Vajracchedikāprajñāpāramitāsūtra

वज्रच्छेदिकाप्रज्ञापारमितासूत्र

Vajracchedikāprajñāpāramitāsūtra

འཕགས་པ་ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་རྡོ་རྗེ་གཅོད་པ་ཞེས་བྱ་བ་ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོའི་མདོ།

'phags pa shes rab kyi pha rol tu phyin pa rdo rje gcod pa zhes bya ba theg pa chen po'i mdo

大般若波羅蜜多經

Dà bān ruò jīng chū huì xù

The Diamond Sūtra; The Perfection of Wisdom Sūtra called The Diamond Cutter

D16   ·  T220,235,236,237,238,239

SOURCE TEXT

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.

Relevance to Buddha-nature

Though this is generally considered an important source text for the Madhayamaka teachings, it is quoted in the Uttaratantra, though it is not explicitly cited as the source of the quotation.

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Recensions of This Text

Vajracchedikāprajñāpāramitāsūtra. (The Perfection of Wisdom Sūtra called The Diamond Cutter). Recension information:

Sanskrit	वज्रच्छेदिकाप्रज्ञापारमितासूत्र (vajracchedikā-nāma-prajñāpāramitā-mahāyāna-sūtra). MS 2385. (Sanskrit manuscript). Schøyen Collection, Norway. https://www2.hf.uio.no/polyglotta/index.php?page=volume&bid=2&vid=22&entity=22&kid=22 Pargiter. F. E. "Vajracchedikā in the Original Sanskrit," in A.F. Rudolf Hoernle, Manuscript Remains of Buddhist Literature Found in Eastern Turkestan. Oxford: Clarendon Pr., p. 176-195; cf. p. 239-288, 1916. Muller, Friedrich Max. "Vajracchedikā." In Buddhist Texts from Japan, p. 19-46 Oxford: Clarendon Press (AnecOx 1[1]); repr. New York: AMS Press, 1976, (originally published in 1881). Vajracchedika Prajnaparamita. Edited by Vaidya, P. L. Darbhanga in: Mahayana-sutra-samgrahah, Part 1. Darbhanga: The Mithila Institute 1961 (Buddhist Sanskrit Texts, 17). Input by members of the Sanskrit Buddhist Canon Input Project: http://www.dsbcproject.org/canon-text/content/403/1863 Conze, Edward. Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā. Rome: IsMEO (SOR 13); 2nd rev. ed, 1974, (originally published in 1957); ed. pp. 27-63, tr. pp. 65-92. Schopen, Gregory. The Manuscript of the Vajracchedikā Found at Gilgit, in Studies in the Literature of the Great Vehicle: Three Mahāyāna Buddhist Texts (ed. by L. O. Gómez and J. A. Silk) Ann Arbor, pp. 89-139, 1989.
Tibetan	འཕགས་པ་ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་རྡོ་རྗེ་གཅོད་པ་ཞེས་བྱ་བ་ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོའི་མདོ།, ('phags pa shes rab kyi pha rol tu phyin pa rdo rje gcod pa zhes bya ba theg pa chen po'i mdo). BCRD Link: http://databases.aibs.columbia.edu/index.php?id=fe8dc4d8de32393b3d2e6e0e82d37cfa&enc=tibetan_wylie_title&coll=kangyur Derge 16, shes rab sna tshogs, ka 121a1-132b7 (vol. 34), translated by Śīlendrabodhi and Ye shes sde. Also appears in Q 739, sher phyin, tsi 161b2-175b8 (vol. 21, p.250); N 18, sna tshogs, ka 222a6-240a3 (vol. 34).; C 1006, sna tshogs, ka 169a8-186a6 (vol. 78); H 18, sna tshogs, ka 215a4-235b7 (vol. 34); J 18, sna tshogs, ka 151b8-164b8 (vol. 39); U 16, shes rab sna tshogs, ka 121a1-132b7 (vol. 34).
Chinese	大般若經初會序 (Dà bān ruò jīng chū huì xù), T220(09), 05: https://21dzk.l.u-tokyo.ac.jp/SAT2012/T0220.html, translated by Xuánzàng. 金剛般若波羅蜜經 (Jīn gāng bān ruò bō luó mì jīng), T235, 08: https://21dzk.l.u-tokyo.ac.jp/SAT2012/T0235.html, translated by Kumārajīva. 金剛般若波羅蜜經 (Jīn gāng bān ruò bō luó mì jīng), T236, 08: https://21dzk.l.u-tokyo.ac.jp/SAT2012/T0236.html, translated by Bhodiruci. 金剛般若波羅蜜經 (Jīn gāng bān ruò bō luó mì jīng), T237, 08: https://21dzk.l.u-tokyo.ac.jp/SAT2012/T0237.html, translated by Paramārtha. 金剛能斷般若波羅蜜經 (Jīn gāng néng duàn bān ruò bō luó mì jīng), T238, 08: https://21dzk.l.u-tokyo.ac.jp/SAT2012/T0238.html, translated by Dharmagupta. 能斷 金剛般若波羅蜜多經 (Néng duàn jīn gāng bān ruò bō luó mì duō jīng), T239, 08: https://21dzk.l.u-tokyo.ac.jp/SAT2012/T0239.html, translated by Yìjìng.

Text Metadata

Other Titles	~ ārya-vajracchedikā-nāma-prajñāpāramitā-mahāyāna-sūtra
Text exists in	~ Sanskrit ~ Tibetan ~ Chinese
Canonical Genre	~ Kangyur · Sūtra · sher phyin · Prajñāpāramitā
Literary Genre	~ Sūtras - mdo

sūtra - Sūtras mainly refer to the discourses delivered by the Buddha and his disciples, and the Sūtra corpus is one of the three main sets of teachings which form the Buddhist canon. Skt. सूत्र Tib. མདོ། Ch. 佛经

anātman - The nonexistence of the self as a permanent, unchanging entity. Skt. अनात्मन् Tib. བདག་མེད་པ་ Ch. 无我

Uttaratantra - The Ultimate Continuum, or Gyü Lama, is often used as a short title in the Tibetan tradition for the key source text of buddha-nature teachings called the Ratnagotravibhāga of Maitreya/Asaṅga, also known as the Mahāyānottaratantraśāstra. Skt. उत्तरतन्त्र Tib. རྒྱུད་བླ་མ་ Ch. 寶性論

These are the root verses of the Uttaratantra attributed to Maitreya by the Tibetan tradition.

Prajñāpāramitā - A class of Mahāyāna sūtras which represents some of the earliest known literature of this genre of Buddhism. There are around forty texts associated with this category, though the most widespread is the exceedingly brief Prajñāpāramitāhṛdayasūtra, popularly known as the Heart Sūtra. This class of literature is typically associated with the second turning of the dharma wheel and especially with the teachings on emptiness (śūnyatā). As such, these texts were the primary scriptural source for the philosophy of the Madhyamaka school. Skt. प्रज्ञापारमिता Tib. ཤེར་ཕྱིན་,ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་ Ch. 般若波羅蜜多

Mahāyāna - Mahāyāna, or the Great Vehicle, refers to the system of Buddhist thought and practice which developed around the beginning of Common Era, focusing on the pursuit of the state of full enlightenment of the Buddha through the realization of the wisdom of emptiness and the cultivation of compassion. Skt. महायान Tib. ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོ། Ch. 大乘

sūtra - Sūtras mainly refer to the discourses delivered by the Buddha and his disciples, and the Sūtra corpus is one of the three main sets of teachings which form the Buddhist canon. Skt. सूत्र Tib. མདོ། Ch. 佛经

MS - Mahāyānasaṃgraha

AMS - Aṅgulimālīyasūtra

Prajñāpāramitā - A class of Mahāyāna sūtras which represents some of the earliest known literature of this genre of Buddhism. There are around forty texts associated with this category, though the most widespread is the exceedingly brief Prajñāpāramitāhṛdayasūtra, popularly known as the Heart Sūtra. This class of literature is typically associated with the second turning of the dharma wheel and especially with the teachings on emptiness (śūnyatā). As such, these texts were the primary scriptural source for the philosophy of the Madhyamaka school. Skt. प्रज्ञापारमिता Tib. ཤེར་ཕྱིན་,ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་ Ch. 般若波羅蜜多

Prajñāpāramitā - A class of Mahāyāna sūtras which represents some of the earliest known literature of this genre of Buddhism. There are around forty texts associated with this category, though the most widespread is the exceedingly brief Prajñāpāramitāhṛdayasūtra, popularly known as the Heart Sūtra. This class of literature is typically associated with the second turning of the dharma wheel and especially with the teachings on emptiness (śūnyatā). As such, these texts were the primary scriptural source for the philosophy of the Madhyamaka school. Skt. प्रज्ञापारमिता Tib. ཤེར་ཕྱིན་,ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་ Ch. 般若波羅蜜多

IsMEO - Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente

BCRD - The Buddhist Canons Research Database a project of the American Institute of Buddhist Studies (AIBS) and the Columbia University Center for Buddhist Studies (CCBS) http://databases.aibs.columbia.edu/