Text: T1420; 龍樹五明論

No

[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.

• T1420; 龍樹五明論

Entry author: Michael Radich

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• Title: 龍樹五明論
• Identifier: T1420

No

[Lowe 2014]  Lowe, Bryan D. “The Scripture on Saving and Protecting Body and Life: An Introduction and Translation.” Journal of Chinese Buddhist Studies 27 (2014): 1-34. — 16-17

• T1237; 阿吒婆拘鬼神大將上佛陀羅尼神呪經
• T1238; Dhāraṇī Book of Āṭavaka General of the Demons; 阿吒婆𤘽鬼神大將上佛陀羅尼經
• T1311; 梵天火羅九曜
• T1336; 陀羅尼雜集
• T1420; 龍樹五明論

Lowe discusses references to copying out the text on "fine paper" 好紙 as a possible sign of Chinese authorship. The only five texts in which this phrase appears, in the translation portion of the canon, are the 阿吒婆拘鬼神大將上佛陀羅尼神呪經 T1237; the 阿吒婆𤘽鬼神大將上佛陀羅尼經 T1238; the 梵天火羅九曜 T1311; the 陀羅尼雜集 T1336; and the 龍樹五明論 T1420. "Each of these hits points to sources that likely originated, at least in part, in China." The passages in question in T1237, T1238 and T1336 are identical, and feature a spell related to the deity Āṭavaka 阿吒婆拘. Āṭavaka is likely of Indic origin, but only found in Chinese texts, "and became particularly important in the sixth century...these spells include some Sinitic elements". T1420 "was composed in China"; Lowe refers to Strickmann (2002): 170, who argued for a date in the sixth century, but also states that Stuart Young argues "convincingly" for a later date in a forthcoming publication (Conceiving the Patriarchs, U. Hawai'i Press). T1311 was compiled by Yixing 一行 [see the note at the head of the text: 一行禪師修述, T1311:21.459b5---MR].

Entry author: Michael Radich

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No

[Strickmann 2002]  Strickmann, Michel. Chinese Magical Medicine. Edited by Bernard Faure. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002. — 170-178

• T1420; 龍樹五明論

Strickmann characterises T1420 by saying that it "seems to have been written in North China during the sixth century." He notes that the text "appears to survive in only a single manuscript copy, made in Japan probably in the eleventh or twelfth century and preserved there in a monastic archive." Strickmannn discusses the content of the text in some detail. He notes that the text includes a passage in which "the chief concern of [a group of] converted brahmans is with the writing of talismans---and talismans of a familiar Chinese sort". He also notes the presence in the text of the twelve hours of the Chinese day.

A note added by the editors [probably Faure], 321 n. 76, gives several references on this text, including Osabe Kazuo, Tō Sō mikkyōshi zakkō 唐宋密教史雑考 (Kyoto: Nagata bunshodō, 1982): 234-247.

Entry author: Michael Radich

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• People: Anonymous (China), 失譯, 闕譯, 未詳撰者, 未詳作者, 不載譯人 (author)
• Date: 500-600

No

[Young 2015]  Young, Stuart. Conceiving the Indian Buddhist Patriarchs in China. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2015. — 170 ff.

• T1420; 龍樹五明論

The Longshu wuming lun 龍樹五明論 T1420 "identifies itself as the sole remaining fragment of an enormous text of some ten thousand scrolls". The text (T1420 21.967b) attributes itself to Aśvaghoṣa and Nāgārjuna. Young cites Strickmann (2002, 170), who speculates that the larger text was composed in northern China during the sixth century, following Osabe Kazuo‘s 長部和雄 suggestion that it is an excerpt from the Wuming lun 五明論 listed in the Sui-Tang Buddhist catalogues as a translation completed in 558 by Jñānabhadra and Jinayaśa at Poqie si 婆伽寺 in Chang'an.

Young argues that T1420 was attributed to Aśvaghoṣa and Nāgārjuna during the mid-Tang dynasty, around the time that the Wuming lun and the Poluomen tianwen 婆羅門天文 went missing from the canon, namely the 8th or 9th century. The evidence supporting this conclusion is threefold: (1) In the Xin Huayan jing lun 新華嚴經論 T1739 by Li Tongxuan 李通玄 (ca. 635-730), there is a passing reference to Nagārjuna’s talismanic seals. (2) Like T1420, The Jinpiluo tongzi weide jing 金毘羅童子威德經 T1289, composed around the 8th-9th centuries, gives a similar portrayal of Nāgārjuna and Aśvaghoṣa prescribing ritual techniques. This may have prompted some editor to ascribe T1420 to the two (Young refers to Osabe 1982, 243). (3) The Wuming lun and Poluomen tianwen were often associated with the non-Buddhist forms of the “five sciences”. "It is not difficult to imagine" that in order to ensure their preservation, an anonymous editor made an excerpt from the Wuming lun and ascribed it to Nāgārjuna. Furthermore, "by the middle of the Tang, Nāgārjuna had become associated with broader canons of Buddhist spell-craft, and was incorporated into the lineage of the burgeoning Esoteric Buddhist tradition."

Entry author: Chia-wei Lin

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