Zàoxiàng liángdù jīng 造像量度經
Sūtra of Image-Construction Measurements (Citralakṣaṇa)
by 工布查布 (譯)
About the work
A single-juan iconometric scripture translated from Tibetan (and ultimately from Sanskrit Citra-lakṣaṇa / Pratimā-lakṣaṇa tradition) by 工布查布 Gönpojab (mGon po skyabs; mid-18th-century Mongol-Tibetan-Chinese translator at the Qīng court). The colophon identifies the translator as 大清內閣掌譯番蒙諸文西番學總管儀賓工布查布譯 — i.e. Dà-Qīng nèigé zhǎngyì fān-Méng zhūwén Xīfānxué zǒngguǎn yíbīn Gōngbùcháb yì (“Director-General of [Western-Tibetan and] Mongolian Studies in the Inner Cabinet of the Great Qīng, Imperial-In-Law Gönpojab, translator”). The text is the foundational iconometric scripture in the late-imperial Chinese Buddhist canon, and was supplemented by Gönpojab’s own commentary KR6j0658 (T1419). The Sanskrit base belongs to the Indian Citralakṣaṇa iconometric tradition, transmitted through Tibetan canonical bstan-‘gyur witnesses.
Abstract
“Thus have I heard”: the Buddha is at Śrāvastī, Jeta Grove, with bodhisattvamahāsattvas, śrāvaka-disciples, all human and deva, and nāga-class beings, an immeasurable retinue. The Buddha is about to ascend to the Trāyastriṃśa heaven to preach to his mother. Śāriputra (賢者舍利弗) approaches, prostrates, and addresses the Buddha: “World-Honoured One, while you are absent — should there be a virtuous person who, in his longing, wishes to make an image of the World-Honoured One — what is the law for doing so?”
The Buddha replies: “Excellent, Śāriputra. I now ascend briefly to the deva-realm and have not yet returned. Or after my anuparinirvāṇa, when virtuous persons in their longing wish to make an image of me — and for the meritorious aim of self- and other-benefit — they wish to construct an image of me. They must follow the Law of Iconometric Measurement (量度法 māna-vidhi). The body-measurements of the Tathāgata are ‘broad-and-tall in equal correspondence’ (縱廣相稱), like the nyagrodha tree, complete in one vyāma / fathom. Now I will summarise for you, beginning from the topmost uṣṇīṣa, the proportional measurements (大小節分豎橫制度) of the bodily limbs and joints. Listen carefully and reflect on it well.” Whereupon the Buddha pronounces the verse-formula:
“Measured by the practitioner’s own finger, [the body] is 120 fingers; the uṣṇīṣa is 4 fingers, and the hairline likewise. The face’s vertical measurement is 12 finger-lengths and a half. Divided into three: the forehead, the nose, and the chin — each one part.”
The text then continues with detailed iconometric prescriptions for every part of the Buddha-body — the eye, nose, mouth, ear, throat, shoulders, breast, arms, hands, fingers, navel, hips, thighs, knees, calves, ankles, and the padma-seat — each in finger-units relative to the practitioner’s own measurements. The text concludes with prescriptions for the cakra on the soles, the uṣṇīṣa curls, and the colours of the cīvara and the body.
Translations and research
- Mochizuki Shinjō 望月信成. “Zōzō ryōdokyō no kenkyū” 造像量度經の研究, Bukkyō Geijutsu 11 (1951): 56–84.
- Bentor, Yael. Consecration of Images and Stūpas. Leiden: Brill, 1996. — for the broader Indo-Tibetan iconometric tradition.
- Brilliant, Richard, and Tomi Suzuki. “Citralakṣaṇa: An Old Treatise on Indian Painting,” Marg — for the Indian Citralakṣaṇa base text.
- Goepper, Roger, et al. Alchi: Ladakh’s Hidden Buddhist Sanctuary. London: Serindia, 1996. — for the iconometric tradition’s Tibetan-Himalayan reception.
Other points of interest
This text and its sister-commentary KR6j0658 (T1419) are the foundational iconometric texts of late-imperial Chinese Buddhism, used as normative reference works in the Qīng-court Buddhist sculpture and painting tradition. They mark the systematic late-imperial assimilation of Tibetan-Indian iconometry into the orthodox Chinese Buddhist canon — a programme actively patronised by the Qiánlóng emperor as part of the broader Qīng integration of Tibetan Buddhism into the imperial state.
Links
- CBETA online: https://cbetaonline.dila.edu.tw/zh/X0028
- Companion (commentary) text: KR6j0658
- Kanseki DB