Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia

(Ben Green) #1

442 charles d. orzech


or tantric, including major works such as the first full translation of
the Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgraha (T. 882) by Dānapāla,^10 the Mañ-
juśrīmūlakalpa (T. 1191) by Devaśāntika,^11 the Guhyasamāja-tantra
(T. 885) by Dānapāla,^12 and the Hevajra ḍākinī-jala-saṃvara-tantra
(T. 892) by Dharmapāla.^13 Also translated were substantial ritual manu-
als for the worship of a variety of deities, including Vināyaka (T. 1272)^14
and Bhairava (T. 1242) by Dharmabhadra,^15 and Mārīcī (T. 1257) by
Devaśāntika.^16 Also included in this production was material drawn
from the siddha traditions that employed the imagery of the cremation
ground (śmaśāna, hanlin ) in rites to subdue enemies, attract sex-
ual partners, and so forth, as well as numerous short dhāraṇī texts.


Availability of Texts and Translators


Despite imperial sponsorship the institute faced serious obstacles dur-
ing its century of operation under the Northern Song. These included
repeated requests by monks at the Chuanfa yuan to shut down the
project, calls from members of the court and bureaucracy to shut it
down on ideological and financial grounds, and a shortage of San-
skrit manuscripts;^17 the lack of trained Sanskrit scholars was also an
issue. Attempts were made to deal with this problem, and while it is
true that the period of the most prolific output was during the ten-
ure of Devaśāntika, Dānapāla, and Dharmadeva, the Japanese pilgrim
Jōjin ( 1011–1081), who spent an extended period at the insti-
tute, reports the presence of a number of South Asian and Central


(^10) Foshuo yiqie rulai zhenshi she dacheng xiancheng sanmei dajiaowang jing


. 11
Dafangguang pusa Wenshushili genben yigui jing
. 12
Foshuo yiqie rulai jin’gang sanye zuishang mimi dajiaowang jing
. 13
Foshuo Dabei kongzhi jin’gang dajiaowang jing.


(^14) Jin’gangsato shuo Pinnayejia tian chengjiu yigui jing
.
(^15) Foshuo miaojixiang yuqie dajiao jin’gang peiluozu lun guanxiang chengjiu yigui
jing.
(^16) Foshou da Molizhi pusa jing.
(^17) See Sen 2002, 41. The initial shortage of Indic manuscripts prompted a further
scouring of monastic libraries that resulted in a surfeit of texts. For this situation,
see Fozu tongji, T. 2035.49:410a15–17. The problem was soon to become a lack of
experienced translators.

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