Abstract

The present study examines the Mi-la'i-rnam-thar, a fifteenth century Tibetan religious classic. The narrative traditions of Mi-la have a complex vector of literary development through oral and written sources over three and a half centuries. Gtsang-smyon Heruka compiled and edited the narrative traditions into the collected songs and the rnam-thar. The main argument of this dissertation that Gtsang-smyon composed the rnam-thar with a reformist intent. He portrayed the poet-saint Mi-la as a mad saint to justify the mad saint movement in Tibet. ;The traditional and historical-critical interpretations of the Mi-la'i-rnam-thar do not sufficiently unpack the potential of the text as a religious classic. Aporias do emerge and remain unexplained: the social context of the text, the oral hermeneutics, the conflation of shamanistic and tantric traditions, the intent and genius of Gtsang-smyon. The traditional and historical-critical frameworks fall short, failing to understand the dynamic nature of the Mi-la'i-rnam-thar. The rnam-thar genre concerns hermeneutics in action, the transmission of enlightenment from lama to disciple. ;Ricoeur's writings on hermeneutics, metaphor, and narrative provide a horizon to unpack the potential of Gtsang-smyon's rnam-thar. Ricoeur's writings provide a framework that comprehends the configuration of the lama/disciple relationship within the text, the oral hermeneutics of Tibetan Buddhism, the refiguration of the Mi-la'i-rnam-thar into other cultural media and the text of one's life. Ricoeur's notion of the unmooring of the text or the negation of the ostensive reference allows for new hermeneutical appropriation within the world of the reader. Hermeneutical analysis of the Mi-la'i-rnam-thar opens the text to understanding that is dynamic and reflective of its development within Tibetan Buddhism. ;The hermeneutics of the Mi-la'i-rnam-thar is a hermeneutics of madness. Madness is a symbol of transcendence. Gtsang-smyon's hermeneutics of madness is grounded in the application of the Buddhist notion of the two truths and the tantric contemplative imagination. The public behavior of the mad saint is similar to the semantic impertinence of the metaphor. The mad saint stands outside of the social conventions. His behavior is both liminal and ludic; it presents a critical and innovative alternative set of values. Gtsang-smyon uses the portrayal of Mi-la as a mad saint to present a critical alternative to the monastic ideal. He attempts to revive the founding ideals, teachings, spirituality and practice as displayed in the life of Mi-la-ras-pa. Gtsang-smyon believed in their imaginative capacity to inspire reform.