Notes

n.1Pearcey, Adam, trans., The Four Factors (84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha, 2023a).

n.2Pearcey, Adam, trans., The Noble Mahāyāna Sūtra on the Four Factors (84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha, 2023b).

n.3Dharmachakra Translation Committee, trans., The Accomplishment of the Sets of Four Qualities: The Bodhisattvas’ Prātimokṣa (84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha, 2024).

n.4Dharmachakra Translation Committee, trans., The Fourfold Accomplishment (84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha, 2020).

n.5See Tsong-kha-pa 2000 vol. 1, 251–4. Dza Patrul Rinpoche’s (rdza dpal sprul, 1808–87) famous nineteenth century work kun bzang bla ma’i zhal lung and its commentary by Khenpo Ngawang Pelzang (ngag dbang dpal bzang, 1879–1941) discuss the four powers in relation to meditation on the deity Vajrasattva. See Patrul Rinpoche 1998, 265–7 and Ngawang Pelzang 2004, 226–7.

n.6One such text, entitled stobs bzhi’i bshags bsdoms bya tshul, was composed by the First (or Fourth according to some methods of counting) Paṇchen Lama, Losang Chökyi Gyaltsen (blo bzang chos kyi rgyal mtshan, 1570–1662). The same author also wrote another rite incorporating the four powers that focuses on the thirty-five buddhas of confession. See stobs bzhi tshang ba sangs rgyas so lnga’i bya tshul.

n.7Patrul Rinpoche’s kun bzang bla ma’i zhal lung, for example, makes no reference to the sūtra and discusses the four powers in a different sequence, beginning with the power of support. See Patrul Rinpoche 1998, 265–7.

n.8Besides the Potala manuscript, there is also a Sanskrit edition included in Samten and Pandey 2003, 45–52.

n.9See Tseng 2010.

n.10The Potala Sanskrit edition (Tseng 2010, vol. 1, 404) is as follows: kṛtvābudho ’lpam api pāpam adhaḥ prayāti kṛtvā budho mahad api prajahāty anarthān | majjaty ayo ’lpam api vāriṇi saṃhataṃ hi pātrīkṛtaṃ mahad api plavate tad eva ||. The verse also appears, without mention of its source, in Vasubandhu’s auto-commentary to the Abhidharmakośa. For alternative English translations see Tseng 2010, vol. 1, 405, and Pruden 1988, 962.

n.11Skilling (2021), pp. 181–88.

n.12The Potala Sanskrit edition (Tseng 2010, vol. 1, 397) reads “one thousand two hundred and fifty monks” (ardha­trayoda­śabhir bhikṣuśatair).

n.13Here the translation follows the Peking Kangxi and Yongle Kangyurs, as well as the Potala Sanskrit manuscript and the Śikṣāsamuccaya, in reading mi phyed pa’i sdom pa as mi byed pa’i sdom pa (akaraṇasaṃvara). This reading not only accords with the available Sanskrit, it also follows the definitions of the other powers in providing an instruction rather than a mere description. Moreover, the phrase mi byed pa’i sdom pa is also retained in the citations of the Catur­dharma­nirdeśa­sūtra that appear in several treatises in the Tengyur, including Bhāviveka’s Tarkajvālā, Prajñākaramati’s Bodhi­caryā­vatāra­pañjikā, and Abhayākaragupta’s Munimatālaṃkāra. The alternative reading, which is to be found in the other Kangyurs, could be translated as: “The power of restraint is to make a pledge and thereby gain an inviolable vow.”