Fragments Of Sthiramatis Trimsikavijnaptibhasya In Patna Ccollection Of Tibetan Manuscript Materials

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This article, "Fragments of Sthiramati's Trimsikavijñaptibhasya in the Patna Collection of Tibetan Manuscript Materials" by V. V. Gokhale, discusses the discovery of two new fragments of Sthiramati's commentary on Vasubandhu's Trimśikāvijñaptikārikā.

Background:

• Sthiramati's commentary is an important work in the Yogācāra Buddhist tradition.
• The primary Sanskrit text was first published by Sylvain Lévi in 1925.
• Subsequent studies by Western and Eastern scholars have involved corrections and translations based on Tibetan and Chinese sources.
• No new Sanskrit manuscripts of this commentary had been discovered since Lévi's edition until the present findings.

Discovery of the Fragments:

• The author, V. V. Gokhale, while examining photographs of Sanskrit palm-leaf manuscripts from the K. P. Jayaswal Research Institute in Patna, discovered these fragments.
• These manuscripts were collected by the late Pandit Rahulabhadra Sāmkriyāyana in Tibet.
• The photographs correspond to items in a bundle from the Ngor monastery in Tibet, described as "Darśanagrantha" (a collection of philosophical texts).
• The collection contains four plates, with the fragments of Sthiramati's commentary found on the first two plates (IA and IB). These plates also contain fragments of other Mahāyāna texts.

Description of the Fragments:

• Fragment 1: Located on the first plate (IA), it's the right half of a folio. It begins with the words "...h/kliste tu manasi" (found on page 24, line 8 of Lévi's edition) and ends with "...kleśairupaklesais trive..." (on page 25, line 10). This fragment is missing the left half of each of its six lines.
• Fragment 2: Located on the second plate (IB), it covers one full folio (both sides). It begins with "...kṣa cittasamatā..." (page 27, line 29 of Lévi's edition) and ends with "...bhavatityato nirvastuka" (page 29, line 17).
• Manuscript Dating and Origin:
  • Based on the number of lines per page, it's estimated that three pages of Lévi's text are missing between the end of the first fragment and the beginning of the second.
  • A faint marginal numbering on the full folio in Plate IB suggests it's folio No. 12, implying the first fragment might be from the right half of folio No. 10.
  • Paleographical comparison with Lévi's manuscript reveals a key difference: the Ngor fragments exhibit "Nepalese hooks" on the tops of letters, while Lévi's manuscript shows the Gupta style of drawing straight lines to support letters.
  • This suggests the Ngor fragments were written by a Nepalese scribe before being taken to Tibet, while Lévi's manuscript might have been brought to Nepal from Bengal.
  • The two manuscripts, though close, represent separate recensions from the 12th-13th centuries AD and are not copies of each other.
  • The Sanskrit text in the Ngor fragments has been revised and corrected by a later hand in the margins, a common practice in Tibetan manuscript materials.

Variant Readings:

• The article includes tables that present a detailed comparison of notable variant readings found in the two Ngor fragments against Lévi's edition and corrections noted by Wogihara (W) and Ui (U). These variants highlight differences in spelling, phrasing, and word choices, contributing to the understanding of the textual history of Sthiramati's commentary.

Significance:

• These newly discovered fragments are valuable additions to the existing textual material of Sthiramati's Trimśikāvijñaptibhāṣya.
• They provide insights into textual variations and the history of manuscript transmission, demonstrating the existence of different recensions and the influence of scribal practices in different geographical and temporal contexts.
• The presence of "Nepalese hooks" in the Ngor fragments offers specific evidence for the origin and scribal tradition of these particular manuscripts.