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The Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra

Translation of The Sūtra on the Descent into Laṅka (84000)

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Originally published in 1932, this was the first English translation of the Laṅkāvatārasūtra. It was based on the Sanskrit edition of Nanjo Bunyu, published by the Otani University Press in 1923.

Citation	Suzuki, D. T., trans. The Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra: A Mahāyāna Text. Buddhist Tradition Series 40. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 2003. First published 1932 by George Routledge and Sons (London).

Table of Contents About the Book Texts Translated Quotes

• Foreword by Alex Wayman v
• Preface vii
• Introduction xiii
• Chapter One. Ravana, Lord of Lanka, Asks for Instruction 3
• Chapter Two. Collection of all the Dharmas 22
  • I. Mahāmati Praises the Buddha with Verses 22
  • II. Mahāmati's "One Hundred and Eight Questions" 23
  • III. "The One Hundred and Eight Negations" 31
  • IV. Concerning the Vijñānas 33
  • V. Seven Kinds of Self-nature (svabhāva) 35
  • VI. Seven Kinds of First Principle (paramārtha), and the Philosophers' Wrong Views regarding the Mind Rejected 35
  • VII. Erroneous Views held by Some Brahmans and Śramanas Concerning Causation, Continuation, etc.; The Buddhist Views Concerning Such Subjects
    as Alayavijñāna, Nirvana, Mind-only, etc.; Attainments of the Bodhisattva 36
  • VIII. The Bodhisattva's Discipling himself in Self-realisation 39
  • IX. The Evolution and Function of the Vijũānas; The Spiritual Discipline of the Bodhisattva; Verses on the Alaya-ocean and Vijũāna-waves 39
  • X. The Bodhisattva is to Understand the Signification of Mind-only 44
  • XI (a). The Three Aspects of Noble Wisdom (āryajñāna) 44
  • XI (b). The Attainment of the Tathāgatakāya 45
  • XII. Logic on the Hare's Horns 46
  • XIII. Verses on the Alayavijñāna and Mind-only 49
  • XIV. Purification of the Outflows, Instantaneous and Gradual 49
  • XV. Nishyanda-Buddha, Dharmatā-Buddha, and Nirmāṇa-Buddha 51
  • XVI. The Śrāvaka's Eealisation and Attachment to the Notion of Self-nature 52
  • XVII. The Eternal-Unthinkable 53
  • XVIII. Nirvana and Alayavijñāna 55
  • XIX. All Things are Unborn 55
  • XX. The Five Classes of Spiritual Insight 56
  • XXI. Verses on the Triple Vehicle 58
  • XXII. Two Classes of the Icchantika 58
  • XXIII. The Three Forms of Svabhāva 59
  • XXIV. The Twofold Egolessness (nairātmyadvaya-lakshaṇa) 60
  • XXV. Assertion and Eefutation (samāropāpavāda) 62
  • XXVI. The Bodhisattva Assumes Various Personalities 64
  • XXVII. On Emptiness (śūnyatā), No-birth, and Non-duality 65
  • XXVIII. The Tathāgata-Garbha and the Ego-soul 68
  • XXIX. A Verse on the Philosophers' Discriminations 70
  • XXX. The Four Things Needed for the Constitution of Bodhisattvahood 70
  • XXXI. On Causation (Six Kinds), and the Rise of Existence 72
  • XXXII. Four Forms of Word-discrimination 75
  • XXXIII. On Word and Discrimination and the Highest Reality 76
  • XXXIV. Verses on Reality and its Representations 77
  • XXXV. Mind-only, Multitudinousness, and Analogies, with an Interpolation
    on the Dualistic Notion of Existence 78
  • XXXVI. The Teaching (dharmadeśanā) of the Tathagatas 84
  • XXXVII. Four Kinds of Dhyāna 85
  • XXXVIII. On Nirvana 86
  • XXXIX. Two Characteristics of Self-nature 87
  • XL. Two Kinds of the Buddha's Sustaining Power (adhishṭhāna) 87
  • XLI. On the Chain of Causation (pratityasamutpāda) 90
  • XLII. Words (abhilāpa) and Realities (bhāva) 91
  • XLIII. On Eternality of Sound (nityaśabda), the Nature of Error (bhrānta),
    and Perversion (viparyāsa) 92
  • XLIV. On the Nature of Māyā 95
  • XLV. That All Things are Unborn 96
  • XLVI. On Name, Sentence, Syllable, and Their Meaning 97
  • XLVII. On Inexplicable Statements (vyākṛitāni) 98
  • XLVIII. All Things are and are not (Verses on Four Forms of Explanation) 99
  • XLIX. On the Śrāvakas, Srotaāpanna, Sakṛidāgāmin, Anāgāmin, and Arhat;
    on the Three Knots (saṁyojāni) 100
  • L. The Intellect (buddhi), Examining and Discrimnating 105
  • LI. The Elements, Primary and Secondary 106
  • LII. The Five Skandhas 107
  • LIII. Four Kinds of Nirvana and the Eight Vijñānas 108
  • LIV. The False Imagination Regarding Twelve Subjects 110
  • LV. Verses on the Citta, Parikalpita, Paratantra, and Parinishpanna 112
  • LVI. The One Vehicle and the Triple Vehicle 114
• Chapter Three. On Impermanency 118
  • LVII. Three Forms of the Will-body (manomayakāya) 118
  • LVIII. The Five Immediacies (pañcānantaryāṇi) ; Desire as Mother and
    Ignorance as Father 120
  • LIX. The Buddha-nature (buddhatā) 122
  • LX. The Identity (samatā) of Buddhahood and its Four Aspects 122
  • LXI. Not a Word Uttered by the Buddha; Self-realisation and an Eternally-
    abiding Reality 123
  • LXII. On Being and Non-Being; Realism and Nihilism 125
  • LXIII. Realisation and Word-teaching 127
  • LXIV. Discrimination, an External World, Dualism, and Attachment 129
  • LXV. The Relation between Words (ruta) and Meaning (artha) 133
  • LXVI. On Knowledge, Absolute (jñāna) and Relative (vijñāna) 135
  • LXVII. Nine Transformations (pariṇāma) 137
  • LXVIII. The Deep-seated Attachment to Existence 138
  • LXIX. Self-nature, Reality, Imagination, Truth of Solitude, etc. 141
  • LXX. The Thesis of No-birth 144
  • LXXI. True Knowledge and Ignorance 146
  • LXXII. Self-realisation and the Discoursing on it 148
  • LXXIII. On the Lokāyatika 149
  • LXXIV. Various Views of Nirvana 157
  • LXXV. Is Tathagatahood Something Made? Its Relation to the Skandhas, to Emancipation, to Knowledge 161
  • LXXVI. The Tathagata Variously Designated; Relation Between Words and Meaning; Not a Word Uttered by the Buddha 164
  • LXXVII. Causation, No-birth, Self-mind, Nirvana 170
  • LXXVIII. Verses on No-birth and Causation 172
  • LXXIX. Various Views of Impermanency 176
• Chapter Four. On intuitive Understanding 182
  • LXXX. Perfect Tranquillisation Attained by Śrāvakas, Pratyekabuddhas, and Bodhisattvas; Stages of Bodhisattvahood 182
• Chapter Five. On the Deduction of the Permanency of Tathagatahood 187
  • LXXXI. Permanency of Tathagatahood 187
• Chapter Six. On Momentariness 190
  • LXXXII. The Tathāgata-garbha and the Alayavijñāna 190
  • LXXXIII. The Five Dharmas, and Their Relation to the Three Svabhāvas 193
  • LXXXIV. The Five Dharmas 197
  • LXXXV. Tathagata and Sands of the Gangā 198
  • LXXXVI. Momentariness; the Eight Vijñānas 202
  • LXXXVII. Three Kinds of the Pāramitās 204
  • LXXXVIII. Views on Momentariness; Discrimination 206
• Chapter Seven. On Transformation 207
  • LXXXIX. On Transformation 207
• Chapter Eight. On Meat-Eating 211
• Chapter Nine. The Dhāranīs 223
• Sagāthakam 226
• Appendix 297

It is more than seven years now since I began the study of the Lankavatara Sutra quite seriously, but owing to various interruptions I have not been able to carry out my plan as speedily as I wished. My friends in different fields of life have been kind and generous in various ways, and I now send out to the perusal of the English-reading public this humble work of mine. There are yet many difficult and obscure passages in the Sutra, which I have been unable to unravel to my own satisfaction. All such imperfections are to be corrected by competent scholars. I shall be fully content if I have made the understanding of this significant Mahayana text easier than before, even though this may be only to a very slight degree. In China Buddhist scholars profoundly learned and endowed with spiritual insights made three or four attempts extending over a period of about two hundred and fifty years to give an intelligible rendering of the Lankavatara. It goes without saying that these have helped immensely the present translator. May his also prove a stepping board however feeble towards a fuller interpretation of the Sutra!

The present English translation is based on the Sanskrit edition of Bunyu Nanjo's published by the Otani University Press in 1923.

I am most grateful to Mr Dwight Goddard of Thetford, Vermont, U. S. A., who again helped me by typing the entire manuscript of the present book. To Assist me in this way was indeed part of the object of his third visit to this side of the Pacific. Says Confucius, "Is it not delightful to have a friend come from afar?" The saying applies most appropriately, to this case.

It was fortunate for the writer that he could secure the support and help of the Keimeikwai, a corporation organised to help research work of scholars in various fields of culture; for without it his work might have dragged on yet for some time to come. There is so much to be accomplished before he has to appear at the court of Emma Daiwo, to whom he could say, "Here is my work; humble though it is, I have tried to do my part to the full extent of my power." The writer renders his grateful acknowledgment here to all the advisers of the Society who kindly voted for the speedy culmination of this literary task—a task which he tenderly wishes would do something towards a better appreciation by the West of the sources of Eastern life and culture.

Whatever literary work the present author is able to put before the reader, he cannot pass on without mentioning in it the name of his good, unselfish, public-minded Buddhist friend, Yakichi Ataka, who is always willing to help him in every possible way. If not for him, the author could never have carried out his plans to the extent he has so far accomplished. Materially, no visible results can be expected of this kind of undertaking, and yet a scholar has his worldly needs to meet. Unless we create one of these fine days an ideal community in which every member of it can put forth all his or her natural endowments and moral energies in the direction best fitted to develop them and in the way most useful to all other members generally and individually, many obstacles are sure to bar the passage of those who would attempt things of no commercial value. Until then, Bodhisattvas of all kinds are sorely needed everywhere. And is this not the teaching of the Lankavatara Sutra, which in its English garb now lies before his friend as well as all other readers?

Thanks are also due to the writer's wife who went over the whole manuscript to give it whatever literary improvement it possesses, to Mr Hokei Idzumi who gave helpful suggestions in the reading of the original text, and to Professor Yenga Teramoto for his ungrudging cooperation along the line of Tibetan knowledge.

-Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki Kyoto, November, 1931 (Source: Preface)

1. Bunyu, Nanjo, ed. The Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra. Bibliotheca Otaniensia 1. Kyōto: Otani Daigaku, 1923. https://archive.org/details/dli.ernet.313027/mode/2up.

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

Descent into Laṅka Sūtra, a very influential text in East Asia and Nepal.

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