298 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM. vol.59. 



being decided by divination. But also the abbots of the greater 

 monasteries (cliutuldus) are looked upon as incarnations of Bodhisatt- 

 vas. Besides these quasi deified mystical persons, there are in the 

 Tibetan church other hierarchical ranks and degrees. "The word 

 'lama/ written Ma-ma and meaning 'the superior one/ is that given 

 by Chinese and foreigners generally to the members of the Buddhist 

 monastic order in Tibet. In Tibet, however, this word is reserved 

 for those monks who have not only taken the highest theological 

 degrees, but who have also led a saintly life and become famed for 

 their knowledge. The word draba is used by Tibetans as a generic 

 term for all persons connected with the order, monks as well as lay 

 brethren." 5 



Buddhism wherever it went was modified by the national char- 

 acteristics and inherited beliefs of its converts, so that fundamental 

 doctrines were often overshadowed, sometimes destroyed, and it 

 developed into strangely inconsistent and even antagonistic beliefs 

 and practices. In accommodating itself to the genius and the 

 habits of widely diversed peoples it was obliged to submit to various 

 far-reaching compromises. It took on the color of any local condi- 

 tion and absorbed the native cults. In its development and expan- 

 sion it gathered up into itself, like a snowball, all that it found in its 

 way and changed even its essentials. But for all that, the impress 

 of Gautama's lofty teachings has not been blotted out. They became 

 a vehicle of a superior civilization, and their influence in the realms 

 of art, philosophy and religion has been profound. In the field of 

 art, in particular, it may be said that Buddhism was creator and 

 originator. It gave the keynote to painting, sculpture, and archi- 

 tecture of the East for many centuries much like Christianity did for 

 the art of the West. 



THE COLLECTION. 



For the purpose of the descriptive catalogue the collection may be 

 divided into: 



I. The Buddhist Pantheon: (1) Images of Buddha; (2) images of 

 Bodhisattvas and other divine beings. 



II. The Buddhist Scriptures (DJiarma). 



III. The Buddhist Congregation (Sangha): (1) Saints and priests 

 and their appurtenances; (2) religious edifices and their parapher- 

 nalia. 



IV. Miscellanous: Magic, divination, etc. 



* W. W. Roekhil!, Notes on the Ethnology of Tibet, p. 730. The political authority of the Dalai Lama 

 is confined to Tibet itself, but he is the acknowledged spiritual head of the Lamaist Buddhists throughout 

 Mongolia and China, as also by the Buriats and Kalmuks in Russia. 



