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攝大乘論

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Text ID
KR6n0059
Date
563–564
Dynasty
陳

Shè dàshèng lùn 攝大乘論

Compendium of the Mahāyāna (Asaṅga, Mahāyāna-saṅgraha) by 無著菩薩 (Wúzhuó púsà = Asaṅga, 造) and 真諦 (Zhēndì = Paramārtha, 譯)

About the work

真諦’s three-fascicle translation of Asaṅga’s Mahāyāna-saṅgraha — the second of three Chinese versions of this central Yogācāra compendium. Produced during Paramārtha’s Chén-period translation activity at Liángān 梁安 / Guǎngzhōu 廣州, this version became the doctrinal foundation of the Shèlùn 攝論 school of early Chinese Yogācāra and was the dominant Mahāyāna-saṅgraha in China for almost a century until 玄奘’s revised translation (KR6n0060, 648–649). Three fascicles (上中下), accompanied by Vasubandhu’s bhāṣya in KR6n0061 Shè dàshèng lùn shì (T31n1595, also by Paramārtha).

Structural Division

CANWWW (T31N1593) lists KR6n0058 Shè dàshèng lùn (T31n1592, Buddhaśānta) and KR6n0065 Shè dàshèng lùn shì (T31n1598, Asvabhāva commentary trans. Xuánzàng) as related texts. The three fascicles preserve the ten-chapter structure: (1) the ālayavijñāna and the jñeya-āśraya (knowable basis); (2) the three natures; (3) entry into knowledge of the basis; (4) the cause and result of entry; (5) the cultivation of the cause and result; (6) increase of adhiśīla; (7) increase of adhicitta; (8) increase of adhiprajñā; (9) result-elimination; (10) the result-knowledge / jñāna doctrine.

Abstract

The Paramārtha translation is the foundational text of the Shèlùn 攝論 school of early Chinese Yogācāra. Composed in 563–564 during the most productive years of Paramārtha’s southern translation activity, the work was transmitted through his disciples — chiefly Huìkǎi 慧愷 (518–568) and Fǎtài 法泰 — and became, with the Foxing lùn (KR6n0087) and Paramārtha’s Yogācārabhūmi fragments, the principal southern Yogācāra curriculum until Xuánzàng’s later translation activity supplanted them.

The translation is celebrated for its distinctive vocabulary, particularly Paramārtha’s use of “ālaya” (阿黎耶, sometimes 阿犁耶 or 阿羅耶) for the eighth consciousness, and his interpretation of the amala-vijñāna 阿摩羅識 (“untainted consciousness”) as a ninth, pure consciousness — a doctrinal position later contested by the Xuánzàng-Cí’ēn tradition (see KR6n0026). The Shèlùn school disputes between Paramārtha’s heirs (Tánqiān 曇遷, Lǐngrùn 靈潤) and the Cí’ēn school across the seventh century turn principally on this point.

The catalog dating (563–564) is firm: the Lìdài sānbǎo jì j. 9 records the translation completion in Tiānjiā 天嘉 4–5 (Chén). The Mahāyāna-saṅgraha itself is the central systematic Yogācāra treatise — a topical compendium of the entire path from the basis (āśraya) through the trainings (śikṣā) to the resultant kāya-doctrine — and its three Chinese translations (T1592, T1593, T1594) constitute one of the principal sites of comparative study for the development of the Yogācāra textual tradition.

Translations and research

  • Lamotte, Étienne. La somme du Grand Véhicule d’Asaṅga. Louvain, 1938.
  • Keenan, John P. The Summary of the Great Vehicle. Berkeley: Numata Center, 1992. (English trans. of T1593.)
  • Nagao Gadjin 長尾雅人. Shōdaijōron — wayaku to chūkai. Tokyo: Kōdansha, 1982–1987.
  • Funayama Tōru 船山徹. Shintai sanzō kenkyū ronshū. Kyoto, 2012.
  • Paul, Diana Y. Philosophy of Mind in Sixth-Century China. Stanford, 1984.

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