Sam van Schaik

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.^[1] 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.^[2] He has also taught occasional courses at the School of Oriental and African Studies of the University of London.^[3]

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.^[4]

Bibliography

Monographs

• 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.

References

External links

• Sam van Schaik's academic blog