by Laurence Austine Waddell, 1854-1938
1895
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XI. MONASTERIES ....
The chief monasteries of central Tibet are: —
Sam-yas, which as the first monastery founded in Tibet, deserves first mention.
Its full title is "bSam-yas Mi-'gyur Lhun-gyis grub-pal Tsug-lug- K'an" or "The academy for obtaining the heap of unchanging Meditation."
The explorer Nain Singh resided in this monastery in 1874 and has given a good account of it. It is situated (N. lat. 29° 20', E. long. 91° 26, altitude about 11,430ft.) about thirty miles to the S.E. of Lhasa, near the north bank of the Tsang-po river amidst hillocks of deep sand, clothed with scanty herbage. It was built about 74 by Thi-Sron Detsan with the aid of the Indian monks, Padma-sambhava and Santa-rakshita, after the model of the Udandapur,24 temple-monastery of Bihar. But the building is believed to have been altogether miraculous, and an abstract of the legend is given underneath.25
Part of the original building yet remains. The monastery, which contains a large temple, four large colleges, and several other buildings, is enclosed by a lofty circular wall about a mile and a half in circumference, with gates facing the cardinal points, and along the top of the wall are many votive brick chaityas, of which the explorer, Nain Singh, counted 1,030, and they seemed to be covered with inscriptions in ancient Indian characters. In the centre of the enclosure stands the assembly hall, with radiating cloisters leading to four chapels, facing at equal distances the four sides of the larger temple. This explorer notes that "the idols and images contained in these temples are of pure gold, richly ornamented with valuable cloths and jewels. The candle-sticks and vessels are nearly all made of gold and silver." And on the temple walls are many large inscriptions in Chinese and ancient Indian characters. In the vestibule of the chief temple, to the left of the door, is a colossal copy of the pictorial Wheel of Life.
The large image of "Buddha," over ten feet high, seems to be called "the Sam-yas Jing " (Samyas Gyal-po).
The library contains many Indian manuscripts, but a great number of these were destroyed at the great fire about 1810 A.D.
In a temple close by among the sand is a celebrated chamber of horrors, built of large boulders, and containing gigantic figures of the twenty-five Gon-po demons. The images are made of incense, and are about twenty feet high, of the fiercest expression, and represented as dancing upon mangled human corpses, which they are also devouring. And great stains of blood are pointed out by the attendants as the fresh stains of bodies which the demons have dragged to the place during the previous night.
We have already referred to the miraculous account of the building of this monastery, which is said to rest upon Raksha fiends. On account of the peculiar safety imparted to the locality by the spells of the wizard priest, Padma-sambhava, the Tibetan government use the place as a bank for their reserved bullion and treasure, of which fabulous sums are said to be stored there.
Although it is now presided over by a Sa-kya Lama, the majority of its members are Nin-ma.
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XII. TEMPLES AND CATHEDRALS....
In the larger fanes the more demoniacal images, especially the fiendish "lords" and protectors of Lamaism, are relegated to a separate building, where they are worshipped with bloody sacrifices and oblations of wine and other demoniacal rites inadmissible in the more orthodox Buddhist building. Some of such idol-rooms are chambers of horrors, and represent some of the tortures supposed to be employed in hell.....
11. Pair of human thigh-bone trumpets.35 These are sometimes encased in brass with a wide copper flanged extremity, on which are figured the three eyes and nose of a demon, the oval open extremity being the demon's mouth. In the preparation of these thigh-bone trumpets the bones of criminals or those who have died by violence are preferred, and an elaborate incantation is done, part of which consists in the Lama eating a portion of the skin of the bone, otherwise its blast would not be sufficiently powerful to summon the demons.