Mànshūshìlì púsà jíxiáng jiātuó 曼殊室利菩薩吉祥伽陀
Auspicious Gāthā of Mañjuśrī Bodhisattva by 法賢 (Fǎxián, 譯)
About the work
A one-fascicle Sòng-period gāthā (“verse-hymn”, jiātuó = gāthā) of Mañjuśrī, translated by Fǎxián (法賢, d. 1000) at the Sòng Translation Institute. 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.
Abstract
The text consists of a Sanskrit auspicious gāthā (maṅgala-gāthā) of Mañjuśrī rendered phonetically into Chinese as a continuous chain of transliterated syllables: 鉢囉(二合)倪焬(二合)誐桑誐(一)酤里隷(引)訥婆(二合)嚩(二)冒地唧大(引三)曼儒(仁祖切)室哩(二合)曳(引)… (= prajñā-gaṅgā-kulī-leha-udbhava-bodhicittaṃ Mañjuśriye…).
This is a recitational text — a liturgical mantra-hymn in transliteration — comparable in form to the dhāraṇī-saṃgraha genre. The Chinese transliteration preserves the Sanskrit phonology with characteristic fǎnqiè gloss-marks (二合, 引, 仁祖切 etc.) for vowel-length, conjunct-consonant combination, and special pronunciations. The sūtra’s audience is the Esoteric practitioner who has received initiation and uses the gāthā as a daily recitation; the doctrinal content is encoded in the Sanskrit praise-and-invocation register.
The dating bracket follows Fǎxián’s tenure at the Sòng Translation Institute (982–1000).
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located.
Links
- CBETA T20n1196
- 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.