Abstract
For over a thousand years, Tibet has preserved and translated ancient Buddhist Sutras
from India, keeping the tradition of Buddhist philosophy and meditation alive long
after it died out in India by the 12th Century. Recent efforts to digitize materials
from this textual tradition offer opportunities to broaden the circulation of rare
materials to the exiled Tibetan scholarly community, but also suggest conceptual
challenges arising from the complexity of the texts and their inherently multimodal
character. This paper describes the scholarly and meditative traditions from which
these texts come, and discusses possible approaches to their digitization.
For over a thousand years, Tibet has preserved and translated ancient Buddhist Sutras
from India, keeping the tradition of Buddhist philosophy and meditation alive long after
it died out in India by the 12th Century. The accuracy of the Tibetan translations of
Sanskrit Buddhist texts meant that modern scholars could establish the oldest versions
of Buddhist theories with some reliability. As the 19th Century scholar F. Max Müller
noted,
The Tibetan version [of The Buddha-karita of
Asvaghosha] appears to be much closer to the original Sanskrit than the Chinese;
in fact from its verbal accuracy we can often reproduce the exact words of the
original, since certain Sanskrit words are always represented by the same Tibetan
equivalents, as for instance the prepositions prefixed to verbal roots.
[Müller 1894, vii]
Known not only for their care in translation but also for their understanding of
Buddhism, Tibet’s monastic scholars added commentaries to the original Indian root
texts, and they established hundreds of libraries and universities where the texts could
be studied. Through the ages, Tibet’s ancient texts have received careful handling and
storage as sacred texts; they were printed by hand from wood blocks, wrapped in silk
covers, and stored on shelves behind the main altars of the shrine rooms in monasteries
and temples. Representing one of the Three Jewels of Buddhism — the Dharma — the texts
instruct Buddhists on how to achieve enlightenment.
But canonical texts represent only one piece of what has always been a multimedia
enactment of the key meanings of Vajrayana Buddhism, the particular form of Buddhism
that Tibet inherited from India. Vajrayana Buddhism (also known as Tantra) emphasizes
intensive meditation, but its meditation methods incorporate complex visual imagery,
bodily movements, the sounds of drums and horns, as well as the chanting of the texts
within the overall container of quiet meditation practice. Instructions on these
visualizations, bodily gestures and chanting practices have been passed down through
oral lineages, teacher to student, codified by sacred rituals in which monastics joined
together in learning and standardizing these practices.
Today the Tibetan textual tradition faces extinction unless serious efforts are made to
preserve it and the Vajrayana practices it supports. In the years following the Chinese
invasion of Tibet in the 1950s, Tibetan scholars struggled to preserve and circulate the
classical texts of their ancient Buddhist heritage. Many books were lost during the
1960s and 70s when the Chinese launched the Cultural Revolution on Tibetan soil,
destroying the libraries, temples, monasteries and universities in Tibet that had kept
the books safe. Some important, time-honored texts elucidating Tibet’s distinctive
Vajrayana meditation methods, liturgies and philosophical investigations may never be
found again, although the search by Tibetans still continues today for these famous
commentaries and instruction manuals.
The Tibetan scholars who fled into India first attempted to preserve the texts they
carried with them by printing the texts without delay. But at that time, the paper
available in India was of such poor quality (it was non-acid-free paper or rice paper)
that the print bled through from both sides, making the texts illegible [
Marvet 2006]. Many classical Tibetan texts were never reprinted at all but
were left in their original hand-printed, woodblock form (called “pecha” texts; see
Figure 1). The lack of facilities and poor economic
conditions for Tibetan refugees as they scattered abroad introduced added risks for the
storage of their paper texts. Simply transcribing the rescued texts and protecting them
in archives were stopgap measures. With Tibetan refugees living in India, Europe, North
America, South America, and other parts of Asia, it was impossible to establish
centrally located archives where all Tibetans could easily study the texts and learn the
highly detailed Vajrayana meditation methods described in the texts. When Western
scholars and meditators became interested in learning about Tibetan Buddhism, they also
found it difficult to locate or understand the old Tibetan texts mentioned in more
recent commentaries. Not only were indigenous Tibetan scholars unable to verify which
ancient texts had actually been preserved or where the texts had been stored, but the
iconography and complex symbolism associated with Vajrayana texts were not explained in
the texts themselves.
By the late 1980s Tibetan scholars recognized the possibilities of digital formats for
preserving their texts and for circulating the texts amongst the far-flung members of
the Tibetan community [
Chilton 2006]. Digitized texts could be made
accessible to Tibetan and western scholars around the world through the Internet, and
digital formats also made cataloguing the texts and searching for specific titles
easier, so that a more accurate assessment could be made of which texts had survived and
which texts were still missing. Several digitizing projects began in India, Nepal,
Europe and North America.
Today, after over a decade of work, there are digital archives of thousands of Tibetan
books.
[1]
For example, one of the Tibetan scholars committed to digitizing the Tibetan canon, the
Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche, established the Nitartha International Document Input Center
in Kathmandu, Nepal, with a team of Tibetan monks, Tibetan refugees born in diaspora,
and western computer specialists. At the Input Center, indigenous Tibetan scholars
represent classical Tibetan texts in digital formats that would be most useful for
Tibetan scholars in exile and for Tibetan translators. In addition to its digitization
of texts, Nitartha International has developed a Tibetan font software, several
informative websites on Tibetan Buddhism, and modern educational materials linked to
classical texts, such as CDs with interactive modules that outline the logic of
philosophical arguments, define basic concepts used in Buddhist philosophy, and
represent key points through visual images.
Recently, some indigenous Tibetan scholars have also begun to learn TEI encoding for
their digitized texts. The Text Encoding Initiative (TEI) is an XML language designed
for representing literary and historical texts. Maintained by an international
consortium of major universities, the TEI publishes detailed guidelines and
documentation of this language, maintains a listserv for questions, trouble-shooting and
general discussion amongst TEI users, and holds a yearly meeting for the hundreds of TEI
projects and encoders scattered around the world. What Tibetan scholars see in TEI is
not only a markup language, but a flexible text publishing method for digital texts, a
cataloguing schema for archiving the texts, and an application that will make it easier
to conduct analytical searches and link the texts to their translations. One obstacle to
using TEI (or any XML language) for the Tibetan canon is that Unicode for the Tibetan
language only became available recently, in partial form. Even though texts can now be
encoded in Unicode, they cannot be printed in the Tibetan Unicode script.
This example of Tibetan scholars experimenting with TEI for their ancient texts shows
the promise of TEI for multicultural texts. Multiculturalism as a theoretical approach
aims to respect the autonomy and value of other cultures. Recently, the TEI consortium
has initiated a project to translate its Guidelines into as many languages as possible
[
Rahtz 2005]. Without denying the very concrete economic and political
forces that create the Digital Divide, the TEI consortium intends to support indigenous
scholars as they protect and sustain their own textual traditions. In this way the Text
Encoding Initiative is expanding its work beyond its original North American and
European borders, becoming a global digital technology that is supportive of
multicultural textual traditions. The TEI consortium has welcomed Tibetan forays into
what started as a western scholarly undertaking, because TEI members understand that
text preservation by multicultural, and especially minority, populations is important.
Providing indigenous scholars and teachers with tools for keeping their textual
traditions alive helps secure the future for all the literatures of the world.
Not only is TEI an important strategy for preserving rare texts, but the TEI Guidelines
offer a standard set of schemas and documentation that is widely used in the
international scholarly community. By representing their texts through this scholarly
framework, indigenous Tibetan scholars can introduce their textual tradition to the
wider scholarly community. Over the centuries, Tibetan scholars have developed a
painstaking system for marking up the internal organization of their texts — a system
which delineates between several layers of scholastic commentaries on the original
Sanskrit root text. Its inherent complexity makes the Tibetan canon a natural for TEI
encoding. The TEI guidelines have been designed with complex historical texts in mind —
the texts expected to endure through the ages. The guidelines also offer specific ways
to represent the complicated scholarly features of historical texts. This precision of
TEI encoding is a good match for the complexity of Tibet’s commentarial tradition.
Tibetan commentaries form a nesting structure, such that later commentaries include and
surround earlier commentaries, which themselves include and surround the original Indian
Sutra.
[2] The Tibetan commentaries
proceed paragraph by paragraph, verse by verse, or sometimes even line by line in
explicating the meaning of the earlier text(s). All of these complicated internal
divisions of a text can be captured by TEI encoding. TEI encoding can also represent
linkages between texts, for example between the original Tibetan text and translations
of the text in western languages.
As an example, consider the following passage from a Tibetan commentary which concerns
the differences between two philosophical schools, the Consequentialists and the
Autonomists. The indented verses are from a root text, Nagarjuna’s Fundamental Verses on
Centrism. Generally, Tibetan commentaries such as the one below quote lines from the
earlier root text and then explain the meaning of that quoted passage in detail or
explore the philosophical debates that have arisen in response to that passage.
6.2.1.2.1.2.3.1.1.1. The system of the Centrists Following the
Sutras
In general, there originated many ways of commenting on the intention of
the text, The Fundamental [Verses on] Centrism [called] Supreme Knowledge
by noble Nagarjuna. However, these mainly fall under the two [schools of]
the Consequentialists and the Autonomists. The [first verse after the
eulogy] at the beginning of [Nagarjuna’s] treatise reads,
Not from themselves, not from others,
Not from both and not without a cause —
At any place and any time,
...Entities lack arising.
As for the way to explain the meaning of this [verse]: [First], through
the four claims of non-arising from the four extremes, master
Buddhapalita has invalidated the [four] antitheses [of these claims], but
did not set up any means to prove an actual thesis. Then, master
Bhavaviveka criticized the way in which Buddhapalita had formulated his
invalidation. He set up the [above four] initial sentences [about
non-arising] as autonomous [probative arguments] and also proved the
subject property in an autonomous way. After that, venerable Chandrakirti
explained how Bhavaviveka’s critique of Buddhapalita does not apply and
that Bhavaviveka’s acceptance of autonomous arguments in the context of
his own explanation of reasonings that analyze the ultimate is flawed.
Thus, he was the one who founded the tradition of the Consequentialists
in an extensive manner....
Example 1.
Passage from English translation of The Treasury of Knowledge
<head type="argument">6.2.1.2.1.2.3.1.1.1. The system of the <name
type="philosophical school">Centrists</name> Following the
Sutras</head> <p>In general, there originated many ways of commenting on
the intention of the text <title rend="italic">The Fundamental [Verses on]
<name type="philosophical school">Centrism </name> [called] Supreme
Knowledge</title> by noble <persName key="N1">Nagarjuna</persName>.
However, these mainly fall under the two [schools of] the <name
type="philosophical school">Consequentialists</name> and the <name type=
"philosophical school">Autonomists</name>. The [first verse after the
eulogy] at the beginning of [<persName key="N1"> Nagarjuna</persName>'s]
treatise reads,</p> <q><lg> <l>Not from themselves, not from
others,</l> <l> Not from both and not without a
cause<mdash></l> <l> At any place and any time,</l>
<l>...Entities lack arising.</l></lg> </q> <p>As for
the way to explain the meaning of this [verse]: [First], through the four claims of
<rs type="basic argument">non-arising from the four extremes</rs>, master
<persName key="BP1">Buddhapalita </persName> has invalidated the [four]
antitheses [of these claims], but did not set up any means to prove an actual thesis.
Then, master <persName key="BP2">Bhavaviveka</persName> criticized the
way in which <persName key="BP1">Buddhapalita</persName> had formulated
his invalidation. He set up the [above four] initial sentences [about <rs
type="basic concept">non-arising</rs>] as autonomous [probative arguments]
and also proved the subject property in an autonomous way. After that, venerable
<persName key="C1">Chandrakirti</persName> explained how <persName
key="BP2">Bhavaviveka</persName>'s critique of <persName
key="BP1">Buddhapalita</persName> does not apply and that <persName
key="BP2">Bhavaviveka</persName>'s acceptance of autonomous arguments in the
context of his own explanation of reasonings that analyze <rs type="basic
concept">the ultimate</rs> is flawed. Thus, he was the one who founded the
tradition of the <name type= "philosophical
school">Consequentialists</name> in an extensive manner....</p>
Example 2.
TEI encoding of the same passage
The challenge in using TEI to capture these Tibetan materials lies in what escapes this
kind of basic encoding. Because the TEI was initially developed by scholars familiar
with the western textual tradition, features of some non-western textual traditions may
pose theoretical and practical challenges, and may require some adaptation of the TEI.
For example, one important feature is the enunciative mode associated with the text. It
is not irrelevant to Tibetan scholars whether a text is chanted, read silently,
transmitted by a teacher in a lung (a ritual that empowers listeners to practice
meditation or study denoted by the text), or scanned on a computer screen. Tibetans
believe that their texts do not simply record information but actually embody ancient
ideas or meanings that, in some situations, require appropriate methods of transmission.
Thus if we were to understand Tibetan texts according to a theoretical and operational
paradigm that treats them only as information, we would not only lose the original
Tibetan cultural context but would lose the different degrees of “transmission
power” said to be generated by different media (reading, chanting, lung
transmission, etc.) within the Tibetan textual tradition. This representation of the
enunciative mode, which is essential to practicing with Tibetan texts, might be
accomplished by additional, customized TEI elements for the chanted sections of the
texts.
Another challenging dimension is the readers’ actions in association with a text. Some
of the most advanced Tibetan meditation techniques include hand movements (called
mudras;
Figure 2 shows examples of these gestures), bodily
movements (such as prostrations), chanting, and complex visualizations. Texts are always
central to these meditation methods, but engagement with the Vajrayana text is far more
active than what occurs by simply reading or even chanting the text.
For example, one of the sections of the “Medicine
Buddha” meditation (which is used for healing) requires special hand movements
(mudras), performed while imagining a dark blue Buddha figure as one chants the mantra
of Medicine Buddha. The co-ordination of body (mudras), speech (mantra), and mind
(visualization of blue Buddha figure; see
Figure 3) is
difficult but necessary for the Vajrayana meditation practice. Instructions on how to
perform the mudras and how to chant the mantra are not in the Tibetan text itself; the
image of the blue Buddha is not in the text either. Traditionally, the mudras and chant
melody must be learned from a Tibetan teacher, and the visualization image is usually
memorized by focusing on a thangka painting in a shrine room.
These additional dimensions are not simply contextual information necessary to
understand the text being encoded: in an important sense, they are integral parts of the
text and its meaning, without which it cannot be said to be truly preserved. Tibetans
are intent upon preserving their textual heritage, but not simply as information in
storage. Instead, they aim for “real preservation” that records and encodes enough
of the living textual tradition so that the texts may be taken up again by future
generations in a way that continues Tibetan culture’s most meaningful values and
customs. Transcription or simple digitization of Tibetan texts constitutes mere
“storage preservation”; the texts may be read and studied in the future, but
their Vajrayana elements of mantra, mudra and meditation will not be captured, since
these elements need to be practiced “live”, so to speak, not just read. If a
Tibetan text sits in a library or a digital archive, but no one knows how to chant it or
meditate with it or debate in response to it, then the text has lost virtually all of
its meaning. The fossil of the text would be preserved, but the text itself would have
become extinct.
Real preservation requires the help of indigenous “text custodians” who teach the
traditional ways of working with the texts. This is a pressing concern because the older
Tibetan teachers who were born in Tibet before the diaspora will die in the next decade
or two. When they are gone, there may no longer be Buddhist practitioners who know
exactly how to chant certain texts or how to perform mudras in connection with specific
textual passages or how to lead more complex rituals based on the texts. To preserve as
complete a record as possible, so that the texts can live again in the meditation
practices and rituals performed with the texts, the gestural, musical and mental
dimensions of these texts must ideally also be recorded. Linking audio, video, and
images to the transcriptions may help, but it may also be worth exploring ways to notate
gestural and other information within the transcription itself. The TEI offers some
approaches to this in its chapters on transcription of speech and on performance texts,
and these could be extended further to accommodate the distinctive combination of
information carried in Tibetan texts.
The encoded TEI file can also form the basis of a more complex multimedia
representation. The TEI version of the Medicine Buddha liturgy can be linked to an audio
file of the correct pronunciation and melody of the mantra, to pictures of the hand
mudras that must be performed during the chanting of the text, and to a visual image of
the blue Buddha figure. The TEI transcription itself can also contain instructions on
how to perform the mudras or other bodily movements that occur at each point in the
text, allowing them to be displayed or suppressed as appropriate. By linking the TEI
transcription to multimedia resources, an editor could allow the appearance of videos,
graphics or photos as memory aids at certain points in the text, which would help the
reader/practitioner perform the visualization of the Buddha figure. An example is shown
in
Figure 4, which gives the text of a chant in multiple
scripts together with a description of the mudras to be performed; these mudras are
illustrated in
Table 1 below. The practitioner's voicing of
the chant could be corrected or accompanied by an audio file of an indigenous Tibetan
chant master's articulation or by an audio file of Tibetan horns, symbols and bells.
Argham |
|
Padyam |
|
Pupe |
|
Dhupe |
|
Aloke |
|
Gendhe |
|
Newidye |
|
Shapda |
|
Table 1.
Diagram of mudras associated with Medicine Buddha text
Click for an
audio file of a Tibetan
mantra. Audio file © 2005 Karma Kagyu Institute. Chanted by Umdze Lodro
Samphel.
How could the Text Encoding Initiative help indigenous “text custodians” around the
world, who are struggling to protect their ancient cultural heritages? Ideally, we might
envision creating a simple shared descriptive system to facilitate the cataloguing of
endangered texts, so that international scholars become more aware of which texts have
been lost and which have been saved. Ideally such a system would be easy to learn, by
any scholar, working in any language. However, the significant differences between
textual traditions and descriptive goals make it hard to create a system that would be
both simple and widely agreed upon. It may be more practical to work on disseminating
TEI expertise more widely among “text custodians”. A second step, therefore, would
be to hold workshops on these digital technologies in the universities and teachers’
colleges of developing countries. The Digital Divide is closing in some parts of the
world (for example, India), and outreach from well-endowed scholarly communities to
poorer scholarly communities could include the sharing of digital methods for preserving
texts. Supported by occasional workshops, a virtual, international community of “text
custodians” trained in TEI could grow and bridge the Digital Divide between
developed and developing countries.
In this endeavor, it is important to respect the control that indigenous scholars have
over their own textual heritage. A textual heritage is a cultural property that can
speak to the world, but it should be maintained by the people whose ancestors created
it. If there are traditional rules about access to certain texts, digital technologies
should not bypass these rules. Digital technologies should not be used to appropriate
the world’s textual riches or simply to add inventory to western digital archives. The
model of broad “access” that often motivates western digitization efforts does not
apply universally, and may in some cases go directly against the indigenous textual
tradition. This issue comes up with regard to Tibetan texts, because some of these texts
are esoteric texts, reserved for advanced meditators. It is generally presumed by
western scholars that increased access to texts is better. But this presumption is not
shared by Tibetan scholars, who deal with texts that require special permission and
instruction from a qualified teacher before they can be read, studied, chanted or
memorized. The restricted nature of some Tibetan texts relates to the difficulty of the
meditation practices described in the text. Not everyone has advanced meditation skills
or sufficient commitment to undertake the mental training methods relayed in the text.
Before the Chinese invasion of Tibet, there were monastic libraries that contained
esoteric volumes which never circulated beyond the monastery or even amongst all members
of the monastery. Thus although most western scholars do not consider “trespassing”
a serious textual practice crime, Tibetan scholars might regard TEI-encoded texts as
inviting trespassers. This is why it is essential for any multicultural development of
TEI to involve indigenous scholars, who understand the threats faced by their endangered
textual tradition and are committed to protecting it.
When a culture is endangered, as the Tibetan culture is, members of that culture not
only try to preserve its texts but try to continue the rituals and other practices that
keep the culture alive. Transcribing texts and digitizing them are important
preservation methods, but these methods need to be supplemented with other tools for
awakening the texts from their archival slumber. The benefits of TEI encoding for the
Tibetan canon range from enhanced preservation of the texts and greater accessibility
for scholars, to support for the continuation of Vajrayana meditation practices that
renew the Tibetan Buddhist heritage. Despite the challenges of reconciling Tibetan
textual assumptions and western digital methods, especially if Tibetan scholars
themselves learn to apply TEI encoding there is a chance that 21st century technology
will not leave the ancient Tibetan textual tradition behind.
Why are modern digital methods such as TEI encoding so important for endangered Tibetan
texts? There are a couple of reasons. First, digital text applications support the
Tibetan scholarly community, which is spread across the globe. Online digitized Tibetan
texts can be accessed by a Tibetan in exile no matter where he or she has taken up
residence. The circulation of texts is made easier when the cataloguing and searching of
texts follows standardized guidelines, and TEI encoding provides just this kind of
standardized information. The other side of this point, however, is that the exiled
Tibetan scholarly community lacks the kind of financial support that a government would
normally provide for modernizing its textual tradition; this community must rely on the
largesse of western scholarly institutions. By concerning itself with the plight of
endangered textual traditions, the Text Encoding Initiative might provide aid to these
Tibetan scholars in exile.
Another reason is that TEI encoding gives the Tibetan textual tradition entrance to an
international scholarly enterprise that may make it easier for non-Tibetans to
understand Tibetan Buddhism. Even though the Tibetan Buddhist tradition is being lost on
its home soil, an international Tibetan Buddhist culture is appearing. Scholars and
meditators in Europe and the western hemisphere are studying Vajrayana Buddhism and
practicing its meditation methods, liturgies and philosophical debate techniques.
Vajrayana Buddhism depends upon the direct transmission of teachings from a qualified
teacher to students, but there is also a virtual dimension to this spread of Tibetan
Buddhism. Tibetan Buddhists often go online to find information and to communicate with
one another; digital technologies have been used to forge connections between western
newcomers to Tibetan Buddhism and indigenous Tibetan monks and nuns. Compared to the
restrictions on the study and practice of Tibetan Buddhism within Tibet itself, there is
greater freedom online to discuss the issues and share the achievements that are
important to Tibetan Buddhists. This global Tibetan Buddhist community is forming with
the aid of digital communication tools unavailable twenty years ago. The adoption of TEI
encoding will add a scholarly tool to this digital toolkit.
Finally, the rich heritage of Vajrayana Buddhism cannot be represented by a
one-dimensional medium. Its exuberant visual imagery, its complex symbolism, its
deep-toned chanting and music, and its engagement of the body in ritualized motions
combine within the most advanced meditation practices. Although Tibetans do practice
quiet, unmoving meditation, what is distinctive about the Tibetan tradition is the
overabundance of forms — painting, music, ritualized gesture, chanting, dance, even
formal philosophical debate — within its meditation practices. Digital technologies
capture this rich dimension of Tibetan texts better than the simple transcription of
texts can. Because TEI encoding offers ways to release a Tibetan liturgy, meditation
manual or philosophical inquiry from its text-cocoon and express its full
multidimensionality, TEI is one of the digital technologies that holds promise for
preserving the Vajrayana textual tradition.
Acknowledgements
- Jeff Hoogmoed, http://www.freespacegraphix.biz
- Union College East Asian Studies Freeman Foundation grant
- Union College Humanities Faculty Development grant
- Editors of Digital Humanities Quarterly
- Photographs courtesy of Tenzin Namdak, Nitartha International Document Input
Center, Kathmandu, Nepal and Karma Triyana Dharmachakra Monastery, Woodstock,
NY
- Audio file courtesy of Karma Kagyu Institute, Woodstock, NY