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大方廣菩薩藏文殊師利根本儀軌經

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Text ID
KR6j0417
Date
982–1000
Dynasty
北宋

Dàfāngguǎng púsàzàng Wénshūshīlì gēnběn yíguǐ jīng 大方廣菩薩藏文殊師利根本儀軌經

Sūtra of the Root Ritual-Manual of Mañjuśrī, from the Mahāvaipulya-Bodhisattva-Piṭaka by 天息災 (Tiānxīzāi, avant la lettre of 法賢, 譯)

About the work

A massive twenty-fascicle Sòng-period Esoteric scripture — the Mañjuśrī-mūlakalpa (Mūlakalpa = “Root Ordinance”) — translated by Tiānxīzāi (天息災 — note: this colophon uses his pre-987 monastic name, which the catalog meta correctly retains; he was renamed to Fǎxián 法賢 in 987). The colophon reads 西天譯經三藏朝散大夫試鴻臚少卿明教大師臣天息災奉詔譯, i.e., the title 明教大師 conferred at the founding of the Translation Institute in 982 but before the renaming, dating the bulk of the translation to 982–987.

Abstract

The Mañjuśrī-mūlakalpa is one of the most encyclopedic kriyā/caryā-tantra texts in the Indian Buddhist canon — a vast compilation of dhāraṇī-rites, maṇḍala-rituals, royal-protection ceremonies, astrological lore, and historical and prophetic material organized around Mañjuśrī as the central deity. The Sanskrit text (preserved partially) is significantly larger still than the Chinese; Tiānxīzāi’s twenty-fascicle rendering is a substantial but not exhaustive abridgment.

The text opens with the Sequence Chapter (序品第一): the Buddha at the Tuṣita / Pure-Light Heaven (淨光天) addresses Pure-Light Devaputra (淨光天子) on the surpassing yoga-practices of the bodhisattva-assembly. The Mūlakalpa’s subsequent chapters cover, in turn:

  1. The maṇḍala-architecture of the Mañjuśrī-mūla-maṇḍala (its directions, gates, deity-arrangement, and consecration rite);
  2. The full mantra-repertoire of the cycle, including the one-syllable, five-syllable, six-syllable and eight-syllable Mañjuśrī mantras (cross-referenced to the smaller texts KR6j0395–KR6j0411);
  3. The standard Esoteric vidhi — abhiṣeka, homa, mudrā-cycles, dhyāna;
  4. Royal-protection rites (rāja-yāga / 護國法), including dhāraṇīs for the protection of king and kingdom against war, disease, and natural catastrophe;
  5. Predictive and prophetic content — most notably the prophetic chapter (often called the rāja-vyākaraṇa) which contains a famous prophecy-list of Indian dynasties, of major importance to historians of medieval India.

The text’s Sanskrit prophetic chapter is the principal Indian source for the Pāla-Sena dynastic chronology and has been intensively studied since Lévi (1902) and Jayaswal (1934). The Chinese rendering, however, drops or reformulates most of this Indian-historical material.

The dating bracket (982–1000) brackets Tiānxīzāi’s documented activity at the Sòng Translation Institute; the colophon’s use of the pre-987 name “天息災” suggests that the translation was completed before 987, though the official entry into the Sòngběn canon may have been later.

Translations and research

  • Lalou, Marcelle. “Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa et Tārāmūlakalpa.” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 2 (1936): 327–349.
  • Jayaswal, K. P. An Imperial History of India in a Sanskrit Text [c. 700 B.C. – c. 770 A.D.] with a Special Commentary on Later Gupta Period. Lahore: Motilal Banarsi Das, 1934. (Edition and translation of the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa prophecy-chapter.)
  • Lévi, Sylvain. “Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa.” (Various studies, 1902 onward.)
  • Wallis, Glenn. Mediating the Power of Buddhas: Ritual in the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa. Albany: SUNY Press, 2002.
  • Delhey, Martin. “The Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa: A Preliminary Analysis of Its Structure.” In Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia, ed. Charles D. Orzech, Henrik H. Sørensen, and Richard K. Payne, 184–211. Leiden: Brill, 2011.

Other points of interest

The Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa is the single most important Mañjuśrī Esoteric text in the Indian canon, and its Chinese rendering by Tiānxīzāi is the longest of the Sòng-period imperial-decree translations. Its prophetic chapter in the Sanskrit version is a foundational source for the political history of medieval India, though this material is largely absent from the Chinese version — a notable instance of late-medieval Chinese reception filtering out Indian-specific historical content.

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