五字陀羅尼頌

Wǔzì tuóluóní sòng 五字陀羅尼頌

Verses on the Five-Syllable Dhāraṇī (Pañcākṣaradhāraṇīkārikā) by 不空 (Bùkōng, Amoghavajra, 譯)

About the work

A one-fascicle Tang Esoteric verse-text translated by Amoghavajra (不空, 705–774). Sanskrit title (per CANWWW): Pañcākṣaradhāraṇīkārikā. Colophon: full Amoghavajra titulature with 大廣智大興善寺三藏沙門不空奉詔譯. The text consists of kārikā-style verses (頌) on the Mañjuśrī Five-Syllable formula. Companion to KR6j0395, KR6j0396, KR6j0399, and KR6j0400 in the Mañjuśrī-Pañcākṣarī cycle.

Abstract

The text opens with the foundational doctrinal-pedagogic verse-frame: Among hundreds of thousands of yoga-systems, the great Vajra-master expounded the holy Mañjuśrī-kumāra’s secret method of the five syllables (百千瑜伽中 金剛大師說 聖曼殊童子 五字祕密法). The remainder of the text proceeds in kārikā-verse form, treating the bīja-cluster A Ra Pa Ca Na as the doctrinal-ritual heart of Mañjuśrī’s Prajñāpāramitā embodiment. Each syllable receives meditative-and-iconographic-and-doctrinal exegesis (e.g., A as anutpāda “non-arising”; Ra as rajas “passion-purified”; Pa as paramārtha “ultimate”; Ca as caryā “practice”; Na as nāman “name-and-form”). The kārikā-verse format makes the text suitable for memorisation and recitation as a doctrinal-mnemonic compendium of the Mañjuśrī-Pañcākṣarī tradition. The text complements the prose-and-narrative T1171/T1172 ritual texts and the longer T1175 supplication-and-offering manual.

The dating bracket follows Amoghavajra’s translation activity at Cháng’ān (746–774).

Translations and research

• Birnbaum, Raoul. Studies on the Mysteries of Mañjuśrī. Boulder: Society for the Study of Chinese Religions, 1983.
• Goble, Geoffrey. Chinese Esoteric Buddhism: Amoghavajra. New York: Columbia University Press, 2019.

Links

• CBETA T20n1174
• 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.