Fó shuō shèng fómǔ Bōrě bōluómìduō jīng 佛說聖佛母般若波羅蜜多經
Sūtra of the Holy Mother of the Buddhas: the Perfection of Wisdom, Spoken by the Buddha by 施護 (譯, Skt. Dānapāla)
About the work
The seventh and last of the canonical Chinese Heart Sūtra translations preserved in the Taishō (T257), produced under the Northern Sòng translation bureau by the North Indian master Shīhù 施護 (Dānapāla). The work is a “long recension” rendering, opening with the evaṃ mayā śrutam nidāna, including the Avalokiteśvara–Śāriputra dialogue and the Buddha’s concluding praise. The title — Shèng fómǔ Bōrě bōluómìduō jīng — reframes the Hṛdaya not as the “heart” of the Prajñāpāramitā but as the entire short Prajñāpāramitā sūtra of the “Holy Mother of the Buddhas” (聖佛母 = Bhagavatī Prajñāpāramitā personified as the mother of all Buddhas), an honorific tied to esoteric and devotional contexts in late-Indian and Tibetan tradition. One fascicle.
The colophon: 「西天譯經三藏朝奉大夫試光祿卿傳法大師賜紫臣施護奉詔譯」 — “Translated by imperial decree by Shīhù, Court Gentleman for Audience and Subject of the Test, Director of the Court of Imperial Banquets (試光祿卿), Master of Transmitting the Dharma (傳法大師), Conferred Purple Robe, Western-Country Translator-Tripiṭaka.”
Prefaces
No narrative preface in the Taishō witness — only the standard Taishō header (No. 257 [Nos. 250–255]) and the translator’s colophon. The text proper closes with the dhāraṇī “怛[寧也]他 唵 誐帝 誐帝 播囉誐帝 播囉僧誐帝 冒提 莎賀” preceded by the introductory formula “我今宣說般若波羅蜜多大明曰” — characteristically expanded with the tadyathā opening (怛[寧也]他 = tadyathā) absent from earlier Chinese translations.
Abstract
T257 is the latest in the Taishō Heart Sūtra series and the only Sòng-period translation. Doctrinally it follows the long recension closely (compare T253 of Bōrě and Lìyán, T254 of Zhìhuìlún, T255 of Fǎchéng); stylistically it represents the mature Sòng translation idiom of the imperial bureau — clearer Chinese syntax, fuller use of Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit transliteration conventions, and the now-standard tadyathā opening to the dhāraṇī. The renaming “佛母” 經 reflects the late-Indian devotional context in which the Prajñāpāramitā literature had become formally personified as the female Buddha-Mother, a development paralleled in contemporary Indian and Tibetan tradition.
The translation must postdate Shīhù’s installation in the Yìjīng yuàn 譯經院 (the imperial Sòng translation bureau) in Tàipíng xīngguó 7 (982) and predate his death in Tiānxǐ 1, twelfth month (= late January 1018). The bracket notBefore 982 / notAfter 1017 reflects his attested floruit. The work appears in the Sòng catalogue Dà zhōng xiángfú fǎbǎo lù 大中祥符法寶錄, but the precise year of translation is not given there.
T257 is included in subsequent printed canons (Kāibǎo zàng and successors), and in CBETA bears textual notes from the 大正 base edition with collations against the 明, 元, 宋, and 宮 editions.
Translations and research
- Edward Conze, Buddhist Wisdom Books (London: Allen & Unwin, 1958; rev. 1975) — translates the long recension.
- Jan Nattier, “The Heart Sūtra: A Chinese Apocryphal Text?” JIABS 15.2 (1992): 153–223 — places T257 in the long-recension series.
- Jan Yün-hua, “Buddhist Relations between India and Sung China,” History of Religions 6 (1966): 24–42, 135–168 — institutional context for Shīhù’s translation work.
- Tansen Sen, Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Trade: The Realignment of Sino-Indian Relations, 600–1400 (Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press, 2003) — extensive treatment of the Sòng Yìjīng yuàn and Shīhù’s role within it.
- Shi Wuyin 釋悟因 and others, modern Chinese-language studies of the Sòng Buddhist translation bureau.
- Iwamoto Yutaka 岩本裕, Bukkyō hannya shisō no rekishiteki kenkyū 仏教般若思想の歴史的研究, with discussion of the late Heart Sūtra recensions.
Other points of interest
The honorific 「聖佛母」 (“Holy Mother of the Buddhas”) in the Sòng title is significant: it incorporates the Heart Sūtra into the late-Indian and Tibetan devotional cult of Prajñāpāramitā as a personified female Buddha-Mother, attested for example in the iconography of the Aṣṭasāhasrikā manuscripts from Pāla-dynasty eastern India. T257 is thus a witness not only to the textual transmission but also to the late-Indian cultic reframing of the Prajñāpāramitā literature.
Links
- 施護 DILA
- CBETA online
- Wikipedia, “Heart Sutra”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_Sutra - Wikipedia, “Dānapāla”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%C4%81nap%C4%81la - Dazangthings date evidence (1000): [ T ] T = CBETA [Chinese Buddhist Electronic Text Association]. Taishō shinshū daizōkyō 大正新脩大藏經. Edited by Takakusu Junjirō 高楠順次郎 and Watanabe Kaigyoku 渡邊海旭. Tokyo: Taishō shinshū daizōkyō kankōkai/Daizō shuppan, 1924-1932. CBReader v 5.0, 2014. https://dazangthings.nz/cbc/source/1/
- Kanseki DB