The Mahavadanasutra A Reconstruction of Chapter VI ＆ V (original) (raw)
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ARIRIAB, 2020
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Paris: École française d’Extrême-Orient (Monographies, n° 195), 2017
Speculations about buddhas and bodhisattvas flourished with a remarkable dynamism between the 1st and the 6th century CE. This so-called “Middle Period” of Indian Buddhism is, for instance, characterized by the growth of the Bodhisattvayāna, the movement promoting the path to perfect Awakening (samyaksambodhi), understood as a realisation far superior to that the achieved by arhants. The present book aims at tracing these “buddhological” developments within the literature of the Mahāsāṅghika-Lokottaravāda, a lineage that was influential in Magadha and in the Northwest of South Asia during the period considered. This historical enquiry is rooted in a philological praxis, and, in particular, it is achieved by scrutinising the formation and the vicissitudes of an integral part of the school's Vinayapiṭaka, namely the Mahāvastu. The latter work, dealing with the lengthy bodhisattva career and the last birth of the Buddha Śākyamuni, is vast and composite. The reconstruction of distinct phases in its composition necessarily entails a close examination of the witnesses transmitting the work and, in particular, of its earliest copy, being a 12th century CE palm-leaf manuscript preserved in Nepal. The study, which forms the first part of this book, is therefore grounded on the new annotated edition and French translation of carefully selected sections of the Mahāvastu, featuring as part two. The close study of these key sections allows to uncover the editorial and rhetorical practices of Mahāsāṅghika milieux, as well as some of their core doctrines. This book therefore contributes to furthering our understanding of the monastic lineages, the canonical corpora, and the soteriology of Indian Buddhism. This monograph, recipient of the Collette Caillat Prize in Indology at the Institut de France (2018), has been reviewed by G. Ducoeur in the Revue de l'Histoire des Religions (2021/4): https://doi.org/10.4000/rhr.11617 and by N. McGovern in Religions of South Asia (2021/15.1): https://doi.org/10.1558/rosa.20913\. A detailed review article by O. von Hinüber further appeared in the Indo-Iranian Journal (2023, 66/1): https://brill.com/view/journals/iij/66/1/iij.66.issue-1.xml.
2024a Preliminary Notes on the Mahāmudrātilaka: Contents, History, Transmission
Journal of East Asian Cultures, 2024
This short essay is an introduction to the study of the Mahāmudrātilaka (‘An Ornament of the Great Seal’), an important Buddhist tantric scripture of the Hevajra cycle. The text is a so-called uttaratantra (ancillary scripture) of the Hevajratantra. This cult emerged around ca. 900 CE in Eastern India and quickly rose to a position of prominence. In order to illustrate this point, first I discuss some historical references to the Hevajra cult: a lexicographical work, inscriptions, and testimony in Śaiva exegesis. I then contextualise the Mahāmudrātilaka among the Hevajra ancillary scriptures and share some notes on the purpose of such texts. I argue that such scriptures were meant to update a cult’s ritual and doctrinal palette in order to keep up with developments seen (and thought desirable to have) in rival schools. In the next section, I present the only known Sanskrit manuscript of the Mahāmudrātilaka, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Preußischer Kulturbe-sitz Orientabteilung Hs. or. 8711, a late Nepalese copy dated 1827 CE, which can be shown to be a copy of a Vorlage dating to 1204 CE. Next, I compare the text transmitted therein to the Tibetan translation, Tōh. 420, and identify them as two recensions. I then proceed to discussing exegesis on the Mahāmudrātilaka, the works of *Gambhīravajra and *Prajñāśrīgupta; these texts are for now available only in their Tibetan translation. I also identify some testimonia of the Mahāmudrātilaka. Using all this evidence, I argue that the text cannot be much earlier than the late 11th century. Next, I present an overview of the text by means of examining selected passages and their most significant features, with special focus on the differences and similarities with the Hevajratantra, the internal references to other scriptures, and the text’s significant parallels with the Vajramālābhidhāna. I argue that the text is unapologetically antinomian and gnostic. In the second half of the paper, styled as an appendix, I select five blocks of verses, which I edit and translate: the first deals with the relationship between initiating master and disciple, the second provides some insights into the attitudes of tantric practitioners towards orthodox Buddhists, the third contains detailed instructions on how to gather the antinomian substances known as ‘nec-tars’, the fourth deals with communal worship in a rite known as the gaṇacakra, and the final one describes a somewhat rare and rather gruesome ritual meant to bestow the power of flight.
2015
Tensho Miyazaki, Jundo Nagashima and Zhou Liqun, “The Śārdūlakarṇāvadānafrom Central Asia”, in: Buddhist Manuscripts from Central Asia: The St. Petersburg Sanskrit Fragments, ed. Seishi Karashimaet al., vol. 1, 2015, Tokyo: The Institute of Oriental Manuscripts of The Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, andThe International Research Institute for Advanced Buddhology at Soka University.