Guānfó sānmèihǎi jīng běnxíng pǐn dìbā 觀佛三昧海經本行品第八
The Eighth Original-Practice Chapter of the Sūtra on the Ocean of Buddha-Visualisation Samādhi (recension e, system 2) anonymous Chinese composition; critical edition by 黃霞 (整理)
About the work
The third (and final) system-2 recension of the Fó shuō xiānghǎo jīng — see KR6v0038 for the full description. This recension has both the shùnguān nìguān 順觀逆觀 instructions and the salvific-promise block, but omits the “sān niàn fó” 三念佛 rubric after each mark — suggesting it represents a textually purer (less liturgically marked-up) state of the system-2 lineage.
Abstract
See KR6v0038 for the full discussion of the five-recension structure and witness-base. The recension e survives in a single witness; the precise manuscript number is given in Huáng Xiá’s edition.
The Fó shuō xiānghǎo jīng cluster (KR6v0038–KR6v0042) is one of the principal lab-cases for studying the textual proliferation of Chinese popular Buddhism: from a single Indian source (T15n0643’s Guān xiàng pǐn + Běnxíng pǐn), a Chinese liturgical compiler produced a recitation manual; that manual then evolved through scribal accretion into five recensions in two systems, all preserved at Dūnhuáng. Comparable cases include the Tiāngōng jīng triad (KR6v0015–KR6v0017) and the Fómǔ jīng tetrad (KR6v0018–KR6v0021).
Translations and research
- See KR6v0038.