Page 373 [373]
PRELIMINARY NOTES ON TIBETAN AFTER-DEATH RITES AND THEIR TEXTS IN MONGOLIAN BUDDHIST PRACTICE
related practices and texts used, ceremonies and practice of readings upon individual
request following death, making consultations with specialized astrologer lamas who
do the calculations after someone’s death and other specialist lamas, observing cer¬
emonies and related readings and rituals, as well as studying and analysing the related
ritual texts. The ritual practice will be studied in the context of the modern Mongolian
circumstances, dealing with the question of how these death rituals were revived in
Mongolia after 1989 in the new democratic socio-political situation. The possible
differences between the practices of different traditions / monasteries / lamas and the
reasons for these differences (Yellow Sect / Red Sect temples, specialized monasteries,
or deriving from different traditions followed / different main deities worshipped, etc.),
as well as the differences from the Tibetan Buddhist after-death rites will be analysed,
too. Further details are needed to gain a much complex view of how this fits into the
current everyday practices in modern Mongolian temples (fixed ceremonial schedule
and chantings on request). The main emphasis during the planned fieldworks will be
not on the personal participation at rites connected to someone’s death, but on details of
the text usage (and its differences between the different traditions and temples), details
of the practice of performing the individual rituals in the schedule of after-death rites,
specifications or instructions for performing the given rites and details of when the
individual texts are used exactly after death, text typology and text analysis, mainly
based on information gained in interviews with the specialist lamas.*°
Bibliography
Agöcs, Tamäs: Tibeti halottaskönyv. A bardo utmutatas nagykönyve. Cartaphilus
Könyvkiadö, Budapest 2009 [The Tibetan Book of the Dead. The Great Book of
Guidance in the Bardo]
Arwis, A. (ed.): Mongolin xid dacangiidad xurax xuralin tine, nersin jagsalt, towé
agilga. Ulanbatar 2001 [Prices, List of Titles, and Short Contents of Ceremonies
Held in Mongolian Monasteries]
Bat-Irédiii, J. — Ariyasiiren, C.: Mongol yos jansilin ix tailbar tol’. Ulsin Ix Surgilin
Xewlel, Ulanbatar 1999 [The Great Explanatory Dictionary of Mongolian Cus¬
tomes]
Bawden, C. R.: A Note on a Mongolian Burial Ritual. Studia Orientalia 74, Helsinki
(1977), pp. 25-35.
Bawden, C. R.: A Mongolian Ritual for Calling the Soul. Asia Major Vol. 15. (1970),
Part 2, pp. 145-158.
* The current article was written in 2015. Afterwards, in 2016 and 2017 I had the possibility for fieldwork
and resarch on the topic, therefore most of the research planned here had already been executed by the
publication of this volume. However, the outcomes could not be incorporated in this article, but are
published in my other, new articles.
371