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8vo. [9], x-xliv, [1], 2-248 pp. Green cloth with a gilt design stamped on the front board, the Hindu/Buddhist swastika at the center of the design, gold lettering and a gold decoration on the spine; top edge gilt. Title page printed in red and black. Illustrated with a double-sided frontispiece and with several plates of black and white photographs. Foreword by Sir John Woodroffe. World History Encyclopedia, Joshua J. Mark, "Tibetan Book of the Dead". According to the traditional story, Lotus Guru Padmasambhava and a female disciple, Yeshe Tsogyal, wrote the texts that would become the Bardo Thodol (the Tibetan Book of the Dead) during the eighth century of the Common Era. The texts became lost to time until they were found and disseminated orally by Karma Lingpa (in the fourteenth century). Although written as a guide to assist and comfort the dead, the work has taken on a new life as a guide for the living on spiritual transformation and self-improvement. The buddhist text is divided into six sections, beginning with the moment of death until the moment that the deceased soul is either reborn, or breaks the cycle of reincarnation (samsara). The book was intended to shepherd the recently deceased through these cycles of the intermediate stages of reality, and was read aloud at funeral rites for either days or weeks at a time by a monk. It was not until the twentieth century that the work was published in English. Walter Evans-Wentz was an anthropologist and scholar of Tibet and sought Dawa-Samdup's help in translating the texts from Tibetan into English. Dawa-Samdup died in 1922, after completing the funerary section of the book, and Evans-Wentz filled in the rest accourding to his own knowledge. The Tibetan Book of the Dead is an excellent example of the core tenets of Buddhism, and of eastern philosophy in general. A contemporary bookplate on the front pastedown, very light foxing to the title page. Overall, a beautiful copy. Seller Inventory # 000013000
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