རྐང་གསུམ་པ་
Transliteration: rkang gsum pa
<noun> 1) "Tripod". Translation of the Sanskrit "mandzi". 2) [Mngon] metaphor for དྲེའུ་ "a mule" q.v. 3) [RYD] gives as epithet of Vaiśhravaṇa, one of the རྒྱལ་ཆེན་རིགས་བཞི་ four great kings.
མུ་བཞི་སྐྱེ་འགོག་གི་རིགས་པ་
Transliteration: mu bzhi skye 'gog gi rigs pa
<phrase> "The reasoning of four limits of production and cessation". The name of a particular type of reasoning used in Madhyamaka to discover emptiness. One of the གཏན་ཚིགས་ཆེན་པོ་བཞི་ "Four Great Reasonings" and གཏན་ཚིགས་ཆེན་པོ་ལྔ་ "Five Great Reasonings". The reasoning involved pursues a tetralemma, a four-cornered refutation of origination / production, that establishes the absence of a…
རྒྱལ་ཆེན་ཐོ་
Transliteration: rgyal chen tho
<noun> "Billboard of the Great Kings". A flat board with the names, mantras, and pictures if possible of the རྒྱལ་ཆེན་རིགས་བཞི་ Four Guardian Kings. It is usually posted at the entrance to a retreat hut or inserted in the top of a cairn nearby the hut in order to obtain the protection of the four kings for the practitioner's retreat. See རྒྱལ་པོ་ཆེན་པོ་བཞི་ for more explanation.
ཕྱོགས་སྐྱོང་
Transliteration: phyogs skyong
<noun> "Guardian(s) of the Directions". Translation of the Sanskrit "dikpāla". An epithet given to a variety of groups of divinities who exert protective power over their respective regions. E.g, the རྒྱལ་ཆེན་རིགས་བཞི་ Four Classes of Great Kings are the Guardians of the (four) Directions and ལྷ་དབང་བརྒྱ་བྱིན་ Devendra Kauśhika is one of the ཕྱོགས་སྐྱོང་བཅུ་ ten guardians of the ten directi…
སྐད་རིགས་
Transliteration: skad rigs
<noun> "Languages" meaning the various types of languages that there are. E.g., there are the སྐད་རིགས་ཆེན་པོ་བཞི་ "four major languages of India".
རྗེའུ་རིགས་
Transliteration: rje'u rigs
<noun> Translation of the Sanskrit "vaiśhya". The name of one of the རིགས་བཞི་ four castes of the Hindu culture of ancient India. The Tibetan literally means "lesser lordly caste" which is often translated as "nobility" or "aristocracy". However, it actually means "upper class members of the culture who were neither priests nor royalty". The members of this caste performed upper class funct…
དམངས་རིགས་
Transliteration: dmangs rigs
<phrase> "Low caste", "commoners caste". Translation of the Sanskrit "śhūdra". The name of the lowest of the རིགས་བཞི་ four castes of the Hindu culture of ancient India. The Tibetan literally means "commoner's caste" but in practice its members were regarded as of very low status and held apart from the members of the other three castes. The members of the caste performed all of the lower c…
རྒྱལ་ཆེན་རིས་བཞི་
Transliteration: rgyal chen ris bzhi
<noun> "The Four strata of the Great Kings". Translation of the Sanskrit [NDS] "cāturmahārājakāyikāḥ". The general name for the four abodes of the རྒྱལ་ཆེན་རིགས་བཞི་ Four Classes of Great Kings, the lowest of the འདོད་ལྷ་རིགས་དྲུག་ six types of gods who live in འདོད་ཁམས་ the desire realm q.v.
The four strata of the Great Kings are called (from first to fourth and lowest to highest): 1) ལག་ན་…
གདོལ་པའི་རིགས་
Transliteration: gdol pa'i rigs
<noun> Lit. "The basest caste". Translation of the Sanskrit "caṇḍāla". The name of the lowest caste of people in the Indian, Hindu-derived, caste system. Due to the British Raj, this caste became known in English as "the untouchables / outcastes". A person of the caste is called གདོལ་པ་ "an untouchable / outcaste".
This caste is one subdivision of the དམངས་རིགས་ commoners caste, which is the…
འདོད་ལྷ་རིགས་དྲུག་
Transliteration: 'dod lha rigs drug
<phrase> "The six classes of the gods of desire" are the six types of ལྷ་ gods in the འདོད་པའི་ཁམས་ realm of desire. They are the highest beings in the desire realm. Their abodes are on རི་བོ་རི་རབ་ Mt. Sumeru and above its peak. The lowest of the six types have their abodes on the four terraces which are on the bottom half of the mountain. The second lowest have their abodes on the upper h…
རྒྱལ་ཆེན་
Transliteration: rgyal chen
<noun> "Great King". Common abbrev. of རྒྱལ་པོ་ཆེན་པོ་. Translation of the Sanskrit "mahārāja". 1) Meaning a principal king or major king of an area. India had many lesser rāja's and several great rājas; the latter were called mahārāja "great(er) kings". In Tibet, "great king" usually refers to one of the several great dharma kings of the early period starting with སྲོང་བཙན་སྒམ་པོ་ King Son…
གནོད་སྦྱིན་
Transliteration: gnod sbyin
<noun> Translation of the Sanskrit "yakṣha" which literally means "One who malevolently harms".
I. Generally speaking, yakṣhas are a class of beings who assail and cause harm to humans. Because they are troublesome, they are taken as a whole as one of the སྡེ་བརྒྱད་ eight classes of spirits. They are "officially" regarded as a class of ལྷ་ gods living in the lowest level of the desire realm;…
མི་བཅུ་བཞི་
Transliteration: mi bcu bzhi
<phrase> "The fourteen humans". This is a classification of the various types of humans as defined by Hindu culture of ancient India. It is actually the མི་རིགས་བཞི་ four castes of Hindu culture sub-divided into the most common occupations within that caste. [DGT] gives as follows:
The four of the རྒྱལ་རིགས་ royal caste are: 1) རྐང་ཐང་ "foot travellers"; 2) རྟ་པ་ "horse-riders"; 3) གླང་ཆེན་པ…
མུ་བཞི་སྐྱེ་འགོག་
Transliteration: mu bzhi skye 'gog
<phrase> "Four limits of production and cessation". A tetralemma used in the logical analysis that seeks to find emptiness. See མུ་བཞི་སྐྱེ་འགོག་གི་རིགས་པ་ "The reasoning of four limits of production and cessation" for more.
རིགས་ཀྱི་ཐ་དད་
Transliteration: rigs kyi tha dad
<noun> "Difference of class". One of the ཐ་དད་བཞི་ four differences.
སཾསྐྲྀཏ་
Transliteration: saMskrIta
<noun> "Sanskrit". Translit. of the Sanskrit "saṃskṛit". Translated into Tibetan with ལེགས་སྦྱར་ q.v. According to Indian Buddhism, the name of one of the སྐད་རིགས་ཆེན་པོ་བཞི་ four major languages of India q.v. It refers to the language of the educated people and the elite as པྲཀྲྀཏ་ Prakṛit which is was the language of the commoners.
པི་ཤ་ཙི་ཀ་
Transliteration: pi sha tsi ka
<noun> "Piśhacika". Translit. of the Sanskrit "piśhacika". Translated into Tibetan with ཤ་ཟའི་སྐད་ "flesh-eater's language" q.v. According to Indian Buddhism, the name of one of the སྐད་རིགས་ཆེན་པོ་བཞི་ four major languages of India q.v.
རྒྱལ་པོ་ཆེན་པོ་བཞི་
Transliteration: rgyal po chen po bzhi
<noun> "The Four Great Kings". This refers to the four gods who are the rulers of the lowest level of the six levels of gods of the desire realm (which is called རྒྱལ་ཆེན་རིགས་བཞི་ "Four Classes of the Great Kings"). These ruling gods live in the highest of the four strata that make up the abode of this level of desire realm gods. Each god lives on one of the four faces of Mt. Meru in one o…
ཨ་བ་བྷྲཾ་ཤ་
Transliteration: aa ba bhraM sha
<noun> Translit. of the Sanskrit "avabhraṃśha". According to Indian Buddhism, the name of one of the སྐད་རིགས་ཆེན་པོ་བཞི་ four major languages of India q.v. Avabhraṃśha as a language refers to ཟུར་ཆག་གི་སྐད་ local, corrupted forms of the main languages spoken in centres of culture and learning.
པྲ་ཀྲྀ་ཏ་
Transliteration: pra krI ta
<noun> "Prakrit". Translit. of the Sanskrit "prakṛit". Translated into Tibetan with རང་བཞིན་གྱི་སྐད་ q.v. According to Indian Buddhism, the name of one of the སྐད་རིགས་ཆེན་པོ་བཞི་ four major languages of India q.v. It refers to the common language of the people as opposed to Sanskrit which is the elevated language of the educated and elite.
སྤྱི་བཞི་
Transliteration: spyi bzhi
<enum> "The four generalities". Four categories discussed in ཚད་མ་ valid cognition. [JKE] gives as: 1) ཚོགས་སྤྱི་ ""; 2) རིགས་སྤྱི་ ""; 3) དོན་སྤྱི་ ""; 4) སྒྲ་སྤྱི་ "".
རིགས་བདག་
Transliteration: rigs bdag
<phrase> 1) "Lord of the family" i.e., the principal figure of a particular buddha family. E.g., see སངས་རྒྱས་རིགས་ལྔ་ for the lords of the five families. 2) "Lord of the families" meaning someone who has complete mastery of enlightenment and hence who is the principal over all the enlightened families. This term is often used as an epithet of the guru.
