Vajracchedikā in the Original Sanskrit

🤓 Admin Zone 🛠️ hidden to non-admins
view on research edit on research Add an excerpt Add a bilingual page Add full text subpage

Chapter in a Book

Sutras (Sanskrit)

LibraryArticlesBibliography PDF Link

Please note that many items in our library are simply pages that represent a detailed library catalog entry and citation of someone else's work, presentation, or performance. Read our General Disclaimer for more information.

Descriptionངོ་སྤྲོད།

No abstract given. Here are the first relevant paragraphs:

This is a fresh manuscript of the Vajracchedika. The text of that work was published by Max Müller, from manuscripts discovered in Japan, in the Anecdota Oxoniensia (Aryan Series), vol. i, part i, in 1881. The manuscript, now published, was discovered by Sir Aurel Stein in his first expedition to Eastern Turkestan in the years 1900-1. As related by him in his Ancient Khotan, vol. i, p. 258, it was dug out on the 23rd of December, 1900, from the ruins of a small 'dwelling-place' [id. p. 256) belonging to the ancient settlement of Dandān Uiliq; see also id., p. 295, and the same author's Sand-buried Ruins of Khotan p. 300. It was identified by Dr. Hoernle as containing the text of the Vajracchedikā; and a notice of the identification was published by him in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society for 1903, p. 364.
This manuscript is written on nineteen folios, long and narrow, of coarse country paper, and each folio is about 39 cm. (15 1/4 inches) in length and 75 mm. (2 15/16 inches) in width. It is in fairly good preservation, except that parts have perished or decayed. The folios are numbered on the left margin of the obverse side, and are all present except nos. 1, 3-5, and 12, which are wanting. A few of the folios are nearly whole (nos. 11, 17, and 18), some have lost one or both ends (nos. 7, 8, and 16), but most have perished more or less within the page, and present gaps severing the papier in two, partially or completely (nos. 2, 6, 9, 10, 13-15, and 19). In the transcript these gaps are enclosed within the mark (missing character). Where the paper has not perished, the writing has suffered injur in many places, so as to show every stage of decay from merely slight defacement to total obliteration. The folios which have suffered least are nos. 17 and 18, which are reproduced in Plate CVIII in vol. ii of Sir Aurel Stein's Ancient Khotan, while for the present volume fol. 14b (shown in Plate XXI) has been selected, in order to give an idea of the more common condition of the leaves of the manuscript. (Pargiter, preliminary remarks, 176) Read more here

Citation

Pargiter. F. E., ed. "Vajracchedikā in the Original Sanskrit." In Manuscript Remains of Buddhist Literature Found in Eastern Turkestan: Facsimiles with Transcripts, Translations, and Notes. Vol. 1, edited by A. F. Rudolf Hoernle et al., 176–195: Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1916.

Interconnections

Works related to this item

1 Recension of

Vajracchedikāprajñāpāramitāsūtra [वज्रच्छेदिकाप्रज्ञापारमितासूत्र]. 'phags pa shes rab kyi pha rol tu phyin pa rdo rje gcod pa zhes bya ba theg pa chen po'i mdo [འཕགས་པ་ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་རྡོ་རྗེ་གཅོད་པ་ཞེས་བྱ་བ་ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོའི་མདོ།]. [The Sūtra on the Perfection of Wisdom "The Diamond Cutter" (84000)]. Translated by Bodhiruci, Śīlendrabodhi, Ye shes sde, Kumārajīva, Paramārtha, Dharmagupta, Yijing, Xuanzang. Kangyur, RKTSK 16 http://www.rkts.org/cat.php?id=16&typ=1.

Classical WorksAbout this item

One of the most revered and recited scriptures of the perfection of wisdom genre (prajñāpāramitāsūtras), perhaps second only to the Heart Sūtra, both of which became especially popular in the East Asian Buddhist traditions. It is a crucial source for Mahāyāna tenets of selflessness and the emptiness of phenomena, and its discourse is framed as an explanation of how to enter into the vehicle of the bodhisattvas by developing and sustaining their enlightened perspective.

1 Chapter or part of

Hoernle, A. F. Rudolf, ed. Manuscript Remains of Buddhist Literature Found in Eastern Turkestan: Facsimiles with Transcripts Translations and Notes. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1916. https://archive.org/details/cu31924023185584/page/n5/mode/2up.

Books1916About this item

Manuscript Remains of Buddhist Literature Found in Eastern Turkestan: Facsimiles with Transcripts, Translations and Notes, Volume I (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1916), edited by A. F. Rudolf Hoernle (1841–1918) "in conjunction with other scholars," presents facsimiles, transcriptions, translations, and scholarly notes for Buddhist manuscript fragments recovered from Central Asian sites—chiefly through Sir Aurel Stein's expeditions, alongside material from Hoernle's own and George Macartney's collections—in Sanskrit, Khotanese, Kuchean, Tibetan, and Chinese. Compiled as a genuinely international collaboration, its contributors included Lionel D. Barnett, Édouard Chavannes, Sten Konow, Sylvain Lévi, Heinrich Lüders, F. E. Pargiter, and F. W. Thomas, each responsible for the material in their specialty. Hoernle's lengthy General Introduction argues, based on the newly recovered Khotanese material, that the Tibetan alphabet derived not directly from India but specifically from the script of Khotan. Though conceived as the first volume of an ongoing series, no further volumes were published. The Sanskrit material includes newly discovered fragments of hymns by the celebrated poet Mātṛceṭa, among other canonical and noncanonical texts.

1 Scholarship on

Vajracchedikāprajñāpāramitāsūtra [वज्रच्छेदिकाप्रज्ञापारमितासूत्र]. 'phags pa shes rab kyi pha rol tu phyin pa rdo rje gcod pa zhes bya ba theg pa chen po'i mdo [འཕགས་པ་ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་རྡོ་རྗེ་གཅོད་པ་ཞེས་བྱ་བ་ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོའི་མདོ།]. [The Sūtra on the Perfection of Wisdom "The Diamond Cutter" (84000)]. Translated by Bodhiruci, Śīlendrabodhi, Ye shes sde, Kumārajīva, Paramārtha, Dharmagupta, Yijing, Xuanzang. Kangyur, RKTSK 16 http://www.rkts.org/cat.php?id=16&typ=1.

Classical WorksAbout this item

One of the most revered and recited scriptures of the perfection of wisdom genre (prajñāpāramitāsūtras), perhaps second only to the Heart Sūtra, both of which became especially popular in the East Asian Buddhist traditions. It is a crucial source for Mahāyāna tenets of selflessness and the emptiness of phenomena, and its discourse is framed as an explanation of how to enter into the vehicle of the bodhisattvas by developing and sustaining their enlightened perspective.