Structure and Outline of the Dilgo Khyentse Kabum
In terms of the structure of the Dilgo Khyentse Kabum, the topical outline (sa bcad) divides the collection into ten sections. Like the other examples of collected works (bka' 'bum or gsung 'bum) available on this site, these ten sections act as micro collections, often of specific literary genres or overlapping subject matter, that provide a basic structure for overall collection of the author's oeuvre. In the Dilgo Khyentse Kabum these sections are presented descriptively as collections of the author's works on a single genre or style of Buddhist literature, with the exception of section nine, which catalogs recent additions to the collected works.
It should be noted that the collection is numbered according to folios, rather than pages. Though it is common for Tibetan pechas to have two concurrent numbering schemes, one in written Tibetan that appears on the left side margin of the front page of each folio that counts the number of folios in a given text and the other in Arabic numerals that appears on the right margin of every page that counts the number of pages in the entire volume. However, in the Dilgo Khyentse Kabum the Arabic numerals that appear in the right margin count the number folios in the volume, rather than pages. Therefore, the Arabic numerals only appear on the right margin of the first page of each folio. This is true for all of the volumes except Volume 23, in which the Arabic numerals count the pages rather than folios.
The topical outline divides the collection into the following ten sections:
| 1 | དང་པོ། དམ་པ་གོང་མ་རྣམས་ཀྱི་རྣམ་ཐར་སྐོར། | A cycle on the biographies of the holy masters of the past. |
|---|---|---|
| 2 | གཉིས་པ། བླ་མའི་རྣལ་འབྱོར་དང་གསོལ་འདེབས། ཞབས་བརྟན། ཞལ་གདམས། རྡོ་རྗེའི་གླུ། གཏམ་ཚོགས་སོགས་ཀྱི་སྐོར། | A cycle of collections of guru yoga practices, supplications, prayers for longevity, advice, vajra songs, discourses, and so forth. |
| 3 | གསུམ་པ། གསར་རྙིང་གི་ལྷག་པའི་ལྷ་རབ་འབྱམས་ཀྱི་སྒྲུབ་ཐབས་ཀྱི་སྐོར། | A cycle of the sādhanas of the countless supreme deities from the Old and New schools. |
| 4 | བཞི་པ། དབང་གི་ཆོག་ཁྲིགས་སྐོར། | A cycle of liturgical arrangements for empowerment rituals. |
| 5 | ལྔ་པ། ཁྲིད་ཡིག་རྣམ་བཤད་སྐོར། | A cycle of contemplative guidebooks and detailed explanations. |
| 6 | དྲུག་པ། ཟབ་གཏེར་སྐོར། | A cycle of profound treasures. |
| 7 | བདུན་པ། རྗེ་ཉིད་ཀྱི་རྣམ་ཐར་སྐོར། | A cycle of biographies. |
| 8 | བརྒྱད་པ། བསྔོ་སྨོན་ཤིས་བརྗོད་སྐོར། | A cycle of prayers for the dedication of merit, aspiration, and the invocation of auspiciousness. |
| 9 | དགུ་པ། གསར་རྙེད་སྣ་ཚོགས་སྐོར། | A cycle of various recently discovered texts. |
| 10 | བཅུ་པ། གསན་ཡིག་སྐོར། | A cycle of records of teachings received. |
