Shuō miàofǎ juédìng yèzhàng jīng 說妙法決定業障經
The Sūtra Expounding the Definitive Karmic-Obstruction of [Slandering] the Marvelous Dharma (alt. Miàofǎ bōdìng yèzhàng jīng 妙法波定業障經) translated by 智嚴 (Zhìyán of Zhìxiāngsì, 譯)
About the work
T841 in one fascicle is the parallel translation of [[KR6i0546|Chēngzàn dàshèng gōngdé jīng 稱讚大乘功德經 (T840)]] by Xuánzàng, translated by the Táng monk 智嚴 (Zhìyán) of the Zhìxiāngsì 至相寺 — the celebrated early Huáyán monastery on Zhōngnánshān 終南山 outside Cháng’ān. Both texts are Chinese renderings of the same Indian source-text. Zhìyán’s lifedates are unrecorded; the translation must postdate Xuánzàng’s of c. 645 onward, with no firm later limit. The colophon — 大唐至相寺沙門釋智嚴 — identifies him precisely with the Zhìxiāngsì lineage, but no biographical-reference attribution to a known DILA-authority monk has been secured. (He is to be distinguished from the contemporaneous Huáyán patriarch 智儼 Zhìyǎn (602–668) of the same monastery — different characters in the personal name.)
Abstract
The narrative frame is identical to that of T840: at the Hall of the Dharma-Realm Treasury, the Buddha is teaching innumerable bhikṣus and bodhisattvas. A female interlocutor — here named Gōngdé zhuāngyán kāifūhuā 功德莊嚴開敷花 (“Merit-Adorned-Blossoming-Flower”; corresponding to T840’s 德嚴華) — asks the Buddha which beings are not “good friends” (善知識 shànzhīshí) and so should not be co-resident with the new bodhisattva.
The Buddha responds with the same polemical doctrine as in KR6i0546: the brahmā-rāja-, indra-, catur-mahā-rāja-, śramaṇa-, brāhmaṇa-classes are all good friends to the new bodhisattva, but the śrāvaka-vehicle adherents are NOT good friends (惟除聲聞非善知識). The reason — that śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas seek their own parinirvāṇa and would tempt the new bodhisattva back to the lower vehicle — is glossed parenthetically in Zhìyán’s translation (恐聲聞退修行菩薩大乘道行 “lest the śrāvaka cause the practising bodhisattva to retreat from his Great-Vehicle path”). The injunction follows: not co-resident, not co-seated, not co-walking. Only when the new bodhisattva has attained “vast wisdom and non-dual discernment” may he share quarters — and then only for the purpose of converting the śrāvaka to the Mahāyāna.
The doctrinal content is identical to that of T840 — see for the full doctrinal summary. Zhìyán’s translation register is somewhat closer to the Mahāyāna-Vinaya register of Xuánzàng’s circle than to the Empress-Wǔ-period polished idiom of Divākara, suggesting a date in the late seventh or early eighth century.
Translations and research
See KR6i0546 for the relevant secondary literature.
Links
- CBETA online
- Kanseki DB
- Dazangthings date evidence (707): [ 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. https://dazangthings.nz/cbc/source/1/