Recent Essays/Post-35

Lodrö Tsungme or Longchenpa: Who Is the Author of a Commentary on the Ultimate Continuum?

[[ |300px|thumb| ]] In recent decades, many Nyingma scholars and lamas have expressed jubilation in supposedly finding a commentary on the Ultimate Continuum by Longchenpa, perhaps the most important figure for the systematization of Dzogchen thought and a leading patriarch of the Nyingma tradition. A commentary by a Nyingma master, especially by someone of Longchenpa's stature, would certainly add to the wealth of Nyingma philosophical literature and give Nyingmapas their own voice on important philosophical topics contained in the Ultimate Continuum. The need for hermeneutics and clear interpretations of Indian classics became more evident as the Nyingma scholastic literature and study saw unprecedented development since Mipam wrote his scholastic commentaries and as interschool exposure and exchanges became heightened in the second half of the twentieth century. But the school did not have a thoroughgoing commentary on the Ultimate Continuum apart from the annotation and short exegesis by Mipam. A commentary from an authority like Longchenpa would have given Nyingmapas a clear and firm position to follow.

The commentary entitled The Precious Lamp That Illuminates the Definitive Meaning of the Mahāyāna Uttaratantra Treatise (ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོ་རྒྱུད་བླ་མའི་བསྟན་བཅོས་ཀྱི་ངེས་དོན་གསལ་བར་བྱེད་པའི་རིན་པོ་ཆེའི་སྒྲོན་མེ།) was written by someone called Lodrö Tsungme of Sangpu Neutok monastery in the early part of the thirteenth century. As some Nyingma lamas, such as Minling Terchen Gyurme Dorje, considered Lodrö Tsungme to be another name for Longchenpa, and since Sangpu Neutok monastery was clearly Longchenpa's alma mater, there were reasonable grounds for them to attribute the commentary to Longchenpa. The commentary also mentioned the author being from the Ü region of Tibet, which Longchenpa was. In addition, there was a widespread rumor being passed down that Longchenpa had composed a commentary on the Ultimate Continuum. The content of this commentary was also generally consistent with the philosophical views of Longchenpa found in his popular writings. Khenpo Palden Sherab, a scholar based in New York, went on to claim that even the style of writing is that of Longchenpa and that the commentary is unmistakably the one authored by Longchenpa. He rejoices in the fact that the commentary, after over six hundred years, has come to light through the kindness of the great Nyingma figures.

Following Khenpo Palden Sherab's claims, the Ngagyur Nyingma College of Lhodrak Kharchhu Dudjomling monastery in Bhutan, in the preface to their publication of the commentary in 2014, laments how the text has remained inaccessible for nearly seven hundred years and adds that it has finally come to light through the kindness of Longchenpa and the merit of sentient beings. Namkhai Nyingpo Rinpoche recounts how he heard of the existence of a commentary on the Ultimate Continuum by Longchenpa as a young boy and how, in 1995 during the Nyingma Prayer Festival, he came across an important person who claimed to have a copy in his possession. He did not pursue the book then, but after many years he saw the book listed in the catalogue of the extensive edition of Kama teachings published in Kham. The Lhodrak Kharchhu edition was published after one of the teachers at his monastery downloaded the electronic version, most likely from the website of the Tibetan Buddhist Resource Center. The text is reproduced in neat typeset, making it very accessible to readers, and it is clearly attributed to Longchenpa based on Khenpo Palden Sherab's claims. Even an annotation that reads "born in Yoru Draichatö drong" (གཡོ་རུ་གྲའི་ཆ་སྟོད་གྲོང་) is newly inserted while discussing the author's origin in Ü in order to specify the birthplace of Longchenpa.

The editors of the extensive Kama teachings in Tibet were, however, a little more scrupulous in their recent publication after having recognized an error they made previously. They first encountered a copy of the manuscript of this commentary in 1997 in Shechen monastery in Nepal with a note saying it was written by Longchenpa. In order to protect the text, which was at that time available only in a few copies, the editors included it in their new extensive edition of the Kama teachings published in 1999 in Tibet. However, as they delved deeper into codicological considerations and enhanced their textual preservation programs, it became clear that the commentary was composed by Lodrö Tsungme, the Kadampa scholar of Sangpu Neutok, who was an older contemporary of Longchenpa. For many reasons, including differences in the writing styles, they attributed the commentary to this Kadam scholar and excluded it from the collection of Longchenpa's writings, which they published as part of the Mes po'i shul bzhag series through dPal brtsegs bod yig dpe rnying zhib 'jug khang. Instead, they included the commentary within their bKa' gdams gsung 'bum series alongside other works of Lodrö Tsungme.

Both redactions of the commentary available as part of bKa' gdams gsung 'bum series from dPal brtsegs bod yig dpe rnying zhib 'jug khang in Tibet and the typeset version from Lhodrak Kharchhu monastery in Bhutan are based on the copy of the manuscript which is available from the Buddhist Digital Resource Center (numbered W465 on www.tbrc.org). This photo offset print of the book was published in 1974 by Tseten Dorji of Tibetan Nyingmapa monastery in Tezu, Arunachal Pradesh, India. According to the preface for the publication written in 1974, most likely by E. Gene Smith, the book was created by copying a manuscript in the library of Ri-bo-che Rje-drung and is described as "a beautiful but faded ancient piece of calligraphy with numerous bsdu-yig." The original manuscript was "unfortunately unsuitable for direct reproduction," and "a careful copy was prepared preserving the old orthography and checked several times against the original." The preface identified the author to be Lodrö Tsungme, a contemporary of Butön, whose famous treatise Ornament That Illuminates and Beautifies the Tathāgata Heart (བདེ་གཤེགས་སྙིང་པོ་གསལ་ཞིང་མཛེས་པར་བྱེད་པའི་རྒྱན།) was triggered by Butön's philosophical discussions with Lodrö Tsungme.

Riwoche Jedrung, whose library contained the book, must be the 7th Riwoche Jedrung, Jampal Jungne (1856–1922), who lived in Pemakoe, a hidden land in Arunachal Pradesh, and was a staunch follower of both Nyingma and Kagyu traditions and a teacher of modern Nyingma masters such as Dudjom Jigdrel Yeshe Dorje and Kangyur Rinpoche. Yet, it is not clear how his library was created and where it was located. Thus, nothing can be said about the provenance and history of the original manuscript besides what the above-mentioned preface contains.

Similarly, not much is known about its author Lodrö Tsungme although a little more information has come to light in the recent decades. Buddhist Digital Resource Center has him registered him under the names Nyalpa Lodrö Tsungme (gnyal ba blo gros mtshungs med) and Sangpuwa Lodrö Tsungme (gsang phu ba blo gros mtshungs med) and his writings are found within first and third batches of bKa’ gdam gsungs ‘bum phyogs bsgrigs. Although we do not have a biography for him, he is mentioned in a number of sources which helps us roughly place him in the late 13th and first half of the 14th century. He was the 14th throne holder of Lingme College at Sangpu Neutok monastery and well known for his scholarship on the five treatises of Maitreya (བྱམས་ཆོས་སྡེ་ལྔ་). He was student of Jamyang Śākya Zhönu and a teacher of the 1st Shamarpa Drakpa Sengge, Yakde Paṇchen Tsondru Dargye, and also of the 3rd Karmapa Rangjung Dorje according to the résumé in bKa’ gdam gsung ‘bum phyogs bsgrigs thengs dang po. His works include a commentary on the Bodhicaryāvatāra, Madhyāntavibhāga, a condensed exegesis of pramāṇa, an exposition on dedication of merit and an explanation of the precious vehicle. These works were recently discovered in the Neychu temple library of Drepung monastery and published as part of the bKa’ gdams gsung ’bum phyogs bsgrigs series.

With sparse knowledge of the author and manuscript and close affinity of content and writing styles between this text and writings of Longchenpa, can we then categorically say whether the author of this commentary, Lodrö Tsungme, is Longchenpa or not? The clear answer perhaps lies in the detailed reading of this commentary and the works of Longchenpa, which those who attributed this commentary to Longchenpa clearly did not do. A cursory search carried out by this author to verify certain orthographic issues for the current project of compiling a new edition of Longchenpa's writing has led to the following revelation. In the sixth chapter of the Great Chariot, an auto-commentary on his Finding Rest in the Nature of the Mind, Longchenpa discusses the concept of the Three Jewels and refutes the interpretation of a certain lama.

Here, a certain lama says that the followers of Mahāyāna claim the dharmakāya buddha, which one will attain, is the only thing that can protect one from even the fears of inferiority and fears of very subtle impurities, thus it is posited as resultant state of refuge. The followers of the vehicle of pratyekabuddhas claim the dharma jewel which is the realization that will naturally arise in one's mindstream in the future to be the result. Thus, that is posited as the resultant state of refuge. The followers of the vehicle of śrāvakas posit the saṅgha of arhats that will arise in one's mindstream in the future as the resultant state of refuge. Thus, the three vehicles are each said to have one resultant state of refuge. This is slightly not right.

འདིར་བླ་མ་ཁ་ཅིག་ནི་ཐེག་ཆེན་པས་སྨན་[དམན་]པའི་འཇིགས་པ་དང་སྒྲིབ་པ་ཕྲ་ཤིང་ཕྲ་བའི་འཇིགས་པ་ལས་ཀྱང་སྐྱོབ་པར་བྱེད་པ་ནི་རང་གིས་ཐོབ་པར་འགྱུར་བའི་སངས་རྒྱས་ཆོས་ཀྱི་སྐུ་ཅན་དེ་ཁོ་ན་ཡིན་པས་འབྲས་བུའི་སྐྱབས་གནས་སུ་བཞག་གོ། རང་སངས་རྒྱས་ཀྱི་ཐེག་པས་མ་འོངས་པ་ན་རང་རྒྱུད་ལ་རྟོགས་པ་རང་བྱུང་དུ་སྐྱེ་བར་འགྱུར་བའི་ཆོས་དཀོན་མཆོག་ནི་འབྲས་བུ་སྟེ། འབྲས་བུའི་སྐྱབས་གནས་སུ་བཞག་གོ། ཉན་ཐོས་ཀྱི་ཐེག་པས་རང་རྒྱུད་ལ་མ་འོངས་པ་ན་འབྱུང་བའི་དགྲ་བཅོམ་པའི་དགེ་འདུན་དེ་འབྲས་བུའི་སྐྱབས་གནས་སུ་བཞག་པས། ཐེག་པ་གསུམ་པོ་སོ་སོ་ལ་འབྲས་བུའི་སྐྱབས་གནས་ནི་རེ་རེ་ཡིན་ནོ་ཞེས་གསུངས་པ་ཡང་ཅུང་ཟད་མི་རིགས་ཏེ།

Longchenpa goes on to refute such claims and argues that followers of each vehicle consider their final state of enlightenment as the resultant state of refuge. This passage which Longchenpa cites as opposition in his Great Chariot can be found, with slight differences, in Lodrō Tsungme's commentary on page 165 of the BDRC redaction and on page 131 of the Lhodrak Kharchhu edition. Thus, by "a certain lama," Longchenpa is referring to the author of this commentary. This makes it very clear that this commentary was not written by the Nyingma master Longchenpa and that Longchenpa was fully aware, and perhaps also had a copy, of Lodrō Tsungme's commentary when he wrote his Great Chariot.

However, this finding then leaves us with the same old question: Where can Longchenpa's commentary be found if he has written one? Are there any chances that it exists as many lamas believe? The chapter of finding Longchenpa's commentary on the Ultimate Continuum remains far from closed and the search must continue.

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