Acta Orientalia 34. (1980)

1-3. szám - G. Bethlenfalvy: Bla-ma Bžad-pa and the Rdzon-khul gompa

Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hung. Tomus XXXIV (1 — 3), 3—6 (1980) BLA-MA BËAD-PA AND THE RDZON-KHUL GOMPA BY G. BETHLENEALVY (Budapest) Like a rare gem kept away from the eyes of common people busy in their everyday tasks, the ancient monastery of Rdzon-khul nestles hidden on the side of a ravine, in a big cave, difficult to approach, in the midst of the wilder­­ness of snowy peaks, bare rocks and boulders. It does not belong to the very famous monasteries. As far as I know, it was first mentioned by a western scholar in 1926, when A. H. Francke reported in a short communication that he had received new informations concerning the activities of Alexander Csoma de Köms in Ladakh. Francke writes, that in 1924 an English official touring in Zanskar has visited the rock-monastery of Rdzon-khul and that he was shown there a diary of a Lama, who was a friend of Alexander Csoma de Körös.1 — In the next year Francke asked Joseb Gergen, a priest of the Moravian Mission, who was to visit Zanskar, to check the report. Gergen was able to visit Rdzon-khul and to copy a Tibetan text — a «dris-lan» — written for Csoma (Skander beg) by Kun-dga’-chos-legs, and also a biography of this famous abbot of the monastery.1 2 In 1933 a paper of Prof. L. Ligeti brought about a new turn in the matter : he reported that the original Tibetan manuscript, written for Csoma, wast kept in the collection of the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in Budapest.3 After this communication new developments came only recently, when both the manuscripts of the «Csoma dris-lan» preserved in Budapest and in Rdzon-khul respectively were published in Delhi : the first by Jôzsef Terjék in the Öata-pitaka series, and the other by Tobdan Tsering (alias «Ashok»), a Tibetan publisher from Lahul, village Kawring. Other publications by Tobdan Tsering have revealed that in the 18th— 19th centuries Rdzon-khul was an important centre of learning and art, and that a whole gallery of great scholars and yogis lived and worked there. 1 Ungarische Jahrbücher VI, 1926, pp. 320—322. 2ibid., VIII, 1928, pp. 375-377. 3 T’oung Pao XXX, 1933, pp. 26—36. Acta Orient. Hung. XXXIV. 1981 1*

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