Fó shuō hǎiyì púsà suǒ wèn jìngyìn fǎmén jīng 佛說海意菩薩所問淨印法門經
The Sūtra on the Pure-Seal Dharma-Gate Questioned by the Ocean-Wisdom Bodhisattva (Sāgaramati-paripṛcchā) by 惟淨 (Wéijìng, 等譯; with the Translation Bureau of the Northern Sòng)
About the work
The Hǎiyì púsà suǒ wèn jìngyìn fǎmén jīng in 18 fascicles is the Northern-Sòng (Běi Sòng 北宋) translation of the Sāgaramati-paripṛcchā — the Hǎihuì púsà / Hǎiyì púsà “Ocean-Wisdom Bodhisattva” sūtra — produced under the patronage of the imperial Translation Institute (Yìjīng yuàn 譯經院) at the start of the eleventh century. The translator of record is 惟淨 Wéijìng, signing as “譯經三藏朝散大夫試鴻臚卿光梵大師賜紫沙門臣惟淨等奉詔譯” — the standard Sòng formula naming Wéijìng as the head of the translation team acting on imperial command. The text is the most extensive Chinese rendering of the Sāgaramati-paripṛcchā; a much earlier and shorter version of the same source-text was incorporated as section 5 (Hǎihuì púsà pǐn 海慧菩薩品) of the [[KR6h0001|Dà jí jīng]] in the Dharmakṣema translation.
Prefaces
No separate preface is preserved in the canonical print, though the imperial signature formula on fascicle 1 records the translation context fully.
Abstract
The work is recorded in the Dà Sòng xīnyì sānzàng shèngjiào xù 大宋新譯三藏聖教序 of Tàizōng 太宗 (the founding-emperor’s preface to the new Sòng translations) and in the Tiānshèng shìjiào zǒnglù 天聖釋教總錄, the canonical Sòng catalogue closing in 1037. The bracket 1004–1037 in the frontmatter reflects the operative period of the Yìjīng yuàn under 惟淨’s direction (he became chief director of the institute by Dàzhōngxiángfú 大中祥符 1 = 1008, and remained active until the institute’s curtailment under Rénzōng around 1037). The Tibetan translation of the Sāgaramati-paripṛcchā survives in the Kanjur and provides the principal control text for studying the Sòng version’s source-text. The doctrinal content develops the bodhisattva-path teachings of the paripṛcchā genre with a particular focus on jìngyìn 淨印 (pure seal) — the imprint of the bodhisattva’s vow on his subsequent practice — and on the resolution of the bodhisattva’s encounter with conventional and ultimate truth.
The Sòng translation marks the intellectual reopening of state-sponsored Buddhist translation in China after a long hiatus following the [[KR6e0001|Avataṃsaka]] retranslation by 實叉難陀 in the early eighth century. Compared with the older Liángzhōu and Cháng’ān workshops, the Sòng Yìjīng yuàn used a strictly bureaucratised pipeline (see Sen 2002, Bowring 1992); the textual idiom is correspondingly more uniform but less linguistically vivid than the Táng and pre-Táng Mahāyāna translations.
Translations and research
- Braarvig, Jens. Akṣayamatinirdeśasūtra, vol. 2: The Tradition of Imperishability in Buddhist Thought. Oslo: Solum, 1993. — Frame for the paripṛcchā class with comparative remarks on the Sāgaramati sūtra.
- Sen, Tansen. Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Trade: The Realignment of Sino-Indian Relations, 600–1400. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2003. — On the Northern Sòng Yìjīng yuàn and Wéijìng’s role.
- Jan Yün-hua. “Buddhist Relations between India and Sung China.” History of Religions 6 (1966–67): 24–42, 135–168.
Links
- CBETA online text
- DDB entry
- Kanseki DB
- 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. dazangthings.nz/cbc/source/1