Púsà niànfó sānmèi jīng 菩薩念佛三昧經
The Sūtra of the Bodhisattva’s Buddha-Recollection Samādhi (Bodhisattva-buddhānusmṛti-samādhi-sūtra) by 功德直 (Gōngdézhí, 直譯) — catalog meta truncates the name to 功德; the canonical signature reads 功德直 in full
About the work
The Púsà niànfó sānmèi jīng in 5 fascicles is the Liú-Sòng-period translation of the Bodhisattva-buddhānusmṛti-samādhi-sūtra — the great Mahāyāna treatise on the bodhisattva’s buddhānusmṛti samādhi (recollective concentration on the buddhas). The Taishō print signs the entry “宋天竺三藏功德直譯” and explicitly cross-references No. 416 — KR6h0024, the 達磨笈多 Dharmagupta retranslation incorporated into the Suí Dà jí jīng recension (as the Púsà niànfó sānmèi fēn 菩薩念佛三昧分 in 10 fascicles). The catalog meta gives the translator name as 功德; the fuller form 功德直 in the Taishō signature is to be preferred.
Prefaces
No separate preface is preserved in the canonical print, only the standard signature.
Abstract
The Bodhisattva-buddhānusmṛti-samādhi-sūtra belongs with the closely-related [[KR6h0026|Bānzhōu sānmèi jīng 般舟三昧經]] (T0417 / T0418, Pratyutpanna-buddha-saṃmukhāvasthita-samādhi-sūtra) in articulating the early Mahāyāna doctrine of buddhānusmṛti samādhi — the practice in which, by sustained recollection of the buddhas of the present, the practitioner is brought into the direct presence of the buddhas of the ten directions. This practice tradition would become the doctrinal basis for Pure Land cultivation in the East Asian tradition, with 慧遠 Huìyuǎn’s White Lotus Society at Mount Lú (the Liánshè 蓮社) as its earliest documented Chinese practice community.
The work was translated at Yángzhōu 揚州 (Jiànkāng, modern Nánjīng) around Dàmíng 大明 6 (462) by 功德直 Gōngdézhí, with the Chinese monk 玄暢 Xuánchàng acting as brush-holder. The dating window 458–462 reflects this bracket. The Lìdài sānbǎo jì 歷代三寶紀 (T2034) and the Kāiyuán shìjiào lù 開元釋教錄 (T2154) record the work in his name. The Indic source-text is partially preserved in Tibetan as the Bodhisattva-buddhānusmṛti-samādhi, and the work has been the subject of philological study by Paul Harrison and others working on the early Mahāyāna samādhi corpus.
Translations and research
- Harrison, Paul. The Samādhi of Direct Encounter with the Buddhas of the Present: An Annotated English Translation of the Tibetan Version of the Pratyutpanna-buddha-saṃmukhāvasthita-samādhi-sūtra. Tokyo: International Institute for Buddhist Studies, 1990. — Standard study of the closely-related Pratyutpanna-samādhi; provides the comparative frame for the present sūtra.
- Harrison, Paul. “Buddhānusmṛti in the Pratyutpanna-Buddha-Saṃmukhāvasthita-Samādhi-Sūtra.” Journal of Indian Philosophy 6 (1978): 35–57. — On the buddhānusmṛti doctrine across the Mahāyāna samādhi-sūtra corpus.
Links
- CBETA online text
- DDB entry
- Kanseki DB
- Dazangthings date evidence (462): [ 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