Xūkōngzàng púsà shénzhòu jīng 虛空藏菩薩神呪經
The Spirit-Spell Sūtra of the Bodhisattva Ākāśagarbha by 失譯 (anonymous translator)
About the work
The Xūkōngzàng púsà shénzhòu jīng in 1 fascicle is an anonymous Chinese translation of a short Mahāyāna sūtra concerning the spell (shénzhòu 神呪 / dhāraṇī) of the bodhisattva 虛空藏 Ākāśagarbha. The Taishō print signs the entry without a translator and explicitly cross-references the parallel translations Nos. 405, 407–408 — the equivalent Chinese versions by 佛陀耶舍 Buddhayaśas (KR6h0009), 曇摩蜜多 Dharmamitra (KR6h0011), and 闍那崛多 Jñānagupta (KR6h0012).
Prefaces
No preface is preserved in the canonical print, and the customary translator’s signature is absent. The header simply reads “佛說虛空藏菩薩神呪經”.
Abstract
The text opens at Khalāṭika mountain (佉羅帝耶山), where the Buddha has just expounded the dharma of the Tathāgata’s merit. From the western world-system the cintāmaṇi “wish-fulfilling jewel” appears, surrounded by retinue of Śakrābhilagna jewels, and emits radiance that pervades the assembly. The bodhisattva Ākāśagarbha is then introduced and the body of the sūtra develops as a series of spells (dhāraṇī) of protection and wish-fulfilment associated with the bodhisattva.
The catalogues conventionally assign the work to the Eastern Jìn 東晉 register, but the translator’s name is lost; the Lìdài sānbǎo jì 歷代三寶紀 (T2034) and the Kāiyuán shìjiào lù 開元釋教錄 (T2154) record it among the shīyì 失譯 (anonymous-translator) entries. The dating window 317–420 reflects the standard Eastern-Jìn register conventionally assigned by the catalogues; modern scholarship is more sceptical of the precision of register-based attributions in the shīyì corpus (cf. Nattier 2008, on early Chinese Buddhist anonymous translations). The work is closely related to KR6h0011 (Dharmamitra’s translation) — so closely, in fact, that the two have sometimes been suspected of being recensions of the same Chinese text rather than independent renderings.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located beyond reference works on the Ākāśagarbha cult.