Fó shuō dàkǒngquè zhòuwáng jīng 佛說大孔雀呪王經
Buddha-Pronounced Sūtra of the Great Peacock Spell-King by 義淨 (Yìjìng, 譯)
About the work
A three-fascicle Tang-period translation of the Mahāmāyūrī-vidyārājñī by Yìjìng (義淨) — the great pilgrim-translator who studied at Nālandā 671–695 and translated extensively at Cháng’ān and Luòyáng under 武則天 Wǔ Zétiān, Zhōngzōng, and Ruìzōng. The text is the definitive pre-Esoteric Tang recension of the Mahāmāyūrī, midway between Saṅghapāla’s Liáng version (KR6j0171) and Amoghavajra’s Tang Esoteric T982 (KR6j0167).
Abstract
Yìjìng’s translation reflects an early-Tang Sanskrit recension that he obtained at Nālandā during his long residence there. His version contains a more detailed yakṣa-general geographical list than Saṅghapāla’s, including names that Lévi identified as topographically corresponding to Indian sacred sites of the Pāla period. Yìjìng’s translation programme at Cháng’ān (705–710 for this text) was organised around the vinaya-Sarvāstivāda and Mūlasarvāstivāda corpus, but he also translated significant dhāraṇī and vidyārājñī materials of which the Mahāmāyūrī is the principal item. The text was the immediate predecessor to Amoghavajra’s T982 and provided the textual base from which Amoghavajra developed the elaborated yoga-tantra recension.
Translations and research
- DesJardins, J. F. Marc. Le Sūtra de Mahāmāyūrī. Paris: Cerf, 2017.
- Lévi, Sylvain. “Le catalogue géographique des Yakṣa dans la Mahāmāyūrī.” Journal Asiatique (1915): 19–138.
- Takakusu Junjirō, trans. A Record of the Buddhist Religion as Practised in India and the Malay Archipelago (by Yìjìng). Oxford: Clarendon, 1896. — Yìjìng’s biographical-translation context.