Kangyur

Tibetan Canon
Early texts
Jataka tales Early sutras Vinaya Abhidharma
Mahayana Sutras
Prajnaparamita Avatamsaka Ratnakuta General sutra section
Tantras
Four classes Chakrasamvara Hevajra Kalachakra Guhyasamaja Inner (Nyingma)
Divisions
Contents Kangyur Tengyur (Nyingma Gyubum)

Kangyur
Tibetan name
Tibetan	བཀའ་འགྱུར་
Transcriptions Wylie bka' 'gyur
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese	甘珠爾
Simplified Chinese	甘珠尔
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Gānzhūěr

Kangyur (Tib. བཀའ་འགྱུར་, Wyl. bka' 'gyur) literally "translated words", is one of the two branches of the Tibetan Buddhist Canon.

Traditionally speaking, the Kangyur contains the "words of the Buddha", referring to the sutras and tantras. The commentaries to these texts are collected into the Tengyur, which is the second branch of the Tibetan Buddhist Canon.

The compilation of the first version of the Kangyur was completed by the Tibetan scholar Butön Rinchen Drup in the 1300s. Several versions of the compilation existed in Tibet, among which the most notable are those from Dergé, Lhasa, Narthang, Choné, Peking, Urga, Phudrak, and Tok Palace.

Though these collections aimed at exhaustiveness, most of the Nyingma tantras were left out of the Kangyur by their Sarma compilers. This lead to the creation of the Nyingma Gyübum that brings together the Nyingma tantras.

Divisions

The divisions of the Kangyur (according to the Degé edition) are:

• Vinaya (འདུལ་བ་, 'dul ba) --> Discipline
• Sutra (མདོ་, mdo) --> Discourses
  • Prajnaparamita (ཤེར་ཕྱིན་, sher phyin)
    • Perfection of Wisdom
  • Buddhāvataṃsaka (ཕལ་ཆེན་, phal chen)
    • The Sūtra of the Ornament of the Buddhas
  • Ratnakūṭa (དཀོན་བརྩེགས་, dkon brtsegs)
    • Heap of Jewels
  • General Sutra Section (མདོ་སྡེ།, mdo sde) (the principal collection of 266 sūtras, containing both Mahayana and Sravakayana sutras)
    • General Sutras
  • Thirteen late translated sutras (གསར་འགྱུར།, gsar 'gyur) (a group of Theravada sutras)
    • Thirteen late translated sutras
• Tantra (རྒྱུད་, rgyud) --> Tantra
  • Tantra (a collection of 468 tantras, mainly from the "later translation period")
    • Tantra collection
  • Nyingma Tantra (seventeen tantras from the "early translation period")
    • Old Tantras
  • Kalacakra (tantras belonging to the “Wheel of Time” class)
    • Wheel of Time Commentary
• Dharani (short texts based on formulae for recitation) --> Incantations

Further Reading

• Paul Harrison, 'A Brief History of the Tibetan bKa' 'gyur' in Cabezón and Jackson, ed., Tibetan Literature: Studies in Genre, Snow Lion, 1996
• Peter Skilling, Translating the Buddha's Words: Some Notes on the Kanjur Translation Project, Nonthaburi, March 11, 2009
• Peter Skilling, 'Kanjur Titles and Colophons' in Tibetan Studies, vol. 2. Oslo, 1994, pp.768-780

See also

• Tengyur

External links

General reference:

• Facts and Figures about Kangyur and Tengyur
• Tibetan Buddhist Canon - The Kangyur, by D. Phillip Stanley

English language translations:

• The Kangyur (online library of translated texts)
• Words of the Buddha

Tibetan language Kangyur collections:

• བཀའ་འགྱུར། ༼ཅོ་ནེ༽
• བཀའ་འགྱུར། ༼སྡེ་དགེ༽
• བཀའ་འགྱུར། ༼སྣར་ཐང་༽
• བཀའ་འགྱུར། ༼ལྷ་ས༽
• Asian Classics Input Project (Tibetan texts)
• Online Kangyur and Tengyur (University of Vienna)