The texts used were two small blockprints, nearly identical A 1 and A
2, and a large blockprint B.
On the whole A furnishes a good text and it may be used as the basis
for the edition. Two curious cases of the use of བ་ for པ་ (7. 45) seem
more than mere negligence of the wood-cutter in connection with the
badly printed པའི་ in l. 13 (which looks also like བའི་) and also a པ་
like བ་ in l. 23. Inversely there is a clear པ་—ཐཔས—in l. 37 and a བོར་
for པོར་ in l. 48. A 2 twice lacks the hook in རྩ (20, 24) and the naro
ོ in lines 29, 47. These two latter variants may be due to
deterioration in the blocks or the roughness of the paper, or defective
inking. Otherwise A 1 and A 2 are practically identical, and except for
the last pages (the last two of A 1 are condensed into a single one in
A 2) the two copies may have been printed from the same blocks.
In 5 B writes ལྡིང་པའི་ for བའི་ as authorized by the Dicts. But the
question of final particles is still far from being satisfactorily
settled. The Dicts. are on the whole much at variance on this point.
Desg. gives as a rule a greater variety of them than J.
Some differences in the tenses of the verb are presented by the two
copies of A on one side and B on the other. In l. 2 སྙེག་ is the present
tense as against the past form བསྙེག་ in A. As to the sense both would
do, and though the past form in Tibetan is better rendered in English
by the present we may understand the past form as ‘has begun to rise.’
In verse XI B gives imp. forms, making the sense one of command whereas
A has present forms giving a mere statement. The final ས་ in སོམས་,
however, is not recorded in the Dicts., nor the form སྦྱོངས་; ཐུལ་,
however, is a regularly recognised imp. form.
འཁྲུགས་ in l. 35 is a correct past tense. The form ཁྲུག་ (without an
initial འ་) as in B is not recorded, though འཁྲུག་, present, might do
equally well. འཁྲེལ་, l. 32, is not authorized by the Dicts. which all
omit the initial འ་. The substitution of འཆད་ for བཤད་ (38) seems to
lack sufficient urgency, though J. records a འཆད་ཉན་པ་ ‘to listen to an
explanation’ from Sch. A འཕུང་, l. 29, is correct according to the
Dicts., not ཕུང་ of B, though J. and S. Ch. D. give the alternative
spelling.
In the treatment of grammatical particles A is superior to B. པར་ (10)
is correct, not པ་ B. It is an adverbial construction. In 18, པར་, and
22, བར་, equally so. In 24 པར་ is a terminative dependent on བགྱིད་པ་.
The remaining variants are all in the nature of equivalents for or
against which nothing (or the same!) can be said, and which would do as
well as the readings we have adopted. Many of them are, however,
curious for this reason, that they are not homonymous variants at all
and consequently substitutions for, not corruptions of, the text. We
have to leave the question alone whether those in A or in B are likely
to be the original ones.
In 7, དྲིན་པོ་ཆེ་, very kind, is as good as རིན་པོ་ཆེ་, very precious; in 17
དུས་འདི་ནས་ means practically the same as དུས་དེང་ནས་, ‘from this moment’,
and ‘from this very day.’ In 19 གཞན་དུ་ ‘in another’ seems even a trifle
better than གཞན་ནས་ ‘from another.’ གྱིས་ seems better in 32 than ཀྱང་ in
B, ‘even, indeed!’ བྱེད་པ་ ‘to perform,’ in l. 34, is as good as བསྒྲུབ་པ་,
also ‘to perform, accomplish,’ and the future form of the latter would
be better if changed into a pf. form བསྒྲུབས་ or pr. སྒྲུབ་. In l. 40 གཏོང་བ་,
‘the sending, throwing,’ seems as good as སྐྱེལ་བཞིན་, ‘(as silly) as the
conveying.’ In 41 the article པ་ means the same as plural རྣམས་ B. In
44, བདག་འཛིན་, ‘egotism, selfishness,’ is substituted for ཉོན་མོངས་,
‘sin’; similarly in 45 and 49 ཀུན་ ‘all,’ for རྣམས་ ‘many.’ Lastly, the
difficult construction ལྷུང་བས་མ་འཆང་བར་, in 46, is replaced in B by the
easier ལྷུང་བར་མི་བྱེད་པར་, ‘not allowing (letting, making) it [the soul]
(to) fall’ instead of ‘letting it remain fallen when once it has done
so.’
All these examples seem to point out that one of the blockprints
(probably the larger one) was derived from a version which was not
actually copied from the original but rather written down from memory.
The variants are no cutting or copying mistakes except ངེས་སོ་ and ངས་སོ་
l. 16, and དྲིན་པོ་ཆེ་ and རིན་པོ་ཆེ་ in l. 7.
In l. 26 we find an erroneous ཅིང་ for ཞིང་.
The two ༈ at the end of lines 16 and 48 in B (or rather at the
beginning of the following lines, for that is where they must be put if
the Tibetan text is printed line for line like English verse) do not
agree with my conception of the structure of the poem as indicated by
my typographical arrangement of it. I would not have expected a ༈ after
line 16 but after lines 12, 24, 36 and 48. The occurrence of the sign
after line 48 may, however, be taken to indicate that the next two
verses have to be regarded as appendices to the body of the poem
proper.
It must be mentioned that in the title, in both copies of A., the final
word is བཞུགས་. In B., as the poem occurs in the body of the volume,
there is no equivalent title. I have written བཞུགས་སོ༷་ without prejudice
to the question whether the form བཞུགས་ is legitimate or not. My
teachers say that before a ༎ the སོ་ is required.
The only reading taken from B is ངེས་ for the incomprehensible ངས་ of A
1 and 2, in line 16.
It may be, finally, remarked that the three copies from which this
edition was prepared, show once more that textual correctness and
perfection of typographical execution are not necessarily related in
Tibet. The two small prints which are, but for the single omission of a
dengbu in line 16, quite correct, are small, badly printed on bad
paper, and not carefully or neatly cut. The larger copy is neat, well
printed on good paper, very legible, but not nearly so satisfactory as
a text.