本願 Original Vow · 書目Bibliography

This bibliography lists the base text on which this edition actually rests, the three alternate translations, and the three mirrors of carrying forward; and it keeps apart, as fact requires, the two classes 「已對校之書」—“works this edition has itself collated” and 「注家所引而本版未取其本對校之書」—“works the commentators cite, whose own texts this edition has not taken up for collation.” For scriptures and treatises cited here and there within a single unit, the canon numbers and page anchors listed under Topics III and VIII of that unit’s Apparatus remain authoritative. This edition holds scripture and the ancient masters to be the bounds of authority, and lists no modern research as a ground of doctrine.

I. The Base Text and the Alternate Translations (one sūtra, four translations)

The four translations are collated only within the passages each actually contains. Differences in the ordering and grouping of the vows, in fullness and brevity, and in the rendering of names are set side by side as they stand: nothing from another translation is silently supplied into the base text, and no wording of the base text is laid over an alternate translation.

Self-attestation of the sequence of the translations (twofold · both drawn from this sūtra and its commentary, not from modern textual criticism): the preface to the Sui recension records of itself that an older Song-era translation preceded it — 「昔宋孝武之世，鹿野寺沙門慧簡已曾譯出在世流行，但以梵宋不融、文辭雜糅，致令轉讀之輩多生疑惑」—“Of old, in the time of Emperor Xiaowu of the Song, the śramaṇa Huijian of Luye Monastery had already brought out a translation which circulated in the world; but because the Sanskrit and the Chinese were not fused and the diction was mixed and confused, those who recited it were led into much doubt” 〔T14n0449 0401a11〕 — and it sets down its own version as settled: 「此本最定，諸讀誦者願莫更疑，得罪不輕」—“This version is the most settled; may those who read and recite it doubt no further, for the fault incurred is not light” 〔T14n0449 0401a28〕. The line-by-line mirror, for its part, matches the three titles to the three translations: 「此中宋孝武世大明元年譯出之本，取第三名拔除過罪生死得度」—“Among these, the version brought out in the first year of the Daming era in the time of Emperor Xiaowu of the Song takes the third title, the uprooting of past sins and deliverance from birth and death.” 〔T38n1770 0257a10〕, 「隋大業十一年東都洛水南上林薗翻經館譯，略取初名藥師如來本願經」—“The translation made in the eleventh year of the Daye era of the Sui, at the Sūtra-Translation Hall of the Shanglin Park south of the Luo waters in the Eastern Capital, takes the first title in brief, the Sūtra of the Original Vows of the Medicine Tathāgata.” 〔T38n1770 0257a12〕, 「今大唐貞觀年中玄奘三藏所譯之本，具取初名題一部也」—“The version translated by Tripiṭaka Master Xuanzang in the Zhenguan years of the present Great Tang takes the first title in full as the title of the whole work.” 〔T38n1770 0257a13〕; and it judges their fullness and brevity thus: 「文義廣略，後二相似」—“In the breadth and brevity of letter and sense, the latter two are alike.” 〔T38n1770 0257a15〕. Both witnesses point to a Song-era translation, and neither says when it was incorporated into the twelve fascicles of the Consecration Sūtra — that matter is recorded without adjudication.

II. The Three Mirrors of Carrying Forward

The three do not gloss the same translation. Whenever an outline or a gloss of theirs is cited, the recension it glosses is named first; a commentary on another translation is never made to serve directly as an explanation of the base text. Which recension each glosses is settled by mechanical collation, not by report.

• At the head of its fascicle Ancient Traces gives its own attribution, 「青丘沙門太賢撰」—“composed by Taehyŏn, śramaṇa of Ch’ŏnggu” 〔T38n1770 0257a05〕. The books it cites run throughout along the Dharma-characteristics line.
• Both Dunhuang commentaries are anonymous and neither records a date of composition; their period is not adjudicated, and only the recension each glosses and the books each cites are recorded as found. T85n2766 cites the Vibhāṣā, the Four-Part Abhidharma, the Saṃyukta-abhidharma-hṛdaya, the Tattvasiddhi, the Bodhisattvabhūmi, and the Daśabhūmika treatise; T85n2767 cites the Cheng weishi lun and the Treatise on the Buddha-Bhūmi.
• Both are manuscripts, in which corrupt and missing graphs occur. Every citation reproduces the manuscript graph as it stands: nothing is emended and nothing is supplied.
• In three places Ancient Traces cites the words of one 「邁師」—“Master Mai” by way of gloss: 「邁師云」—“Master Mai says” 〔T38n1770 0260a14〕 (glossing the months and the year of the eight-precept fast), 〔T38n1770 0260a27〕 (glossing birth by transformation), and 〔T38n1770 0262a13〕 (glossing the form of the seven lamps). Of his name and where he lived Ancient Traces says nothing, and this edition records without adjudicating, setting him down only as an authority whose words the line-by-line mirror cites.

III. Works Cited in the Canon’s Collation Notes

IV. Scriptures and Treatises Cited in the Commentaries

Two classes, kept apart.

A · Works whose own texts this edition has collated

B · Cited but not collated (this edition has not separately taken up their texts as a textual ground)

All the works below are cited by the line-by-line mirror. This edition records its citations and its anchors as they stand, inferring nothing as to whether the works survive, and taking up no other text on their behalf to supply corroboration.

V. The Scope of Sanskrit and of Modern Materials

This edition treats no modern Sanskrit critical edition and no modern scholar as an authority over the wording of the sūtra. Roman script serves only as a pronunciation aid, and must rest upon what the ancient masters transmitted — such transmission occurs in three places: a commentator’s interlinear 「梵云／唐云」, a transliteration in an alternate translation, and a transliteration in the sūtra itself. Where none of the three yields a form, none is supplied.

On this ground the Sanskrit of that buddha is written Bhaiṣajyaguru Vaiḍūryaprabha: Yijing’s recension transliterates the name graph by graph within the great dhāraṇī spoken by the Medicine Buddha himself 〔T14n0451 0414b29〕, and this is not a modern reconstruction; and since 「薜琉璃」 = vaiḍūrya, the 「琉璃」 series is rendered beryl. For the names of the twelve yakṣa generals none of the three commentaries yields a Sanskrit form, and so the Chinese sound is kept and no reconstruction is attempted. Where the ancient masters transmitted nothing, nothing is supplied: no reconstructed form is invented for a dhāraṇī, a proper name, or a technical term.

Tibetan translations and modern manuscript materials do not enter into the textual adjudications of this edition; where they are used merely to explain what survives and what is lost of a recension, their limited role is stated expressly.

This bibliography lists the base text, the line-by-line mirror, and the works read alongside them on which this edition actually rests, and it distinguishes honestly between works collated graph by graph against their own canonical text and works cited but not so collated. Works cited only in passing in a single chapter are governed by the canon numbers and page anchors given under topics three and eight of that chapter's Apparatus. Authority is confined to scripture and to the ancient masters; no modern study is listed as a doctrinal ground. Titles and attributions are taken from each work's own opening and colophon in the canon, not from secondary report.

I. The Base Text

There is no alternate recension of this sūtra in the canon. Topic two of the Apparatus is therefore empty in all thirteen chapters, and says so plainly while recording what was searched. That the Tang catalogues do not record this sūtra is recorded without adjudication.

II. One Mirror, Three Canon Numbers

There is a single line-by-line mirror. The three numbers separately issued in the Zokuzōkyō come from Lingcheng's one hand: X21n0382 and X21n0383 are the front matter of X21n0384, and they do not constitute three differing commentaries.

• Why the work was written: 「迨今尚無撰集法門，殊為闕典」—“to this day no one has compiled a treatment of this teaching; it is a signal gap among the books” 〔X21n0383 0639a05〕.
• The lineage the author avows: 「嗣興天台教觀正宗第五世」—“fifth-generation successor in the orthodox lineage of Tiantai teaching and contemplation” 〔X21n0383 0639a22〕; the instruments of his reading are the house method of Tiantai, and are marked as his wherever used.
• The period is marked as Qing on the evidence of 「皇清康熙二十二年」—“the twenty-second year of Kangxi of the august Qing” 〔X21n0383 0652b02〕, while two prefaces at the front are dated to the fifth year of Jōkyō in Japan and the postface to the third year of Genroku. Composition in the Qing, printing in Japan — both recorded.
• The mirror's base text runs to three fascicles against the base text's two, so the linkage runs by chapter and never by fascicle; both arrangements are attested in the canon by 「地藏菩薩本願經〔二卷流通本作三卷〕」—“The Sūtra of the Original Vows of Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva 〔in two fascicles; the circulating edition makes it three〕” 〔J31nB271 0821a07〕.

III. Sūtras of the Same Honored One (read alongside · not alternate recensions)

A comparison is a lamp turned on this sūtra, not a scale weighing two sūtras.

IV. Cited by the Mirror and Collated Graph by Graph Here

Each of the works below has had its own canonical text drawn off into a line-anchored file; every citation carries that work's own canon number and page anchor, and the mirror's quotation of a work is never allowed to stand in for the work's own text. Where the mirror's quotation and the text diverge, both are recorded under topic nine of the chapter concerned.

A · Sūtras

B · Treatises

C · Commentaries and Reference Works

V. Later Transmission, Each Marked for What It Is

VI. Cited by the Mirror but Not Collated Here

The following are cited by the mirror or by works of later transmission; this edition reproduces the citation and its anchor, and neither asserts anything about the work's survival nor substitutes another text for it: the Tattvasiddhi, T32n1646 (the treatise to which the other tradition's five names are ascribed, though not one of the four forms occurs in it — the source is unascertained and is recorded without adjudication); the Essential Record of the Responses of the Three Jewels, T51n2084 (compiled by Feizhuo, Song); the Six Tablets of the Śākya Clan, B13n0079 (compiled by Yichu); the Recorded Sayings of Chan Master Du of Meixi in Dongshan, J39nB447; and the Outline and Commentary on the Repentance of the Compassionate Bodhimaṇḍa, X74n1496 (attested by Xizong, Qing).

Where the mirror cites a work that is not in hand — as with the record it points to in glossing 「魍魎」 — that it is not in hand is recorded as it stands and nothing is supplied in its place.

VII. The Bounds of Sanskrit and of Modern Materials

This edition treats no modern Sanskrit edition and no modern scholar as an authority over the wording of the text. Roman script serves only as an aid to pronunciation and must rest on what the ancient masters transmitted — in the mirror's gloss (「梵語」／「梵名」／「此云」／「唐言」), in a transliteration in a sūtra of the same honored one, or in a transliteration in the sūtra itself. Where none of the three yields a form, none is supplied.

The forms this mirror transmits number fourteen and cover persons, places, objects, and colors, each anchored under topic six of its chapter. Among them: 「地藏之名準佛說八大菩薩曼陀羅經」—“the name Kṣitigarbha follows the Sūtra of the Maṇḍala of the Eight Great Bodhisattvas Spoken by the Buddha” 〔X21n0383 0639c23〕, 「應云乞灑」—“it should be said kṣa” 〔X21n0383 0639c24〕〔the two graphs joined as one syllable〕hara-ja, 「義翻地藏」—“rendered by sense as the store of the earth” 〔X21n0383 0639c24〕; 「梵名涅哩鋤，此翻堅牢」—“the Sanskrit name is Nielichu; here it is rendered Firm-and-Stable” 〔X21n0384 0748b05〕; 「梵語誐誐曩獻惹，此云虗空藏」—“in Sanskrit Ege'nangxianre; here it means the store of space” 〔X21n0384 0765b13〕.

Where the ancient worthy says plainly that a name is not ascertained, that is recorded as it stands: 「悅帝利未詳」—“Yuedili: not ascertained” 〔X21n0384 0674b03〕; and of the six transliterated king-names, 「祁利失王等，未見翻譯」—“King Qilishi and the rest: no rendering has been found” 〔X21n0384 0725b02〕. Where the ancient masters transmitted nothing, nothing is invented — not for proper names, not for technical terms, not for numbered sets.

Tibetan and modern manuscript materials do not enter into any decision about the wording of this edition.