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師子素馱娑王斷肉經

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Text ID
KR6b0016
Date
700–721
Dynasty
唐

Shīzǐsùtuósuō wáng duànròu jīng 師子素馱娑王斷肉經

Sūtra of King Lion-Saudāsa’s Renunciation of Meat-Eating by 智嚴 (Zhì Yán, 譯)

About the work

A short single-fascicle jātaka / avadāna recounting King Shīzǐsùtuósuō (= Siṃha-Saudāsa, “Lion-Saudāsa”) who, while hunting in the forest, takes refuge in a cave from a storm, and through the encounter is led to abandon meat-eating. Translated by 智嚴 Zhì Yán in the Tang. Signature: 「大唐沙門智嚴譯」.

The text is one of the principal Mahāyāna scriptural sources for the East-Asian Buddhist vegetarian tradition (duànròu 斷肉 / “cutting off meat”), alongside the Lankāvatāra chapter on meat-eating and the Brahmajāla bodhisattva śīla-sūtra (T1484).

Prefaces

The text bears no preface or postface; only the canonical translator-signature. The opening is a long verse passage in the bāoyǐ shì (“treasure-revealing”) form recapitulating the king’s past life.

Abstract

T164 is a Tang-period translation; 智嚴 Zhì Yán (the Tang-period Tibeto-Khotanese translator, fl. late 7th – early 8th c.) — distinct from the earlier Six-Dynasties Zhì Yán of the same dharma-name — was active in the Cháng’ān translation circle around the time of 義淨 Yìjìng. The Kāiyuán shìjiào lù 開元釋教錄 (KR6s0093) dates Zhì Yán’s translation activity to roughly 700–721 CE.

The Indic source is identified with the Saudāsa-jātaka / Siṃha-Saudāsa-rāja-jātaka tradition known in multiple Indic sources; the narrative is one of the canonical Buddhist anti-meat-eating jātakas, and the sūtra’s emphasis on the renunciation of meat as a bodhisattva-act anticipates the East-Asian Mahāyāna integration of vegetarianism into bodhisattva-precept observance.

Translations and research

  • Kieschnick, John. The Impact of Buddhism on Chinese Material Culture. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003. (Section on Buddhist vegetarianism; T164 cited.)
  • Sāgaramati. “Buddhism and Vegetarianism in East Asia.” Pacific World (2002).

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