Pelerins, lamas et visionnaires: Sources orales et ecrites sur les pelerinages tibetains.

• Author: Tatz, Mark
• Position: Book Review

By KATIA BUFFETRILLE. Wiener Studien zur Tibetologie und Buddhismuskunde, vol. 46. Vienna: ARBEITSKREIS FUR TIBETISCHE UND BUDDHISTISCHE STUDIEN, UNIVERSITAT WIEN, 2000. Pp. xii + 377.

Snow mountains, lakes, caves, and hidden valleys are focal points of pilgrimage in Tibet. These are generally conceived as the residence of deities and teachers ("lamas"). This work is an important contribution to understanding the Tibetan views of them, both popular and monastic. It presents textual materials and their translation, some informed by field work, on pilgrimage sites in various regions of Tibet and upland Nepal.

The sources would be best characterized as high literary, sometimes drawing upon oral and folk tradition. Although the pilgrimage guide is a well-defined category in Tibetan literature, this collection is a melange: some items are strictly biographical, others contain more history or ritual meditation than pilgrimage. Most are modern or contemporary (post-Chinese invasion), occasionally through the literary gambit of being a prophecy by the Buddha or a "treasure text" (gter ma), concealed in ancient times to be discovered later. Overall, the conception of the book is vague; it has the feel of a dissertation in need of a new approach for publication.

The original Tibetan is provided for all texts, minimally edited because in most cases there is only one exemplar for each. The translations are uniformly accurate and felicitous; only in places they miss nuances of literary and religious meaning. Introductions place each text in perspective without needless digression or dilation. There is a sketch map of greater Tibet and surrounding areas with major pilgrimage sites, a pocket map of Solo Khumbu, in Tibetan, and other sketch maps, though unfortunately not of every site.

The biographical and historical articles add new data to our store of knowledge, especially of western Tibet (mnga' ris) and of events during the recent Chinese occupation. Several texts include elements of the Gesar and Padmasambhava legends. Several include sadhana (ritual visualization and invocation of deity; in Buffetrille's definition, "method of spiritual realization"). Most valuable, however, is the interpretation of landscape. Buffetrille summarizes this aspect of the text (translating her description into English):

The actual topography is used for spiritual ends, namely the installation of a Buddhist pantheon: the texts present the reader with a landscape on which...