Fóshuō Rúlái dúzhèng zìshì sānmèi jīng 佛說如來獨證自誓三昧經
The Sūtra on the Tathāgata’s Solitary Realization of the Self-Vow Samādhi as Spoken by the Buddha translated by 竺法護 (Zhú Fǎhù / Dharmarakṣa, 譯)
About the work
T623 (one fascicle, alt. title 龍施本起經) is the Western Jin parallel to T622 (the version attributed to An Shigao), translated by 竺法護 (Dharmarakṣa, c. 233–c. 311). Both texts are independent renderings of the same Indic source — a Mahāyāna samādhi-sūtra centred on the zìshì sānmèi, with the naga princess Lóngshī as the principal narrative agent.
Abstract
The text is unanimously attributed in the canonical bibliographies to Dharmarakṣa. Date bracket follows Dharmarakṣa’s productive period at Cháng’ān and Luòyáng (266–308). The attribution to Dharmarakṣa is one of the most secure in the early Chinese Buddhist tradition: he is the most prolific Mahāyāna translator of the Western Jin and his stylistic profile is well-attested. Boucher (2006, 2008) has provided detailed comparative analysis of Dharmarakṣa’s translation technique against later renderings, and confirms T623 as authentic.
The text is the “different translation” (異譯) of the same Indic original underlying T622; the [[KR6s0084|Chū sānzàng jì jí]] (T2145) lists both. Its prose is leaner and more concrete than T622; the Lóngshī story is told with characteristic Dharmarakṣa precision and is among the earliest Chinese versions of the female bodhisattva-vow narrative that culminates in the gender-transformation episode familiar from the Lotus Sūtra’s Dragon Princess.
Translations and research
- Boucher, Daniel. Bodhisattvas of the Forest and the Formation of the Mahāyāna: A Study and Translation of the Rāṣṭrapālaparipṛcchā-sūtra. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2008. — extended analysis of Dharmarakṣa’s translation technique.
- Nattier, Jan. A Guide to the Earliest Chinese Buddhist Translations. Tokyo: IRIAB, 2008.
- Zürcher, Erik. The Buddhist Conquest of China. Leiden: Brill, 1959.
No book-length Western translation located.
Links
- CBETA T15n0623
- Kanseki DB
- 竺法護 DILA
- Dazangthings date evidence (160, 245, 300, 420) — Fèi Chángfáng 費長房. Lìdài sānbǎo jì (LDSBJ) 歷代三寶紀 T2034. T2034 (XLIX) 51b5, 63b11, 71c11.