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信佛功德經

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Text ID
KR6a0018
Date
987–1000
Dynasty
宋

Xìnfó gōngdé jīng 信佛功德經

Sūtra on the Merits of Faith in the Buddha (the Sampasādanīyasūtra; parallel to Cháng Āhán sūtra 18, the Zìhuānxǐ jīng 自歡喜經) by 法賢 (Fǎxián, 譯)

About the work

The Xìnfó gōngdé jīng is a single-fascicle Northern-Sòng translation of the Sampasādanīyasūtra, Sāriputta’s “lion’s-roar” expression of confident faith in the Buddha’s surpassing teaching, delivered in the presence of the Buddha himself at Anuppiya 阿拏迦城 in the Mango Park (菴羅園) of the Mallas. The Pāli parallel is DN 28 Sampasādanīya-sutta; the Cháng āhán parallel is sūtra 18, the Zìhuānxǐ jīng 自歡喜經 (literally “Sūtra of Self-Generated Joy”), and the Taishō head-note marks T18 explicitly as a parallel to T1[18].

The text opens with Sāriputta returning from his alms-round at Anuppiya, taking his meal, and then approaching the Buddha to declare his confident faith — that no one in the past, present, or future has exceeded or will exceed the Buddha in knowledge of the path to awakening. The body of the discourse is a systematic exposition, in nine sections, of the Buddha’s surpassing teaching: on wholesome states, on the analysis of the sense-bases, on the descent into the womb, on the four kinds of confession, on the four kinds of person, on right views, on the four roads to power, on the kinds of liberation, and on the previous lives of disciples.

Prefaces

The text bears no preface or postface. The only paratext is the Sòng-court translator’s signature at the head: 「西天譯經三藏朝奉大夫試光祿卿明教大師臣法賢奉詔譯」 (cf. KR6a0009, KR6a0015). The post-987 name 法賢 with the title 明教大師 places the translation in the period 987–1000.

Abstract

T18 is one of Fǎxián’s (= Tiānxīzāi’s) post-987 series of Sòng-Institute renderings of Cháng āhán discourses; the defensible bracket 987–1000 is recorded in the frontmatter. The Indic source is presumed lost; the rendering is a fresh translation rather than a revision of T1[18]. The principal interest of the text lies in the contrast it offers with the older Chinese version: T18 is shorter, more analytically structured, and places explicit doctrinal headings before each of the nine sections in a way that the older version does not. The Indic Vorlage may have been a more compact recension of the Sampasādanīya than that underlying T1[18].

The discourse is one of the canonical loci for the Buddhist conception of prasāda (Pāli pasāda, “serene confidence” / “faith-as-clarity”) — the specific kind of devotional disposition that arises in a disciple at the recognition of the Buddha’s surpassing teaching. T18’s title gloss 信佛功德 (“the merits of faith in the Buddha”) foregrounds this aspect.

Translations and research

  • Walshe, Maurice, tr. The Long Discourses of the Buddha: A Translation of the Dīgha Nikāya. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 1995. — DN 28 with notes.
  • Sen, Tansen. Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Trade: The Realignment of Sino-Indian Relations, 600–1400. 2nd ed. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2016. — Background on the Sòng Institute.
  • No dedicated study of T18 specifically has been located.

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