Fó shuō Bǎoxián tuóluóní jīng 佛說寶賢陀羅尼經
Sūtra of the Dhāraṇī of Pūrṇabhadra, Spoken by the Buddha by 法賢 (Fǎxián, formerly Tiānxīzāi 天息災, 譯)
About the work
A short one-fascicle Esoteric dhāraṇī-sūtra translated by Fǎ-xián (法賢, d. 1001), the Sòng court name of the Indian translator-monk Tiān-xī-zāi 天息災, one of the three principal early-Sòng translators alongside 法天 (Dharmadeva) and Shīhù 施護 (Dānapāla). The deity is Bǎo-xián 寶賢 (Skt. Pūrṇabhadra), the great yakṣa-king of treasures who in the Mahāmāyūrī lineage and elsewhere appears alongside his brother Maṇibhadra 滿賢 / 摩尼跋陀 as one of the principal yakṣa-generals of the wealth-cycle.
Abstract
The frame: the Buddha is at Jetavana in Śrāvastī (舍衛國祇樹給孤獨園), surrounded by the great bodhisattva-host. The great yakṣa-king named Pūrṇabhadra 寶賢 approaches the Buddha, prostrates, joins palms, and announces that he wishes to expound a “great secret heart-dhāraṇī” (大祕密心陀羅尼) that he has long wished to declare, asking the Buddha for the protective sanction.
He declares: any bhikṣu, bhikṣuṇī, upāsaka, or upāsikā who at the three times of day single-mindedly recites his dhāraṇī shall have him as their constant refuge — they will be granted in all matters auspicious result, supplied with food, clothing, bedding, gold-and-silver, and grain, granted accomplishment in all advantageous undertakings, and made beloved by all people, “save only those who indulge in lust, anger, and folly and the unwholesome dharmas.” The dhāraṇī proper follows. The Buddha approves the rite.
Bǎo-xián is essentially a yakṣa-class wealth-protector, comparable in function to but distinct from the Jambhala of the KR6j0514/KR6j0515 cycle and from the Vaiśravaṇa of the Northern-Heaven-King cycle. The text is a self-contained dhāraṇī-grant, characteristic of the early-Sòng translation programme’s many short Tāntric scriptures rendering pan-Indian yakṣa-cult dhāraṇīs into Chinese.
The dating bracket follows Tiānxīzāi / Fǎxián’s documented tenure at the Translation Institute (982 – 1001). His Chinese name was changed by imperial decree from 天息災 to 法賢 in Xiánpíng 3 (1000); this text is conventionally placed in his later, post-rename programme.
Translations and research
- Sen, Tansen. Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Trade: The Realignment of Sino-Indian Relations, 600–1400. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2003 — for the Sòng Translation Institute.
- Jan Yün-hua. “Buddhist Relations between India and Sung China.” History of Religions 6, no. 1 (1966): 24–42 and no. 2 (1966): 135–168.
- Bhattacharyya, Benoytosh. The Indian Buddhist Iconography. 2nd ed. Calcutta: Firma K. L. Mukhopadhyay, 1958 — for Pūrṇabhadra and the yakṣa-cult background.