Rúlái fāngbiàn shànqiǎo zhòu jīng 如來方便善巧呪經
Sūtra of the Tathāgata’s Skilful-Means Dhāraṇī by 闍那崛多 (Jñānagupta, 譯)
About the work
A one-fascicle Suí dhāraṇī-sūtra, the Suí re-translation of the same Indic text (Sanskrit Saptabuddhakasūtra) that the anonymous Liáng-period KR6j0563 T1333 already rendered as Xūkōngzàng púsà wèn qī fó tuóluóní zhòu jīng. Translated by 闍那崛多 Jñānagupta (Shénàjuéduō; 523–600) at the Suí Dàxīngshànsì 大興善寺, almost certainly during his Suí-period activity (after 587, before his death in 600). CANWWW lists T20N1147 and KR6j0563 T1333 explicitly as related texts.
Abstract
The frame story is essentially identical to KR6j0563: the Buddha at Kailāsa with five hundred bhikṣus and five hundred mahāsattvas; two of the bhikṣus are possessed (one by a demon, “his body unclothed and unaware”, the other “deviated, with his back turned to the Buddha, in mid-air uttering wails and unable to be at ease”); Ākāśagarbha 虛空藏 inquires; each of the Seven Buddhas of the Past pronounces in turn a vidyā-spell, with the same fruits as in KR6j0563 (cure of disease, suppression of demonic possession, protection of the dhāraṇī-holder). The translation idiom is recognisably Jñānagupta’s: more closely calqued on the Indic syntax than the Liáng version, and with his characteristic introduction of double-syllable transcription markers.
The relationship between the two recensions is a textbook case of Suí-Táng “re-translation” — Jñānagupta could see the Liáng version (it was already in the catalog tradition by his time) and produced his version not as a correction but as a new working from a fresh manuscript. Nanjio N0367. The text is recorded in the Lìdài sānbǎo jì 歷代三寶紀 and the Kāiyuán shìjiào lù 開元釋教錄 under Jñānagupta’s name.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located.