Notes

n.1See Liljenberg (2016a).

n.2See Liljenberg (2016b).

n.3Abhisamayālaṃkāra­kārikā­prajñā­pāramitopadeśa­śāstra­ṭīkā­prasphuṭa­padā (Toh 3796). The quotation from The Question of Maitreya can be found on folio 37.a in the Degé edition.

n.4Currently the manuscript is kept in the Potala. Vinītā’s critical edition is based on a copy of the manuscript that is kept in the China Tibetology Research Center. For further details on the state of this manuscript, see Vinītā (2010), pp. xv–xvii.

n.5Vinītā (2010), pp. xxvii–xxix.

n.6See in particular Toh 172: Mañjuśrī­paripṛcchā­sūtra (’jam dpal gyis dris pa’i mdo) in Vinītā (2010), pp. 703–69. Here also the teaching of the Dharma, or the speech of the Buddha‍—or in this case his Dharma conch‍—is said to be supremely meritorious. For translation see Kīrtimukha Translation Group (2021).

n.7Of the three sūtras called The Question of Maitreya (byams pas zhus pa) listed in the Denkarma, the first is most likely the aforementioned longer sūtra from the Ratnakūṭa, Toh 85. The second is listed among the general Mahāyāna sūtras (theg pa chen po’i mdo sde sna tshogs) and described in the catalog as having the length of seventy ślokas (a śloka equaling sixteen syllables in the Sanskrit), which is far too long for this text. Finally, the “small” Question of Maitreya (’phags pa byams pas zhus pa chung ngu) has a lacuna in the printed text where the number indicating its length would normally be visible; however, since the texts listed in the catalog are ordered by descending length, it can be surmised that it is between fifteen and thirty ślokas in length (Denkarma, folio 300.a). This correlates with the “small” Question of Maitreya (spelled slightly different, ’phags pa byams pas zhus pa nangs kyi chung ngu) found in the Phangthangma, which is listed as having sixteen ślokas (Phangthangma (2003), p. 18). Although these lengths listed in the catalogs tend to be somewhat unreliable, this length closely matches our text. As a side note in regard to the seventy-śloka Question of Maitreya, the Phangthangma does not mention the seventy-śloka text in the catalog’s section for general Mahāyana sūtras, but it does mention a Question of Maitreya of forty ślokas in a miscellaneous section for texts that were not found in the official catalogs but in a list recorded by a certain monk, Shönu Nyingpo (ban dhe gzhon nu snying po; see ibid., p. 50). See also Halkias (2004), pp. 75–76.

n.8For a discussion of dating of the Denkarma catalog, see Herrmann-Pfandt (2008), pp. xviii–xx.

n.9Skilling (2021), pp. 227–34.

n.10Sanskrit adds deva­parṣanmaṇḍale saṃniṣaṇṇaḥ (“who was seated in an assembly of gods”).

n.11In Sanskrit the sequence varies slightly: “not even a hundredth, a thousandth, a hundred-thousandth, a ten-millionth, a billionth, a ten-billionth, or a trillionth” (śatatamīm api … sahasratamīm api śata­sahasratamīm api koṭī­śata­sahasratamīm api saṃkhyām api).

n.12Sanskrit has “give excellent world realms full of riches” (ratnasya pūrṇān varalokadhātun | dadyād).

n.13Translated from Stok: gang gi, which aligns more closely with the attested Sanskrit kāṃcin. Degé has gang gA’i (“Ganges”), which is mentioned in the previous verse but does not fit in grammatically with this line.

n.14Sanskrit omits “monks” in this list.