Kǒngquè wáng zhòu jīng 孔雀王呪經
Sūtra of the Peacock-King Spell by 鳩摩羅什 (Kumārajīva, 譯)
About the work
A one-fascicle late-Yáo-Qín-period translation of the Mahāmāyūrī-vidyā attributed to Kumārajīva (鳩摩羅什) — the great Kuchean trepiṭaka whose translation activity at Cháng’ān (401–413) reshaped the entire foundation of Chinese Buddhist scriptural translation. The Kumārajīva attribution is preserved in the early bibliographic catalogs but has been questioned by some modern scholars, who note that the text’s dhāraṇī genre is atypical of Kumārajīva’s mainline prajñāpāramitā-Madhyamaka translation programme.
Abstract
If genuine, the Kumārajīva attribution would make T988 the most authoritative early Mahāmāyūrī witness, dated to 401–413. 僧祐 Sēngyòu’s Chū sānzàng jì jí 出三藏記集 (KR6s0084) records a Kǒngquè wáng zhòu among Kumārajīva’s translations, supporting the canonical attribution; but the text-internal stylistic features (transliteration conventions, narrative-frame syntax) deviate from Kumārajīva’s mainline norms, and some modern scholarship attributes the text to a near-contemporary anonymous translator whose work was secondarily ascribed to the more prestigious Kumārajīva. Either way, the text represents the early-fifth-century recension of the Mahāmāyūrī — comparable to and possibly slightly later than T986–T987 (KR6j0173–KR6j0174) but earlier than Saṅghapāla’s Liáng T984 (KR6j0171). The text was widely circulated in the Sui-Tang period and was used in court rituals before being progressively superseded by the later Tang recensions.
Translations and research
- DesJardins, J. F. Marc. Le Sūtra de Mahāmāyūrī. Paris: Cerf, 2017.
- Robinson, Richard H. Early Mādhyamika in India and China. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1967. — for Kumārajīva’s translation programme.
- Lévi, Sylvain. “Le catalogue géographique des Yakṣa dans la Mahāmāyūrī.” Journal Asiatique (1915): 19–138.