Introduction to the Thirteen Major Texts

Introduction to the Thirteen Major Texts

by Adam Pearcey

The thirteen major texts (gzhung chen po bcu gsum) formed the core of the curriculum in many scriptural colleges or commentarial schools (bshad grwa) of eastern Tibet, especially Śrī Siṃha college at Dzogchen Monastery. They are:

1. Prātimokṣa-sūtra (so sor thar pa’i mdo);
2. Vinaya-sūtra (’dul ba’i mdo);
3. Abhidharmakośa (mngon pa mdzod);
4. Abhidharmasamuccaya (mngon pa kun btus);
5. Mūlamadhyamaka-kārikā (dbu ma rtsa ba shes rab);
6. Madhyamakāvatāra (dbu ma la ’jug pa);
7. Catuḥśataka (bzhi brgya pa);
8. Bodhi(sattva)caryāvatāra (byang chub sems dpa’i spyod pa la ’jug pa);
9. Abhisamayālaṃkāra (mngon rtogs rgyan);
10. Mahāyānasūtrālaṃkāra (mdo sde rgyan);
11. Madhyāntavibhāga (dbus mtha’ rnam ’byed);
12. Dharma-dharmatā-vibhāga (chos dang chos nyid rnam ’byed);
13. Mahāyana-uttaratantra (rgyud bla ma).

Commentaries

Khenpo Shenpen Nangwa, also known as Shenga (1871–1927), wrote famous annotational, interlinear or 'gloss' commentaries (mchan 'grel) on these texts in the early twentieth century. These were not original compositions, but rather extracts from Indian commentaries, selected by Shenga and inserted into the root texts.

Khenpo Shenga composed many of his commentaries for the thirteen texts at the behest of Situ Pema Wangchok Gyalpo (si tu padma dbang mchog rgyal po, 1886–1952) during his time at Palpung (dpal spungs) Monastery between 1910 and 1918. Nevertheless, it is likely that he based these commentaries on explanations he had given earlier in his teaching career, during his tenure at Dzogchen Śrī Siṃha. And these, in turn, were likely based on the explanations of his own teacher, Orgyen Tenzin Norbu (o rgyan bstan ’dzin nor bu, 1841–1900), and may represent a tradition going back to Gyalsé Shenpen Thayé (1800–1855) or even earlier. The fact that Orgyen Tenzin Norbu's writings are unavailable makes a proper assessment difficult.

The annotational commentaries were later adopted as the core of the curriculum at Kham-jé (khams bye) shedra at Dzongsar (rdzong gsar), which Shenga founded in 1918. This institution produced a number of celebrated scholars, several of whom founded shedras of their own, contributing to a revival of scholarship within the Sakya school, and further promoting the centrality of the thirteen texts.

Meanwhile, Jamgön Mipham Rinpoche (1846–1912) and other leading scholars of the Nyingma school produced commentaries on many of the thirteen treatises as part of a revival of Nyingma scholasticism. Mipham's goal was not to present summaries of Indian interpretations but to clarify what he saw as the distinctive Nyingma approach to philosophy. This role is evident in his commentary on the ninth chapter of the Bodhicaryāvatāra and other works, including some compiled posthumously from lecture notes taken by his disciples.

Arrangement

Editions of Khenpo Shenga's commentaries present the texts in a sequence based on the traditional division into Vinaya, Sūtra and Abhidharma. Here, the Sūtra category is further divided into the two traditions of Profound View (lta ba zab mo) and Vast Conduct (rgya chen spyod pa) and positioned after the Abhidharma. This sequence reflects another traditional division, the progression through the Three Turnings of the Wheel of Dharma, in which the Vinaya and Abhidharma represent the first turning, the four treatises of the Profound View belong to the intermediate turning, and the Five Treatises of Maitreya (byams chos sde lnga) correspond to both the intermediate and final turnings.

Omissions and Alternative Systems

Georges Dreyfus misidentified the thirteen texts in his The Sound of Two Hands Clapping: The Education of a Tibetan Buddhist Monk by excluding the Bodhicaryāvatāra and replacing it with Dharmakīrti's Pramāṇavārttika. Although recent editions of the thirteen texts include no fewer than eighteen root texts, the Pramāṇavārttika is not among them, nor did Khenpo Shenga write a commentary on it.

The Pramāṇavārttika is included in the list of eighteen major texts which form the basis of the curriculum in the Sakya school, the so-called "eighteen texts of great renown" (gzhung grags chen bco brgyad), a list that includes the following in addition to the thirteen discussed above:

1. Pramāṇa-samuccaya by Dignāga
2. Pramāṇavārttika by Dharmakīrti
3. Pramāṇaviniścaya by Dharmakīrti
4. Treasury of Valid Reasoning (tshad ma rigs gter) by Sakya Paṇḍita
5. Clear Differentiation of the Three Sets of Vows (sdom gsum rab dbye) by Sakya Paṇḍita

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Further Reading

Dreyfus, Georges. The Sound of Two Hands Clapping: The Education of a Tibetan Buddhist Monk. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003.

______. “Where Do Commentarial Schools Come From? Reflections on the History of Tibetan Scholasticism” in Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies (Vol. 28, No. 2), 2005, pp. 273–297

Jackson, David, P. “A Reviver of Sa-skya-pa Scriptural Studies” in Les Habitants du toit du monde. Études recueillies en hommage à Alexander W. Macdonald. Samten Karmay and Philippe Sagant ed. Nanterre: Societé d’Ethnologie, 1997, pp. 139–153

Pearcey, Adam S. “The Curricula of Tibetan Buddhist Commentarial Schools (bshad grwa): Traditional Models and Some Recent Adaptations” in Contemporary Buddhism Vol. 16, 2, 2015, pp. 451–461

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