Fóshuō yīqiè rúlái jīngāng shòumìng tuóluóní jīng 佛說一切如來金剛壽命陀羅尼經
Sūtra of the Vajra-Longevity Dhāraṇī of All Tathāgatas Spoken by the Buddha by 不空 (Bùkōng, Amoghavajra, 譯)
About the work
A one-fascicle Tang Esoteric dhāraṇī sūtra translated by Amoghavajra (不空). Alternate title 壽命陀羅尼經. The colophon names Amoghavajra as 開府儀同三司特進試鴻臚卿肅國公食邑三千戶賜紫贈司空諡大鑑正號大廣智大興善寺三藏沙門不空奉詔譯. The Taishō head-note: No. 1135. CANWWW lists this together with KR6j0352 (T1136) as a pair of related texts within the longevity-dhāraṇī cycle, and the work belongs to the same Amoghavajra Vajra-āyuṣ group as KR6j0348, KR6j0349, KR6j0350.
Abstract
The text frames the Vajra-āyuṣ-dhāraṇī in the standard sūtra form: opening on the bank of the Gaṅgā with a great assembly, the Buddha addresses the Four Heavenly Kings (毘沙門等四天王) on the four fearsome conditions afflicting all beings — birth, ageing, sickness, and death — and identifies death-fear (死怖) as the chief enemy. Facing east, the Buddha snaps his fingers to summon all the Tathāgatas of the ten directions and propounds the Vajra-Longevity Dhāraṇī as the antidote, with the Tathāgatas joining in anumodanā. The text thus serves as the canonical-sūtra warrant for the longevity-prolongation practice that is operationalised in the companion ritual texts T1133 and T1134. Together with T1136 (KR6j0352) it transmits the Vajra-Longevity material under a slightly different doctrinal framing — T1135 invoking “all Tathāgatas” as the source, T1136 routing the dhāraṇī through Samantabhadra. Both belong to the cluster of late-Tang esoteric āyuṣ-cult literature that fed into the Sòng-period Aparimita-āyuṣ devotion.
Translations and research
- Strickmann, Michel. Mantras et mandarins: Le bouddhisme tantrique en Chine. Paris: Gallimard, 1996.
- Orzech, Charles D. Politics and Transcendent Wisdom: The Scripture for Humane Kings in the Creation of Chinese Buddhism. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1998.
Links
- CBETA T20n1135
- Kanseki DB
- 不空 DILA
- 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.