A History of Buddhism in India and Tibet

"This volume contains the first full English translation of a thirteenth-century history of Buddhism in India and Tibet. That means most of all a complete life of the Buddha with the history of his renunciate order and of early Buddhist authors in India. Midway through, the action moves to Tibet where there is an emphasis on the Tibetan ruling dynasty, the translators of Buddhist texts, and the lineages that transmitted doctrinal understanding, meditative insights, and practical realization. It concludes with a pessimistic account of the demise of the monastic order followed by optimism with the advent of the future Buddha Maitreya. The composer of this remarkably ecumenical Buddhist history remains anonymous but was likely a follower of rare lineages of Dzogchen and Zhijâe teachings. He put together some of the most important early sources on the Tibetan imperial period that had been preserved in his times and supplies the best witnesses we have for many of them in our own times"--

Dan Martin is the author of over fifty articles as well as two books, Mandala Cosmogony and Unearthing Bon Treasures. A renowned scholar among scholars, he has published mainly on the literary, religious, and cultural history of Tibet from the late tenth century to the present. He has been a fellow at two Institutes for Advanced Studies in Jerusalem and Oslo. His publications include Tibetan Histories: A Bibliography of Tibetan-Language Historical Works, which after twenty-five years continues to be a leading resource in Tibetan Studies, as well as the monumental bibliography Tibskrit Philology.