Terjék József: Collection of Tibetan MSS and Xylographs of Alexander Csoma de Kőrös.
The History of the Collection
the chapters and subdivisions in coloured ink. What is, however, more essential is that he made marginal annotations with pencil. These annotations are in general commentaries, mostly the Sanskrit equivalent in transcription of a Tibetan term, or some remarks in English. Comparisons made with Csoma's handwriting testify to these being his own. There is an undoubted relationship between the Alexander-books and the rest of the Collection. It is shown by the fact that most of the works recommended by the Lamas in the Alexander-books can be found in the Collection. Sans-rgyas phun-chogs, for instance, calls Csoma's attention in his syllabus on linguistic and literary theory (No. 8) to works of the same kind which are indeed included in the Collection (No. 33, 34, 35, 36 and No. 10, 37). Similarly, Sureáamatibhudra's works, abstracted by "the Lama", are included in the Collection (No. 7, 29, 30, 31), as well as the most important products of the lam-rim doctrine reviewed at great length by Kun-dga' éhos-legs (No. 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19), etc. On the basis of this it seems evident that these books cover Csoma's subjects and main field of interest. Here follows a brief summary of the subjects represented in the Collection. First of all come the so called secular sciences with special emphasis on Tibetan linguistics: the two most important works on Tibetan linguistics (Sum-iu-pa and Rtags-'jug-pa) and their rare commentaries; a dictionary of Tibetan language reform (the famous Li-Si gur-khan); the most comprehensive summary of the theory of literature (the Kávyadarsa commentary by the 5th Dalai Lama). The next field is Lamaist astronomy and chronology (mostly the works of Suresamatibhadra of the above mentioned Drug-pa order). Then come historical works (not always considered one of the secular sciences), of which the two most outstanding are Taranätha's and Padma dkar-po's works. Of Buddhist and Lamaist scholastics Csoma was primarily interested in lam-rim, that is the doctrine created by Conkha-pa, represented by his own works and their commentaries. Esoteric tendencies seem not to have attracted Csoma's attention, except for the theory of bar-do ( antűrábhava, "intermediate-existence" ). Thus the five main fields of Csoma's interest are: Tibetan linguistics and theory of literature, history, Lamaist astronomy and chronology and the theory of lam-rim.
