Pú tí xīn lí xiāng lùn 菩提心離相論
Treatise on the Bodhi-Mind Free of Marks (Bodhicitta-vivaraṇa) by 龍樹菩薩 (Lóngshù púsà / Nāgārjuna, 造) and 施護 (Shīhù / Dānapāla, 譯)
About the work
A short one-juǎn prose treatise traditionally attributed to 龍樹菩薩 (Nāgārjuna, c. 150–250) and translated into Chinese by 施護 (Dānapāla, fl. 980–1017) at the Sòng-period imperial Yìjīng-yuàn 譯經院. The title means “Treatise on the Bodhi-Mind Free of Characteristics/Marks” — the bodhicitta understood through the lens of śūnyatā, free of all signs and conceptual constructions. The text is commonly identified with Nāgārjuna’s Bodhicitta-vivaraṇa (“Exposition of the Bodhi-Mind”), one of the principal Madhyamaka treatises on bodhicitta; this identification, however, has been questioned in modern scholarship since the Tibetan Byang chub sems kyi ‘grel pa (D 1800/1801) corresponds only loosely to the Chinese.
Structural Division
CANWWW (T32N1661) does not record an internal sub-division.
Abstract
The Taishō text opens “菩提心離相論 / 龍樹菩薩造 / 西天譯經三藏朝奉大夫試光祿卿傳法大師賜紫臣施護奉詔譯”. The opening sentence (“歸命一切佛。我今略說菩提心義”) signals the work’s character as a brief, programmatic exposition. The translation is fixed by the Yìjīng-yuàn records of the Sòng dynasty within Dānapāla’s long career between 982 and his death around 1017. The Sanskrit original of the Bodhicitta-vivaraṇa survives only in fragments; the Tibetan version (D 1800) is the principal complete witness, and comparison with the Chinese suggests they are translations of related but not identical recensions, with Dānapāla’s Chinese being closer to a vyākhyā on a slightly different Bodhicitta-vivaraṇa than the Tibetan represents. The attribution to Nāgārjuna is generally accepted in Tibetan tradition but is disputed by some modern scholars who place the work among the late Madhyamaka bodhicitta literature of the post-Bhāvaviveka period rather than as a genuine Nāgārjuna composition.
Translations and research
- Lindtner, Christian. Nagarjuniana: Studies in the Writings and Philosophy of Nāgārjuna. Copenhagen, 1982. — Treats authenticity of the Bodhicitta-vivaraṇa attribution.
- Wedemeyer, Christian K. “Tantric Buddhism and the Origin of Bodhicitta-vivaraṇa.” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies (various). — Late dating arguments.
- Williams, Paul. Mahāyāna Buddhism: The Doctrinal Foundations. London: Routledge, 2nd ed. 2009. — Treats the Bodhicitta-vivaraṇa in the Madhyamaka context.
Other points of interest
The work is one of three Sòng-period imperial-translation bodhicitta texts attributed (some questionably) to Nāgārjuna: this work, the [[KR6o0067|Pútí xíng jīng 菩提行經]] (T1662, actually Śāntideva’s Bodhicaryāvatāra — see KR6o0067 for the misattribution), and the [[KR6o0069|Guǎng-shì pútí-xīn lùn 廣釋菩提心論]] (T1664, by Kamalaśīla, not Nāgārjuna). Together these reflect the late tenth- and eleventh-century Sòng program of recovering Indian Mahāyāna bodhicitta literature.
Links
- CBETA
- Dazangthings date evidence (1000): [ T ] T = CBETA [Chinese Buddhist Electronic Text Association]. Taishō shinshū daizōkyō 大正新脩大藏經. Edited by 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. https://dazangthings.nz/cbc/source/1/