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金剛般若波羅蜜經

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Text ID
KR6c0023
Date
402–412
Dynasty
姚秦

Jīngāng bōrě bōluómì jīng 金剛般若波羅蜜經

Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā (Diamond Sūtra) by 鳩摩羅什 (Kumārajīva, 譯)

About the work

The Diamond Sūtra — the most-revered short Mahāyāna scripture in East-Asian Buddhism — translated by Kumārajīva 鳩摩羅什 (344–413) at Cháng’ān under Latter-Qín 姚秦 patronage. Single fascicle. Signature: 「姚秦天竺三藏鳩摩羅什譯」. The Taishō header cross-references [KR6c0001|T220] (玄奘 Xuánzàng’s later integration as the ninth huì of T220) and the parallel translations T236a, T236b, T237, T238, and T239.

Prefaces

No preface or postface in the source file; only the canonical translator-signature.

Abstract

T235 is one of the most-influential single texts in East-Asian Buddhism. The Indic source — the Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā-sūtra — is the most-widely-attested prajñā-sūtra in Sanskrit, with multiple recensions surviving from Gilgit, Central Asia, and Nepal (Conze 1957; Schopen). Modern scholarship places the Indic original in the third or fourth century CE.

The Vajracchedikā is the Prajñāpāramitā-text that most decisively articulates the doctrine of the empty nature of all bodhisattva-acts and the apophatic mode of prajñā-discourse: “If a bodhisattva has the marks of a self, of others, of beings, of life, then he is no bodhisattva” (Vajracchedikā §3); “what the Tathāgata has taught as the bhūta-tathatā, this the Tathāgata has taught as no bhūta-tathatā; therefore it is taught as the bhūta-tathatā” (the four-corner negation formula).

T235 is the canonical Chinese version: it became the textual base for Chán Buddhism (慧能 Huìnéng’s enlightenment, traditionally placed at hearing the Diamond Sūtra recited, established T235 as the foundational Chán scripture); for popular Buddhist devotion (the Diamond Sūtra is one of the most-recited East-Asian Buddhist scriptures); and for the entire East-Asian prajñā-doctrinal tradition. The 868 CE Dūnhuáng Diamond Sūtra (British Library MS Or.8210/P.2) is the world’s earliest dated printed book and contains T235.

Translations and research

  • Conze, Edward (ed. and trans.). Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā. Rome: Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente, 1957. (Critical edition of the Sanskrit; comparative apparatus including T235.)
  • Conze, Edward, trans. Buddhist Wisdom Books. London: Allen & Unwin, 1958. (English translations of the Diamond Sūtra and Heart Sūtra.)
  • Müller, F. Max, trans. The Sacred Books of the East, vol. 49: Buddhist Mahâyâna Sûtras. Oxford: Clarendon, 1894. (English translation of the Diamond Sūtra.)
  • Schopen, Gregory. “The Manuscript of the Vajracchedikā Found at Gilgit.” In Studies in the Literature of the Great Vehicle, ed. Luis Gómez and Jonathan Silk, 89–139. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 1989.
  • Pine, Red [Bill Porter], trans. The Diamond Sutra: The Perfection of Wisdom. Berkeley: Counterpoint, 2001.
  • Yìn-shùn 印順. Bōrě jīng jiǎngjì (sections on T235).

Other points of interest

T235 is the world’s earliest dated printed book: the Dūnhuáng print of T235 dated to Xiántōng 咸通 9 = 868 CE (British Library MS Or.8210/P.2) is the earliest extant complete printed book in any language. The colophon states: 「咸通九年四月十五日王玠為二親敬造普施」 (“On the fifteenth day of the fourth month of Xiántōng 9, Wáng Jiè respectfully made and freely distributed [this] for his two parents”). This is the most-celebrated single artefact in the history of printing.

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