The Treasury of Knowledge Part II: Books Two to Four
At the request of Akong Rinpoche, in 1994 Ringu Tulku Rinpoche continued his commentary on Jamgön Kongtrul Lodrö Tayé’s The Treasury of Knowledge ( ཤེས་བྱ་ཀུན་ཁྱབ་མཛོད་, Sheja Kun La Khyabpé Dzö, Wyl. shes bya kun khyab mdzod or simply Sheja Dzö) — Jamgön Kongtrul’s encyclopedia of Buddhist wisdom and knowledge; one of The Five Great Treasures —at Kagyu Samye Ling in Scotland.
The first recordings are available in the Archive here: https://bodhicharya.org/teachings/archives/the-treasury-of-knowledge
In the first of these second series of teachings, Ringu Tulku Rinpoche begins to discuss the text in the first recording at 00:30:05 with an overview of the Ten Books.
In the Water Dog and the Iron Pig years [1862–63], when he was fifty years old, Kongtrul wrote the Treasury of Knowledge (both the root text and the commentary). He wrote the root text in the second month of the Water Dog year [1862], when he did a seven-day retreat on the hearing lineage teachings. Earlier, Lama Ngedön had said that Kongtrul should write a treatise on the three vows, and when that was done Lama Ngedön would write a commentary on it. However, Kongtrul thought that several texts on the three vows were already available, and that if he had to write something, it should be more comprehensive in scope and more helpful for people who had not studied very much.
With that in mind, during the breaks between sessions of his one-week retreat, he wrote the root text of the Treasury of Knowledge, a treatise on the three higher trainings of discipline, meditation, and wisdom.
Later on, he showed this to Jamyang Khyentse, who told him, “When you wrote this you must have been inspired by the blessings of the lamas, and your channels opened by the power of the dakinis. You should place the Treasury of Knowledge at the head of the Five Great Treasuries, and you need to write a commentary on it.” To encourage him, Khyentse gave him many gifts along with these words. So, in only three months, from the fourth month until the seventh month of the Iron Pig year [1863], Kongtrul wrote the commentary to the Treasury of Knowledge, with Khenchen Tashi Özer acting as his scribe.
Students wishing to study this text along with Ringu Tulku can find the three volumes discussed in these recordings here:
https://www.shambhala.com/the-treasury-of-knowledge-books-two-three-and-four-2410.html
This translation: begins with the appearance of Shakyamuni Buddha in the world (Book Two); describes the Buddha’s life, enlightenment, and teachings from a wide variety of Buddhist viewpoints (Book Three). Then (Book Four) covers Buddhism’s transmission to, and preservation in, Tibet; describing the scriptural transmissions and lineages of meditation practice as well as the Buddhist arts.
As in all other years when Rinpoche taught on The Treasury of Knowledge, he takes time to discuss the most important aspects of the text in detail and provides students with many opportunities to ask Questions. The 28 recordings are approx 90min each as they were originally edited to appear on C90 cassette tapes. At this point in his life Rinpoche was staying at Kagyu Samye Ling for long periods, hence why he was able to dedicate such a considerable amount of time to his commentary on this important text.
