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大方廣圓覺修多羅了義經

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Text ID
KR6i0551
Date
690–750
Dynasty
唐

Dàfāngguǎng yuánjué xiūduōluó liǎoyì jīng 大方廣圓覺修多羅了義經

Mahāvaipulya Sūtra of Perfect Enlightenment, Definitive Meaning (commonly Yuánjué jīng 圓覺經, Sūtra of Perfect Enlightenment) by 佛陀多羅 (Buddhatrāta, 譯)

About the work

The Yuánjué jīng 圓覺經, in 1 fascicle (Taishō no. 842, vol. 17), is a short Mahāyāna scripture in twelve chapters, each framed as a dialogue between Śākyamuni (in a state of “great luminous-radiance treasury samādhi” 神通大光明藏) and one of twelve great bodhisattvas (Mañjuśrī, Samantabhadra, Pǔyǎn 普眼, Vajragarbha, Maitreya, Pure Wisdom 清淨慧, Mighty Virtue 威德自在, Distinguishing Sound 辯音, Pure Karmic Hindrances 淨諸業障, Universal Awakening 普覺, Perfect Awakening 圓覺, and Worthy-Excellent-Head 賢善首). Its central teaching is the doctrine of yuánjué 圓覺 — “perfect enlightenment” — understood as the originally pure, intrinsically luminous nature of mind that all sentient beings already possess and to which all dharmas are reduced. The sūtra’s brevity, lucidity, and broad doctrinal scope (combining tathāgatagarbha ontology, sudden-awakening rhetoric, and a tripartite taxonomy of meditative practice — śamatha, samāpatti, dhyāna) made it one of the most influential scriptures in Chán-Huáyán syncretic discourse from the late Táng onward, second perhaps only to the Lèngyán jīng 楞嚴經 in its long-term hold on East Asian Buddhist exegesis.

Abstract

The sūtra is preserved in a single Chinese version attributed to the Kashmirian monk Buddhatrāta (Fótuóduōluó 佛陀多羅) and has no extant Sanskrit or Tibetan counterpart; no parallel manuscript witnesses are known from Central Asia. Modern scholarship — beginning with Mochizuki Shinkō 望月信亨 and continuing through Yanagida Seizan 柳田聖山, Peter Gregory, and Robert Buswell — treats the Yuánjué jīng as a Chinese apocryphon (wěi jīng 偽經 / yí jīng 疑經) compiled in early-to-mid Táng China, probably between the late seventh and the first half of the eighth century, and most likely in a milieu close to the early Hézé 荷澤 / Northern-Chán 北宗 communities of the metropolitan capitals. Its dependence on the Dàshèng qǐxìn lùn 大乘起信論 vocabulary, on the Lèngqié jīng 楞伽經, and on the Shǒuléngyán jīng 首楞嚴經, together with the absence of any catalogue notice before the Kāiyuán shìjiào lù 開元釋教錄 (730), point to a composition window in the years bracketing 700 CE. The composition date here (notBefore 690 / notAfter 750) reflects this scholarly consensus rather than the traditional Buddhatrāta attribution. The “translator” Buddhatrāta is otherwise unattested in Chinese Buddhist biography, and the prefatory ascription (大唐、罽賓三藏佛陀多羅譯) is generally regarded as part of the apocryphal apparatus rather than as evidence for an Indic original.

The text became a major scriptural focus through the work of 宗密 Guīfēng Zōngmì 圭峰宗密 (780–841), who is reported to have had his own awakening experience reading the Yuánjué jīng under his master Suízhōu 道圓 Dàoyuán. Zōngmì composed the most influential exegetical apparatus around the sūtra: his Yuánjué jīng dàshū (KR6i0555) 圓覺經大疏 and Yuánjué jīng dàshū chāo (KR6i0557) — together with the abbreviated Lüèshū (KR6i0553), the Lüèshū chāo (KR6i0559), the Dàshū chāo kē (KR6i0556), the Lüèshū kē (KR6i0558), and the Yuánjué jīng dàoch ǎng xiūzhèng yí 圓覺經道場修證儀 — established the standard framework for all later commentaries. From Zōngmì onward the Yuánjué jīng became a foundational text for the HuáyánChán synthesis, and its twelve-bodhisattva structure has remained a fixed reference for East Asian Mahāyāna spiritual practice down to the present.

Structural Division

The CANWWW dataset notes only one related text: the principal medieval commentary, KR6i0553 Yuánjué jīng lüèshū 大方廣圓覺修多羅了義經略疏 (T39n1795) by 宗密.

Translations and research

  • Mochizuki Shinkō 望月信亨. Bukkyō kyōten seiritsu shi ron 仏教経典成立史論. Tokyo: Hōzōkan, 1946. — Foundational Japanese discussion of the Yuánjué jīng as Chinese apocryphon.
  • Mizuno Kōgen 水野弘元. “Engakukyō no kenkyū” 円覚経の研究. Komazawa daigaku Bukkyō gakubu kenkyū kiyō 4 (1949).
  • Gregory, Peter N. Tsung-mi and the Sinification of Buddhism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991. — The standard English-language study of Zōngmì; chapter 3 surveys the Yuánjué jīng and its place in his thought.
  • Gregory, Peter N. (trans.). The Sūtra of Perfect Enlightenment: Korean Buddhism’s Guide to Meditation, with the Commentary by the Sŏn Monk Kihwa. Albany: SUNY Press, 1994. (= A. Charles Muller, trans.) — Note: the canonical English translation is by Muller, not Gregory.
  • Muller, A. Charles. The Sūtra of Perfect Enlightenment: Korean Buddhism’s Guide to Meditation, with the Commentary by the Sŏn Monk Kihwa. Albany: SUNY Press, 1999. — Full annotated English translation of the sūtra together with the Wǒnak kyǒng ǒnhae commentary by Hamhŏ Kihwa 涵虛己和 (1376–1433).
  • Luk, Charles (Lù Kuān-yǔ 陸寬昱). The Sūtra of Complete Enlightenment. London: Rider, 1962. — Earlier, less-philological English rendering, still cited.
  • Buswell, Robert E. (ed.). Chinese Buddhist Apocrypha. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1990. — Contains the foundational article-length treatment of the apocryphal status of the Yuánjué jīng.
  • Yanagida Seizan 柳田聖山. Engakukyō 円覚経. Tokyo: Daizō shuppan, 1987 (Butten kōza). — Modern Japanese annotated translation with detailed introduction.

Other points of interest

The Yuánjué jīng is the locus classicus for the famous formulation 知幻即離，不作方便；離幻即覺，亦無漸次 (“To know illusion is at once to depart from it — no expedient is required; departing from illusion is at once awakening — there is no gradual progression”), one of the most-quoted lines in the entire late-Táng / Sòng Chán literature.

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