Book Description

In Search of Milaʼs Collected Songs – Back to the Basics is a comparative study of Tibetan texts with stories and songs of the great yogin and poet Milarepa, written between the 12th and the 15th centuries. By comparing these texts, the evolution of the narratives and the songs related to the lineages in which the texts were transmitted comes to light. The research leads up to the m ost famous Tibetan text regarding Milarepa, Tsangnyön Herukaʼs Life and Songs – The Life of Milarepa and The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa. The analysis of the evolution in the life-and-song stories allows us to evaluate the iconic image of the great yogin as depicted by Tsangnyön Heruka. The book consists of two main parts. Part One assesses the available sources, classified according to the period and the lineages in which they were produced. In Chapter 1, the biographies before Tsangnyön are studied. In Chapter 2, the specific characteristics of Tsangnyönʼs work are highlighted as compared to the earlier works. Chapter 3 considers some doctrinal aspects and their evolutions in all these works. The first part ends with the conclusions drawn from the comparative study. Part Two consists of translations relative to the research. This part is divided into ten chapters. The first one (Chapter 4) is a translation of Milarepa's hitherto unstudied life story by one of his main disciples, Ngendzong Tonpa. Chapters 5, 6 and 7 are translations of specific topics as they appear in all the different texts: Milarepa's stay with his teacher Marpa, the encounter between Milarepa and Gampopa, and the teaching transmission of a specific meditation tradition from Milarepa to his disciple Rechungpa. Chapter 8 describes interesting details found in a text by Zhijé Ripa. Chapter 9 compares the episode of a dying Bönpo, in the different texts. In Chapter 10 three episodes from the biographical compendium ʽLife and Songs of the Glorious Laughing Vajraʼ are studied and compared with Tsangnyön Herukaʼs version. Chapter 11 gives an interesting interpretation of certain features of Milaʼs encounters with non-human beings due to the interconnections between inner winds and outer appearances. Chapter 12 analyses the colophons of the most ancient Chapters in the texts, regarding Milaʼs interactions with the Tseringma long-life sisters. Chapter 13 gives Milaʼs instructions on the intermediate states. Here two different texts explaining the same instructions are compared to each other. Then follows a bibliography and an appendix containing 8 Song Charts, in which the chapters and the songs in all these works are localised.