Labrang Monastery: A Tibetan Buddhist Community on the Inner Asian Borderlands, 1709-1958

306 Pages·2010·2.543 MB·English

by  Paul Kocot Nietupski

Labrang Monastery
Studies in Modern Tibetan Culture
Series Editor
Gray Tuttle, Columbia University
Advisory Board
Lauran Hartley, Columbia University (literature)
Isabelle Henrion-Dourcy, Université Laval (anthropology)
Kurtis Schaeffer, University of Virginia (religion)
Emily Yeh, University of Colorado at Boulder (human geography)
The Studies in Modern Tibetan Culture series focuses on Tibetan culture and
society from the early modern period of the seventeenth century to the
present. The first series on modern Tibetan studies by a scholarly press,
it explores how modernity manifests in a wide range of fields, not only
religion, but also literature, history, economy, anthropology, media, and
politics. It seeks to bring rarely heard and important Tibetan perspec-
tives to a wider audience by publishing fresh analyses of yet unexplored
source materials ranging from census and yearbook databases to auto/
biographies and ethnographic fieldwork, as well as original translations
of poetry, biography, and history.
Titles in Series
The Nine-Eyed Agate: Poems and Stories by Jangbu and translated by
Heather Stoddard
Labrang Monastery: A Tibetan Buddhist Community on the Inner Asian Border-
lands, 1709–1958 by Paul Kocot Nietupski
Labrang Monastery
A Tibetan Buddhist Community
on the Inner Asian Borderlands,
1709–1958
Paul Kocot Nietupski
Lexington Books
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Nietupski, Paul Kocot, 1950–
Labrang Monastery : a Tibetan Buddhist community on the inner Asian
borderlands, 1709-1958 / Paul Kocot Nietupski.
p. cm. — (Studies in modern Tibetan culture)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-7391-6443-3 (hardcover : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-7391-6445-7 (ebook)
1. Labuleng si (Xiahe Xian, China)—History. 2. Amdo (China : Region)—
Civilization. I. Title.
BQ6349.L34N55 2011
294.3’657095145—dc22 2010040533
 ™
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for
Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992. Printed in the United States
of America
Contents
Maps vii
Preface xi
Introduction xv
 1  Amdo: An Overview 1
 2  Tibetan Religions in Amdo 15
 3  Labrang’s Society 53
 4   Growth and Development: The Evolution of
Labrang Monastery 113
 5  Twentieth-Century Labrang 169
 6  Visions and Realities at Labrang 203
Appendix 1 Family History: Gönpo Döndrup 213
Appendix 2 Pronunciation and Word Lists 217
Bibliography 233
Index 263
About the Author 273
v

Maps
Map 1. Amdo. Courtesy of Tsering Wangyal Shawa, Princeton University.
vii
viii Maps
Map 2. Labrang’s extended community, ca. 1930.
Courtesy of Tsering Wangyal Shawa, Princeton University.
Maps ix
Map 3. Xiahe County, ca. 1928. Reprinted in Zhang Dingyang 张丁杨. Labuleng she zhi
ji 拉卜楞设治记, 1928. In Zhongguo xibei wenxian congshu 中国西北文献丛书, edited
by Zhongguo Xibei Wenxian Congshu Weiyuanhui, 1991.