Dàcí dàbēi jiùkǔ Guānshìyīn zìzài wáng púsà guǎngdà yuánmǎn wúài zìzài qīngjǐng dàbēi xīn tuóluóní 大慈大悲救苦觀世音自在王菩薩廣大圓滿無礙自在青頸大悲心陀羅尼
Vast, Perfect, Unhindered, Sovereign Blue-Necked Great-Compassion Heart-Dhāraṇī of the Great-Loving-Kind, Great-Compassionate, Suffering-Saving Avalokiteśvara-Sovereign-King Bodhisattva by 不空 (Bùkōng, Amoghavajra, 譯)
About the work
A one-fascicle Tang Esoteric Chinese-rendering of the Nīlakaṇṭha-dhāraṇī as the Great-Compassion Heart-Dhāraṇī (大悲心陀羅尼). The colophon attributes the translation to Dàguǎngzhì Bùkōng 大廣智不空 — Amoghavajra (不空) under his honorific Dàguǎngzhì style. The text is the Chinese-rendering counterpart to the Sanskrit-transliteration form of KR6j0323 (T1113A, collated by Dhyānabhadra).
Prefaces
The text opens with a namaskāra invocation: 南無歸命頂禮南方海上蒲陀落淨土。正法… — “I take refuge, prostrate with bowed head, to the Pure Land of Potalaka in the southern sea, the True Dharma…” — anchoring the Avalokiteśvara cult to Mt. Potalaka.
Abstract
The text expounds the Nīlakaṇṭha-Mahā-Karuṇika-dhāraṇī — the Great Compassion Mantra (Dàbēizhòu 大悲咒) — in operative Chinese-rendering form: each of the dhāraṇī-syllables is given with its semantic gloss, the iconography of Nīlakaṇṭha-Avalokiteśvara is specified, the vidyā-formulae and mudrā-repertoire are catalogued, and the siddhi-applications are listed. As Amoghavajra’s authoritative Chinese rendering of the Nīlakaṇṭha-dhāraṇī (which became the basis of the popular East Asian Dàbēizhòu), the text is a foundational document for the Chinese reception of this central Avalokiteśvara mantra. Together with KR6j0323 (Sanskrit-transliteration form by Dhyānabhadra) and the earlier Tang witnesses KR6j0321–KR6j0322, it forms the principal canonical apparatus for the Nīlakaṇṭha-Avalokiteśvara cult in the Chinese tradition.
Translations and research
- Reis-Habito, Maria. Die Dhāraṇī des Großen Erbarmens. Nettetal: Steyler, 1993 — definitive monograph.
- Lokesh Chandra. The Thousand-Armed Avalokiteśvara. Delhi: Abhinav, 1988.
- Studholme, Alexander. The Origins of Oṃ Maṇipadme Hūṃ. Albany: SUNY Press, 2002 — adjacent material on Avalokiteśvara mantra-cult.
Links
- CBETA T20n1113B
- Kanseki DB
- 不空 DILA
- Wikipedia (English)
- Dazangthings date evidence (750) — 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.