Dà shèng bǎo yào yì lùn 大乘寶要義論
Treatise on the Essential Meaning of Mahāyāna Treasures (Sūtrasamuccaya) by 法護 (Fǎhù / Faxian / Dharmapāla, 等譯)
About the work
A ten-juǎn anthology of canonical Mahāyāna sūtra-passages compiled to demonstrate the philosophical teachings of the bodhisattvayāna, traditionally ascribed to Nāgārjuna under the Sanskrit title Sūtrasamuccaya but more probably the work of a later Indian compiler. Translated under the Northern Sòng 北宋 by 法護 (Faxian / Dharmapāla, fl. 1004–1058) and his bureau at the Yìjīng-yuàn 譯經院 in Kāifēng. The text is one of the great anthologies of Mahāyāna sūtra-citation, comparable in scope to Śāntideva’s Śikṣāsamuccaya KR6o0040, which Faxian’s bureau also translated; together they provide a systematic catena of canonical authorities for Mahāyāna doctrine.
Structural Division
CANWWW (T32N1635) lists no internal sub-divisions for the ten juǎn.
Abstract
The colophon “西天譯經三藏朝散大夫試鴻臚少卿傳梵大師賜紫沙門臣法護等奉詔譯” — “Translated by imperial decree by Faxian, the Indian Tripiṭaka master, cháo-sǎn dà-fū (Court Gentleman of Dispersed Ranks), Acting Lesser Vice-Director of the Court of State Ceremonial, Master of Sanskrit Transmission, awarded the purple cassock, with others” — gives the standard formulation of Faxian’s official titles in the Sòng translation bureau. Faxian (法護) — to be distinguished from the early-fifth-century pilgrim Fǎxiǎn 法顯 — was an Indian monk who arrived in China in 1004 and led the Sòng translation effort for some five decades; the Dà shèng bǎo yào yì lùn is one of his major productions. The text is an anthology: each chapter takes up a Mahāyāna doctrinal theme (e.g. the ten perfections, the qualities of buddhahood, the practice of bodhicitta) and adduces extensive citations from named Mahāyāna sūtras (the Daśabhūmika, the Śūraṃgamasamādhi, the Saddharmapuṇḍarīka, etc.) in support. The Sanskrit Sūtrasamuccaya survives in Tibetan and in fragments of the Sanskrit; modern attribution generally rejects the Nāgārjuna ascription and places the text in the late fifth or sixth century. The Taishō uses the Korean canon as base text, collated against the Jīn 金 canon manuscript from Guǎngshèng-sì 廣勝寺.
Translations and research
- Pāsādika, Bhikkhu. Nāgārjuna’s Sūtrasamuccaya: A Critical Edition of the mDo kun las btus pa. Copenhagen: Akademisk Forlag, 1989. — Standard critical edition of the Tibetan with comparison to the Chinese.
- Lindtner, Christian. Nāgārjuniana. Copenhagen, 1982. — Discusses the attribution problem.
- Sengaku Mayeda 前田專學. “On the Sūtrasamuccaya.” Indogaku Bukkyōgaku kenkyū 12.1 (1963).
Links
- CBETA
- 法護 Fǎhù (Dharmapāla / “Faxian”) DILA
- Dazangthings date evidence (1050): T = CBETA, Taishō shinshū daizōkyō 大正新脩大藏經, ed. 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. Dazangthings source
- Kanseki DB