Fó shuō rú lái bù sī yì mì mì dà chéng jīng 佛說如來不思議祕密大乘經
The Great Vehicle Sūtra Spoken by the Buddha on the Tathāgata’s Inconceivable Secret by 法護 (Fǎhù / Dharmapāla, 譯)
About the work
This 20-fascicle text by 法護 Fǎhù (Dharmapāla, the Northern-Sòng imperial translation-bureau monk, distinct from the Western-Jìn 竺法護 Zhú Fǎhù / Dharmarakṣa) is a substantial Mahāyāna sūtra on the bù sī yì mì mì 不思議祕密 (“inconceivable secret”) of the Tathāgata — i.e. the doctrine of the secret meaning of the cosmic Buddha-body, paralleling material in the Mahā-ratnakūṭa tradition. The text was incorporated into the Bǎo jī tradition as assembly 3 (Mìmì shéntōng huì 密迹神通會 in Bodhiruci’s Bǎo jī).
Prefaces
No formal preface.
Abstract
法護 Fǎhù / Dharmapāla (active early 11th c.) was a Northern-Indian Buddhist translator attached to the Northern-Sòng imperial Buddhist translation bureau (the Yìjīngyuàn 譯經院) in Kāifēng. Per DILA and the Sòng huì yào 宋會要, he produced more than 100 translations during his Sòng career, alongside 法天 Fǎtiān / Dharmadeva and 法賢 Fǎxián / Devaśānti. The translation of the present text is conventionally placed in the period 1004 – 1058 CE, the bracket of Fǎhù’s documented Sòng-bureau activity. The bracket adopted here reflects this window.
The Taishō text (T0312) is established on the standard apparatus.
Translations and research
Reminder: AI generated list - beware of hallucinations. Corrections and additions welcome
- No substantial Western-language translation located.
- Sen, Tansen. Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Trade (2003) — for the Northern-Sòng translation bureau.
Other points of interest
- Fǎhù (Northern-Sòng) is to be carefully distinguished from his much earlier namesake 竺法護 Zhú Fǎhù / Dharmarakṣa (Western-Jìn). The two share the Chinese rendering 法護 but are entirely distinct figures separated by some seven centuries; conflations occur in older secondary literature.
Links
- CBETA T11n0312
- Kanseki DB
- 法護 DILA
- Dazangthings date evidence (1050) — 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.