Schaik, S.

Schaik, S. on the DRL

Authors of English Works

Sam van Schaik

English Phonetics	Sam van Schaik

Tibetan calendar dates

Dates of birth

Day
Month
Gender
Element
Animal
Rab Jyung

Dates of passing

Day
Month
Gender
Element
Animal
Rab Jyung

Contact information

Website:	http://idp.bl.uk // http://earlytibet.com

About

Primary Affiliation (Workplace)

Endangered Archives Programme, British Library

Secondary Affiliation

International Dunhuang Project

PhD University

University of Manchester

Biographical Information

Sam Julius van Schaik is an English Tibetologist. He obtained a PhD in Tibetan Buddhist literature at the University of Manchester in 2000, with a dissertation on the translations of Dzogchen texts by Jigme Lingpa. Since 1999 he has worked at the British Library in London, and is currently a project manager for the International Dunhuang Project, specialising in the study of Tibetan Buddhist manuscripts from Dunhuang. He has also taught occasional courses at SOAS, University of London.

From 2003 to 2005 van Schaik worked on a project to catalogue Tibetan Tantric manuscripts in the Stein Collection of the British Library, and from 2005 to 2008 he worked on a project to study the palaeography of Tibetan manuscripts from Dunhuang, in an attempt to identify individual scribes.

In February 2019 van Schaik was appointed as the head of the Endangered Archives Programme at the British Library. (Source Accessed Aug 5, 2020)

Curriculum Vitae

Sam Van Schaik has worked with the Stein Collection at the British Library for the International Dunhuang Project (IDP: http://idp.bl.uk) since 1999. In the beginning, Sam worked on the Central Asian manuscripts from the Tibetan imperial period. Between 2002 and 2005 Sam compiled a detailed catalogue of the Tibetan tantric manuscripts from Dunhuang. At the moment Sam is engaged in an ongoing research project on the palaeography of the Tibetan and Chinese Dunhuang manuscripts. Recent publications include Esoteric Buddhism at Dunhuang (Brill, 2010) and Manuscripts and Travellers: The Sino-Tibetan Documents of a Tenth-century Buddhist Pilgrim (de Gruyter, 2010). Source-(Accessed Feb 7, 2011).

Publications

Monographs

• Tibetan Zen: Discovering a Lost Tradition (Boston & London: Snow Lion, 2015). ISBN 9781559394468
• Manuscripts and Travellers: The Sino-Tibetan Documents of a Tenth-Century Buddhist Pilgrim, coauthored with Imre Galambos (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2012). ISBN 9783110225648
• Tibet: A History (London: Yale University Press, 2011). ISBN 9780300154047
• Esoteric Buddhism at Dunhuang: Rites and Teachings for this Life and Beyond, co-edited with Matthew Kapstein (Leiden: Brill, 2010). ISBN 9789004182035
• Tibetan Tantric Manuscripts from Dunhuang: A Descriptive Catalogue of the Stein Collection at the British Library, co-authored with Jacob Dalton (Leiden: Brill, 2006). ISBN 9789004154223
• Approaching the Great Perfection: Simultaneous and Gradual Approaches to Dzogchen Practice in the Longchen Nyingtig (Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2004). ISBN 0861713702

Articles

• "The Stone Maitreya of Leh: The Rediscovery and Recovery of an Early Tibetan Monument", with André Alexander, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 21.4 (2011): 421–439.
• "The Prayer, the Priest and the Tsenpo: An Early Buddhist Narrative from Dunhuang", with Lewis Doney, Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 30.1–2 (2007): 175–217.
• "Fragments of the Testament of Ba from Dunhuang", with Kazushi Iwao, Journal of the American Oriental Society 128.3 (2008): 477–487.
• "A Definition of Mahāyoga: Sources from the Dunhuang Manuscripts", Tantric Studies 1 (2008): 45–88.
• "The Sweet Saint and the Four Yogas: A ‘Lost’ Mahāyoga Treatise from Dunhuang", Journal of the International Association of Tibetan Studies 4 (2008 [2009]): 1-67,
• "Beyond Anonymity: Palaeographic Analyses of the Dunhuang Manuscripts", with Tom Davis and Jacob Dalton, Journal of the International Association of Tibetan Studies 3 (2007): 1-23.
• "The Early Days of the Great Perfection", Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 27/1 (2004): 165–206.
• "Tibetan Dunhuang Manuscripts in China", Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 65.1 (2002): 129–139.
• "The Origin of the Headless Style (dbu med) in Tibet", in Medieval Tibeto-Burman Languages IV, ed. Nathan W. Hill (Leiden: Brill, 2012).
• "A New Look at the Invention of the Tibetan Script", in New Studies of the Old Tibetan Documents: Philology, History and Religion (Old Tibetan Documents Monograph Series, vol. III)., ed. Yoshiro Imaeda, Matthew Kapstein and Tsuguhito Takeuchi (Tokyo: ILCAA, 2011): 45–96.
• "Oral Teachings and Written Texts: Transmission and Transformation in Dunhuang", in Contributions to the Cultural History of Tibet, ed. In Matthew T. Kapstein and Brandon Dotson (Leiden: Brill, 2007): 183-208.
• "The Tibetan Avalokiteśvara Cult in the Tenth Century: Evidence from the Dunhuang Manuscripts", in Tibetan Buddhist Literature and Praxis (Proceedings of the Tenth Seminar of the IATS, 2003, Volume 4), ed. Ronald M. Davidson and Christian Wedemeyer (Leiden: Brill, 2006): 55-72.
• "Where Chan and Tantra Meet: Buddhist Syncretism in Dunhuang", with Jacob Dalton in The Silk Road: Trade, Travel, War and Faith, ed. Susan Whitfield (London: British Library Press, 2004): 61-71.

Translations

• Dhongthog Rinpoche, The Sakya School of Tibetan Buddhism: A History, Translated by Sam van Schaik (Somerville, MA: Wisdom Publications, Inc., 2016).

Other

• Matko, Marta and Sam van Schaik, Scribal Colophons in the Tibetan Manuscripts at the British Library (Prajñāpāramitā and Aparimitāyus sūtras), First Electronic Edition (London: International Dunhuang Project, 2013). http://idp.bl.uk/database/oo_cat.a4d?shortref=Matko_vanSchaik_2013;random=15506

Links

Wiki Pages

• Schaik, S. on the DRL
• Schaik, S. on the LIB
• Schaik, S. on the BNW

Buddha Nature Project

Person description or short bio

Expand to see this person's philosophical positions on Buddha-nature.

Is Buddha-nature considered definitive or provisional?
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All beings have Buddha-nature
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If "Qualified", explain:
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Which Wheel Turning
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Yogācāra vs Madhyamaka
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Zhentong vs Rangtong
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Promotes how many vehicles?
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Analytic vs Meditative Tradition
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What is Buddha-nature?
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Svātantrika (རང་རྒྱུད་) vs Prāsaṅgika (ཐལ་འགྱུར་པ་)
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Causal nature of the vajrapāda
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Full Name

Sam van Schaik

Affiliation

Sam van Schaik
International Dunhuang Project
The British Library
96 Euston Road
London NW1 2DB

http://idp.bl.uk
http://earlytibet.com

Other Information

Author of the http://earlytibet.com/author/ blog

Project manager International Dunhuang Project (IDP)

Sam Van Schaik has worked with the Stein Collection at the British Library for the International Dunhuang Project (IDP: http://idp.bl.uk) since 1999. In the beginning, Sam worked on the Central Asian manuscripts from the Tibetan imperial period. Between 2002 and 2005 Sam compiled a detailed catalogue of the Tibetan tantric manuscripts from Dunhuang. At the moment Sam is engaged in an ongoing research project on the palaeography of the Tibetan and Chinese Dunhuang manuscripts. Recent publications include Esoteric Buddhism at Dunhuang (Brill, 2010) and Manuscripts and Travellers: The Sino-Tibetan Documents of a Tenth-century Buddhist Pilgrim (de Gruyter, 2010). Source-(Accessed Feb 7, 2011).

Sun and Moon Earrings: Teachings Received by Jigmé Lingpa by Sam van Schaik. Originally published in the Tibet Journal 25.4 (2000): 3–32. It is reproduced here without any substantial changes.

Dzogchen is an advanced system of meditation techniques to reveal the innate state of perfection primarily, but not exclusively, espoused by the Nyingma Buddhist tradition and the Tibetan Bön tradition.

This is first one of the inner tantric schools according to the Nyingma tradition. Mahāyoga includes two sub-sections of the tantras which includes eighteen tantras and the sādhanās that includes the eight sādhanā practices. Mahāyoga focuses on the Development Stage and espouses the view of equality and purity in which equality refers to equal nature of phenomena in being empty and purity refers to all appearances being inherently enlightened energies. The Mahāyoga path leads to four stages of vidyadharas.

International Association for Tibetan Studies

International Association for Tibetan Studies

The Sakya tradition developed in the eleventh century in the Khön family of Tsang, which maintained an imperial-era lineage of Vajrakīla and which adopted a new teaching from India known as Lamdre.

Refers to something that is taught for a specific reason, rather than because it is entirely true.

Along with Madhyamaka, it was one of the two major philosophical schools of Mahāyāna Buddhism. Founded by Asaṅga and Vasubandhu around the fourth century CE, many of its central tenets have roots in the Saṃdhinirmocanasūtra and the so-called third turning of the dharma wheel (see tridharmacakrapravartana).

Along with Yogācāra, it is one of the two major philosophical schools of Mahāyāna Buddhism. Founded by Nāgārjuna around the second century CE, it is rooted in the Prajñāpāramitā Sūtras, though its initial exposition was presented in Nāgārjuna's Mūlamadhyamakakārikā.

The state of being devoid of that which is wholly different rather than being void of its own nature. The term is generally used to refer to the ultimate, or buddha-nature, being empty of other phenomena such as adventitious defiling emotions but not empty of its true nature.

The state of being empty of self, which references the lack of inherent existence in relative phenomena.

Tsen Khawoche's "meditative tradition" of exegesis of the Uttaratantra; it is one of two major Tibetan traditions of exegesis, both stemming from students of Sajjana.