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Dharmaraksha and the Transmission of Buddhism to China

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Daniel Boucher

Dharmaraksha and the Transmission of Buddhism to China

W.hen we consider the entire history of Chinese Buddhist translation activity, there can be little doubt that Dharmaraksha rightly takes his place among a handful of great names, including at the very least Kumƒraj…va, Paramƒrtha, and Xuanzang ??. This status can be claimed in regard to both his output and his influence. Dharmaraksha clearly ranks as one of the most prolific translators; by reliable count, he and his teams were responsible for 154 translations over a forty-year period, many of which are as sophisticated as they are sizeable. Moreover, his translations enjoyed considerable prestige. By all accounts his

translation of the Lotus Sutra was an immediate success, and it would be impossible to understand the emergence of fourth-century Chinese exegesis of ªˆnyatƒ (emptiness) thought without his translation of the Perfection of Wisdom in 25,000 Lines. But my goal here is to locate Dharmaraksha in the context of the broader transmission of Buddhism from India to China, particularly as the first Buddhist for whom we have evidence at Dunhuang, a site that may not have long known this Indian religion in his day. By starting with the evidence provided by his biography and the preserved colophons to his translations, we can piece together a partial history of his travels and translation activity from Dunhuang to north central China in the late-third century. In addition, these records

give us some sense of who assisted and collaborated with him in his translation work, and this evidence may enable us to gain a better understanding of the nature of the earliest Buddhist presence along the important trade routes through the Tarim Basin. I would like to thank my colleagues Ding Xiang Warner of Cornell University and Valerie Hansen of Yale University for their careful reading of this paper and their valuable suggestions. In this article, the use of asterisks in transliterations indicates a reconstruction, usually based on Tibetan translations; the question mark indicates that there is no known correspondence and the transliteration is much less certain.


THE BIOGRAPHY OF DHARMARAKSHA

What we know of Dharmaraksha’s life is derived largely from the early-sixth-century biography that is preserved in Sengyou’s (445?–518) Chu sanzang ji ji (?????? Compilation of Notices on the Rendering of the Tripi¾aka).1 This biography, “Zhu Fahu zhuan” ???? (“Biography of Dharmaraksha”), was shortly thereafter incorporated — large sections of it verbatim — into Huijiao’s (497–554) Gaoseng zhuan

(Biographies of Eminent Monks).2 The biographies must be our starting point for examining the life of this Buddhist translator from Dunhuang. What follows is an annotated translation of the version preserved in Chu sanzang ji ji with the disparities and additions of the Gaoseng zhuan version noted where appropriate.3 Throughout the translation I make critical remarks

concerning the data presented by the sixth-century bibliophiles, and I augment their portrait with additional data from other sources.4 This allows me to pursue at more length a few issues related to Dharmarak™a’s life, translation career, and relations with Central Asian collaborators. Zhu Fahu zhuan ?????[The Biography of Dharmaraksha Dharmaraksha (Zhu Fahu ???).5 His ancestors were Yuezhi 1 T 2145, vol. 55, pp. 97c–98b. 2 T 2059, vol. 50, pp. 326c–27a. There have been a number of studies concerning the sources of these collectanea as well as the relationship between them. See Arthur F. Wright, “Biography and Hagiography: Hui-chiao’s Lives of Eminent Monks,” in Silver Jubilee Volume of the Zinbun-kagaku-kenkyˆsyo (Kyoto: 1954), especially pp. 421–22 on C S Z J J

as a source for GS Z; Arthur E. Link, “Remarks on Shih Seng-yu’s Ch’u San-tsang chi-chi as a Source for Huichiao’s Kao-seng chuan as Evidenced in Two Versions of the Biography of Tao-an,” Oriens 10 (1957), pp. 292–95; and the translation of and commentary on these sources by Leon Hurvitz and Arthur Link contained in Hirai Shun’ei ????, “K±s±den no chˆshakuteki kenkyˆ” ????????? (I), Komazawa daigaku Bukky±bu kenkyˆ kiy± ??????? ???? 49 (1991), pp. (1)–(15), especially the bibliography of studies pp. (6)–(7), n. 1. I would like to thank Victor Mair for not only bringing the series of articles by Hirai to my attention, but for kindly photocopying them and sending them to me from Japan. 3 I have benefited from the previous translations of Dharmaraksha’s CS Z J J biog. in Tsukamoto Zenryˆ, A History of Early Chinese Buddhism: From Its Introduction to the Death of Huiyüan, trans. Leon Hurvitz (Tokyo: Kodansha International Ltd., 1985) 1,

pp. 544–46, and Lai Man Mai, “Dharmaraksha and His Work: The Impact of Central Asian Buddhist Thought in Translating Buddhist Texts in the Third to Fourth Century,” Ph.D. diss. (Madison: University of Wisconsin, 1994), pp. 338–50, as well as the translation of the GS Z biog. in Robert Shih, Biographies des moines éminents (Kao Seng Tchouan) de Houei-Kiao (Louvain: Université de Louvain, Institut Orientaliste, 1968), pp. 33–37, and in Hirai, “K±s±den no chˆshakuteki kenkyˆ” ????????? (IV), Komazawa daigaku Bukky±bu ronshˆ ????????? 25 (1994), pp. (11)–(25). Nevertheless there are a number of places where I have disagreed with a given interpretation; I have noted such instances where significant. 4 Further scholarly discussion of Dharmarakshas biography can be found in Okabe Kazuo , “‘Jikuh±go den’ saik±sei no koromi, Jikuh±go yakky± kenkyˆ no kiso no tame ni” , Bukky± shigaku 12.2 (1965), pp. 67–87, and Kawano Satoshi ???, “Jikuh±go den ni tsuite” ????????, Indogaku Bukky±gaku kenkyˆ ? 37.2 (1989), pp. 85–88. 5 GS Z reads Zhu tanmoluocha ?????. This transcription of Dharmaraksha’s monastic

??.6 For generations they lived in Dunhuang commandery.7 When he was eight years old he left the household.8 He served the foreign ªrama¡a Gaozuo ??,9 taking him as his teacher. He name also occurs in the colophon to Dharmaraksha’s translation of the Suvikrƒntacintidevaputraparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra (CS Z J J , vol. 55, p. 48b.24), which also describes Dharmaraksha as an Indian bodhisattva. Clearly his ethnikon, derived from that of his teacher at Dunhuang, is the source of that confusion. For a translation and discussion of this colophon, see Daniel Boucher, Bodhisattvas of the Forest and the Formation of the Mahayana: A Study and Translation of the Rƒ™¾rapƒlaparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra, Studies in the Buddhist Traditions (Honolulu: University of Hawai Press, forthcoming), chap. 5, and Antonello Palumbo, “Dharmaraksha and Ka¡¾aka: White Horse Monasteries in Early Medieval China,” in Giovanni Verardi and Silvio Vita, eds., Buddhist Asia 1 , Papers from the First

Conference of Buddhist Studies Held in Naples in May 2001 (Kyoto: Italian School of East Asian Studies, 2003), pp. 186–99. Palumbo deals at great length with the seeming inconsistencies between this record and other notices concerning Dharmaraksha’s translation work, though these inconsistencies do not necessarily call the authenticity of this record into question in my opinion. 6 GS Z adds, “his original family name was the clan name zhi ?,” i.e., he had the [Yue]zhi ethnikon. The ethnic identity and linguistic affiliation of the Yuezhi is one of the most vexed subjects in Central Asian history. Despite decades of

studies drawing upon Greco-Roman, Chinese, Tibetan, and Central Asian sources, there has yet to be a consensus on even some of the most fundamental issues. Much of the problem lies in the great difficulty — and probable impossibility — of pinpointing the identity of the Yuezhi before their expulsion by the Xiongnu out of Gansu in the second century bc. Maenchen-Helfen is almost certainly correct in suggesting that the ethnikon Yuezhi in Chinese sources ceased as a sociological-ethnic term after the migration of the Great Yuezhi to the west (Otto Maenchen-Helfen, “The Yüeh-chih Problem Re-examined,” JAOS 65 [1945], pp. 71–81). From that point, this designation represented a composite people: one group (the Da yuezhi ???) settled in the western Tarim Basin and eventually conquered Bactria, where they adopted an Iranian language and culture; others (the Xiao yuezhi ???) remained in the Nanshan region (in modern Gansu) among the Qiang tribes and probably spoke a Tokharian language. While there is no definitive evidence linking Dharmaraksha to either group, the greater probability lies, I suspect, in his having belonged to the Xiao yuezhi, who may well have been related to, if not identical with, the indigenous inhabitants of the nearby Shan-shan kingdom. On the Yuezhi as discerned from Chinese sources, see Erik Zürcher, “The Yüeh-chih and Kani™ka in the Chinese

Sources,” in A. L. Basham, ed., Papers on the Date of Kani™ka (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1968), pp. 346–90, and more generally Enoki Kazuo, G. A. Koshelenko, and Z. Haidary, “The Yüeh-chih and Their Migrations,” in János Harmatta, B. N. Puri, and G. F. Etemadi, eds., History of Civilizations of Central Asia, vol. 2, The Development of Sedentary and Nomadic Civilizations: 700 B.C. to A.D. 250 (Paris: UNESCO, 1994), pp. 171–89. 7 Dunhuang was established as a military colony already in the second century BCE as a base for Chinese campaigns in the Western Regions, particularly against Dayuan ?? (Ferghana). It soon after became a mercantile hub, the point at which the northern and southern silk routes converged before continuing eastward through the Hexi corridor to the metropolitan centers of north China. For a discussion of the geographical and political nature of Dunhuang during the Western Jin, see Sat± Chisui ????,

“Saishin jidai” ????, in Enoki Kazuo ???, Tonk± no rekishi ????? (Tokyo: Dait± Shuppansha, 1980), pp. 41–46. 8 Chujia ?? (Skt. pravrajita); some scholars regularly translate this Chinese expression as “became a monk,” but obviously that is impossible here. Clearly this statement indicates that Dharmarak™a became a novice (ªrƒma¡era) at age eight and would have been fully ordained only upon reaching the appropriate age, usually said to be twenty. 9 The Song, Yuan, and Ming edns., as well as GS Z, read Zhu Gaozuo ???, suggesting that Dharmaraksha’s teacher was either of Indian descent or was a Central Asian or Chinese monk who was himself ordained by an Indian master. Contra Erich Zürcher (The Buddhist Conquest of China: The Spread and Adaptation of Buddhism in Early Medieval China [[[Leiden]]: E. J. Brill, 1959; rpt. 1972], p. 65), I see no reason not to take this as a proper monastic name,


[[[Dharmaraksha]]] recited scriptures [to the extent of] ten thousand words a day; with a single glance he could [understand what he read]. By nature he was genuine and virtuous; his conduct was dedicated and assiduous. Firm in determination and fond of study, he sought teachers over a myriad of tricents (li ?). This is how he became broadly read in the six classics and widely versed in the sayings of the hundred schools.10 Although the world is caught up in praise and blame, Dharmaraksha never had recourse to mere appearance and reputation.11 At that time, during the era of Jin emperor Wu ? (265–290), monasteries, temples, illustrations, and images were admired in the capital (Luoyang), yet the profound vaipulya (Mahƒyƒna) sˆtras were confined to the Western regions.12 Dharmarakshaaccordingly sighed in despair, frustrated,13 and set his mind upon disseminating the Great Way (the Mahƒyƒna). Accompanying his teacher to

the Western regions, they wandered through diverse countries. The different languages of these foreign countries numbered thirty six, and the scripts were similarly numerous. Dharmaraksha widely studied them all; he was well versed in interpreting them.15 especially given the fact that it is preceded by the ethnikon zhu ?. 10 In place of shelie baijia zhi yan , ?????? GS Z reads youxin qi ji ????, “surveyed (lit. ‘set his mind to wander through’) the seven treatises.” Shih, Biographies, p. 34, n. 122, suggests that qi ji ?? refers to the qi lüeh ?? (“The Seven Summaries”), also

known as the qi lüeh bielu ???? (“Another Catalogue of the Seven Summaries”), which was based on a catalogue by Liu Xiang (?? 77–6 bc) but composed by his son. This catalogue listed and digested books concerning bibliography, the six arts, the philosophers, poetry, warfare, numerology, and occult sciences. Hirai, “K±s±den,” p. (20), n. 8, explains the seven treatises as the seven classics (Shijing, Shujing, Liji, Yueji, Yijing, Chunqiu, and Lunyu) in light of a reference in the biography of Zhang Chun ?? in Hou Hanshu ??? (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984) 65. Given the immediately preceding reference to the six classics, this explanation strikes me as less unlikely. For want of a better suggestion, Shih’s explanation seems preferable. 11 In place of yu shi ting ???, GS Z has bao ?,

“[without recourse] to harboring them.” 12 GS Z describes the vaipulya sˆtras as “confined to beyond the Pamirs (cong wai ??),” a mountain range in southwest Xinjiang forming the western border of the Tarim Basin. 13 The biographer’s use of the expression fa fen ?? (“express frustration”) may have been intended to echo Sima Qian’s potent usage in Shiji. See Stephen W. Durrant, The Cloudy Mirror: Tension and Conflict in the Writings of Sima Qian (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995), pp. 13–15. I am indebted to my colleague Ding Xiang Warner for this reference. 14 The countries in the Western regions traditionally numbered thirty-six from at least Han times; see A. F. P. Hulsewé and M. A. N. Loewe, China in Central Asia; The Early Stage: 125

B.C.–A.D. 23 . An Annotated Translation of Chapters 61 and 96 of the History of the Former Han Dynasty (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1979), p. 71 and n. 2. This number cannot be taken literally. It only suggests that Dharmaraksha was at home in the languages necessary for his travels in Central Asia. It is another question entirely as to whether he actually found texts in Central Asian languages during his travels. 15 I read guxun ?? (“to explain or gloss [the classics]”) with the Song, Yuan, and Ming variant and GS Z. Note that this allusion to classical philological acumen by Dharmaraksha’s


There were no phonemes, meanings, or graphs that he did not understand in detail. Having thus obtained numerous Western texts (huben ),?? 16 he returned to China. He transmitted and translated texts along the route from Dunhuang to Chang’an and copied them down into Chinese.17 The texts he obtained included sˆtras of the Great and Small Vehicles, such as the Bhadrakalpika, Tathƒgatamahƒkaru¡ƒnirdeªa, Saddharmapu¡ºar…ka, Lalitavistara, and so on.18 Altogether there were 149 titles.19 His tireless endeavor was solely the task of broadly circulating [these texts]. Throughout his whole life he translated and copied [[[scriptures]]], toiling without any mention of weariness. The means by which the Dharma was disseminated throughout China was through the efforts of Dharmaraksha. At the end of the reign of emperor Wu of the Jin, Dharmaraksha dwelled in seclusion deep in the mountains. In the midst of the mountains there was a pure river valley where he always took his bath and rinsed his mouth. Afterwards someone collecting firewood polluted and treated disdainfully the banks [of the river].20

biographers supports Wright’s contention that these biographers were actively engaged in an attempt to portray eminent Buddhist clerics in terms that would have appealed to sixth-century Chinese literati (Wright, “Biography and Hagiography,” p. 387). Such statements cannot, of course, be taken as solid evidence for Dharmaraksha’s actual skills. 16 Instead of huben, GS Z reads fanjing ??, “Indic (lit. brƒhm…) sˆtras.” On the distinction between hu and fan in these kinds of textual notices, see Daniel Boucher, “On Hu and Fan Again: The Transmission of ‘Barbarian’ Manuscripts to China,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 23.1 (2000), pp. 7–28. In that article I argued that hu may often have denoted kharo™¾h…, one of the two scripts used to write Indic manuscripts in the first half of the first millennium. I render the term hu here as “Western,” since Sengyou may use it here without the technical nuance that I believe it carried in many of the colophons he records. 17 I have treated the likelihood of such claims for Dharmarakshas skills in literary Chinese elsewhere; see Daniel Boucher, “Buddhist Translation Procedures in Third-Century China: A Study of Dharmaraksha and His Translation Idiom,” Ph.D. diss. (U. of Pennsylvania, 1996), pp. 62–169; “Gƒndhƒr… and the Early Chinese Buddhist Translations Reconsidered: The Case of the Saddharmapu¡ºar…kasˆtra,” J AOS 118.4 (1998), pp.

471–506; and Bodhisattvas of the Forest, chap. 6. 18 The texts mentioned in GS Z are Bhadrakalpika (reading xianque ?? with Song, Old Song, Yuan, and Ming variants, which is a wrong reading for jie ), ? Saddharmapu¡ºar…ka, and the Pañcavi¿ªatisƒhasrikƒ Prajñƒpƒramitƒ. 19 As Shih (Biographies, p. 34, n. 126) mentions, we should almost certainly understand this number as representing those texts Dharmaraksha translated rather than merely procured. I should also note that the number of translations attributed to Dharmarak™a here differs from the number given by Sengyou in his own list in the CS Z J J (55, p. 9b.28), 154, and from the actual number listed there, 159, five of which Sengyou reports were not known to Dao’an in his catalogue of 374. The GS Z attributes 165 texts to Dharmaraksha. Later catalogues expand this number greatly. 20 CS Z J J reads here hui man qi ze, shui ... ???? ?... GS Z reads instead hui qi shuize ???? “polluted the banks of that river.”


The river suddenly dried up.21 Dharmaraksha then wandered about, lamenting:22 “If the water is forever dried up, there truly will not be enough for my needs. I must certainly move away immediately.” As soon as he finished speaking, a spring flowed forth23 and filled the river valley. Responses to his unfathomable sincerity were all of this kind.24 Later he established a monastery outside of the Azure Gate in Chang’an where he zealously practiced the Way.25 For this reason his virtuous influence radiated in the four [[[directions]]] and his reputation spread far and wide.26 His monastic disciples numbered in the thousands; all came to honor and serve him.27 At that time there was a ªrƒma¡era named Zhu Fasheng ?? ?.28 At eight years of age he was [already] wise, relying upon

Dharmaraksha as his teacher. In Guanzhong ??29 there was a man from a prominent family who wanted to receive the great Dharma and test Dharmaraksha’s moral virtue (daode ??). He went to Dharmaraksha under the pretense of explaining that he immediately needed 200,000 in cash.30 Before Dharmarak™a could re21 Read zao ? with Yuan and Ming editions. As Shih (Biographies, p. 35, n. 127) suggests, this account probably intends to indicate that this man urinated in the stream where Dharmaraksha took his bath. As a supernatural response to his intrinsic purity and virtue, the stream dried up to protect Dharmaraksha from defilement. 22 GS Z adds before the following discourse: ???? ??????, “another’s lack of virtue consequently makes the pure spring cease to flow.” 23 GS Z reads

yong ?, “to gush,” instead of liuchu .?? 24 GS Z adds the following interpolation from a eulogy (zan ?) by Zhi Dun (314–366), a Buddhist intellectual who was thoroughly at home in the xuanxue and qingtan circles of the Eastern Jin dynasty (biog. in GS Z 50, pp. 348b–49c): “Therefore Zhi Dun, in making a eulogy on a statue, said: ‘The Venerable Hu was calm and tranquil; his virtue in the Way was deep and exquisite. Softly intoning [[[scriptures]]?] in the deep ravine, he rinsed his mouth with water from the dried up spring. How distant is the Venerable Hu now! Selected by heaven, [his virtue] was broad and deep. After he washed his feet in the flowing sands [of the Central Asian desert], he understood how to extract the mysterious principles.’” 25 This is almost certainly the same monastery, Baima si, that was the site of his first recorded translation, the Suvikrƒntacinti-devaputra-parip¬cchƒ; see CS Z J J , vol. 55, p. 48b.22–26. Note, however, that

the colophon to this translation describes Baima si as inside the Azure Gate. See Palumbo, “Dharmaraksha and Ka¡¾haka,” pp. 186–90, on this disparity in the sources. 26 Here GS Z reads instead: ???? ????, “his virtue transformed far and wide; his reputation spread in the four distances.” 27 GS Z reads ????, “he was honored and served by them all.” 28 Zhu Fasheng was one of Dharmaraksha s most dedicated disciples at Dunhuang; he established a monastery at Dunhuang while Dharmarak™a traveled to Chang’an and Luoyang for his translation work. See biog. at GS Z, 50, pp. 347b–c, and the discussion in Tsukamoto, History of Early Chinese Buddhism, pp. 229–30. 29 Guanzhong, “Inside the Pass,” a region in modern Shanxi province, north of Chang’an. 30 Although this incident smacks of a pious, apocryphal interpolation, Zürcher (Buddhist Conquest, pp. 68–69) rightly notes that it is significant that Dharmaraksha’s biographer had no


ply, [Fa]sheng, then thirteen years old and serving at his teacher’s side, said to the visitor: “the Master (heshang ??; Skt.: upƒdhyƒya) has considered [your request] and will grant it to you. The visitor left. [Fa]sheng said: “When I look at this man’s mien,31 [I see that] he does not truly seek money. [His request] is solely to observe what the Master’s moral virtue is like.” Dharmaraksha said, “I too take [his request] as such. The next day this visitor led over one hundred people of his clan to Dharmaraksha and petitioned to receive the five precepts (pañcaª…la). He thoroughly apologized for his scheme to seek money. Thereafter gentry and commoners in the four directions heard about his fame and flocked to him. He propagated and fostered the Buddha’s influence for over twenty years.32 Later, when emperor Hui ? (r. 290–306) made a westward imperial tour to Chang’an,33 Guanzhong was desolate34 and the populace was dispersed. Dharmaraksha and his disciples retreated from this region to the east, reaching Kun Pond ,?? 35

qualms about a monk possessing large sums of money. While the story may tell us nothing of fact about Dharmaraksha himself, it speaks volumes about the assumptions of prominent Buddhist clerics of the sixth century. 31 Shense ?? is difficult to capture in English, although I think “mien” effectively conveys the sense that it is the man’s outer bearing that reveals his inner mental state. Hurvitz’s “emotional expression” (Tsukamoto, History of Early Chinese Buddhism, p. 545) strikes me as off the mark. This expression is clearly drawn from the long Chinese tradition of physiognomy, which assumed that one’s inner states of mind were manifested in one’s bodily and especially facial expression. 32 This entire section concerning Zhu Fasheng and the visitor seeking money (CS Z J J , vol. 55, pp. 98a.10–18) is omitted from the GS Z biography. 33 Emperor Hui fled from Luoyang to Chang’an in 304 when the city came under attack. The Xiongnu

and Xianbei tribes subsequently attacked Chang’an in 306; the emperor returned to a ravaged Luoyang and the region remained in chaos for the rest of his reign. See Rafe de Crespigny, “The Three Kingdoms and Western Jin: A History of China in the 3rd Century AD, II, East Asian History 1.2 (1991), p. 159; and Hirai, “K±s±den (IV),” p. 23, n. 26. GS Z reads ?????, “When [[[Emperor]]] Hui of the Jin fled west… .” 34 Instead of CS Z J J ’s xiaotiao ??, GS Z reads raoluan ??, “chaotic.” 35 Kunchi is the name of an artificial lake southwest of Chang’an in modern Shanxi province, dug at the order of Emperor Wu of the Western Han, so named for its likeness to a lake near Kunming. The Song, Yuan, and Ming recensions read mianchi ??, as does the text of the GS Z. Mianchi is a lake in modern Henan province, west of Yiyang ?? district near ancient Luoyang. If Dharmaraksha and his disciples headed east from Guanzhong, they could have reached the vicinity of Luoyang rather than a place to the west of Chang’an. Tang Yongtong has taken issue with this report, suggesting that it would have been highly unlikely if not impossible for Dharmaraksha to have fled eastward toward Luoyang, presumably from Chang’an, during a period of intense turmoil and warfare. He thinks it more likely that Dharmaraksha headed toward Liangzhou and probably died in or near Dunhuang; see Tang Yongtong ?? , ? Han Wei liang Jin Nanbeichao Fojiaoshi ?????????? (Changsha: Shangwu Yinshu guan, 1938; rpt. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1983), pp. 113–14. A more convincing explanation of the disparity among the sources can now be found in Palumbo, “Dharmaraksha and


where Dharmarak™a fell ill and died. He was seventy-eight years old.36 Subsequently, when Sun Xinggong ??? composed the Treatise on Worthies of the Way,37 he compared seven monks from India with the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove, pairing Dharmarak™a with Shan Juyuan ???.38 His treatise states:39 “Because the Venerable Hu Dharmarak™a lived virtuously, he was revered among men. When Juyuan rose to a prominent position, he discussed the Way [at court]. The deportment and virtue of these two masters was extraordinary; they could be companions of the same stripe.” He [Dharmarak™a] was lauded by future generations in this way. When Dharmarak™a first obtained the Chao riming jing ???? from the Western Regions, the kharo™¾h… text (huben ??) was translated, but it was prolix and repetitious. At that time the upƒsaka Nie Chengyuan ???40 corrected the details and rectified the Ka¡¾haka,” pp. 197–98. Palumbo demonstrates that the designation Kun Pond “applied to the stretch of the Kunming canal to the east of Chang’an and more particularly outside the Blue Gate of the old city wall,” which would place it in the vicinity of Baima si, a monastery Dharmarak™a is known to have worked in and perhaps died at. 36 Although the length of Dharmarak™a’s life is made clear, we have no means to pinpoint his birth and death dates. Most scholars have supposed that he died shortly after his last recorded translation (Puyao jing ???) of 308, and have accordingly taken his dates to be ca. 233–ca. 310, although there are a few unresolved and probably unresolvable problems. See the discussion in Okabe, “Jikuh±go den,” pp. 73–75. 37 Sun Chuo ??, courtesy name Xinggong ?? (311?–368?), was a famous man of letters during the Eastern Jin dynasty who frequently wrote eulogies of eminent monks; biog. at Jinshu ?? (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1974) 56. His Daoxian lun ???, no longer extant, is quoted five times by name in GS Z and was written as a Buddhist response to Dai Kui’s ? ? Zhulin qixian lun [????? Treatise on the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove] (GS Z, vol. 50, p. 326c). In it he regularly compares prominent Buddhist monks to well-known qingtan adepts; see Wright, “Biography and Hagiography,” p. 428, n. 6. 38 Shan Tao ?? (205–283), courtesy name Juyuan ??, was a famous qingtan adept who held official posts under Jin emperor Wu; biog. Jinshu 43. On these eccentric literati figures, see Donald Holzman, “Les sept sages de la forêt des bambous et la société de leur temps,” T P 44 (1956), pp. 317–46; for a list of the seven monks, the corresponding sages of the Bamboo Grove, and Sun Chuo’s notion of their linked trait, see Hirai, “K±s±den (IV),” pp. (23)–(24), n. 30. 39 Hurvitz and Link (in Hirai, “K±s±den [IV],” p. [16]) seem to take lun yun ?? in GS Z as indicating one of Huijiao’s own critical estimates of the significance of a given point or passage in a biography or group of biographies; on this device, see Wright, “Biography and Hagiography,” pp. 390–91. However, CS Z J J makes the referent explicit: qi lun yun ???, “his [i.e. Sun Chuo’s] Treatise [on Worthies of the Way] says? .” 40 Nie Chengyuan was by all accounts Dharmarak™a’s closest disciple. He is mentioned in a number of colophons to Dharmarak™a’s translations, including the earliest, the Suvi krƒn tacinti deva putra-parip¬cchƒ, translated in 267 ad and continues to be mentioned in colophons over the next twenty-five years as a member of Dharmarak™a’s translation teams. Suzuki Hiromi has discussed the possible influence of Nie Chengyuan’s scribal duties upon translation vocabulary choices in Dharmarak™a’s corpus (Suzuki Hiromi ????, “Koyaku ky±ten ni okeru yakugo ni tsuite, Jikuh±go yakushutsu ky±ten o chˆshin to shite” ??????????


prose and verse sections, reducing it to two fascicles. The sˆtra that is transmitted today is this [revised] one. Chengyuan was wise and experienced, talented and principled — devout in the work of the Dharma. When the Venerable Hu [Dharmarak™a] rendered sˆtras, he [[[Nie Chengyuan]]] would frequently examine and correct them.41 Between the reigns of [[[emperors]]] Hui and Huai ? (307–311), there was a ªrama¡a Faju ??.42 It is not known whence he came. He translated Loutan jing ??? (*Lokasthƒna-sˆtra).43 [Fa]ju and the ªrama¡a Fali ???together translated two sˆtras: Fajuyu ??? (Dharmapada) and Futian (?? Sˆtra on the Fields of Merit). Fali also sought and obtained Western texts and separately translated over a hundred verses, but he did not manage to copy them before he met with illness and died. Shortly afterwards, when the turmoil and chaos of the Yongjia reign period (307–311) broke out, [his translated texts] became scattered and lost; they are not extant.44

,Indogaku Bukky±gaku kenkyˆ 43.2 [1995], p. 724), and I have elsewhere suggested a considerable influence from scribes such as Nie Chengyuan in the reception of Dharmarak™a’s recitation and glossing of Indic texts; see Boucher, “Gƒndhƒr…,” esp. pp. 496–98. Nie Chengyuan’s son, Nie Daozhen, also participated as a scribal assistant on at least three translations, including one, the Tathƒgata-mahƒkaru¡ƒ-nirdeªa sˆtra, with his father in 291 (CS Z J J , vol. 55, p. 63b.13–18). 41 This section on Nie Chengyuan (CS Z J J , vol. 55, p. 98a.23–27) is slightly different in order and wording in GS Z. I render the GS Z passage as follows: “At that time there was an upƒsaka Nie Chengyuan. He was wise and talented, of firm determination in exerting himself for the dharma. When the Venerable Hu [Dharmarak™a] rendered sˆtras, he [[[Nie Chengyuan]]] would frequently examine and correct the phrasing (wenju ??). When the Chao riming jing was first translated, it was prolix and full of superfluities. Chengyuan abridged and corrected the prose and verse sections (read wenjie ?? with variant); today it circulates in two fascicles. His detailed modifications were all of this kind.” 42 I suspect that this is the same person as Bo Faju ???, who is recorded to have served as a scribe (bishou ??) on Dharmarak™a’s translation of the Lalitavistara in 308; see CS Z J J , vol. 55, p. 48c.1. 43 Sengyou attributes the translation of Loutan jing to Dharmarak™a in his list of his translations (CS Z J J , vol. 55, p. 8c.20). 44 This subordinate biographical information on Faju and Fali (CS Z J J , vol. 55, p. 98a.27– b.2) is included in GS Z, but in the biography of Weizhinan ??? (50, p. 326b.28–c.1) instead of in that of Dharmarak™a. On the inclusion of such appendices to major biographies, see Wright, “Biography and Hagiography,” p. 390. In its place the GS Z biography of Dharmarak™a has the following: Chengyuan had a son, Daozhen ??, who was also versed in Indic (fan ?) studies. These two gentlemen, father and son, compared expressions [in Dharmarak™a’s draft rendering ?], making them elegant and fitting without adding to the ancient [text]. In addition there were Zhu Fashou ???, Chen Shilun ???, Sun Bohu ???, Yu Shiya ???, etc., all of whom received Dharmarak™a’s instruction, held the brush [i.e., served as scribes], and collated [the translations] in detail. The Venerable [[[Dao]]]an said, “As for the texts rendered by Dharmarak™a, if one examines the main points and fundamentals obtained from the hands of this venerable one, they are certainly correct. Although in general his translated sˆtras are neither eloquent


DHARMARAKHSA’S TRAVELS AND TRANSLATION ACTIVITY

In order to document in more detail the course of Dharmarak™a’s migrations between Dunhuang and the capital as well as the specific periods of his most intense translation work, I will coordinate the list of his translation corpus provided by Sengyou’s catalogue Chu sanzang ji ji (written ca. 515),45 taken together with the preserved colophons that provide information on the dates and locations at which some texts were translated.46 The restriction of this survey to Sengyou’s catalogue is intended to apply a strict criterion for establishing the most likely parameters of Dharmarak™a’s corpus.47 Later bibliographers, as is well known, greatly expanded the attributions to the early translators, sometimes to account for the many anonymous works then extant, and other times to legitimate apocryphal compositions produced in China.48 Thus the corpus of Dharmarak™a was inflated to 165 texts already by the time nor subtle, neither smooth nor clear, they are intelligible and unassuming. [His translations] are particularly good at [expressing the doctrine of] non-production (wusheng ; ?? anutpƒda). They rely upon wisdom, not polish. They are simple and therefore close to the [original] text.” He [Dharmarak™a] is praised like this. Dharmarak™a[’s clan] lived for generations at Dunhuang; his instruction in the Way was widely spread (read xia ? with variant). People at that time all called him the Dunhuang bodhisattva. 45 T 2145, vol. 55, pp. 7b–9c. 46 I have produced a complete list of Dharmarak™a’s translation oeuvre, together with additional bibliographic information in Boucher, “Buddhist Translation Procedures,” pp. 259–91. In ibid., chap. 2, I have translated all of the preserved colophons and discussed in detail their implications for understanding the translation process itself. 47 Erik Zürcher, “A New Look at the Earliest Chinese Buddhist Texts,” in Koichi Shinohara and Gregory Schopen, eds., From Benares to Beijing: Essays on Buddhism and Chinese Religion in Honour of Prof. Jan Yün-hua (Oakville, Ontario: Mosaic Press, 1991), pp. 278–79, applies the even more stringent criterion of limiting the corpus of the translators of the second through fourth centuries to those works known from Dao’an’s now lost catalogue of 374, titled Zongli zhongjing mulu ??????, which is cited at length as Sengyou’s principal authority for the Han, Three Kingdoms, and Jin period translations; see also Kyoko Tokuno, “The Evaluation of Indigenous Scriptures in Chinese Buddhist Bibliographical Catalogues,” in Robert E. Buswell, Jr., ed., Chinese Buddhist Apocrypha (Honolulu: U. Hawai P., 1990), pp. 33–35, on Dao’an’s catalogue. It is important to remember, as Zürcher himself rightly points out, that prudent as Dao’an was for his time, many of his attributions were based on earlier catalogues that were lost by the time of Sengyou, or upon stylistic considerations that would not hold up to modern scholarly scrutiny. Moreover, it is also clear from Dao’an’s own reports that he knew of many texts to which he had no access, especially those preserved in Liangzhou; see Sengyou’s Xinji angong liangtu yijing lu , ????????? CS Z J J , vol. 55, pp. 18c–19b. Many more than the 59 titles listed here — some having clear resemblances in name to those in Dharmarak™a’s corpus — must have existed beyond Dao’an’s reach. Thus we have to leave open the possibility, indeed the likelihood, that some of Dao’an’s attributions are mistaken and some of his omissions are appropriately filled by Sengyou on the basis of other catalogues. In point of fact, however, there are only five texts noted by Sengyou as translated by Dharmarak™a that are not known to Dao’an, and some of these latter attributions are indeed questionable on stylistic grounds. 48 On the Chinese Buddhist bibliographies and their criteria for attribution, see Tokuno, “Evaluation of Indigenous Scriptures.” See also Antonino Forte, “The Relativity of the Concept


of Huijiao’s Gaoseng zhuan biography of Dharmarak™a in the early-sixth century, then to as many as 210 in Fei Zhangfang’s ????Lidai sanbao ji ??????of 597, only to be edited down to 175 by Zhisheng ??, in his Kaiyuan shijiao lu ??????in 730.49 Chronological List of Translations Below is a list in chronological order of only those texts for which we have dates of their translation; I have included the sites of translation when known. Such a list will allow us to chart the ebbs and flows of Dharmarak™a’s activity, which can then be integrated with other data about his life and the history of the period during which he worked.50

267 December 21 (266)–late January/early February:51 Xuzhen tianzi jing ????? [Suvikrƒntacintidevaputra-parip¬cchƒ-sˆtra] at the White Horse Monastery in Chang’an52 of Orthodoxy in Chinese Buddhism: Chih-sheng’s Indictment of Shih-li and the Proscription of the Dharma Mirror Sˆtra,” in Buswell, ed., Chinese Buddhist Apocrypha, pp. 239–49, for a good example of the relativity of the categories “orthodox” and “apocryphal” and the political implications of such designations by cataloguers. 49 Attributions to Dharmarak™a by later cataloguers have already been thoroughly studied by Japanese scholars. See, e.g., Tokiwa Daij± ????, Gokan yori S±sei ni itaru yakky± s±roku ????????????? (Tokyo: T±h± Bunka Gakuin, 1938; rpt. Kokusho kangy±, 1973), pp. 602–72; Ui Hakuju ????, Shaku D±an kenkyˆ ??????(Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1956), pp. 188–94; and Okabe Kazuo, “Jikuh±go no yakky± ni tsuite” ??????? ???, Indogaku Bukky±gaku kenkyˆ 11.1 (1963), pp. 148–49, and idem: “Ky±roku no hikaku kara mita Jikuh±go no yakky± busˆ” , S±t±shˆ kenkyˆ kiy± 4 (1972), pp. 114–16; “Yakky±shi kenkyˆ josetsu (2): genz±ky±chˆ no Jikuh±go yaku no saikent±” ??????? (?) ?????????????, S±t±shˆ kenkyˆ kiy± 5 (1973), pp. (16)–(27); and “Yakky±shi kenkyˆ josetsu (3),” ibid. 6 (1974), pp. (3)–(13). 50 See also Kawano Satoshi, “Jikuh±go no ky±ten yakushutsu nent± saik±” ?????? ? , ????? Bukky± bunka ???? 22 (1989), pp. 50–54, where he notes the translation dates provided by the later — but certainly less reliable — catalogues as well. 51 The colophon dates the completion to the thirtieth day of the twelfth lunar month (Taishi 2). This is problematic, as pointed out by Palumbo (“Dharmarak™a and Ka¡¾haka,” p. 188) since that month had only 29 days. If 30 is a mistake for 13, then the date would be equivalent to January 25, 267. Zhisheng’s Kaiyuan shijiao lu (T 2154, p. 494c), does in fact place the completion of this translation on the 13th day, but in the year Taishi 3. Obviously this constitutes an emendation for which we have no clear justification (see Palumbo, pp. 190–91, n. 66). It is possible, as I suggest below, that the colophon composers may not always have been fully current with calendrical changes as they recorded the dates of these works. Given the problems, we can only provisionally date the completion of the translation to late-January or early-February of 267. 52 Tokiwa, Gokan yori S±sei ni itaru, p. 611, assumes that this record is mistaken, having confused some monastery in Chang’an with the famous Baima si of Luoyang. I have difficulty, however, in finding anything approaching an explanation in Tokiwa’s discussion. I see no reason why a monastery in Chang’an could not have been named after the famous translation center of Han Buddhism, especially if it too served as a regular site for Dharmarak™a’s trans


October 15: Biqiuni jie jing [????? Bhik™u¡…-prƒtimok™a?] October 26: Sanpin huiguo jing ????? [Triskandhaka?] 269 September 6: Fangdeng nihuan jing ????? [Caturdƒrakasamƒdhisˆtra] 270 October 31: Deguang taizi jing ????? [Rƒ™¾rapƒlaparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra] November: Baozang jing ??? [Ratnakƒra¡ºakavyˆha-sˆtra] 271 February 23: Wenshushili wuti huiguo jing ????????? November 4: Chiren pusa jing ????? [*Jagati¿dharaparip¬cchƒsˆtra]53 273 March 6: Yanwang jing ??? 284 March 26: Xiuxing jing ??? [Yogƒcƒrabhˆmi-sˆtra] at Dunhuang November 8: Aweiyuezhizhe jing ?????? [Avaivartikacakra-sˆtra] at Dunhuang 285 August 4: Dashanquan jing ???? [Upƒyakauªalyajñƒnottara bodhisattvaparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra] August 25: Hailongwang jing [???? Sƒgaranƒgarƒjaparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra] 286 April 20: Chixin jing ??? [Viªe™acintibrahmaparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra] at Chang’an September 15–October 6: Zhengfahua jing [???? Saddharma- pu¡ºar…ka-sˆtra] at Chang’an (?) November 27: Guangzan jing ??? [Pañcavi¿ªatisƒhasrikƒ Prajñƒpƒramitƒ-sˆtra] at Chang’an (?) 287 January 28: Puchao jing ??? [Ajƒtaªatrukauk¬tyavinodanƒ-sˆtra] February 10: Pumen jing ??? [Samantamukhaparivarta-sˆtra] May 26: Baonü jing ??? [Mahƒyƒnopadeªa-sˆtra] 288 November 18: Miji jing ??? [Tathƒgatƒcintyaguhyanirdeªa-sˆtra] 289 May 14: Wenshushili jinglü jing [??????? Paramƒrthasa¿v¬tisatyƒnirdeªa-sˆtra] at the White Horse Monastery in Luoyang lation work. On the existence of a Baima si in Chang’an, and perhaps, even its priority to the famous center at Luoyang, see now Palumbo, “Dharmarak™a and Ka¡¾haka,” pp. 186–99. 53 I owe the suggestion of this Indic equivalence to Jan Nattier, A Few Good Men: The Bodhisattva Path According to the Inquiry of Ugra (Ugraparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra), Studies in the Buddhist Traditions (Honolulu: U. Hawai P., 2003), p. 220, n. 76.


December 30: Li gou shinü jing ????? [Vimaladattƒparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra] December 30: Moni jing ??? [Mañjuªr…vikurvƒ¡parivarta-sˆtra] at the White Horse Monastery in Luoyang 290 March 4: Famojin jing ???? [Dharmanirodha-sˆtra ?] September 5: Baoji jing ??? [Ratnacˆºaparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra] November 3: Lecture on Zhengfahua jing at Eastern Ox Monastery in Luoyang End of year: Jigudu mingde jing ?????? 291 May 23: Yongfuding jing ???? [˜ˆra¿gamasamƒdhi-sˆtra] May 27: Dushipin jing ???? [Lokƒtyayaparivarta-sˆtra ?] August 18–October 3: Da’ai jing ??? [Tathƒgatamahƒkaru¡ƒ nirdeªasˆtra] No month/day: Mawang jing ??? No month/day: Puyi jing ??? 292 January 31: Rulai xingxian jing [????? Tathƒgatottpattisa¿bhavanirdeªa-sˆtra] February 16 (?): Yaoji jing ??? [Buddhasa¿g…ti-sˆtra] 295 January 27: Shengfayin jing [???? Acaladharmamudrƒ-sˆtra ?] at Jiuquan ?? 297 December 21: Jianbei yiqiezhi jing ?????? [Daªabhˆmika-sˆtra] at the Shixi ???Monastery in Chang’an 300 August 22: Xianjie jing [??? Bhadrakalpika-sˆtra] in Luoyang (?) 302 May 25: Wugaiyi jie shixing jing ??????? November 9: Pusa shizhu jing ????? [Daªabhˆmika-sˆtra ?] 303 January 27: Loutan jing ??? [Lokasthƒna-sˆtra ?] May 11: Shunquan fangbian jing ????? [Str…vivartavyƒkara¡a-sˆtra] June 2: Wubai dizi benqi jing [??????? Anavatapta-gƒtha? June 7: Fo wei pusa wu meng jing ??????? June 12: Ruhuan sanmei jing [????? Susthitamatiparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra] June 18: Mile benyuan jing [*????? Maitreyaparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra] June 21: Shelifu huiguo jing ?????? August 29: Baotai jing ??? [Garbhavikrƒntinirdeªa-sˆtra ?] December 28: Shidi jing [??? Daªabhˆmika-sˆtra ?]


304 April 9: Yanjingding jing ???? April 22 (?): Guke jing ??? June 5 (?): Gengchu asheshiwang jing ??????? [a retranslaton of the Ajƒtaªatrukauk¬tyavinodanƒ?] September 29 (?): Mie shifang ming jing ????? [Daªandigandhakƒravidvamsana-sˆtra] Tai’an 3, first month, eighteenth day:54 Motianwang jing ???? [Mahƒdevarƒja-sˆtra] Tai’an 3, second month, first day: Zhaoming sanmei jing ????? Tai’an 3, second month, seventh day: Suoyu zhi huan jing ????? 305 March 7: Ren suoconglai jing ????? March 10: Shidengzang jing ???? March 13: Yanwang wubai yan ju jing ??????? March 18: Jieju jing ??? March 22: Juedaosu jing ???? March 31: Mengshi jing ??? April 11: Chengyu jing ??? [Nagaropama-sˆtra ?] 306 March 8: Piyu sanbaishou jing ?????? 307 April 23 (?): Wujibao jing ???? 308 Fifth month: Puyao jing ??? [Lalitavistarasˆtra] at the Tianshu i ?? Monastery Twelfth month, first day: Achamo jing [???? Ak™ayamatinirdeªasˆtra] (?)55 The above list shows that Dharmarak™a began his translation career in Chang’an shortly after the founding of the Jin dynasty.56 Between 266 and 273 he translated at least nine texts. From March of 273 to March of 284 we hear nothing about his activities. Various scholars have speculated as to how he used this time: mountain seclusion, as perhaps suggested by his biographer, mastering the Chinese language, 54 No year corresponding to the third year of the Tai’an reign period is listed in my sources. The Yong’an reign period begins in the first month of 304, but an intercalary month is added after Taian 2 (= January 24–February 21, 304) which could be the source of the confusion here. There was a rapid succession of reign period title changes in 304; it may be that these changes were not always known to colophon writers as they were instituted. 55 This appears to be a duplication of the same text named Wujinyi jing ???? recorded earlier in Sengyou’s list; Dao’an’s catalogue omits the version by the former title. 56 On the founding and early history of the Jin dynasty, see de Crespigny, “Three Kingdoms and Western Jin.”


acquiring new texts from Central Asia, or accessing translations completed under the Wu kingdom in the south, which was incorporated into the Jin empire in the year 280.57 It is entirely possible, however, that many of his other translations for which no date is preserved were translated during this period of seeming inactivity. After this eleven-year period of silence, our records show Dharmarak™a to be active and on the move for the remainder of his career, translating texts not only between Dunhuang and Chang’an, as his biography states, but as far east as the capital at Luoyang as well. Two texts are recorded to have been translated at Dunhuang in the year 284. Between November of 284 and the spring of 286, he transferred his translation activities to Chang’an again, where he rendered at least four large texts in less than a year: Viªe™acintibrahmaparip¬cchƒ-sˆtra, Saddharma-pu¡ºar…ka-sˆtra,58 Pañcavi¿ªatisƒhasrikƒ Prajñƒpƒramitƒ-sˆtra,59 and Ajƒtaªatrukauk¬tyavinodanƒ-sˆtra. In the spring of 289 Dharmarak™a translated the Paramƒrtha sa¿v¬tisatyƒ nirdeªa-sˆtra at the famous White Horse Monastery in Luoyang, the farthest east he is recorded to have traveled.60 It appears that Dharmarak™a spent at least two years in Luoyang. His evangelical work there included a lecture to a large assembly at the Eastern Ox Monastery on the Saddharmapu¡ºar…ka-sˆtra, which he had translated, presumably in Chang’an, four years prior. Although there are no notices concerning the location of his next translation until the year 295, it is likely that Dharmaraksha returned to Chang’an early in 291. His translation of the ˜ˆra¿gamasamƒdhi-sˆtra during that year was assisted by Nie Chengyuan, his principal associ

57 See Kawano, “Jikuh±go den ni tsuite,” pp. 87–88, on the supposition — unsupportable in itself — that Dharmarak™a may have acquired translations by Zhi Qian during this “blank period.” 58 See Karashima Seishi (??? ), ? The Textual Study of the Chinese Versions of the Saddharmapu¡ºar…kasˆtra in Light of the Sanskrit and Tibetan Versions (Tokyo: The Sankibo Press, 1992), for a brilliant study of Dharmarak™a’s translation of the Lotus Sˆtra in comparison with all known Sanskrit texts and the Tibetan translation. 59 Stefano Zacchetti has recently published an impressive study and heavily annotated translation of the first three chapters of Dharmarak™a’s translation of Guang zan jing; see In Praise of the Light: A Critical Synoptic Edition with an Annotated Translation of Chapters 1 – 3

of Dharmarak™a’s Guang zan jing ???, Being the Earliest Chinese Translation of the Larger Prajñƒpƒramitƒ, Bibliotheca Philologica et Philosophica Buddhica 8 (Tokyo: The International Research Institute for Advanced Buddhology, Soka University, 2005). 60 Henri Maspero (“Communatés et moines bouddhistes chinois au IIe et IIIe siècles,” BEFEO 10 [1910], p. 223, n. 2) argued that reports of Dharmarak™a having traveled to Luo yang were in error, stemming from a confusion with an earlier Dharmarak™a reported in the colophon to Lokak™ema’s translation of the Pratyutpannasamƒdhi-sˆtra. He subsequently revised this position, recognizing that the error was almost certainly in the earlier reference to Dharmarak™a, whose name was out of place in that colophon; see Maspero, “Les origines de la communauté bouddhiste de Lo-yang,” JA 225 (1934), p. 94, n. 4.


ate there, and according to our records, Nie Chengyuan is not known to have worked outside of Chang’an.61 The translation committees for the Tathƒgatamahƒkaru¡ƒnirdeªa-sˆtra, rendered later that same year, and for the Buddhasa¿g…ti-sˆtra, rendered early in 292, also included Nie Chengyuan, suggesting that Dharmarak™a may well have remained in Chang’an throughout this period. In 295 he moved west along the Hexi corridor to Jiuquan commandery, but returned to Chang’an in 297 to translate the Daªabhˆmika-sˆtra. It is also during this time that the famous “Disturbances of the Eight Princes” occurred, in which members of the Jin ruling family (the Sima ??!clan) vied with one another and with the increasingly prominent Jia ? family for power at court and for regional military control, resulting in extensive bloodshed in and around the capital.62 This crisis quickly destabilized the empire and opened the door to subsequent raids by northern Xiongnu ?? and Xianbei ?? tribes. It is probably not mere coincidence that Dharmarak™a seems to have left Luoyang by early 291, and there is no clear record of his having returned there again. After this time, our records become more uncertain. We have a vague mention in the colophon to the Bhadrakalpika-sutra that after Dharmarak™a orally rendered his translation into Chinese, one Zhu Fayou ??? brought it from Luoyang. Does this mean that the Indian text was translated in Luoyang or just that a copy of it circulated from there? We cannot be certain, and as I mentioned above, Luoyang may have been a difficult place to work at this time. Furthermore, we have two different translation dates for this text: Yongkang 1, seventh month, twenty-first day (= August 22, 300) and Yuankang 1, seventh month, twenty-first day (= September 1, 291).63 We might be inclined to favor the latter date if indeed this sˆtra was rendered in Luoyang, since we know that Dharmarak™a was residing there at that time. But we also know that he was in the midst of working on the Tathƒgatamahƒkaru¡ƒnirdeªa-sˆtra from August 18 to October 3, 291, making it highly unlikely that he could also have translated the large Bhadrakalpika-sˆtra at the same time. From 303 to 305 there appears to be a rash of rapidly completed short texts. However, there are several reasons why we might be sus61 See Dao’an’s remarks concerning the translation site of Pañcavi¿ªatisƒhasrikƒ Prajñƒpƒramitƒ-sˆtra: “Thus when he [Dharmarak™a] issued the sˆtra, the participants [in the translation process] were said to include Nie Chengyuan as scribe, Bo Yuanxin, and the ªrama¡a Fadu. They are all Chang’an residents. For this reason I assume that [to be the place of translation] (CS Z J J , vol. 55, p. 62b.27–29). 62 See de Crespigny, “Three Kingdoms and Western Jin,” pp. 152–57. 63 Cf. CS Z J J , vol. 55, pp. 7b.13 and 48c.3.


picious of these records. First, it was precisely during this period that northern China was in a desperate state of political and social turmoil. The Xiongnu and Xianbei had forced the emperor to flee the capital in 304, ravaging Luoyang before turning westward to attack Chang’an in 306.64 Although this by no means proves that Dharmarak™a could not have found safe haven in which to continue his translation work, conditions would certainly have been far from ideal. Secondly, some of our records of these translations are in doubt. For example, the Shelifu huiguo jing that is currently extant is attributed to An Shigao but almost certainly postdates both him and Dharmarak™a. If this is the same text referred to by Sengyou, it is a mistaken attribution. Also, the dates of all of the texts translated in 304 except Yanjingding jing are uncertain: they refer either to dates that are not known to exist from our calendrical sources (e.g., the third year of the Tai’an ?? reign period) or to dates that are ambiguous.65 After 305 there are only four texts recorded to have been translated by Dharmarak™a, two of which were not known to Dao’an’s catalogue of 374 and are therefore also in some doubt.66 The last reliable record of Dharmarak™a’s translation activity is his rendering of the Lalitavistara in 308 at the Tianshui Monastery. We do not know where this monastery was located. Some scholars have assumed that Tianshui refers to the commandery in Liangzhou ?? en route to Dunhuang,67 but there is no obvious reason to think that it could not merely be the proper name of a monastery, unrelated to this location. If Dharmarak™a fled east from Guanzhong in ca. 306 as his biography states, it would be difficult — though perhaps not impossible — to explain how he could have been at Tianshui in 308. If it were the case, however, that this monastery was located in the Hexi corridor, then this supposition might shed light on Dharmaraksha’s final resting place. As mentioned above, Tang Yongtong objected to the biographer’s report that Dharmaraksha fled east to 64 Conditions in north China at this time were dire in the extreme. At least 300,000 dead have been counted in the historical sources during the armed strife ushering in the collapse of the Western Jin; see Charles Holcombe, “Re-imagining China: The Chinese Identity Crisis at the Start of the Southern Dynasties Period,” JAOS 115.1 (1995), p. 1, n. 2. 65 For example, Guke jing is dated to the third month of Jianwu 1, and the retranslated Asheshiwang jing is recorded as translated during the fourth month of that same year. However, the Jianwu reign-name was only inaugurated in the seventh month of 304. There is also another Jianwu reign period in 317, but that is several years later than Dharmarak™a is believed to have lived. Thus, either these dates were applied by compilers who did not recognize the calendrical changes that were instituted over time, or else they are in error. 66 On the issue of Dao’an’s catalogue, its reliability, and its relationship to Sengyou’s list, see n. 47 above. 67 Tokiwa, Gokan yori S±sei ni itaru, p. 611; Okabe, “Jikuh±go den, p. 75; and more recently Mai, “Dharmarak™a and His Work,” pp. 66–67.


the area of Luoyang (Mian Pond) at the end of his life, precisely at the time when conditions there would have been the most tumultuous. If Dharmaraksha’s last translations were in fact carried out in Liangzhou — at, for example, Tianshui — then he could very well have fled east as the biography claims, but perhaps only as far as Kun Pond, as read in the Chu sanzang ji ji account, which was either southwest of Chang’an, or as Palumbo has suggested, part of the Kunming canal to the east of the city and therefore not in the midst of the worst chaos.68 This must remain, however, little more than speculation.


TRANSLATION COLLABORATORS FROM INDIA AND CENTRAL ASIA

Dharmaraksha’s travels to Central Asia and relations with Central Asians, though not as well documented as his excursions in China, are no less important for understanding his role in brokering the influx of Buddhist texts into China in the late third century. We know, for instance, that Dharmaraksha was assisted and patronized by a diverse array of Central Asians and Indians, both lay and monastic. A survey of his known assistants and associates and their various roles would include the following:69 Kucheans Bo Faju ???; ªrama¡a; scribe (bishou ??) for Lalitavistara-sˆtra Bo Yuanxin ???; householder; translation intermediary (chuanyanzhe ???) for Suvikrƒntacintidevaputra-parip ¬ cchƒ-sˆtra; collated Saddharmapudarika-sutra; task unknown (Daªabhˆmika-sˆtra) Marquis Meizi ???; Kuchean assistant envoy (Qiuci fushi ????): brought brƒhm… text of Avaivartikacakra-sutra to Dunhuang Parthians An Wenhui ???; translation intermediary for Suvikrƒntacin tidevaputra-parip¬cchƒ-sˆtra Sogdians Kang Nalü ???; bhik™u; copied Dharmaraksha’s translation of the 68 See n. 35, above. 69 A foreign ethnikon does not necessarily indicate an ethnically foreign person. Chinese monks ordained under foreign teachers generally adopted their teacher’s ethnikon from the mid-third century until about the time of Dao’an, who advocated the universal “shi ?” (ªƒkya), suggesting that all monks should trace their lineage to the Buddha. While I include those with foreign ethnikons in my survey of Central Asians here, it should be borne in mind that some of these individuals could have been Chinese. 70 The ethnikon kang ? is generally taken to represent Sogdian, but Wolfram Eberhard has suggested that there is some reason to believe that early use of this ethnikon may have


Saddharmapu¡ºar…ka-sˆtra at Luoyang and questioned him on it Kang Shu ; ªrama¡a; scribe for Lalitavistara-sˆtra Khotanese Zhi Duoluo ; ??? ªrama¡a; brought text of Pañcavi¿ªatisƒhasrikƒ Prajñƒpƒramitƒ-sˆtra to Dharmaraksha Gandhƒran/Kashmiri Zhu Houzheng ???; scholar (wenshi ??); brought text of Yogƒcƒrabhˆmi-sˆtra to Dunhuang; co-translated with Dharmaraksha Anonymous; Kashmiri ªrama¡a who brought text of Bhadrakalpika-sˆtra to Dharmaraksha Indians Zhu Li ??; collated translation of Saddharmapu¡ºar…ka-sˆtra Zhu Fayou ???; brought text of Bhadrakalpika-sˆtra from Luoyang Zhu Fashou ???; ªrama¡a; scribe for Buddhasa¿g…ti-sˆtra, *Acaladharmamudrƒ-sˆtra, and *Sarvavaipulyavidyƒsiddhi-sˆtra Zhu Decheng ???; patron of Saddharmapu¡ºar…ka-sˆtra Zhu Wensheng ???; patron of Saddharmapu¡ºar…ka-sˆtra72 Yuezhi Fabao ??; scribe forYogƒcƒrabhˆmi-sˆtra Zhi Jin ??; patron ofYogƒcƒrabhˆmi-sˆtra Zhi Jinbao ???; patron of Yogƒcƒrabhˆmi-sˆtra Western Regions (?) Ji Zhi ??; man from Western Regions who brought an incomplete text (? possibly in memory) of the Paramƒrtha-sa¿v¬tisatyƒnirdeªasˆtra to Luoyang where Dharmarak™a rendered it into Chinese

designated two different clans: one native to Kangguo (present-day Samarkand) and another, the old Kangju, who were native to Gansu before being forced to emigrate to Transoxiania; these latter may have been Yuezhi (Eberhard, “The Origin of the Commoners in Ancient Tunhuang,” Sinologica 4.3 [1955], p. 150). More recently, see also the impressive history of Sogdian merchants in Étienne de La Vaissière, Histoire des marchands sogdiens (Paris: Collège de France, Institut des Hautes Études Chinoises, 2002), esp. pp. 29–33 and 83–85, on sources — secular and Buddhist — in Chinese vis-à-vis the question of the Kangju. 71 It has been shown that the early Chinese use of the designation Jibin ?? referred to a region that incorporated much of Gandhƒra and adjacent areas of northwest India and not just Kaªmir; see Kuwayama Shoshin (????), “Literary Evidence for Dating the Colossi in Bƒmiyƒn,” in G. Gnoli and L. Lanciotti, eds., Orientalia Iosephi Tucci Memoriae Dicata (Rome: Istituto Italiano Per Il Medio Ed Estremo Oriente, 1987), pp. 708–12, and Enomoto Fumio (????), “Note on Kashmir as Referred to in Chinese Literature: Ji-bin,” in Yasuke Ikari, ed., A Study of the N…lamata: Aspects of Hinduism in Ancient Kashmir (Kyoto: Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, 1994), pp. 357–65. 72 With regard to Zhu Decheng and Zhu Wensheng who “took pleasure in encouraging and assisting the work on the Saddharmapu ¡ºar…ka-sˆtra,” Hurvitz states: “These two Chi


nese lay brethren with the surname Chu must have been very devout indeed, since, although still laymen, they had left the secular community, an act symbolized by abandoning their clan name and taking instead the name Chu, which, as indicated above, is short for ‘T’ienchu,’ i.e., India” (in Tsukamoto, History of Early Chinese Buddhism, p. 486, n. ad). Hurvitz’s speculation is dubious for two reasons. First, despite the Chinese-looking personal names, it is not impossible that they were both naturalized Indians living in China. Secondly, if they were Chinese, it is likely that they were monks, given that they had adopted the ethnikon of a foreign master, perhaps even Dharmaraksha himself. Among the assistants on Dharmaraksha committees with the ethnikon zhu, only Zhu Li and Zhu Fashou are clearly of Indian descent; Zhu Houzheng is from Jibin. 73 At the turn of the fourth century, a junior official named Jiang Tong ?? estimated that half of the over one million inhabitants of Chang’an were non-Chinese peoples, primarily of the Rong and Di tribes. A translation of the relevant section of his Xi rong lun ??? (“Essay on the Western Barbarians”) can be found in Rafe de Crespigny, Northern Frontier: The Policies and Strategy of the Later Han Empire, Faculty of Asian Studies Monographs, New Series 4 (Canberra: Australian National University, 1984), pp. 170–72. 74 See Michael Loewe, “Chinese Relations with Central Asia, 260–290,” BSOAS 32 (1969), p. 96, and Pan Yihong, “Early Chinese Settlement Policies towards the Nomads,” AM 3d ser. 5.2 (1992), p. 56. 75 Loewe, “Chinese Relations with Central Asia,” p. 97. Even should some of these individuals with foreign ethnikons prove to be native Chinese monastics who had adopted the title of their teacher, the range of places of origin among those who are clearly from the West indicates the truly international character of Dharmaraksha’s translation committees. And it is noteworthy that the international make-up of his cohorts extends not just to his associates at Dunhuang, but, more often, to his committees at Chang’an and Luoyang, certainly among the most cosmopolitan cities in the world at this time.73 If Dharmaraksha did travel to the Western Regions during his socalled “blank period” (ca. 273–284), then he did so at a time when relations between Central Asia and China were at a standstill. This period, specifically from 270 to about 280, saw a number of minor rebellions in Liangzhou initiated by northern peoples, and there appears to be evidence that the central government temporarily lost control over official appointments in Dunhuang.74 There is no record of tribute missions to court between 270 and 283, after which time the king of Shan-shan ?? sent his son(s) as “hostage.”75 If contact between Central Asian kingdoms and China was significantly interrupted during this period, it may explain why Dharmaraksha went to the Western Regions with his teacher in search of texts: none were being trafficked along the usual channels. Of course, we cannot be certain as to where exactly Dharmaraksha would have traveled in Central Asia. It would, however, be reasonable to speculate that he is likely to have had some — perhaps considerable — contact with oasis towns within the kingdom of Shan-shan: Loulan ?? (Kroraina), the closest to Dunhuang on the eastern reaches of the Silk Route,


76 On the geographical extent of the Shan-shan kingdom, see Enoki Kazuo ???, “The Location of the Capital of Lou-lan and the Date of Kharo™¾h… Inscriptions,” M T B 22 (1963), pp. 125–71, and John Brough, “Comments on Third-Century Shan-Shan and the History of Buddhism,” BSOAS 28 (1965), pp. 591–93. 77 On the Chinese documents from Loulan from the Jin period, see Henri Maspero, Les documents chinois de la troisième expédition de Sir Aurel Stein en Asie Centrale (London: The British Museum, 1953), pp. 52–81; on Chinese commercial activity in the region, see Christopher Atwood, “Life in Third-fourth Century Cadh’ota: A Survey of Information Gathered from the Prakrit Documents Found North of Minfeng (Niyä),” CA J 35 (1991), pp. 190–92. 78 The dating of the kharo™¾h… documents found at Niya and Loulan has been a point of contention among scholars since their discovery. Both the internal evidence of the documents themselves and confirmation from dated Chinese texts discovered at Loulan point to a range for these texts of ca. 230–ca. 330 ad; see Brough, “Comments on Third-Century Shan-Shan,” esp. pp. 599–605, and the important qualifications to his use of the Chinese evidence in Loewe, “Chinese Relations with Central Asia.” On the Buddhist activities of this community recorded in these documents, see Atwood, “Life in Third-Fourth Century Cadh’ota,” esp. pp.

173–75, and more recently, Ichikawa Yoshifumi ????, “Niya iseki o meguru shomondai, toku ni Chad±ta ni okeru Bukky±s± no jittai o chˆshin to shite” ???????????, ?? ???????????????????????, Bukky± shigaku kenkyˆ ???? ?? 42.1 (1999), pp. 1–37, and Valerie Hansen, “Religious Life in a Silk Road Community: Niya During the Third and Fourth Centuries,” in John Lagerway, ed., Religion and Chinese Society. Volume I: Ancient and Medieval China (Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press and Paris: Ecole française d’Extrême-Orient, 2004), pp. 279–315. 79 It is curious that Dharmaraksha’s biographers state that during the reign of Jin emperor Wu (265–290), Mahƒyƒna texts “were confined to the Western Regions,” provoking Dharmaraksha’s lamentation. During his earliest period of translation activity (266–273), before his purported journey to the Western regions, Dharmaraksha and his teams translated at least six texts clearly of Mahƒyƒna provenance. It also is not the case that his translation activity after 284 was restricted to Mahƒyƒna sˆtras, although this period did indeed see the rendering of a number of large Mahƒyƒna texts. This is another instance in which a hagiographer’s comment demands caution, since the relationship between the vehicles may well have been a more pressing matter for a sixth-century Buddhist intellectual than it might have been for a Yuezhi monk on the fringes of both the Indian and Chinese Buddhist worlds. 80 A. M. Boyer, E. J. Rapson, and E. Senart, eds., Kharo™¾h… Inscriptions Discovered by Sir Aurel Stein in Chinese Turkestan: Part I (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1920), p. 140. 81 Richard Salomon, “A Stone Inscription in Central Asian Gƒndhƒr… from Endere (Xinjiang),” Bulletin of the Asia Institute ns 13 (1999), pp. 1–13.

and cities along the southern route, including Niya (Caºh’ota), Endere, Miran, and Calmadƒna.76 Chinese documents found at Loulan as well as references to Chinese merchants in the contemporaneous kharo™¾h… texts indicate that commerce between China and Shan-shan was extensive.77 And we know that there was a flourishing Buddhist community there by the mid-third century.78 Moreover, despite the slight evidence, there is some reason to believe that Dharmarak™a could have found Mahƒyƒna texts — the objects of his search — in Shan-shan.79 In Niya kharo™¾h… document no. 390, a local administrator (cozbo) named ?amasena is said to have “set forth in the Mahƒyƒna” (mahƒyƒna-sa¿prastitasa).80 More recently, Richard Salomon has edited an additional epigraphical record from Endere which records the Mahƒyƒna affiliation of an individual described with a series of royal epithets.81 This king, whom Salomon

hypothesizes could have been the prominent A¿goka of the mid- to late-third century, which is to say, contemporaneous with Dharmarak™a, is also said to have “set forth in the Mahƒyƒna” (mahƒyƒna-sa¿prastida). Both records are incomplete, and it is possible that neither this king’s nor the cozbo ?amasena’s inclinations were representative of the Buddhist community at large. Nevertheless, these references do at least suggest the strong possibility of a Mahƒyƒna presence in Shan-shan, including the likelihood of royal patronage. With the exception of Khotan, this is atypical of Central Asian Buddhism until much later. The textual and art historical remains from the vast majority of Buddhist sites in the Tarim Basin show an overwhelmingly Mainstream — particularly Sarvƒstivƒdin — Buddhist affiliation. This fact has some interesting implications for our understanding of the transmission of Buddhism to China in the earliest period.


BUDDHISM IN THE TARIM BASIN

The problem of Buddhism in the Tarim Basin has been taken up again recently in a brilliant paper by Erik Zürcher.82 In re-examining the transmission of Buddhism to China during the first few centuries of the Common Era, Zürcher asks a poignant, and in retrospect, obvious set of questions: if Buddhism spread eastward by means of the usual process of contact diffusion as commonly assumed, wouldn’t we expect to find it firmly entrenched along the trade routes in the Tarim Basin before its first appearance in China? Why, then, are none of the earliest missionaries reported to have originated from these sites, especially in the easternmost territories closest to China? The earliest missionaries are overwhelmingly from west of the Tarim Basin: Yuezhi, Parthians, and Sogdians. It is not until the mid-third century that the list regularly includes Kucheans and Khotanese, not to mention Dharmarak™a, a native of Dunhuang. There is in fact no evidence — on the basis of the available archeological and literary data — that Buddhism existed, let alone flourished, anywhere in modern Xinjiang prior to the mid-third century ad.83 Since Buddhism is known to have penetrated China by the mid-first century at the latest, this gap of two centuries calls for an explanation.

82 Erik Zürcher, “Han Buddhism and the Western Regions,” in W. L. Idema and E. Zürcher, Thought and Law in Qin and Han China: Studies Dedicated to Anthony Hulsewé on the Occasion of His Eightieth Birthday (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1990), pp. 158–82. 83 It goes without saying that this position turns on the matter of available data. Subsequent archeological digs — an urgent desideratum in Xinjiang — could throw more light on the earliest phase of this cross-cultural interaction. Nevertheless, unless a find on the magnitude of

Zürcher noticed that a remarkable population explosion occurred at oasis kingdoms in the Tarim Basin between the demographic reports contained in Hanshu (ca. first century bc) and Hou Hanshu (ca. early second century ad).84 In several cases city-state populations grew by a factor of four or five, and at some sites, by much more. Such a population upsurge in premodern times could only have been possible through a significant increase in agricultural production, which, if Zürcher is correct, may have been made possible by the expansion of Chinese militaryagricultural colonies (tuntian ??) in the region during the intervening years. Once these oasis towns developed sufficient agricultural surplus, they could attract and support a parasitic monastic community on a permanent basis. The economic prerequisites for such establishments do not appear to have been met before the mid-third century. Even should new excavations in Xinjiang push the beginnings of Buddhism in the region back a century or more, such data would still not change the fact that Buddhism in China — our principal concern here — did not receive its earliest impetus from missionaries of the Tarim Basin. In this regard it is instructive to remember that the biography of Dharmarak™a, who is reported to have been born at Dunhuang in ca. 233, is our earliest surviving mention of Buddhism from this oasis town on the periphery of the Chinese empire and at the juncture of the northern and southern trade routes. The absence of any mention of Buddhism at this strategic outpost prior to Dharmarak™a is, if anything, more conspicuous. Thus we are in the situation of explaining why Central Asians figure prominently on early Chinese translation committees when Buddhism does not appear to have figured prominently in their homelands. Two clarifications are in order. First, there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that any of Dharmarak™a’s translations derived from anything other than Indian sources — whether in Sanskrit, Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit, or Prakrit, be they in brƒhm… or kharo™¾h… script. These texts are essentially Indian Buddhist documents filtered through a Chinese prism.85 another Dunhuang turns up extensive and convincingly datable materials from the first two centuries of the Common Era, there is no clear reason to believe that our extant data is unrepresentative. 84 Zürcher, “Han Buddhism,” pp. 176–79. 85 I have suggested elsewhere (Boucher, “Gƒndhƒr…,” p. 489) the possibility that Dharmarak™a’s translations could have been affected by pronunciation habits from his native language, either Tokharian or Iranian. But this is quite different from proposing that texts written in Central Asian languages served as the basis of these translations, or that these texts were composed in Central Asia. Neither supposition has been convincingly demonstrated for this early period. See also Boucher, “On Hu and Fan Again,” pp. 17–18, n. 26.


Central Asia has long been the dumping ground for texts of dubious origins, those whose pedigree could not be confidently traced to an Indian source and for which a Chinese apocryphal origin seemed unnecessary. Secondly, it is not clear what could be meant by Central Asian Buddhism in the mid- to late-third century. Buddhist texts in Central Asian languages are not known prior to the fifth or sixth century.86 We are left then with the impression that these so-called missionaries may have come to China precisely because they found little support for their religious persuasion in their native lands. And this may also explain why early Chinese translations are predominantly of Mahƒyƒna orientation. Gregory Schopen has noted that the epigraphical record of Indian Buddhism during the first half of the first millenium indicates that Mainstream monastic institutions were deeply imbedded within their socio-economic milieux.87 Donative inscriptions demonstrate time and again that the Mainstream orders were the recipients of regular and often extensive patronage from prominent lay, even royal, families. The record also indicates that with only one clear exception, Mahƒyƒna fraternities nowhere show up as recipients of patronage prior to the fourth or fifth century, precisely the same time when Mahƒyƒna influences appear conspicuously in the art historical record as well, as, for example, in the cave complexes at Aja¡¾ƒ.88 This is precisely what we might expect if the Mahƒyƒna in India and Indianized regions was in fact what its literature frequently suggests: a fringe, often despised, sectarian movement unable to garner much in the way of public prestige and support.89 It may not be an accident, then, that the majority of early missionaries to China are affiliated with the Mahƒyƒna if in fact China held 86 Jan Nattier, “Church Language and Vernacular Language in Central Asian Buddhism,” Numen 37.2 (1990), pp. 195–219. 87 See the following articles by Schopen: “Two Problems in the History of Indian Buddhism: The Layman/Monk Distinction and the Doctrines of the Transference of Merit,” Studien zur Indologie und Iranistik 10 (1985), pp. 9–47; “Monastic Law Meets the Real World: A Monk’s Continuing Right to Inherit Family Property in Classical India, History of Religions 35.2 (1995), pp. 101–23; and “The Lay Ownership of Monasteries and the Role of the Monk in Mˆlasarvƒstivƒdin Monasteries,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 19.1 (1996), pp. 81–126. 88 See Shizutani Masao (????), “Mahƒyƒna Inscriptions in the Gupta Period,” Indogaku Bukky±gaku kenkyˆ 19 (1962), pp. (358)–(355); Gregory Schopen, “Mahƒyƒna in Indian Inscriptions,” Indo-Iranian Journal 21 (1979), pp. 1–19; and Schopen, “The Inscription on the Ku™ƒn Image of Amitƒbha and the Character of the Early Mahƒyƒna in India,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 10.2 (1987), pp. 99–134. 89 See Boucher, Bodhisattvas of the Forest and the Formation of the Mahƒyƒna, esp. chap. 4, for a fleshing out of the sociology of the early Mahƒyƒna in India . out the prospect of a religious and economic haven many found lacking in India and the Tarim Basin. When the Mahƒyƒna does begin to appear on the scene in Indian Buddhist inscriptions, roughly around the fourth or fifth century, the Mainstream schools increasingly cease to be found epigraphically as recipients of substantial patronage. And, as if to confirm this hypothesis, the first large compendia of Mainstream ƒgama and vinaya texts were translated in China at about the same time, suggesting the possibility of a reversal of fortunes between these groups at the start of the Indian Gupta period.90 If this supposition is even partially correct, there is much about the motivations of the first translators in China that has quite probably been misunderstood. Indeed, many no doubt were moved by a desire to propagate the Dharma. But it may also be true that those who arrived in the first few centuries may have been as much refugees as missionaries. This, of course, has a number of implications for the character of early Chinese Buddhism as well, in particular for our understanding of what conditions made Buddhism in China possible. But it also reminds us that the very conditions which opened the door to this foreign religion in China were still very much in formation in the Tarim Basin when Dharmarak™a appeared on the scene in the third century.


LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

CS Z J J Chu sanzang ji jiG S Z Gaoseng zhuan ?

90 Schopen has discussed the marginality of the early Mahƒyƒna in India vis-à-vis the earlier appearance of Mahƒyƒna texts in Chinese translation; see his “The Mahƒyƒna and the Middle Period in Indian Buddhism: Through a Chinese Looking-glass, Eastern Buddhist ns 32.2 (2000), pp. 1–25. I do not, however, agree with his low estimation of the value of the Chinese