Fó shuō dào shénzú wújí biànhuà jīng 佛說道神足無極變化經
The Buddha Speaks: The Sūtra of Limitless Transformations through the Bases of Path-Power (alt. Dào shénzú jīng 道神足經; Hé dào shénzú jīng 合道神足經) translated by 安法欽 (Ān Fǎqīn, 譯)
About the work
T816 in four fascicles is the parallel translation of Fóshēng dāolì tiān wèimǔ shuōfǎ jīng 佛昇忉利天為母說法經 (T815) by the Western Jìn Parthian translator 安法欽 (Ān Fǎqīn), produced at Luòyáng during his recorded translation activity from Tàikāng 太康 2 (281) to Guāngxī 光熙 1 (306). Both texts descend from the same Indian source — a Mahāyāna recension of the Trāyastriṃśa-sojourn-and-descent narrative — but were translated independently and differ substantially in phrasing, organisation, and length (Ān Fǎqīn’s version is one fascicle longer and includes more elaborated deva-question sections).
Abstract
The narrative frame is identical to that of T815: the Buddha at the Trāyastriṃśa Heaven, seated beneath the Bāzhìshù 巴質樹 (Ān Fǎqīn’s transliteration of Pārijātaka; Dharmarakṣa renders 晝度樹) on a deep-blue vaiḍūrya stone (紺琉璃石), preaching to his mother for the three months of the rains-retreat. The two principal deva-interlocutors are Yuètiānzǐ 月天子 (“Prince of the Moon”) and Yuèxīngtiānzǐ 月星天子 (“Prince of the Moon-Star”), parallel to T815’s Yuèshì and Yuèshàng.
The body of the sūtra expounds across four fascicles the doctrine of the bases of supernormal power (ṛddhi-pāda, 神足), the limitless transformations (nirmāṇa, 變化), and the prajñā-pāramitā-grounded upāya-kauśalya by which the Buddha and the bodhisattvas manifest in countless forms throughout the dharma-dhātu. The narrative unfolds in the same arc as T815: the deva-questions; the Buddha’s exposition; the Buddha’s descent on the triple-jewelled stairway constructed by Indra and Brahmā; the conversion of immense numbers of beings; the standard formula of joyful reception. See KR6i0521 for the full doctrinal summary.
The translation is significant as the principal extant work of the Parthian-Chinese translator Ān Fǎqīn, and as a complement to Dharmarakṣa’s parallel rendering. Ān Fǎqīn’s diction tends toward fuller transliteration of Indic technical vocabulary (Bāzhì 巴質 vs. Dharmarakṣa’s interpretive zhòudù 晝度) — a feature that places his translation idiom closer to the An Shigao stratum than to the standardised post-Daoan register of Dharmarakṣa.
Translations and research
Reminder: AI generated list - beware of hallucinations. Corrections and additions welcome
See KR6i0521 for the relevant secondary literature. On Ān Fǎqīn’s translation idiom and Parthian-Chinese translation lineage see:
- Forte, Antonino. “An Yuán-zhī e gli avatara del Buddha.” In La via della seta e l’oro dell’oriente. Milan: Skira, 2003.
- Zürcher, Erik. The Buddhist Conquest of China. Leiden: Brill, 1959 (3rd ed., 2007).
Links
- CBETA online
- Kanseki DB
- Dazangthings date evidence (186, 290): [ Sakaino 1935 ] Sakaino Kōyō 境野黄洋. Shina Bukkyō seishi 支那佛教精史. Tokyo: Sakaino Kōyō Hakushi Ikō Kankōkai, 1935. 92-98 https://dazangthings.nz/cbc/source/342/