the eldest brother of the ruling emperor at the time. It was Wangge Khan and the eldest brother, he was the second brother and when the messengers got to and invited him, Kama actually had severe doubts about going. Remember he'd run away, so to speak, from the models earlier in East Tibet and so should I go, should I not? He actually writes in his biography and then of course he has a vision and it tells him that if he does go, it will be beneficial. So he decides to go and you can imagine what the local sangha must have thought he'd come, he'd started to revive the monastery. It was quite a thing to have this very adept meditator and teacher with him and then he suddenly decides to go. Anyway, he did make his way and he met Kubla Khan, I think up in northwest Tibet, sort of western China, not in Tibet but just beyond there. And he was well received in the court initially and he gave Kubla Khan some instruction on the Bodhisattva, Bodhichitta, should we say, destruction and things really went quite well to start with. But he had a premonition that there was going to be trouble at the court at some point, there would be some degree of conflict. So he decided to leave which was quite a usual move, should we say and it upset Kubla Khan quite a bit as we'll see later. Sort of retaliated and he continued to spend time in that area up here. He established a monastery, it was built, apparently the building was built in 108 days somewhat miraculously and he gave teachings and he actually, he does mention a wall as well so he must have generally seen one of the great China wars and then it was near that's called Sokka which coincidentally is where the current Dalai Lama was born and he received messengers from Mongikhan who's up in Karakorov, he's the Khan of Khan's. Mongikhan had been a way of, he'd been in Kiev at one time and had been war right over probably as far as Hungary so he was quite a warrior but he was now the Emperor so to speak of the Mongolian Emperor and chief amongst the Khans and he issued this invitation to come up actually to come and visit him. Come up actually had no doubts and his memoirs anyway so he proceeded to cross the desert here and approached Karakorov and he met Mongikhan near Karakorov. Now as he was approaching Karakorov there's the second stage of as I would put it the reincarnation development within his lifetime and what happened was that Dusim Kemper the prior incarnation had spoken Dusim Kemper means knower of the three times so he had a reputation for knowing the past, the present and the future and he had a reputation for telling about his past lives as well and he'd spoken to disciples about this different disciples and there are at least three accounts of him speaking about this and at one point as disciples would they would say well when you're going to die where are you going to be reborn they want to know so he gave not entirely precisely but he gave some examples he gave three examples of where he would be reborn one down in India, one in the west and the third one was I will be reborn for the sake of one person which is very unusual for you've got the Buddhist idea that if you're going to influence your next birth then you would well all your Buddhist practice is in order to help enlighten all beings so to say that you are going to be reincarnated in order to help one being seems contradictory and the other incarnations obviously weren't going to come up actually so you can imagine this was a bit of a puzzle why he said this and yet it hasn't happened well as he approached Kharagpur it was then that he realised and I presume a little bit that he saw the sort of splendid nature of Mongid Khan's court he realised that oh I was actually Mongid Khan that I have been reborn for so to speak because if you convert an emperor then it has a huge influence of many other people that is the intimation that he had as he approached Kharagpur so his meeting with Mongid Khan was it was a bit unusual to start with but it was harmonious there was a bit of thunder and lightning and everybody saw what was going on and he just crossed the desert more or less well we don't know how many people with him but not many and he gets an audience with his grand emperor and once I'll read from the book here page 63 once Kamal Pakshi had gained his first audience with the earth protector king the emperor commanded I am the ruler of the world get rid of my obstacles Kamal Pakshi replied tonight I'll think about it a bit it's a somewhat brave reply to make in front of a warrior emperor in the morning of the next day Khan had access to emperor Mongid and gave his recommendations as recounted in verse indeed in this imperfect world never will there be a king like you whatever any astrologers have said I myself Kamal Pakshi seek to counteract your obstacles benefit the Buddha's teaching and all beings distribute food and wealth throughout the kingdom repair the residences of the lamas offerings with no sense of loss again and again I ask you to set free the prisoners kept in the prisons so he made several sort of social policy requests of Mongid Khan and according to Kamal Pakshi anyway Mongid Khan took them up he actually gave from the treasury distributed food and wealth he did repair monasteries but in the establishment of a temple in Karakoram make bantiful sky offerings it's the Tibetan reference to broken tradition and he said Mongid Khan sent three prisoners to many as 13 times it may not necessarily be criminals it may have been hostages from war he actually claims that he followed all of these things he also prohibited cat and slaughter and hunting on certain days of the month the 8th, the 10th, the 15th, the 23rd this we actually so it would seem that that indicates that Kamal Pakshi had some vegetarian leanings perhaps I don't know but you can imagine getting a Mongolian court not hunt and slaughter four days a month and there is some external evidence apart from Kamal Pakshi of this Cleves Francis Cleves although he was writing about an inscription in 1240 towards the end of the article he refers to the secret if they are a judge to the nation they shouldn't kill them as well there we go, the 8th, the 15th, the 23rd the first day slightly different and the Mongid Khan as well a few months later included it referred to this inscription the Mongid court well not a court but it had Europeans as well famous William Boucher Parisian jeweler made this is just there's no an example of it but this is somebody's imagination in the 18th century but this for many people talked about it wrote about it a fountain that had four districts Kamal Pakshi refers one point to being in the court with Mongid and Adik Burki who was the youngest and they were drinking and Kamal Pakshi was invited to join in and he says that he drank and he drank and drank drank the whole court drank so maybe it was one of these I don't know maybe one of the fountain he drank he said that it didn't affect him at all it was like water into water and he then proceeded to they all thought this was slightly miraculous that he wasn't drunk and he then gave the Chakra Savara initiation to the Mongol court and he also gave Mahmudra instruction to Mongid apparently he was a good meditator going to Kamal Pakshi and several other initiations and instructions detailed in the book but of course Mongid is still a warrior even though he's a warrior with his Buddhist teacher and he was setting in motion the idea of conquering China his grandfather Chinggis Khan had attempted it had died in the attempt in 1227 so now we're into 1257 30 years later Mongid is gathering forces to go south Kamal Pakshi decides to leave and he goes across to the Chagatai capital over at Almaneg to see the Khan there it was a region secret it was the mother that was more in charge and they were more interested in Islam actually so he doesn't mention much of what goes on there and he doesn't seem to have had much success he didn't as a teacher he didn't stay very long and then he proceeded he went to possibly Kucha, possibly Tufan I think I personally think it was the teacher and he spent eight months there he began writing there as well and mine was there he had an important dream important for him anyway but a huge footer spoke to him and said you must build a statue same size as me 60 foot statue and it seemed to have affected him quite strongly because several and many years later when he eventually got back to the actual set about doing this even though he was quite involved by that so he proceeded along the silk route and then he met up with Mongid Khan in the Lhupan Chang excuse my pronunciation mountains again and then a harmonious meeting and he asked that he could leave to go to Tibet by now he'd been given quite a lot of silver by Mongid and he must have got quite a big sort of entourage just for the animals to carry it I suppose and he wanted to go and use it in the monasteries in his home land in Tibet to make them even grander and Mongid was quite willing to let him get more he was engaged in about to start fighting a lot and they parted and Khan actually spent some time in this area again reaching and so forth and in meanwhile Mongid went further south in 1259 in summer from disease so being reincarnated for the second one thus didn't fortunately be too much effect in terms of the influence with Mongid but it may have planted the seeds later for the way that Mongodian went with the religion but anyway there was competition between the youngest brother Arik Boke up in Karakoram and Kublik Khan here in Northern China and something of a civil war started in 1260 and because Khan actually had been up in Karakoram being popular at the court of Mongid and Arik Boke Kublik Khan took up against him he thought for some reason that he was on the side of Arik Boke and also there was the fact that he left and annoyed him very greatly something like 10 years earlier not 10, 5 years earlier so he had well he had him arrested and attempted to have him killed and for some reason I mean it becomes quite legendary but he escaped being killed kept on being they would try various different ways of killing him and each time it didn't work to the extent that eventually the executioner committed suicide so much so and so Kublik Khan decided to punish him or restrict him should we say by sending him into what internal exam here and it could be on this coastline here it's certainly on the edge of either a lake or a sea it's hard to tell and there are islands and there are some islands here but there is a Khan actually does mention quite specifically it's a very barren area so there is a big lake up near Shandu and Zandu that I know which is a very this picture of Zandu drone picture which is surrounding the lake is volcanic rock and it's very barren and desolate so he spent there in this area and spent some time on islands there as well and no trees he said as well I mean this is a modern bit does seem to be quite barren he spent two years there but he didn't waste his time he did quite a bit of writing a bit more than two years by the time the civil war was over then Kublik Khan then had him released and he came oops he came down near well what was eventually built as a Beijing Beijing there were buildings there but what we know as Beijing is near Beijing and he had him imprisoned there in a temple and the doors bolted nails in the doors put a guard on in shifts this is actually detailed but he still managed to get out and he was then brought before Kublik Khan and because of this somewhat frankness event he Kublik Khan then completely relented and asked him to be his teacher it looks like I've actually had enough because he said no thanks I want to go home and Kublik Khan again changed a part he said to go and wherever you go pray for me so it was like a complete change after all this trouble so Kublik Khan actually set off and it took him quite a while doing a sort of missionary tour I should say he came down to Bege area helped some of the monasteries here he's quite a wealthy man goes back to Serpult and starts to build this 60 foot statue which technically must have been quite difficult in that area it got destroyed in the cultural revolution Richardson saw it but he didn't photograph the 1240s so then we get to the really the third stage of the reincarnation points in his lifetime the preparation for both the child the child is to come so to speak and the continuity of the lineage teaching aside from building this statue when the statue got built it almost immediately one would assume became quite well known where are you going to find in the medieval world 60 foot statue it was once in China Japan they're about half night they still exist this is 60 feet so fairly quickly seems to have become a pilgrimage you would go and see it now a party from southern Tibet near the north side of the English came on pilgrimage and amongst them was a potter and his wife a itinerant potter and they came they wished to see the statue came blessings so forth from the teacher and at one point come up actually called aside this potter it actually mentions on the path outside so it really was quite a sign and he said to them I'd like to ask you to loan me your house sometime and the potter thought this is very strange this great teacher coming to me and said what's the problem with this so he went back to his party and said to them this great teacher he's lost a potter in my house and they burst out laughing because he's my itinerant potter he has no house so it was a great puzzle and actually the next year a child was born too his wife potter's wife and that was the child that the person who was looking for the next incarnation said that it was the next incarnation so it seems that he was setting it up in a way that she was pregnant or that it was intimating that she would become pregnant in that way the other the teacher who found the next child was Ugyempa and he spent he came it was a great yogi he came to visit and spent just three days there and he received transmission what they call the mind-to-mind transmission and it was taught the tune the mani tune that we heard and also received an Avalokiteshva initiation as well and during that this mind-to-mind transmission which would help preserve the tradition as general a little while later Kamala actually seems to have had a stroke couldn't talk he had to be helped and then he recovered somewhat as far as we can tell and then eventually he died in so called so the next Kamala is actually there is a book about him in the same series you can see the same kind of design and I think she's talking in London but it's on Zoom, she's in Australia but with the Shangjong either later this month I think it's later this month so you might wish to catch that she has translated she found and translated but it was in plain sight she wanted to attention the the third Kamala was writing about his transition in the intermediary period between death and his next life so it's quite interesting it's quite unusual so yeah not more has been made that's quite interesting so in the book, this book about the second Kamala you'll see the various chapters what he is talking about his previous incarnations his presentation some examples of his verse and his prose his conversations with Mainjusri like a vision his reflections on Pantra his musings on Consecration he was very keen on Consecration and gave his reasons why it's important as well and then some verse about for a decided woman an account of his death based on what by him actually comes from much later but I included it because it's quite useful an account of his verse autobiography we don't have the original but it's contained within a later history so I thought that would be worthwhile his own autobiography written in verse and this is an example this is the memoirs manuscript that I mostly worked from on this you can see it's here this is where it now is you can't get access to it there's a bit of difficulty and but it was sort of copied in 1978 and the issue has been available as a copy of the actual manuscript this black here is the black part of the text and then the writing which comes out white here is actually in silver found somebody who had seen it before and said it was silver and it's in three main parts there some in verse part A has several sections as well each part has certain characters illustrated and yeah it's a bit I call it memoir rather than autobiography because it goes around quite a bit it's not like a linear description so it's quite complicated I also found in 2010 a text which has it's not directed by him but apparently he spoke about his previous incarnations he does in these memoirs as well but not so much in here there's quite a few previous incarnations talked about and this we had this page here we heard this from the precious lord Jetsonsmouth so the person who wrote it apparently heard it directly from him it's a report basically and I found this in Harpoon on a stream actually it was in a kitchen there's a fridge I was at a lamb's kitchen and I was sleeping in the kitchen and I thought I'll have a look through those books and there it was part of, it's quite short it was part of this so that was quite fortunate that's just the details there he was a student on the third come up but apparently he knew the second famous to have heard it directly from him another work that was quite useful and I'm currently working on as well is the songs have come which I didn't know about at all and in the process of writing and publication and so forth we had the pandemic so everything slowly slows down goes on hold and I was tweaking around the internet as you do and I found that actually in Oxford they have a reproduction of this, it's a reproduction from 2015 the original is somewhere either in Chengdu or in Chengdu and I've never heard of this before and so I was able to include perhaps a dozen of the poems in the book so in a way it was quite a fortuitous delay and they're not yeah it doesn't there's songs and library not this building where it is it was quite fortuitous they're known as Vajra songs and there's 59 songs and if they often refer, they don't refer to Kamar Pakshi so much as the Lama of Tupul it is a cool Pakshi and there's quite a lot of references to Saraha, the 8th century you'll remember that's who we see teaching they don't necessarily say where the songs were sung or created unfortunately so I've introduced them into the book if they're talking about something that seems to relate to a particular subject or a place then I've put them in there, I've taken a bit of license to associate particular songs I hope to get them all translated when they're done so the complete works of Kamar Pakshi at the moment we have something like 40 of them I'm not going to go into much detail but what he's famous for is a series, Limitless Ocean Jamsun Dahi series of works 19 half of them are part of this series and it was quite structured you can see very early on he's talking about this Jamsun Dahi this Limitless Ocean the writing from there this is quite early on so it wasn't so much that he just wrote a load of books and include Limitless Ocean in the title he actually got it sort of planned out from very early on and there's some examples of what Limitless Ocean are Limitless Ocean teaching of the excellence and so forth just to give you an idea there and further extracting the essence Limitless Ocean the writing involved with instructions on the subtle wins and this is the one where he had a debate with a magistrate in a vision eliminating a 21 point of views turns out to be 24 and I give the questions I don't give all the answers a very long text in the book of this debate and then Limitless Ocean of Realization the fruition of all these books so that's how he's working in his project so I think we go into more modern times there are two main Paraná traditions that are found to treasures some of you will know the word Paraná that are quite important even nowadays for Buddhist practitioners in the 17th century there was Yong-e Ming some of you will know there's a Yong-e Ming currently he's going to be in Edinburgh in June he's become very well known as a good teacher now but the first Yong-e Ming Yong-e Ming had a vision of Kung Paik-sheen and the instruction and then the whole practice involved with it has become a core practice for the New Kagyo tradition and in fact when the 16th Kung Paik-sheen arrived in the author he arrived in the west in the 70s everywhere he went he said do the Kung Paik-sheen practice it was particularly useful for Westerners so that derives from the 17th century and it's a sort of Kung Paik-sheen and then in 1968 the famous Kung Paik-sheen Kung Paik-sheen he was in Bhutan and he had a vision and out of his kind of practice on the subna of Mahamudra and this is what the Shambhala organization that he founded currently they don't use it nearly as much now but they did use it but I don't know much about it but this publisher Shambhala then there's a group they're different entities the same name and that was in 1968 he had a translator he came back to Scotland and he went to America and they started practicing as well so that's derived from a vision of Kung Paik-sheen as well so there's in 2022 it's giving the initiations of the Kung Paik-sheen practice it's been translated into Chinese and that's a tanker of what's involved in the meditation for it he's got a beard he's the only Kung Paik-sheen that had no Kung Paik-sheen after he had a beard apparently in terms of backgrounds but from the paintings this is the 1968 well this isn't it this is what was printed later I think there's the visualization derived from vision there we have it he had a life of very odd years met two emperors gave some Buddhist instruction to both of them well I suppose later he also could become also an instruction from Paik Paik-sheen and perhaps had more attention to him later on I think it seems like in the early days when it was harmonious between them and it was really interested in common action and that it was chubby his wife was more interested in Paik Paik-sheen it's hard to tell and there is also the so the whole you've got from the 13th century right up until modern times for 800 years this tradition has continued so they've been 17 come up as now if you look at the popes there's been over 2000 years there's been 200 odd but they they went for somebody to die and then they elect somebody inspired by prayers and so forth they elect somebody but it's always an old person much quicker repetition so to speak if you're looking at continuity of the tradition with the come up and then other reincarnations of the tradition it goes to a child and so when it was a child after come up action that was the first time that it was actually a very young child it wasn't really a thought of us being reincarnation until he was 11 and it's really I think by the time the fourth come up it's like beginning to really get established and it spread the idea spread right across to Med and eventually up into Mongolia as well this idea of transferring authority both of the monastery and the teaching to a child and then bringing up the child and then assuming the full authority there about 16 years so he was very influential on that and also this fact that he was both Nyingma and Agu so to speak that was quite it was then alleged later that he was very influential he was a source of inspiration should we say to the Rime movement of the 19th century because they were looking back to come and check me of the 16th century and he had written that the color pack she was the inspiration to him the fact of being non-sectarian so perhaps he had some influence in that way at a great distance and of course these two practices which nowadays all rounds I don't want to give an impression of huge numbers but there are what is the centers North America, Europe, Australia South America, Russia it has extraordinary spreading from him coming in the 70s the and this all derives from color pack she so it's quite an important person from this particular phenomenon of the reincarnated lamas because after him 1642 we always seem to get these 42 votes then 42 that's when the 5th Dalai Lama becomes the governor of Tibet 400 years later they ruled Tibet for 300 years that whole idea of reincarnation starts reincarnated lamas taking over authority that starts my point is you're in dry and I'd better stop it's inspiring and quite exhausting in both senses also because you have to speak against the population but in any case I have questions almost for every slide but I think I first pass the word to the audience so if you have questions maybe we can collect but what's to go first I don't have a question but I did look up the date that actually you referred to as this Saturday night which Ruth Gamble oh gosh is that soon so you can jump to third we it's on what's the structure of oh I'm sorry it was a Buddha Sakimuni Buddha in the dream he sees this Buddha speaks to him and says build something like me that is you think of the complications of doing the same it was so periscope I it had to get metal it had to get to a certain temperature and then to actually have that controlled to build something that big is really quite something gives a little bit of comparison to the Eiffel tower just to give some sort ofgymnastic that we are a special you know with the work I was well we don't know exactly but I suspect it may have been Nepalese and it may well have been reclusive not sure various bits of it that was exploded and destroyed. And they keep this relics. So I'd like to see, you could probably tell how it was made from that. But that would be quite interesting. The one they've then replaced, a smaller one, better again. And that's about 40 feet high. And I actually heard it being made. And that was done by Riverside. It's like risen down. But I didn't see it finish. You mean you have a, technically speaking, it's a slab of iron that's become a... Yes, sheet, sheet metal. And then it gets hammered. The technical ability must be fantastic. The key control of that size. Some of the workers, there was disputes, there were a lot of, of course, and lots of course. And apparently the disputes, you can spread them to the kitchen, so sort of. So it does refer to the obstacles and then eventually they do it. Then it was very much a lot of iron in the whole area. Yeah. There are a lot of collectors, a lot of collectors. I'm interested in two concepts you're just not used to. One is a Tibetan empire. I just wonder why you use the term empire instead of kingdom. Yeah, well, it started in the Yalong area, the sort of southeast of Lhasa. And if you've got one kingdom there and then they start taking over other kingdoms, that's how we think of as an empire. They start to take over, it's a unity of several different kingdoms. Well, since it is an empire, and you also use another term, East Tibet. Yes. But as the traditional name we call that area, Koms, you know, Koms. Yes, Koms. Great H-A-N-S instead of East Tibet because it is used in the modern times. And then it by Westerners. Yes, yes. Yes, I agree. I would refuse to come, but people don't necessarily know the geography of, so I think East Tibet is quite reasonable. It's easier to understand. Yes, yes. But there's Koms and there's Amdol as well, as well. Our speaker comes from Chengdu, by the way. Oh, it's so far away from here. There's some research about him. Oh, really? Just now. It's an interesting place. Very interesting. Yes, yes. Yes, well, next time you might find a moment. There's quite a climb up there. And also, Yes. Name of the place. Kvadak, K-A-T-O-K. Yes. I don't know what is the Chinese name for this place. Chinese. For example, I don't know. It's just a Chinese name. Chinese. Yeah. I notice just now, just between Degu and Dachan. Yes, yes. It's about halfway between. You know Chinese. We would call it Chinese. Chinese. Amstrad. I see. There's quite a few monasteries down there. Well, the river goes down between Degu and Dachan. and it is also called Queenwits, like turkeys. The catwalk is a question to the language. So when you read it, how much has it changed compared to today? Well, today I was working on, in the British Library, I've been looking at some manuscripts and I get a bit bloated, I don't tell anybody. But I mean, I'm careful, of course. But these are Dunhuang material. And so everything there is more than 1,000 years old. So you're just reading it. I couldn't even write to be able to, you know. And the, but that's written there is the same, very much the same. And I can read it. I haven't done any special study of ancient Tibetan or anything. It's just modern Tibetan and you can read it. It's more or less the same. It's not exactly the same. Modern Tibetan has changed a little bit since 1959, for office reasons. But before that, you can read 19th century, you can read 12th century. It's very easy. You try doing that in English, you can't read it. Shakespeare is hard. You go back to Chaucer, it's impossible unless you train. But this, you just get the training. I would take students themselves sometimes up to the British Library at one point and show them manuscripts there. And they would marvel at the fact that they could read something from that 9th century. And it would just, it would read the same. Not just the letters, but also the meaning as well. And the grammar is the same, more or less. The spelling is, there are a lot of variations, but nothing that's complicated. Very fortunately, quite conservative. It's being preserved in that way. And rather than, well, they were quite isolated. There's not this thing of other cultures coming in and changing the language that we had in Europe, for instance. My question is about how do they express, I mean, the leader of Tibet at that time, how do they express their repartement, diplomacy, relationship with, I think it's Yuan dynasty or some Mongolian pilot. How do they express it? Because I think it's an official teacher of the kind of Mongolian, but that kind of special diplomatic relationship or just a part of the whole Mongolian and pilot. Yeah, I'm not quite sure of question, but then... Did he act as an ambassador, more or less, of Tibet? I don't know the formal sense, no, because there was no formal government of Tibet. That came with Pakpa a little bit, and that was instigated by Kudakarn. Pakpa, there is a thesis on Pakpa in Australia, and he might be quite interested in finding it online. And how Kudakarn, when he became emperor, you see, most of the time, he became emperor in 1261, yes, emperor, I would call him, in 1264, but the Yuan dynasty wasn't really started till later because he hadn't unified China yet. He hadn't conquered China yet. They had the north part, but not the south. It took a huge effort, about 20-odd years or so, to get it unified, yeah, to complete the leading song, the southern song. And in Tibet, there was no formal government in that way. They were just beginning, they had 200 years of developing these monasteries on the way, but there wasn't, and there were satellite monasteries, like the main one, and so forth, and then the ones in the east bed, that was slightly unusual in itself. And it became part of the pattern, or, in fact, it didn't really, it wasn't until the next century that you could begin to say that there was a particular leader. Park Pa was posited as the leader. He was appointed by Kudakarn, but it would be hard, it's difficult to know in time, but it would be hard to say that he was a real government leader. It's not really until somebody may disagree, but until the 17th century, with the 5th Dalai Lama, did you get a more unified idea of Tibet, overall government? Mark the Purge, it does, you will find it on the internet. That's great bastion of truth, but no, that actually reaches some point in the south back in the 50s and 60s that the dates come back to the left and Markopoda arrived. Now, it's possibly, possibly, that his Markopoda's father and uncle may have seen of him and that they reported to Markopoda, but Markopoda does mention Tibetan almas at the court of Kudakarn, forming miracles. So, and then people assumed, oh, that's kind of action, but actually when you look into the dates, there's quite a discrepancy, it's not possible. He also just missed, so to speak, historically, rubric of the, we call it Belgian, really, French maybe. He'd been sent by the Pope, European, one thing, swearing, at Frisian Monk, and he'd been sent to a paracoral and he'd spent some time with Monk, rather unsuccessfully. And he wrote an account, as well, and you can read that. And then he, but he left just two years before he actually arrived. So, unfortunately, there wasn't a meeting there. Just a commentary on one of the places that he refers to, Markopoda, sounds like I say English. Yes, it's in Drostiger, no, no, it's Mark Kham. Yeah, Mark means lower, and Kham is Kham. So, it's lower Kham, it's a town in lower Kham, that's all. That's, you're not the first person who's brought you here. Norse has to be an English person, that means. No, I haven't done that today. For the first time, I know Monk Kham means lower Kham, because I was told for a long time, because, yeah, there's some 30 people who travel in the area around Bowsays, but I just don't know why, why is it called the area lower Kham, that's all here? Yes, the Tibetan names, they often have meaning. Deghe is a community of Warchief, so at some point, it must have got this name. How accessible are the original, I mean, what would you describe as the earliest an instant manuscript or writings that are complete? Of Kham. Yes, so, I mean, is this reconstructed from parts, or is this holding? Yes, it's, oh, I see. They're not the, in his original hand, there's not manuscripts in that way, it's, you know, transcribed copy, yes, I would say. And how far did they go back to the first extent? Is there some cortex, which, like the original? Yeah, I think this memoirs is probably the oldest. It hasn't been dated, because at the moment, I mean, it hasn't been seen since 1978. Okay. So it's been in this, in the monastery, and well, it was learned to be brought, there's no further collections. And I said, well, very few again, but not in India. So it was brought to Delhi, and then they did the photo-mechanical process, they called it at the time, and copied it, had it copied, and then it was taken back apparently, but, you know, because I've done quite a bit of talking to people in that area, and they did say that, you know, sometimes texts were learned for this process, and then they didn't come back. And I think it did come back, because the fellow who told me about the Selva writing, it was quite young time, I saw him in 1980. So, and he didn't tell me about it then, he was a young fellow then, he told me many 20 years later. And he, so I assume that he saw it, when it had come back, rather than it disappeared in transit. So I assume that it's still in Sikkim. And then it could be analyzed, but you can't get in, it's locked up. How did you, because you said that you were looking at the start and the end of the manuscripts, and the pictures, libraries, all the day, right? You're gonna have to be very diplomatic, you know, quite a few Chinese people. Yeah, it was taken in the early 20th century by Europeans, those French, British, and German as well, they found them in the caves on the Silk Road, and they hadn't been opened, the caves hadn't been opened. And that's why they're so, so they're in really good condition, you know, I can handle them easily. Paper's good, and the ink is good as well. I think it deteriorates, so yes. I mean, it hasn't deteriorated, it's Chinese ink, it hasn't deteriorated. So it's quite extraordinary, but they were, they were taken. So they actually stealing ink into a cave? Yes, as you know, into a cave. Yes. In some container or? No, just piled up. You can see the picture. If you look up, Pereo is the French name, P-E-W-L-I-O-T. There's a famous picture of him sitting there, this mountain of scrolls, they were more than texts next to him. That's true. I think he was working by satellite, I'm not sure. But he didn't have much time, and you know, he's a little bit of a rush, but they, yeah. They were kind of just lying there, and he was, I mean, that's why a hundred years later, I'm still at, you know, there's been several generations of people trying to get someone to let it. Some present fish, I mean, in the British libraries, it must be activated in very special conditions, also with period, no? I can't tell you exactly where. And now I don't want to know some period and reasons, but yes, it's in a spectral room that has, it's made to be like a cave. And in fact, we have to be quite careful telling people that you're going to go down there, because if you happen to get locked in, it's a special contained room. If you happen to get locked in, you probably wouldn't survive. Because it would reduce the oxygen temperature a little bit, make it very dry. And it seems to be surprising, very likely. So Leon, visualize this. Yes, you can find it online. IDP, International Tomorrow Project. If you just, I just Google IDP-PM, it gets you down. And you can then, you have to, it's not a very, at the moment, it was an early website 20 years ago, sort of prehistoric. And then they're in the process of updating it now, you know, T-E-I. So, but that will take a little bit of time. There is constantly being done. And don't be frustrated if you do log on and it doesn't go through, because we refer to it as grandfather has fallen asleep. Because he does, and then somebody needs to do it and then it comes alive. So that's why they need to make a new one. But while it's working, it was working this afternoon, you can look at the actual text. It's quite interesting. Not all of them, they're still in the process. They're hoping to finish by the end of March. I'm not sure. Hi. Sorry, I have a question over here. My recent study where they were about multiple excavations, they were about the same size. Yes, the worst one. All of them. Spine, it's the name of the British one. It's T-E-I-H. What's the name of the area? Yes, I don't know the name of the area, but it's probably R-R-E-T-E-I-H. You mentioned just the T-F-E-L-T-E-N-E-V-E in Oxford. Is that the T-F-E-L-T-E-N-E-V-E in East River? Never, right? Yes. I've been there. I like it, okay. I want to... I didn't mention that just now. T-F-E-L-T-E-N-E-V-E. Oh, there was a picture. There was a picture from the Richardson picture, yes. That's all wrong. Everything that they have there is a fact, unless you wanted special permission. Can I go to the library in this research? Which library? Pissed River. Pissed River, yes. Yes, you have to write to them and ask if you want to see the Tibetan material that's back now, too. But it's been well digitised. I'm not sure whether you would see anything more by actually going there, but you are welcome. It exists for researchers. So it's in the pictures, on the pictures. Yes, the Tibetan album is pictures. In the Pit Rivers, they do have some Tibetan items, but they're not terribly interesting. It's a sort of eagle-dee-pickle-dee architecture. It's not a serious collection. The Ashmolean has quite nice species. Yes, Ashmolean. Yeah, if you go to the box room and they have some nice tankers and some statues and so forth. They also, if you find something online that's more on exhibition, you're going to ask to have it seen. I would ask to see it, but you have to make it look like it is. The Kababahat is the most prolific writer of all the Kababahic conditions. No, I'd say the eighth. The eighth. Yes. Well, as I said, we've got about 40 now. They did say, yeah, there was about at least 100 works at one time, there are references back in history. Oh, there's a hundred actually works, but either that was an exaggeration or disappeared. He did it mostly when he was in Iqsao, finishing that island. Yes. So it's with nothing, basically. Yes, well, in Kutcher as well, he started writing. That seems to be where he started writing. Then on the island, a good opportunity to write there. And then I think he also, he doesn't put where he was writing. So I remember in the Kodafone's portion, but also, well, certainly poems he wrote. So it started quite a few of them. And it may well have been in the final years and so forth. So he had about 10 years and so forth. Yeah, nobody's really saying the much, not everybody, but a lot of Tibetan writing refers to him. So it was sort of a miracle worker, I suppose. And that's where a lot of the respect comes from. But they say, oh, you know, it's fantastic, but I don't, that's Capstein remarked, the American scholar, they don't seem to actually read him. Yeah, it was considered more legendary. Yes. And it's a salad level than actually his works. Tell your point of view. Yes, well, that's true. There's nobody translated much. And I've, well, it's half the book. So perhaps. But it's, yeah, it's quite cuter stuff. He's more the practitioner, sort of putting it on there, not the intellectual great care. Although there was structure to the limit the social. From this book, this book comes and then out of that, this one and that one. So there's quite a structure. In a time period. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you very much. And if it had been recorded, I would try to get it onto the SOAS YouTube channel in which case you would need to probably look at the SEI, SOAS China Institute website in order to find the address. Yes. If you registered through the, there was a registration function. Yes. Then we should be able to trace you. And you. Yes. And it was promised to us with no trial. Thank you. Thank you very much. And thank you. Thank you very much for a wonderful and very intellectual, very fertile lecture tonight. Thank you. Thank you.