on translation(s)

[Guest guest]

Dear Dharma and All,

 

Mike Dickman, a friend who has studied Tibetan Buddhism for years is

currently working to bring translation to millions of lines which are not

available except in Tibetan. Here is what he has to say on translation and

then tomorrow I will send text he currently translated on Tara.

 

It is not my desire to discuss or argue for or against the validity of his

premises. I will only say that in knowing Mike and his towering brilliance,

he also with great humility does his very best to bring the highest

translation possible to these words as a service. He lives with his wife and

three children in France.

 

I am going to repeat myself, it is not my desire to validate or invalidate

his translations, I will send one to the list tomorrow as an offering for

anyone who may wish to read it, this material is currently available only in

Tibetan.

 

Quote from Mike to a group of Jungians on translations used by Jung:

 

As is well known, Jung's chief source for Chinese material was the

translations undertaken and published by the German Moravian missionary,

Richard Wilhelm, and, for material pertaining to the Tibetan systems, the

Lama-Kazi Dawa Samdub in his edited versions as presented by W. Y.

Evans-Wentz.

I am not going to go into the inadequacies of Wilhelm's translations here

(nor am I critcising his efforts or vaunting the new - All translation,

particularly of 'spiritual' texts (and I speak here as a professional) is

to be taken with more than a pinch of salt), but for those who are

interested there is adequate food for thought in the commentaries attached

to Thomas Cleary's version of the T'ai chin hua tsung chih or 'Secret of

the Golden Flower' [Harper-Collins, 1991] and Eva Wong's excellent

rendition of the Hui-ming Ching (Wilhelm's 'The Book of Consciousness and

Life') entitled 'Cultivating the Energy of Life' and published last year by

Shambhala. Be it said that Wilhelm, for all his good intentions, remained

blissfully unaware of much of the source material surrounding the works he

undertook to translate, and that this lacuna coupled with the fact that

Chinese itself is not exactly the easiest of tongues to master, has left us

with some interesting but not necessarily adequate renditions of several

fairly important Chinese classics. I cannot too strongly recommend that

whatever translations you buy, always buy several. There are - as yet (and

for all that it fills my heart with sadness to say so) - no enlightened

translators.

But there are plenty who will sell you the line they are selling. As I've

said before: DON'T BE TAKEN IN...

I mean it.

It's why I became a translator myself.

 

Be all which as it ever so may, let us come to the Lama-Kazi Dawa Samdup

and his strange if well-intentioned 'editor', as also some of the other

sources available to Jung as regards the rather vast phenomenon (from

Afghanistan to Japan, and Siberia toIndonesia) of 'Buddhism' in its various

guises.

Aside from Grünwedel and Schlagintweit and L. Austine Waddell, and Max

Müller's 'Sacred Books of the East' series (whose avowed aim was 'to prove

the moral and theological superiority of Christianity' anyway), there was

not much available concerning Buddhism at all until the appearance of the

texts by Lama-Kazi Dawa Samdup and W. Y. Evans-Wentz and those by Daisetsu

Teitaro Suzuki for the Tibetan and Japanese Mahayana, and the Pali Text

Society and Nyanaponika Thera for Thai and Singhalese Theravada. Most of

the early translations are very onesided (not to say 'biased') -

(Soothill's 'Lotus of the White Law', for example, being utterly convinced

that what we are looking at here is some species of Solar Myth, many's the

logical positivist finding in Buddhism a 'religion without gods' - whence

the conviction that Tibetan Buddhism must be a degeneration, and so on)...

Wentz at least went to the sources for his translations: Dawa Samdup being

Sikkhimese and the Lamas Karma Sumdhon Paul and Lobzang Mingyur Dorje

Tibetans (albeit of a lineage bitterly opposed to the teachings they were

translating). However, he went elsewhere for his commentaries and

subsequent emendations of the source material.

Wentz's training was as an anthropologist specialising in Celtic Fairy

Story. His upbringing was largly Quaker and, in his youth, he was much

given to reading the Bible. In early manhood, he became a very ardent

Theosophist. He spoke no Tibetan, had no Tibetan teacher and practised no

Tibetan ritual or meditation practices, and spent less than three months

in toto in Darjeeling and Sikkhim where he had the texts he had collected

translated for him into rogh copies upon which he was then to work,

annotating and introducing the texts, for many subsequent years. Note that

the books contain very little translated matter, the bulk of every one of

them being exactly these notes, introductions and explications...

His ideas stemmed mainly from the Theosophists, and were overlaid by a

smattering of Vedanta, although it is true that he really did want to make

the texts available - and palatable - to an increasingly uninterested and

materialistic Western audience. However, Hindu thought is no more an

introduction to Buddhism than arithmetic is to geometry. They have their

own internal coherence and language whereby even terms that seem similar

can have widely different meanings. The Buddhist female consort is not a

shakti - a 'power' - an emanation of the male deity, but a prajña - his

'wisdom aspect' out of which he appears as her upaya, or 'skilful

activity'... Evans-Wentz, for all his good intentions, knew nothing of

Tibet, and almost anything described in any of his commentaries is totally

beside the point as far as the Tibetans themselves are concerned.

I discussed this matter at some length with Lama Govinda who, in fact, at a

slightly later date completely retranslated the Bardo Thödröl - the

so-called 'Tibetan Book of the Dead' (it's actual title is 'Liberation by

Hearing in the Intermediate State)(as is the "Egyptian Book of the Dead"'s

'The Coming Forth By/Into Day') - or, at any rate the portion of it dealing

with the after-death intermediate state (there are at least five others)

that Evans-Wentz had had translated.

I don't want to into this in very much more detail, and it is certainly not

meant to be an attack ad hominem, either on Wentz or on Jung's

interpretation of Wentz's interpretation of the 'mystic east' (long may it

rust in peace!), but simply to point out that if you are being told one

thing which is in fact being claimed to be another and you base your

interpretations of this other on what you have been told by someone you

consider capable, your interpretations will be wrong. Much of Jung's

interpretations of the oriental psyche are - for this very reason - wrong.

There is nothing we can do about that.

However, it does not minimise his own insights into what he *presumed* was

the case, and - since his 'psychological commentaries' to Wentz and to

Wilhelm are largely concerned with these, does not invalidate them as such.

It only invalidates their 'oriental' content.

To forestall tirades concerning 'The Stanzas of Dzyan' and the 'Mahatma'

Koot Humi, not to mention Dwajl Khul, be it said that no text of that name

is extant in any of the several Tibatn Canons and that none of these words

or names exist in any Tibetan or Zhang-zhung dialect right back to their

earliest roots. Sorry. Doesn't mean what they're saying is not valuable and

even true on some level... But they sure'n hell aint one iota Tibetan.

 

Sorry I had to start in so aggressive a manner. I certainly did not mean it

aggressively.

 

L*L*L

Rainbo

[Guest guest]

Hi Annette,

>I cannot too strongly recommend that

>whatever translations you buy, always buy several.

 

This is excellent advice, whatever the language is. I have my favorite

translation of the Gita... I love the use of words and the poetry... in

English, of course. ))) LOL! So I have a couple of others that I can

also refer to. I have one that gives the Sanskrit with definitions of

words and line-by-line literal translation, and at the bottom of the page,

a translation in better English. That one is enormously helpful, though I

don't like the translation as well.

 

Anyone who has tried translating... or even learned another language...

knows how enormously difficult the task is. Really impossible to convey

the full sense and flavor of the original... if you really want that all,

you have to learn the language and read the original.

>Much of Jung's

>interpretations of the oriental psyche are - for this very reason - wrong.

 

This kind of blanket statement means little to me. When he discusses

specific points or interpretations made by Jung, then I'd be interested in

seeing what he's saying and what his evidence is.

 

For one thing, there's the matter of what he considers to be

interpretations of the oriental psyche and what he takes to be the

evidence. I believe it was in his Introduction to the _Golden Flower_ that

Jung first discussed synchronicity as an alternative to causation... an

alternative way of perception and perhaps another way of "happening" in the

world. I certainly wouldn't deny synchronicity because of a dispute about

translations of that book.

 

Love,

Dharma

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 09/11/1999 7:22:14 PM Eastern Daylight Time,

carrea writes:

 

<<

Dharma wrote:

> Hi Annette,

>

> >I cannot too strongly recommend that

> >whatever translations you buy, always buy several.

> >>

Hiya Antoine, Mike Dickman wrote that. :-))) A.

[Guest guest]

Actually, that whole email was a quote from Mike :-) as will be the

translation on Tara, just, please to clarify. Thanks. L*L*L Rainbo

[Guest guest]

Dharma wrote:

> Hi Annette,

>

> >I cannot too strongly recommend that

> >whatever translations you buy, always buy several.

>

> This is excellent advice, whatever the language is. I have my favorite

> translation of the Gita... I love the use of words and the poetry... in

> English, of course. ))) LOL! So I have a couple of others that I can

> also refer to. I have one that gives the Sanskrit with definitions of

> words and line-by-line literal translation, and at the bottom of the page,

> a translation in better English. That one is enormously helpful, though I

> don't like the translation as well.

>

> Anyone who has tried translating... or even learned another language...

> knows how enormously difficult the task is. Really impossible to convey

> the full sense and flavor of the original... if you really want that all,

> you have to learn the language and read the original.

 

Learning the original, is always nice. But i also like to read

translations, after reading the original. The filter that the translator

is, comes to glow out. And i find it beautiful to be able to touch that

glow.

The first language i learned being "portuguese" (don't even know if i

spell it right, could look for it, but i am to lazy, remember , my

first pronounced word was "leuch" for light in portuguese language. And

my second and most used language is french.

 

Each time i read english something in me is translating more than if my

first language was english. A glow comes, that i can see, which allows

me to see myself in another way, in a translation. Pushing to

mathematics, and the process of images, you can do anything from nothing

in a translation, it's the art of animation. O may become 1 or vice

versa by the action of a translation.

 

Tg, beautifully stated "What I find left is acceptance of the *better*

way -- a thought system that was there all the time, but seemed

temporary and illogical because of my conflicting thoughts barring the

way". I could say that in translating, simply in listening, something of

me glows from reading words trying to point to the essential in another

language than my essential one.

 

In reading the emails in english, i come to create "translating"

(instead of conflicting) thoughts that glow me, or shine me, in a deeper

recognition (instead of acceptance) of my "better way", a step out of my

mold of the french canadian language formed me to be and one into the

universal being that i am.

 

Antoine

 

--

Through the coming, going, and the balance of life

The essential nature which illumines existence is the adorable one

May all perceive through subtle intellect

the brilliance of enlightenment.

A translation of the Gayatri Mantra

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 09/12/1999 2:42:19 PM Eastern Daylight Time,

glee writes:

 

<< It may be that everyone here is already familiar with all this history, but

if not I could try to summarize the Colonial Period, which explains how

Emerson and Thoreau acquired their information and the later periods of art

influences are also fascinating. This book reminds me of those Connections

TV shows, its a good read for anyone interested.

>>

I am not familiar with this, nor was I familiar with the material you

presented on Madame Blavatsky, which frankly I found fascinating.

 

More synchronicity with me on the Swans, I saw two fly for the first time

ever this summer, while we were horse back riding, quite breathtaking to see

their beauty in flight.

 

I have not yet received permission from Mike, as we normally hear from him

daily, I think he has probably taken the family to the countryside for the

weekend, and we will hear from him tomorrow and then if permissed (lol, i

don't think that's a word) then I'll be delighted to forward the material.

 

Thank you for the insight Gloria, am looking forward to hearing more.

 

Love*Light*Laughter,

Rainbo

[Guest guest]

Dear Annette,

 

Thank you so much for sharing your friend Mike's insights about

translations. This is a quite fascinating aspect of the growth of Western

interest in Eastern religions, as his example of Jung's conclusions show's

how much can be "lost" in translation. Still, Jung can get more out of "half

understanding" something than most of us glean from a "better" translation.

It seems to me the main point of the Bardo Thodol that impressed Jung was

the recognition that everything seen and described there was known to be a

projection of consciousness. At bottom how different from East to West is

the vast storehouse of consciousness? Jung kept finding these same symbols

recurring in western dreams, anyway. I thought the revelations were more

indicative of universal truths than any singularly Oriental ones? Oh well,

never mind. I look forward to reading Mike's

texts, as I am currently attempting to better understand Tibetan Buddhism in

particular.

 

And.... talk about synchronicity. I just yesterday was reading about all the

people mentioned in his post in the context of a history of Buddhism in

America called "How the Swans Came to the Lake." The early connection with

The Theosophists is a wierd chapter indeed, in that Madame Blavatsky's

allegedly channeled messages from Tibetan masters ( whose names as your

friend Mike points out had never existed) eventually led her and Colonel

Olcott to go to Ceylon, where they may have been the first Americans to

formally become Buddhists in a way recognized by Buddhists themselves as

they took formal vows.

Olcott was instrumental in the restoration of Buddhist schools in Ceylon, a

country entirely overrun by Christian missionaries at that time. He tried to

unite all the various Asian Buddhists under a simple 14 point creed, an

interesting if futile endeavor, and later distanced his promotion of

Buddhism from the Theosophists. While it is not surprising that Evans-Wentz

would have first become interested thru the Theosophists in Tibetan texts,

but there are other reasons given for his

peculiar slant in interpretations in this book. He was seeking to prove some

universal basic wisdom religion that he assumed must have existed prior to

all these known now as being separate, and reincarnation was the thread

which united them all.

 

Also, it was during this period, D.T. Suzuki's teacher Soyen Shaku, who

had spent 3 years previously in Ceylon gathering palm leaf Pali texts to

translate for the Japanese Buddhists. It was this same Soyen who the next

year after becoming Abbot and Zen master of Engakuji Temple back in Japan,

then

took the unprecedented and "highly improper" step of accepting an invitation

to The World Parliament of Religons in Chicago in 1893. There he met Dr.

Paul Carus whose interest in publishing translations of Buddhist texts led

to the suggestion that Soyen's student Suzuki might come to America to

assist him with that task. The Tao Te Ching was Suziki's first translation

for him. By 1900, Carus published Suzuki's own first book. The rest was

history, as they say.

 

It may be that everyone here is already familiar with all this history, but

if not I could try to summarize the Colonial Period, which explains how

Emerson and Thoreau acquired their information and the later periods of art

influences are also fascinating. This book reminds me of those Connections

TV shows, its a good read for anyone interested.

 

Gloria

 

 

 

>RainboLily

>

>Dear Dharma and All,

>

>Mike Dickman, a friend who has studied Tibetan Buddhism for years is

>currently working to bring translation to millions of lines which are not

>available except in Tibetan. Here is what he has to say on translation and

>then tomorrow I will send text he currently translated on Tara.

>

Snipped for length

[Guest guest]

Hi Glo,

>snip<

>It may be that everyone here is already familiar with all this history, but

>if not I could try to summarize the Colonial Period, which explains how

>Emerson and Thoreau acquired their information and the later periods of art

>influences are also fascinating.

 

Yes please, and thank you... this is very interesting.

 

Love,

Dharma

[Guest guest]

Hi Swansome Annette,

 

A bit more synchronicity~

 

Thought you'd be interested in Hamsa.

 

I have had a close relationship to swans and am currently working

on putting tog. an institute called the HAMSA Institute.

 

HAMSA is depicted in Hindu mythology as a swan and

represents supreme, transcental wisdom. Hamsa

signifies our unity with that spirit which pervades the universe

and connects all living beings

 

 

RainboLily wrote:

> RainboLily

>

> In a message dated 09/12/1999 2:42:19 PM Eastern Daylight Time,

> glee writes:

>

> << It may be that everyone here is already familiar with all this history, but

> if not I could try to summarize the Colonial Period, which explains how

> Emerson and Thoreau acquired their information and the later periods of art

> influences are also fascinating. This book reminds me of those Connections

> TV shows, its a good read for anyone interested.

> >>

> I am not familiar with this, nor was I familiar with the material you

> presented on Madame Blavatsky, which frankly I found fascinating.

>

> More synchronicity with me on the Swans, I saw two fly for the first time

> ever this summer, while we were horse back riding, quite breathtaking to see

> their beauty in flight.

>

> I have not yet received permission from Mike, as we normally hear from him

> daily, I think he has probably taken the family to the countryside for the

> weekend, and we will hear from him tomorrow and then if permissed (lol, i

> don't think that's a word) then I'll be delighted to forward the material.

>

> Thank you for the insight Gloria, am looking forward to hearing more.

>

> Love*Light*Laughter,

> Rainbo

>

> --------------------------- ONElist Sponsor ----------------------------

>

> Announcing the ONElist Hawaiian Sweepstakes!

> Enter to win a trip for two to Hawaii!

> <a href=" http://clickme./ad/hawaii3 ">Click Here</a>

>

> ------

> All paths go somewhere. No path goes nowhere. The Radical Truth is Radiance of

Awareness. It is Total Independence and Ever Present. The Truth needs no

psychological or spiritual crutches. It needs no philosophy, no religion, no

explanation, no teaching, and no teacher, and yet It is always their support. A

true devotee relishes in the Truth. The Truth of Self-Knowledge which is Pure

Intelligence. Welcome all to a.

[Guest guest]

Gloria,

 

I am also very interested in this period.

Feel free to post more at your convenience.

 

Thank you,

Raven

 

<<It may be that everyone here is already familiar with all this history, but

if not I could try to summarize the Colonial Period, which explains how

Emerson and Thoreau acquired their information and the later periods of art

influences are also fascinating. This book reminds me of those Connections

TV shows, its a good read for anyone interested.>>