Rnying ma Tantras
Tibetan scholars conventionally divide their canon-
ical tantric literature under two major rubrics: the
old tantras (rnying ma) of the earlier spread of the
doctrine (bstan pa snga dar) and the new tantras
(gsar ma), of the later spread of the doctrine (bstan
pa phyi dar). The terminology developed after many
previously unknown translations of Indian texts
began to enter Tibet from the late 10th century
onward, becoming known as the new tantras: hence
the tantric traditions that had appeared before
became known as the old tantras.
This distinction applied only within the most eso-
teric types of tantras, mainly those that had begun
to appear after the 8th century, and which accepted
prominent use of charnel ground (kāpālika) sym-
bolism. Doctrinally, they were associated with a
radical non-dualism, that could, if not understood,
be misconstrued as subversive of conventional
morality. Doxographical classification in tantric
Buddhism has never been uniform, so that precise
definitions are difficult. Nevertheless, at slight risk
of generalisation, one can say that the term old
tantras nowadays implies texts from the three
categories of mahāyoga, anuyoga, and atiyoga,
indicating progressive gradations of subtlety and
inwardness: mahāyoga focuses on deity meditation
and visualisation; anuyoga on more inward yogas of
subtle physical veins and wheels (nāḍī, cakra); and
atiyoga (also known as rdzogs chen) on the highest
formless meditations on the ultimate nature of real-
ity. The term new tantras usually implies texts classi-
fied as rnal ‘byor bla na med pa’i rgyud (equivalent to
the Sanskrit terms yogottaratantras, yoginītantras,
or yoganiruttaratantras; Sanderson, 2009, 146). The
more exoteric tantras, which had appeared in India
in earlier centuries, categorized by different author-
ities in various ways and under various rubrics,
including kriyātantras, caryātantras, upāyatantras,
ubhayatantras, and yogatantras, were, along with
the Mahāyāna and, in Tibetan parlance, s­o-called
Hīnayāna scriptures, mainly accepted as a shared
common heritage of all Tibetan Buddhism.
© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2015 BEB, vol. I
Also available online – www.brill
Issues of Canonicity
The distinction between new tantras and old
tantras is more than merely a chronological des-
ignation, since despite a considerable overlap
of shared materials and approaches, the old and
new tantric traditions can also reflect differences of
ethos and doctrine. While the new tantras adopted
a simple lexical approach to translation privileging
text autonomy, the old tantras reflect the earliest
efforts at transplanting tantric culture in a much
broader sense from India to Tibet, thus privileging
target audience needs, and involving a significant
degree of adaptive localization to Tibetan culture
and civilisation (Mayer, 1996, 1–153). As a conse-
quence, although they were compiled largely from
Indic materials and to Indic templates, there existed
in many cases no exact Indian equivalent texts from
which the old tantras had originally been trans-
lated. A related and more important factor was that
the old tantras persisted in celebrating an original
Indian tantric vision (Gray, 2010), of a canon that
was in theory unclosable, since infinite quantities of
tantras as yet unknown would always remain in the
buddha fields, whence they could be transmitted to
fortunate human siddhas (perfected masters) at any
time. A moderate number of new tantric scriptures
thus continue to appear within the old tantra tra-
dition until the present day, amongst the revealed
treasure literature (gter ma). By contrast, and espe-
cially after the decline of Buddhism in India, the
new tantras eventually became associated with the
conception of a canon that was in theory closable, in
the sense that all the Buddha’s teachings intended
for Tibet had already been uttered, even if a small
number might still remain to be collected.
As a result, the canonicity of the old tantras has
sometimes been questioned by those who believe
exclusively in a closable canon. Thus, very few old
tantras were included in the original redaction
of Kanjur (Bka’ ’gyur), the ­14th-century scriptural
compilation which marked Tibet’s first effective
attempts at canonical closure. Partly inspired by
the decline of Buddhism in India, and partly by
the example of a s­ tate-regulated canon in China, at
least according to tradition the Tibetan Kanjur was
 Rnying ma Tantras 391
initiated at Narthang (Snar thang) by a Bka’ gdams
pa follower of the new tantras, Jamyang (’Byams
dbyangs), who was at the time serving in China
at the court of the Yuan Emperor Renzong (仁宗)
or Buyantu Khan (r. 1311–1320), and who sent funds
back to Narthang together with requests urging that
such a canon be made (Harrison, 1996, 74–76; see also
Gzhon nu dpal, 1984–1985, 410–412). However, some
slightly later Kanjurs, following the 1­4th-century
Tshal pa redaction, did begin to accept a small seg-
regated old tantras section, while a regional late
­17th-century Kanjur from Tawang, connected with
the fifth and sixth Dalai Lamas, includes many more
old tantras amongst the main body of its collection
(Samten, 1994).
There is little evidence for a closed canon of
Vajrayāna texts in the great Indian centers of learn-
ing to which Tibetans had traditionally turned,
such as the monastic universities of Nālandā or
Vikramaśīla, or, for that matter, even of a closed
Indian canon for Mahāyāna scriptures. On the con-
trary, the Indian siddhas’ vision was more often one
of unlimited tantric scriptures existing in the bud-
dha fields, which could be progressively revealed
to human siddhas on earth over the course of time.
A model for a closed canon was of course supplied
by the Tripiṭaka of mainstream texts. However,
there is little evidence this model was applied by the
early Indian missionaries to the tantric scriptures
they brought to Tibet; for at that time, from the late
8th century to the 10th century, Indian Tantrism was
still in its most productive phase, so that for the first
two hundred years and more of tantric Buddhism
in Tibet, numerous new tantric Buddhist scriptures
were still being revealed in India, some of which, like
the Hevajratantra and the Kālacakratantra, were to
become highly influential in many parts of Asia.
In China, by contrast, a systematic control of the
Buddhist canon modelled on secular precedents
had first been attempted as early as the 6th century,
and in subsequent centuries, the regulation of the
Buddhist canon increasingly became a significant
aspect of Chinese governance, supported by a grow-
ing bibliographical literature that sought to identify
undesirable texts by virtue of their n
­ on-Indic origins
or their excessively transgressive tantric content
(Lancaster, 1989, 187; Tokuno, 1990).
A major difference between the old and new
tantra traditions is thus that while the former
remained conservatively attached to the original
Indian model of an open, somewhat distributed, and
only informally regulated tantric scriptural litera-
ture, the latter promoted the reforming, modernizing
agenda of a single monolithic and highly regulated
set of tantras to be included in a single canon along-
side the sūtras and other n­ on-tantric Buddhist scrip-
tures which, while different from the Chinese model
in its internal arrangement of texts, its rejection in
most cases of multiple translations, and its inclusion
of esoteric tantras, nevertheless resembled the Chi-
nese canon in its basic rationale of regulation, nor-
malization, and centralization, and in its adoption
of the proven existence of an exact Indian equiva-
lent, as the only valid criterion of orthodoxy.
While for these reasons excluded from the pres-
tigious new Kanjur (the ­so-called Old Narthang),
many old tantras continued to be preserved within
their original collections, simply known as tantra
collections (rgyud ’bum) or, after a while, old
tantra collections (rnying ma’i rgyud ’bum). Some
texts are preserved in more specialized collections,
such as the Vairo Rgyud ’bum and the Rgyud bcu
bdun, which have only atiyoga texts, or the Rnying
ma Bka’ ma, which was compiled slightly later and
has a few tantric scriptures accompanied by many
more commentaries. Other old tantras have never
joined such collections, but have simply remained
dispersed within various collections of revealed
treasure literature (gter ma). It is not known when
the first large collections of old tantras appeared,
but it was probably quite early: there is, for example,
mention of an 11th- or ­12th-century collection of
old tantras at the seat of the Zur family, a famous
Rnying ma hereditary lineage (Mayer, 1996, 224).
A collection in 30 volumes containing 335 texts
(or 375 by another count) is also mentioned in the
biography of the Rnying ma master Nam mkha’ dpal
(1171[?]–1237[?]), who is said to have compiled it
on the occasion of the death of his father, the great
codifier of the old tantras, Nyang ral nyi ma ’i ’od
zer (1124–1192), although this collection seems to
have also included a number of new tantras (Nyang
ral, vol. I, 1977, 55–59). Over succeeding centuries,
many further collections of old tantras were made,
which varied in both size and contents. A notable
development was the old tantra collection in 42 vol-
umes organized by Ratna Gling pa in the 15th cen-
tury, based on the Zur family collection mentioned
above, which is said to be the basis of modern recen-
sions and transmissions (Mayer, 1996, 225).
The surviving old tantra collections still vary in
size and contents, between 929 texts in 46 volumes,
in the probably ­ 17th-century Bhutanese manu-
script recension, and 448 texts in 26 volumes in
the late ­18th-century Sde dge xylograph. Excluding
the unknown number of scriptures preserved only
392 Rnying ma Tantras
within gter ma collections, the total number of dif-
ferent texts within the extant old tantra collections
per se has recently been estimated by the University
of Virginia’s online Tibetan and Himalayan Library
as 1,133, of which 478 are classified as rdzogs chen,
45 as anuyoga, 568 as mahāyoga, and 42 as supple-
mentary texts (kha skong). No other categories
of texts are included within the old tantra collec-
tions other than these three most esoteric types of
tantras, all of which are believed to record the utter-
ances of or dialogues between enlightened bud-
dhas. The modern study of the old tantra collections
is not so advanced as that of the Kanjur, and their
study is additionally hampered by the destruction
since the 1950s by the Chinese of about 95% of old
tantra collection witnesses (personal communica-
tion, E.G. Smith). While every Rnying ma monas-
tery of substance once sought to own an old tantra
collection, nowadays, only 13 witnesses are known
to survive, all but two in Bhutan and Nepal. Collec-
tively, they fall within six different doxographical
redactions (see below, where they are listed within
their groupings).
Being largely excluded from the Kanjur does not
seem to have adversely affected the status or cir-
culation of the old tantras. Their carefully honed
adaptations to Tibetan culture garnered popularity,
not only within the Rnying ma school, but across
the other traditions too. Although notionally based
upon the new tantras, the important Bka’ brgyud
traditions in particular have made copious use of
the old tantras, to the extent that in some cases, they
practice as much or even more old tantra than new
tantra. The ’Khon clan hierarchs, hereditary heads
of the Sa skya school which notionally upholds a
new tantra orthodoxy, retain the old tantra cycle
of Rdo rje Phur pa as their main meditational deity
(yi dam), and the great Dge lugs monastery of Se
ra, one of Tibet’s major institutions and notionally
based on the new tantras, also took the old tantra
cycle of Rta mgrin yang gsang (Hayagrīva) as its
main meditational deity (Dreyfus, 2003, 348n48).
Several Dalai Lamas, notably the fifth, thirteenth,
and fourteenth, have been active promoters of
the old tantras, not least because the visionary old
tantra usage of Tibetan national narratives has ren-
dered them a key element in attempts at national
reunification, throughout Tibetan history (Kapstein,
2000, 141–162). So while some might assume Tibet
to have a notionally closed canon, the actual his-
torical reality is more complex: the case was rather
that of a dual system in which notionally closed and
open tantric canons ­co-existed in parallel. If some
advocates of the closed canon rejected the open
canon as apocryphal, and if some advocates of the
open canon likewise deprecated the closed canon
as including texts inferior to their own (Ogyan
Tanzin, 2013), and as having lost its revelatory vital-
ity, it seems more probable that over the longer
course of Tibetan history, an overall majority of
lamas have de facto accepted in parallel the simul-
taneous validity of both open and closed canons.
Historical Origins
Tibetan historiography associates the old tantras
with the great ­ state-sponsored introduction of
Buddhism that began in the late 7th century, when
Emperor Khri Srong lde btsan invited many famous
Buddhist teachers to Tibet, including some mas-
ters of Tantra. Yet the evidence from this period
is by no means unambiguous. More exoteric tan-
tric systems were indeed translated, and some of
these were actively promoted, for example, the
Mahāvairocanābhisaṃbodhitantra as a part of state
ritual, and the Sarvadurgatipariśodhanatantra as
a mortuary text to replace the traditional funerary
rite. However, the more esoteric forms of tantric
Buddhism (Vajrayāna) that made prominent use of
charnel ground imagery, which were still relatively
new and controversial even in India at that time,
seem to have been controlled (Ishikawa, 1990, 4).
The two surviving official catalogues of texts trans-
lated (’Phang thang ma and Ldan dkar ma/Lhan
dkar ma) show little sign of the vast repertoire of
highly esoteric mahāyogatantras, anuyogatantras,
and atiyogatantras, which the later Rnying ma
tradition takes as its most prestigious and important
scriptures, and upon which it is founded (although
we cannot say whether some such texts might have
appeared in the third catalogue that is no longer
extant, the Mchims phu ma; ­Hermann-Pfandt, 2002,
129–149; Halkias, 2004, 46–105). Likewise, esoteric
Vajrayāna translational terms were not system-
atically included in the official lexicographic tracts
prepared to facilitate and standardise translation.
One of them, the Sgra sbyor bam po gnyis pa of
814 ce, specified that such tantras should be kept
secret by order of the state because of their unsuit-
ability for the spiritually immature, and then
observed that the existing translations of such
tantras had already caused damage through their
concealed meanings not being understood, so that
further translation should stop (Ishikawa, 1990, 4).
It is noteworthy also that an important early
 Rnying ma Tantras 393
historical source, the Dba’ bzhed (Testament of
Ba), describes how the great master of Vajrayāna,
Padmasambhava, was invited to Tibet by the
emperor, but created alarm through his inordinate
and frightening displays of miraculous powers, and
so was sent back to India after only a short time
(Wangdu & Diemberger, 2000, 52–60). Elsewhere
the same text mentions that the translation was
banned of the type of teachings with which Pad-
masambhava was associated, the mahāyogatantras
(Wangdu & Diemberger, 2000, 88),
It is unfortunate that a serious dearth of sources
renders the early history of the old tantras frus-
tratingly obscure. After the collapse of the Tibetan
Empire in the m ­ id-9th century, disorder prevailed
across most of the region for nearly a 150 years,
in a period known as the “Time of Fragments”
(bsil ba’i dus), when the historical record became
largely erased. It is therefore very hard to ascertain
if kāpālika-style Vajrayāna was entirely banned dur-
ing the empire, or if it was merely restricted to small
elite circles who had already obtained it, or if it was
at first restricted, and later allowed more widely.
Scholars are still struggling to understand the early
history of the old tantras.
­Proto-Rnying ma texts at Dunhuang
That Vajrayāna did become successful quite early on
is established by a partial glimpse into the latter part
of the “Time of Fragments,” offered by an ancient
sealed document store which remained undisturbed
in Dunhuang, a cave temple site at the Chinese side
of the Silk Routes, until its recovery in the 20th cen-
tury. The numerous largely ­ 10th-century tantric
manuscripts amongst its holdings reveal a snapshot
from shortly before the phyi dar, of what one might
call a flourishing ­proto-Rnying ma, already showing
many of the texts, named personages, doctrines, and
tantric doxographical categories, associated with
the later Rnying ma school.
For example, the greater part of the Dunhuang
materials on the popular phur pa rituals reappeared
within later Rnying ma texts (Cantwell & Mayer,
2008), and the longest of them (IOL Tib J 331.III)
became quite prominent, through its incorpora-
tion complete and verbatim into the definitive
­12th-century codification of Rnying ma mahāyoga,
Nyang ral nyi ma’i ’od zer’s Bka’ brgyad bde gshegs
’dus pa (see below).
Another influential survivor from Dunhuang
is the ’Phags pa Thabs kyi zhags pa padma ’phreng
gi don bsdus pa (henceforth Thabs zhags), which
together with its commentary, comprises IOL Tib J
321 in the British Library (Cantwell & Mayer, 2012).
This unique manuscript, intact in 85 folios, gives us
our most fully comprehensive, detailed, and entirely
unmodified view into ­proto-Rnying ma Tantrism
before the phyi dar. The Thabs zhags has remained
canonical for the Rnying ma, who consider it one
of their 18 tantras of mahāyoga, a core grouping
of highly prestigious texts, several of which are
referred to amongst the Dunhuang finds (Almogi,
2014). As ever, the dating of tantric texts is difficult,
but here we can take advantage of the Indological
work of A. Sanderson. The Thabs zhags and others
among the 18 tantras of mahāyoga share several
historical indicators with the Sarvabuddhasamāyog
aḍākinījālaśaṃvara, a version of which is also men-
tioned at Dunhuang, and which itself also became
one of the 18 tantras of mahāyoga. A. Sanderson has
established this text to be historically intermediate
between the Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgraha and
the Guhyasamāja on the one hand, and the ­full-on
yoginī or yoganiruttaratantras on the other hand.
Thus Sanderson locates its production in India from
the late 8th through 9th centuries (Sanderson, 2009,
145ff), in other words, broadly contemporaneous
with Emperor Khri Srong lde btsan and his succes-
sors. So if tantric texts of this type did indeed enter
Tibet at that time, they will still have been very new
in India, and not yet universally accepted there.
The Thabs zhags still retains reasonably clear
doctrinal connections with the earlier more exo-
teric yogatantras, of the type that had not been
banned by the Tibetan emperor. It maintains two
parallel pantheons: a maṇḍala (circle) of fifty peace-
ful deities which was an adaptation of the 37 deity
maṇḍala of the Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgraha
basic to yogatantra, but here, the male and female
figures are paired as consorts, and a number of fur-
ther female deities are added to complete the set.
Then there is a parallel more esoteric maṇḍala of
terrifying ­ charnel-ground deities, whose central
form is the ferocious Ś rī Heruka still familiar to mod-
ern Rnying ma, with 9 heads and 18 arms, surrounded
by the still popular ten wrathful deities (Khro bo
bcu), each accompanied by two zoocephalic female
emanations. The central terrifying female is speci-
fied in the commentary as Ral gcig ma (Ekajaṭā), still
to this day the main ma mo or wrathful female deity
of the Rnying ma pantheon.
IOL Tib J 321 has a marginal note connecting the
revelation of the Thabs zhags root scripture with
Padmasambhava, the highly mythologised founder
394 Rnying ma Tantras
of Tibetan tantric Buddhism, here already presented
as a uniquely great enlightened being. Another mar-
ginal note cites Śāntigarbha, an Indian yogatantra
master whom later Rnying ma tradition describes
as one of Padmasambhava’s gurus, praising either
Padmasambhava or his work. The concluding verse
of the commentary is a praise of Padmasambhava
as the “Lotus King” (padma rgyal po), which
verse was later incorporated into the mainstream
Padmasambhava hagiographical tradition (Cantwell
& Mayer, 2012, 93).
The doctrinal ethos of the Thabs zhags is not at all
dissimilar to that of later Rnying ma authors, such as
Rong zom pa (11th cent.; exact dates unknown) and
Klong chen pa (1308–1362), who cite it several times.
One of its principal concerns is to interiorize ritual,
as we can see, for example, in the empowerment
rite of chapter 3. Usually, tantric empowerments
are described as complex external ritual procedures
engaging numerous material implements. But here,
it is redefined as essentially an interiorized contem-
plative process, based upon the spiritual qualities
naturally innate to the human mind.
Another preoccupation is to integrate the prag-
matic rituals so typical of tantric literature, and
ostensibly for worldly ends such as wealth and
power, with doctrine. More than half of all the chap-
ters of the Thabs zhags commentary (chs. 18–40)
are dedicated specifically to the encoding of main-
stream abstract Buddhist doctrines within a wide
range of quotidian pragmatic rituals, so that the
rehearsal of those doctrines was rendered insepa-
rable from and integral to the performance of such
rituals (Cantwell & Mayer, 2012, 78–82).
The Thabs zhags version of mahāyoga bears a
close resemblance to the doctrine of the same-
ness of all dharmas (mnyam pa’i chos) of the Rgyud
gsang ba’i snying po or *Guhyagarbhatantra, which
is nowadays considered the most prestigious of all
tantras by the Rnying ma school. Like the Rgyud
gsang ba’i snying po, the Thabs zhags too, on numer-
ous occasions, uses terminology built around the
words mnyam pa or mnyam pa nyid or mnyam nyid
(“even,” “evenness,” or “sameness”). Hence it is not
surprising that later doxographers often paired the
Thabs zhags with the *Guhyagarbha. This famous
doctrine, which involves realising all phenomena of
saṃsāra and nirvāṇa alike as primordially pure, is
seen by some modern scholars (Karmay, 1988, 11) as
one of the historical roots of the Rdzogs chen (“Great
Perfection”) mysticism of the Rnying ma pa.
Recent modern research into Dunhuang docu-
ments has now shown that despite all the traditional
uncertainties about their origins, the old tantra tra-
ditions extant today do reflect at least some genu-
inely old traditions, including several that were
already well developed by the time the Dunhuang
caves were sealed in the 11th century; and moreover
that a small but important core of old tantra texts
did have close Indian counterparts, even if further
redactions might have been made to them in Tibet.
There are in fact direct suggestions within some
Dunhuang sources that early Tibetan tantric scrip-
tures were deliberately redacted by Indian siddhas
to suit Tibetan audiences. PT44 describes Padma-
sambhava redacting the full textual corpus of the
Kīla (“Stake”) deity that he had procured from the
Indian monastic university of Nālandā into a new
arrangement for transmission to his Tibetan and
Nepalese disciples, now redacted to incorporate
Himalayan protector deities that he himself had
newly tamed (Cantwell & Mayer, 2008, 41–68). Like-
wise, IOL Tib J 321 seems to suggest Padmasamb-
hava as the revealer of the Thabs zhags scripture
(Cantwell & Mayer, 2012, 91–99). If so, this could be
of interest because it is the earliest known text to
introduce the distinctively old tantra form of the
winged Heruka. References to such winged Herukas
seem to be extremely infrequent in Indian sources,
unless in rare hybridized forms with Garuḍa; yet the
classic old tantra form of Heruka is both indepen-
dently winged and quite ubiquitous. This seems sig-
nificant because birds, wings, and avian symbolism
in general, are fundamental to indigenous Tibetan
religion, so that the highly accentuated presence of
wings on the old tantric Herukas might have origi-
nated as a means of adaptive indigenization.
Some Differences between
Old Tantras and New Tantras
It seems likely that most old tantras were produced in
Tibet through the 9th and 10th centuries, by Tibetan
masters quite possibly emulating their Indian
siddha counterparts, who during that period pro-
duced many new tantras in India. We thus witness
two Vajrayāna traditions proliferating at a similar
time and under similar conditions of political insta-
bility, but largely independently: In the political
chaos of postimperial Tibet, what were to become
Tibet’s old tantras were compiled in Tibetan, while
in India, in the political chaos between the first and
second Pala empires, what were to become Tibet’s
new tantras were compiled in Sanskrit.
 Rnying ma Tantras 395
A number of cultural differences therefore
characterize the new and old tantras. While the
Indian yoganiruttaratantras or yoginītantras freely
incorporated numerous verses directly from Śaiva
scriptures (Sanderson, 2001, 41ff), less evidence of
such direct verbatim reproduction of Śaiva word-
ing has so far been discovered in the numerous old
tantras that were redacted in Tibet. By contrast,
they show occasional evidence of the absorption
of indigenous Tibetan ritual categories, such as
the protective deities that hover around the body
(’go ba’i lha lnga; Mayer, 1996, 132) and a type of fierce
female deity known as gze ma (Cantwell & Mayer,
2007, 27–28, 196–203). While many yoganiruttara­
tantras or yoginītantras became increasingly con-
cerned to invert the peculiarly Indian ritual notions
of purity and pollution, thus becoming increasingly
violent, sexual, and linguistically crude, the old
tantras tended to be less directly concerned with
such inversions. Hence they could appear less
extreme, often connecting wrathful maṇḍalas with
peaceful ones, and even including the vast genre
of atiyoga, comprising one third of all old tantras,
which were not necessarily transgressive of Indian
ritual notions of purity at all, but dedicated only
to the poetic description of Buddhism’s form-
less ultimate truths about the nature of mind. No
comparable genre to atiyoga was ever developed
in India, and there are no new tantra equivalents;
and several scholars have discussed their affinity
with Chinese Chan Buddhism (van Schaik, 2004,
2012). While the Indian yoganiruttaratantras or
yoginītantras introduced new inner yogas involv-
ing subtle physical veins and wheels (nāḍī, cakra),
these do not seem to have been prominent in the
earliest old tantras, since there is little sign of them
at Dunhuang, although the Rnying ma tradition
did subsequently absorb the methods. By contrast,
the old tantras considerably accentuated the use
of narrative within ritual, an indigenous Tibetan
predilection (Cantwell & Mayer, 2009). While the
yoganiruttaratantras or yoginītantras were often
intertextual amongst themselves (as well as with
Śaiva texts), they showed little sign of iconographi-
cal organization into a single grand unified system;
but the most widely practiced genre of old tantra,
known as mahāyoga, did at some stage become
organized into a symmetrical set of eight identi-
cal fierce Heruka deities, each with three heads,
six arms, four legs, and two wings, differentiated
mainly by their hand implements. Such systemati-
zation is certainly apparent by the time of Nyang ral
nyi ma’i ’od zer (1124–1192), a great codifier of Rnying
ma Tantrism, but might have had its roots in earlier
times. Doctrinal features of mahāyoga were also
standardized, for example, in the use across numer-
ous of its sādhanas of the same sequence of three
meditations (trisamādhi; ting ’dzin gsum) through
which the deity is visualized.
Bibliography
Primary Sources
The extant editions of the old tantra collection (Rnying ma’i
rgyud ‘bum):
(a) Bhutanese recension in 46 volumes, with six extant man-
uscript witnesses:
(1) Mtshams brag: the Mtshams brag manuscript of the Rñiṅ
ma rgyud ’bum (rgyud ’bum/mtshams brag dgon pa). 1982.
Thimphu: National Library, Royal Government of Bhutan.
46 volumes. An electronic version made from the paper
publication is available from the Tibetan Buddhist
Resource Center (TBRC, at http://www.tbrc.org), under
the title, rnying ma rgyud ’bum, mtshams brag dgon pa’i
bris ma (W21521). It is also available online, linked to
its detailed catalogue by THL, at http://www.thlib.org/
encyclopedias/literary/canons/ngb/catalog.php#cat=tb.
More recent color images are available from the British Library
Endangered Archives Research Project (EAP) 310/4/1/1–
4/1/47, a digitization project by Karma Phuntsho, at
http://eap.bl.uk/database/overview_project.a4d?projID=
EAP310;r=20825.
(2) Sgang s­teng-a: the first of two Rnying ma’i rgyud ’bum
manuscript editions preserved by Sgang steng Monas-
tery, Bhutan. 46 volumes. Digital images were made by
Karma Phuntsho as part of the British Library Endangered
Archives Research Project EAP039, 2005, and preserved in
the British Library, in the National Library and Archive of
Bhutan, and at Gangtey Monastery, but their widespread
distribution remains forbidden by the monastery.
(3) Sgang ­steng-b: the second of two Rnying ma’i rgyud ’bum
manuscript editions preserved by Sgang steng Monastery,
Bhutan. 46 volumes. Digital images of Sgang ­steng-b were
made under an AHRC funded project at Oxford Univer-
sity in 2004 by Karma Phuntsho, Cathy Cantwell, and Rob
Mayer, but their distribution remains forbidden by the
monastery. A title catalogue of Sgang s­ teng-b is available
in Achard et al., 2006.
(4) Dgra med rtse: Rnying ma’i rgyud ’bum manuscript edi-
tions preserved by Dgra med rtse Monastery, Bhutan.
46 volumes. Digital images were made by Karma Phunt-
sho as part of the EAP, EAP105, and are available for
free download at http://eap.bl.uk/database/results.a4d?
projID=EAP105;r=41
(5) Dpa’ sgar: Rnying ma’i rgyud ’bum manuscript editions
preserved by Dpa ’sgar monastery, Bhutan. A full set of
color digital images were made by Karma Phuntsho in
January, 2012, jointly by CSMC, University of Hamburg
in cooperation with the Bhutanese NGO Preservation of
Bhutan’s Written Heritage, just prior to the destruction of
396 Rnying ma Tantras
the monastery by fire in February, 2012 (Almogi, forthcom-
ing), but have not been made available for distribution.
(6) Sangs rgyas gling: Rnying ma’i rgyud ’bum manuscript
editions preserved by Sangs rgyas gling Temple, Tawang,
Arunachal Pradesh. Digital images were made in 2013–
2014 by Ngawang Tsepag and Rob Mayer, and are in pro-
cess of being made available from the Bodleian Library,
Oxford, and from the TBRC.
(b) ­South-Central Tibetan recension in 33 volumes, with two
extant manuscript witnesses:
(7) Gting skyes: Rñiṅ ma rgyud ’bum reproduced from the
manuscript preserved at Gting skyes Dgon pa byang Mon-
astery in Tibet, under the direction of Dingo Khyentse
Rimpoche, Thimbu, 1973. An electronic version is avail-
able from the TBRC, under the title Rnying ma rgyud ’bum,
gting skyes (W21518). It is also available online, linked to
its detailed catalogue by THL, at http://www.thlib.org/
encyclopedias/literary/canons/ngb/catalog.php#cat=tk.
A detailed print catalogue was published in Roman Wylie
transcription with Japanese discussion (Kaneko, 1980).
(8) Rig ’dzin Tshe dbang nor bu: the Rig ’dzin Tshe dbang nor
bu edition of the rNying ma’i rgyud ’bum. 29 volumes are
held at the British Library, with the pressmark, Or.15217.
Volume Ka is held at the Bodleian Library Oxford at the
shelfmark, MS. Tib.a.24(R). Microfilm is available from
the British Library, and the Bodleian Library for volume
Ka. Title folios to volume Ga and volume A are held at the
Victoria and Albert Museum, accession nos.: IM 318–1920
and IM 317–1920. A detailed electronic inventory was made
by Cathy Cantwell, Michael Fischer, and Rob Mayer, origi-
nally on ngb.csac.anthropology.ac.uk, but currently in
process of transfer to the University of Vienna’s Resources
for Kanjur and Tenjur Studies https://www.istb.univie.
ac.at/kanjur/xml3/xml/index.php.
(c) ­Tibetan-Nepalese borderlands recension in 37 volumes,
with two extant manuscript witnesses (but many of its
texts descend from the same exemplars or near ancestors
as texts from the ­South-Central Tibetan Tradition, so that
for t­ ext-critical purposes, one can sometimes more fruit-
fully regard it as a subbranch of the S­ outh-Central Tibetan
tradition; see Cantwell & Mayer, 2007, 70–78; Almogi,
forthcoming):
(9) Nubri: manuscript edition of the Rnying ma’i rgyud
’bum from the Nubri area, held by the National Archives,
Kathmandu. Monochrome microfilm was made by the
­Nepal-German Manuscript Preservation Project in 1993,
and can now be digitised to order: NGMPP Reel Nos. L
426/4–L 448/1.
(10) Kathmandu: manuscript edition of the Rnying ma’i
rgyud ’bum from the Khumbu region, held by the National
Archives, Kathmandu. Microfilm is available through the
Nepal Research Centre of the ­Nepalese-German Manu-
script Cataloguing Project. The short title is Rnying ma
rgyud ’bum, ms. no.22, running no. 17, reel AT12/3–AT13/1.
(d) Sde dge xylograph in 26 volumes (a conflated single
witness):
(11) Sde dge: the Sde dge edition of the Rnying ma’i rgyud ’bum.
Twenty-six volumes, K ­ a-Ra, plus Dkar chag, volume A,
Sde dge par khang chen mo.
The original woodblocks survive and are still in use. Hence
numerous prints are available around the world. A digital
catalogue is available from THL at http://www.thlib.org/
encyclopedias/literary/canons/ngb/catalog.php#cat=dg.
(e) Gdong dkar la manuscript, from Bhutan, in 28 volumes
(single witness):
(12) Gdong dkar la: manuscript edition of the Rnying ma’i
rgyud ’bum from Gdong dkar la Temple, Bhutan; said to be
17th century, and to have originated in East Tibet. Digital
images were made by Karma Phuntsho and Orna Almogi
as part of the EAP, EAP570, and are currently in process
of being made available http://eap.bl.uk/database/results.
a4d?projID=EAP570;r=41.
(f) Gzhi chen dgon manuscript, from Gzhi chen dgon in Gan-
dze, in 33 volumes (possibly a composite collection):
(13) This dbu med manuscript has recently been discovered
by the TBRC field team working in Khams. It has been
digitized at their offices in Chengdu, and its title list is
in process of compilation (personal communication, Jeff
Wallman). There appear to be mixed folios from possibly
more than one manuscript – without a uniform dkar chag
(personal communication, Michael Sheehy). Details will
eventually become available at TBRC Resource ID W2PD17382
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