Dàfāngděng dàjí jīng púsà niànfó sānmèi fēn 大方等大集經菩薩念佛三昧分
The Bodhisattva-Buddhānusmṛti-Samādhi Section of the Mahāvaipulya Mahāsaṃnipāta-sūtra by 達磨笈多 (Dharmagupta, 譯)
About the work
The Dàfāngděng dàjí jīng púsà niànfó sānmèi fēn in 10 fascicles is 達磨笈多 Dharmagupta’s Suí-period retranslation of the Bodhisattva-buddhānusmṛti-samādhi-sūtra, structured as a fēn 分 (section) of the larger Suí-recension Dà jí jīng. The Taishō print signs the entry “隋天竺三藏達磨笈多譯” and explicitly cross-references No. 414 — KR6h0023, the older Liú-Sòng 功德直 translation of the same Indic source.
Prefaces
No separate preface is preserved in the canonical print, only the standard signature.
Abstract
The work is the longer (10-fascicle) Suí-period rendering of the Bodhisattva-buddhānusmṛti-samādhi-sūtra. Hobōgirin records it as belonging to the Mahāsaṃnipāta class and assigns it the Sanskrit reconstruction Mahāvaipulya-mahāsaṃnipāta-bodhisattva-buddhānusmṛti-samādhi. The text systematises the practice of buddhānusmṛti samādhi — sustained recollection of the buddhas, leading to direct encounter with the buddhas of the ten directions — that was already the subject of KR6h0023 (Gōngdézhí’s earlier short version) and [[KR6h0026|the Bānzhōu sānmèi jīng]] (T0417 / T0418).
The dating window 590–619 reflects the bracket of 達磨笈多 Dharmagupta’s principal Suí translation activity, beginning with his arrival in Cháng’ān around 590 and ending with his death in 619 (early Táng era). The Lìdài sānbǎo jì 歷代三寶紀 (T2034, completed 597) records part of his early-Suí output; later catalogs (the Dà Táng nèidiǎn lù 大唐內典錄 T2149 and the Kāiyuán shìjiào lù T2154) document his complete corpus.
Translations and research
- Harrison, Paul. The Samādhi of Direct Encounter with the Buddhas of the Present. Tokyo: International Institute for Buddhist Studies, 1990. — Standard study of the Pratyutpanna-samādhi; comparative frame for the present sūtra.
- Yamabe, Nobuyoshi. “The Sūtra on the Ocean-Like Samādhi of the Visualization of the Buddha.” Ph.D. dissertation, Yale University, 1999. — Frame for the samādhi-sūtra corpus.
Links
- CBETA online text
- Kanseki DB
- Dazangthings date evidence (610): [ 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