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佛說觀普賢菩薩行法經

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Text ID
KR6d0120
Date
424–442
Dynasty
劉宋

Fóshuō Guān Pǔxián púsà xíngfǎ jīng 佛說觀普賢菩薩行法經

Sūtra on the Practice of Contemplating Bodhisattva Samantabhadra (Taught by the Buddha) by 曇無蜜多 (Tánwúmìduō / Dharmamitra, 譯)

About the work

A single-juan Liú-Sòng translation by Dharmamitra 曇無蜜多 (356–442) of the Indic Samantabhadra-bodhisattva-dhyāna-cary-dharma-sūtra — the third part of the East-Asian Tiāntái sānbù Fǎhuá 三部法華 (“Three-Part Lotus”) together with the Wúliàngyì jīng (KR6d0118, the prologue text) and the Saddharmapuṇḍarīka itself (KR6d0001, the principal text). The Pǔxián guān jīng serves as the structurally critical epilogue text in the Tiāntái Lotus liturgical-meditative tradition.

Prefaces

The text in the Taishō recension carries the standard front matter and opens with the standard sūtra opening Rúshì wǒ wén 如是我聞 (“Thus have I heard”). The translation-attribution: Sòng Yuánjiā nián Tánwúmìduō yú Yángzhōu yì 宋元嘉年曇無蜜多於楊州譯 (“translated by Dharmamitra at Yángzhōu in the Yuánjiā era of the Sòng [424–453]”).

Abstract

The Pǔxián guān jīng is the canonical Tiāntái epilogue text to the Lotus Sūtra and the principal scriptural authority for the Pǔxián meditative-confessional practice. The work narrates the Buddha’s instruction to the assembly on contemplating Bodhisattva Samantabhadra (普賢菩薩, “Universal Worthy”) riding the six-tusked white elephant — the principal iconographic form of Samantabhadra — and on the meditative-confessional liturgy by which the practitioner attains the realisation of the Lotus’s teaching.

The work is consequently of substantial importance both as a foundational scriptural authority for the East-Asian Tiāntái meditative-confessional tradition (the Fǎhuá sānmèi 法華三昧 / Pǔxián chànyí 普賢懺儀 cycle systematised by 智顗 Zhìyǐ in the Móhē zhǐguān (KR6d0130)) and as a doctrinal-cosmological text articulating the Pǔxián iconographic tradition that became the standard in East-Asian Buddhist art.

The translation is dated to the Yuánjiā era (424–453), with Dharmamitra’s productive period at Yángzhōu placing the work most plausibly in the early-to-mid Yuánjiā era (424–442, the year of Dharmamitra’s death).

Translations and research

  • Stevenson, Daniel B. “The Tiāntái Four Forms of Samādhi and Late North–South Dynasties, Sui, and Early T’ang Buddhist Devotionalism.” PhD diss., Columbia University, 1987.
  • Stevenson, Daniel B. “The Four Kinds of Samādhi in Early T’ien-t’ai Buddhism.” In Traditions of Meditation in Chinese Buddhism, ed. Peter N. Gregory, 45–97. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1986.
  • Reeves, Gene, trans. The Lotus Sutra: A Contemporary Translation of a Buddhist Classic. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2008. (Includes English translation of the Pǔxián guān jīng as the Lotus’s epilogue.)
  • Kubo Tsugunari and Yuyama Akira, trans. The Lotus Sutra: Taishō Volume 9, Number 262. BDK English Tripiṭaka 13-I. Berkeley: Numata Center, 2007.
  • Stevenson, Daniel B., and Kanno Hiroshi. The Meaning of the Lotus Sūtra’s Course of Ease and Bliss. Tokyo: International Research Institute for Advanced Buddhology, Soka University, 2006.
  • Karashima Seishi 辛嶋静志. The Textual Study of the Chinese Versions of the Saddharmapuṇḍarīkasūtra. Tokyo: Reiyukai, 1992.
  • Birnbaum, Raoul. Studies on the Mysteries of Mañjuśrī: A Group of East Asian Maṇḍalas and Their Traditional Symbolism. Boulder: Society for the Study of Chinese Religions, 1983.

Other points of interest

The Tiāntái systematisation of the sānbù Fǎhuá (three-part Lotus) — comprising the Wúliàngyì, the Saddharmapuṇḍarīka, and the Pǔxián guān jīng — is one of the most significant doctrinal-liturgical organisations of the East-Asian Mahāyāna scriptural tradition. The Tiāntái claim that these three texts together constitute the complete revelation of the Lotus assembly was foundational for the school’s distinctive scriptural commitment and for its institutional liturgical tradition.

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