Text: T0234; 佛說濡首菩薩無上清淨分衛經; Jueliao zhufa ru huanhua sanmei jing 決了諸法如幻化三昧經

Summary

Identifier T0234 [T]
Title 佛說濡首菩薩無上清淨分衛經 [T]
Date 劉宋 [Ono and Maruyama 1933-1936]
Translator 譯 Xiang gong, 翔公 [T]

There may be translations for this text listed in the Bibliography of Translations from the Chinese Buddhist Canon into Western Languages. If translations are listed, this link will take you directly to them. However, if no translations are listed, the link will lead only to the head of the page.

There are resources for the study of this text in the SAT Daizōkyō Text Dabatase (Saṃgaṇikīkṛtaṃ Taiśotripiṭakaṃ).

Assertions

Preferred? Source Pertains to Argument Details

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.

Entry author: Michael Radich

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  • Title: 佛說濡首菩薩無上清淨分衛經
  • People: Xiang gong, 翔公 (translator 譯)
  • Identifier: T0234

No

[Ono and Maruyama 1933-1936]  Ono Genmyō 小野玄妙, Maruyama Takao 丸山孝雄, eds. Bussho kaisetsu daijiten 佛書解說大辭典. Tokyo: Daitō shuppan, 1933-1936 [縮刷版 1999]. — s.v., Vol.9, 302-305 (Fukaura Seibun 深浦正文)

Fukaura Seibun 深浦正文 states that the Rushou pusa wushang qingjing fenwei jing 濡首菩薩無上清淨分衛經 T234 was translated probably by Xiang gong 翔公 in the Liu Song 劉宋 period, as shown in the Taishō. He also describes the various attributions given to this text by the catalogues. His descriptions can be summarized as follows: CSZJJ 出三藏記集 lists the text as anonymous. Fajing’s Zhongjing mulu states that the text was translated by Xiang gong in the South Seas 南海, and the catalogues after Fajing followed that account. LDSBJ 三寶記 lists this text and another text with the same title translated by Yan Fotiao 嚴佛調. This description is also taken up by the later catalogues. Fukaura claims that it is dubious whether this version by Yan Fotiao ever existed. In addition to those titles, LDSBJ records a text entitled Fuzhou pusa jing 濡首菩薩經. According to CSZJJ, this should be the same text as the Rushou pusa wushang qingjing fenwei jing, but Fajing and the catalogues after him considered it an independent alternate translation. LDSBJ adds that this Fushou pusa jing was translated in the Wei-Wu 魏呉 or the Han 漢 period. Fukaura states that it is likely that Rushou pusa jing is just an alternate title for the Rushou pusa wushang qingjing fenwei jing, as CSZJJ suggested. He speculates that due to wars and the persecution of Buddhism under the Song, many translation works were produced in the rural areas, and remained anonymous. Those texts were often given different attributions by the catalogues compiled in later times (this insight of Fukaura might suggest that T234 is anonymous, as CSZJJ says; he does not explain why he thinks that the text was probably translated by Xiang gong in this article). The exact year of composition of this text is unknown. The content of the text corresponds to the Eighth Cycle 第八會, *Nāgaśrī portion 那伽室利分 in of the *Mahāprajñāpāramitā-sūtra 大般若經 translated by Xuanzang 玄奘.

Entry author: Atsushi Iseki

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No

[CSZJJ]  Sengyou 僧祐. Chu sanzang ji ji (CSZJJ) 出三藏記集 T2145. — T2145 (LV) 21c19

In Sengyou's Chu sanzang ji ji, T234 is regarded as an anonymous translation, that is to say, it is listed in the "Newly Compiled Continuation of the Assorted List of Anonymous Translations" 新集續撰失譯雜經錄 (juan 4).

儒[v.l.軟SYM]首菩薩無上清淨分衛經二卷(一名決了諸法如幻化三昧經).

Entry author: Michael Radich

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No

[Fei 597]  Fei Changfang 費長房. Lidai sanbao ji (LDSBJ) 歷代三寶紀 T2034. — T2034 (XLIX) 54a15-16, 93c25-94a1

In LDSBJ, this title (T234) is ascribed once to Yan Fotiao, with no source; and again to Xiang gong, citing the Shixing lu, Dao’an (and? via?) CSZJJ.

Entry author: Michael Radich

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No

[Fajing 594]  Fajing 法經. Zhongjing mulu 眾經目錄 T2146. — T2146 (LV) 115b22-23

Ascribed to Xiang gong in an interlinear note: 濡首菩薩無上清淨分衛經二卷(一名決了諸法如幻化三昧經)( [朔-月+羽][v.l. 宋沙門釋朔 SYM]公於南海譯)

[MR: This appears to be the first time T234 is ascribed to Xiang gong; it is treated as anonymous in CSZJJ.]

Entry author: Michael Radich

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No

[Sakaino 1935]  Sakaino Kōyō 境野黄洋. Shina Bukkyō seishi 支那佛教精史. Tokyo: Sakaino Kōyō Hakushi Ikō Kankōkai, 1935. — 91-92

Sakaino states that five titles are ascribed to Yan Fotiao in KYL:

the Rushou pusa jing 濡首菩薩經 (2 juan) (cf. T234);
the Da shanquan jing 大善權經 (2 juan) (cf. T345);
the Gu Weimojie jing 古維摩詰經 (2 juan) (cf. T474);
the Siyi jing 思意經 (1 juan);
and the Pusa nei xi liu boluomi jing 菩薩内習六波羅蜜經(1 juan) T778.

All of these ascriptions are taken from LDSBJ and highly unreliable.

Entry author: Atsushi Iseki

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No

[Naitō 1970]  Naitō Ryūo 内藤竜雄. "Hō Kyō roku ni tsuite 法經錄について." IBK 19, no. 1 (1970): 235-238.

Naitō gives some general information about Fajing's 法經 Zhongjing mulu 眾經目錄 T2146. It was composed in the space of two months in 594 by a commission of 22 scholars. Hayashiya argued that the catalogue was composed in preparation for the copying of the full canon. Naitō argues that there must have been some circumstances precipitating the rush. He notes that suspicious texts were also recorded and categorised as such, which would be odd if the sole purpose of the catalogue was to list works to be included in an approved version of the canon. He therefore proposes that the catalogue, and the canon connected to it, were prepared as a response to the notorious incident in Guangzhou in 593 surrounding the use of the Zhancha jing 占察經, in which practices of self-flagellation, "stupa repentance" rites, and the "mixing of the sixes" were connected with the use of a scripture that a commission of experts then declared spurious. Among the reasons they gave that the text was inauthentic was that the text was recorded in no earlier catalogues, which Naitō treats as circumstantial evidence that there was a mentality current that could see the compilation of a new catalogue as associated with a similar agenda to determine which texts were authoritative and, by implication, which were spurious, in order to forestall recurrence of like incidents.

Naitō also treats the problem of the sources of Fajing's work. Determination of his sources is made difficult by the fact that the catalogue does not explicitly give its sources. Fei Zhangfang/Changfang says that Fajing had seventeen catalogues at his disposal, but then does not himself admit that so many catalogues were extant in their time. Naitō reports very briefly that he has compared the treatment of extant translations in Fajing with treatment in other sources, for a total of 79 translators and 556 works, but here gives no details, rather, promising to report his findings in another venue. He notes that a total of 428 texts were ascribed to named translators in CSZJJ, but in Fajing, that number increases to 459 for translators down to the end of the Qi (i.e. before Sengyou's time). In other words, Fajing has added at least 31 new ascriptions. As a matter of fact, there are 34 more ascriptions on which Fajing does not agree with CSZJJ, for a total of 65 new ascriptions. Naitō is unable to determine Fajing's sources for these ascriptions, but he notes that in total, they entail, among other things, the addition of nine new "translators" to the record: Tanguo 曇果 [cf. T196], Tankejialuo 曇柯迦羅 [to whom no extant texts are ascribed today], Kang Sengkai 康僧鎧 [cf. T360, T1432, X11], Fajian 法堅 [cf. T495], Zhi Fadu 支法度 [cf. T17, T527], An Faqin 安法欽 [cf. T816, T2042], Fahai 法海 [cf. T1490], Xian gong 先公 [cf. T640, T641], and Xiang gong 翔公 [cf. T234].

Naitō argues that probably five catalogues were in fact extant at Fajing's (and Fei's) time, in addition to GSZ: CSZJJ, Baochang's 寶唱 catalogue, Li Kuo's 李廓 catalogue, Fashang's 法上 catalogue, and the Zhongjing bielu 眾經別錄. Prior scholarship had understood that Baochang collected information from a range of older catalogues, and that Baochang was in turn the proximate source for the use of information from these older catalogues in Fei's LDSBJ (Naitō refers to Tokiwa for this view). Naitō doubts this, because he believes that Baochang only reported 226 ascriptions for sutras, and this number probably did not exceed 300 even when śāstras and vinaya works are taken into account; but this total is too few to account for the profusion of new information reported under the Sui. He notes further that comparison to CSZJJ, the only case in which we can check Fei's information against his source, shows that when LDSBJ says "see such-and-such a catalogue", it only means that the title is listed in the source, not the ascription --- CSZJJ is cited in this manner for texts that CSZJJ itself clearly treats as anonymous.

Naitō also discusses Fajing's probable use of Fashang's catalogue. He notes that Fashang stopped at about 568-570, and that Fajing does the same. He takes this fact to indicate that Fajing just took Fashang's information over holus-bolus, and suggests that ascriptions to Fajian, Fahai, and Xian gong were probably added on this basis.

Entry author: Michael Radich

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No

[Zacchetti 2015]  Zacchetti, Stefano. “Prajñāpāramitā Sūtras.” In Brill’s Encyclopedia of Buddhism, Volume One: Literature and Languages, edited by Jonathan Silk, Oskar von Hinüber, and Vincent Eltschinger, 171-209. Leiden: Brill, 2015. — 199

The received ascription of 濡首菩薩無上清淨分衛經 T234 to Xiang gong 翔公 goes back to LDSBJ, and has been questioned by Hikata, xvi, and Kajiyoshi, 138-139. Zacchetti suggests further that it is unclear to what extent T234 is a separate text from T220(8), following Kajiyoshi 139. Referring to:

Kajiyoshi Kōun 梶芳光運. Daijō Bukkyō no seiritsu shiteki kenkyū–Genshi hannyakyō no kenkyū: sono ichi 大乗仏教の成立史的研究—原始般若経の研究:その一. Tokyo: The Sankibo Press, 1980.

Hikata, Ryusho 1958. Suvikrāntavikrāmi-paripṛcchā-Prajñāpāramitā-sūtra Edited with an Introductory Essay. Fukuoka: Comittee of Commemoration Program for Dr. Hikata's Retirement from Professorship, Kyushu University.

Entry author: Michael Radich

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