Fóshuō chímíngzàng yújiā dàjiào Zūnnuó púsà dàmíng chéngjiù yíguǐ jīng 佛說持明藏瑜伽大教尊那菩薩大明成就儀軌經
Sūtra of the Mahā-Vidyā-Accomplishment Ritual Manual of Cundī Bodhisattva from the Great-Teaching Yoga of the Vidyādhara-piṭaka, Spoken by the Buddha by 法賢 (Fǎxián, 譯)
About the work
A four-fascicle Northern Sòng Esoteric ritual sūtra translated by Făxián (法賢, d. 1001). Alternate title 持明藏尊那儀軌經. Internal heading: 龍樹菩薩於持明藏略出 — i.e., “extracted in abridged form by Nāgārjuna Bodhisattva from the Vidyādhara-piṭaka”. Colophon: 西天譯經三藏朝散大夫試光祿卿明教大師臣法賢奉詔譯. Taishō head-note: No. 1169 [cf. Nos. 1075–1079] — the related texts are the corpus of Cundī (尊那 / 准提 Cundī) sūtras and ritual manuals translated separately. CANWWW notes the structural division 大明成就分 (Mahā-vidyā-Accomplishment Section).
Abstract
The text presents a four-fascicle Esoteric ritual sūtra on Cundī (尊那 Cundī / Cundā; in later transcription 准提 / 准胝) — the seven-eyed, eighteen-armed Esoteric goddess derived from the Indic Cundī-dhāraṇī tradition. The text opens with the Buddha announcing the Mahāvairocana-Tathāgata Yoga Great-Teaching (大毘盧遮那如來瑜伽大教): for any kula-putra who wishes to cultivate the siddhi-methods, this sūtra provides the comprehensive ritual programme. The framing-claim — that Nāgārjuna Bodhisattva (龍樹菩薩) extracted these materials from the Vidyādhara-piṭaka (持明藏) — is the standard Indic-Buddhist trope of pseudepigraphic attribution to the great Madhyamaka master, here used to authorise the Esoteric ritual material. The four fascicles unfold the Mahā-vidyā Accomplishment Section (dàmíng chéngjiù fēn) at length, including the construction of the Cundī mandala, the mantra-cycle, the iconographic specifications of the goddess, the mudrā-repertoire, and the siddhi-applications. The text is one of the principal canonical authorities for the Cundī cult in Sòng-and-later Chinese Buddhism, complementing the better-known earlier Cundī-dhāraṇī-sūtras T1075 (Divākara), T1076 (Vajrabodhi), T1077 (Amoghavajra) and T1078 (anonymous Tang). For the textual relationships of the Cundī cycle see Gimello 2004.
The dating bracket follows Făxián’s translation activity at the Sòng Imperial Translation Bureau (989–1001).
Translations and research
- Gimello, Robert M. “Icon and Incantation: The Goddess Zhunti and the Role of Images in the Occult Buddhism of China.” In Images in Asian Religions: Texts and Contexts, ed. Phyllis Granoff and Koichi Shinohara, 225–256. Vancouver: UBC Press, 2004.
- Sen, Tansen. Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Trade. Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press, 2003.
- Bowring, Richard. “Brief Notes on the Sung Buddhist Translation Project.” Cahiers d’Extrême-Asie 7 (1993): 137–146.
Other points of interest
The pseudepigraphic attribution to Nāgārjuna’s extraction from the Vidyādhara-piṭaka is a characteristically Indic-Esoteric authorising trope, paralleling similar attributions in the Mahāmāyūrī and Mahāpratisarā corpora. The Cundī cult subsequently became one of the most active female-deity practices in Sòng-and-later Chinese popular Buddhism, with the goddess incorporated into both lay devotional and monastic ritual cycles.
Links
- CBETA T20n1169
- Kanseki DB
- 法賢 DILA
- Dazangthings date evidence (1001) — 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.