Notes

n.1It is worth noting that although the subject of giving away one’s life, bodily parts, or family members is treated in this and similar texts as a rather commonplace aspect of a bodhisattva’s training, it is made abundantly clear in the commentarial treatises that Buddhist tradition does not teach these kinds of “great giving” (gtong ba chen po) or “exceptionally great giving” (shin tu gtong ba) to ordinary practitioners who have not yet attained one of the ten bodhisattva levels (and many texts specify the three highest or “sublime” levels). Only such advanced bodhisattvas have both fully realized emptiness, and also given rise to the vast altruistic intentions that make such an act viable and meaningful. In the meantime, such stories of “ultimate giving” are intended to inspire a commensurate attitude of selfless generosity in the reader.

n.2Jātakas typically relate stories from the Buddha’s past lives, in which the Buddha is either the protagonist of the story or a witness to other events. See Appleton 2010, pp. 3–6, and Rothenberg 1990, pp. 4–5.

n.3For a critical edition and partial translation of this work, see Rothenberg 1990. For text-critical remarks on the text, see de Jong 1979.

n.4On Kṣemendra’s life and works, see Chakraborty 1991 and Chattopadhyay 1994.

n.5See Ohnuma 2007, p. 22.

n.6Ohnuma (2007) discusses all these tales and the connections between them in her work. She also provides a list of the various versions of the texts in her work’s first appendix, pp. 273–83.

n.7Blessed One (bhagavān), Well-Gone One (sugata), and the Teacher (śāstṛ) are all epithets for the Buddha. The repetition of terms referring to the Buddha is most probably for emphasis.

n.8We chose to translate pho brang as “royal estate” instead of the more usual “palace” as the text says this “palace” included fields and the dwellings of the king’s subjects. A palace is a building; it does not include grounds, fields, or villages.

n.9Here we have read chur as tshur.

n.10This translation follows the Narthang edition, which reads khyim ba. The Degé edition reads khyim bya, meaning “chicken.” We assume this is a misspelling.

n.11This translation follows the Degé edition, which reads skyong ba. The Comparative Edition, Narthang, and Lhasa editions read skyob pa, which means “to protect.”

n.12In other words, it has to be seen to be believed.

n.13One rgyang grags (Skt. krośa) is approximately two miles.

n.14The use of mchog to describe a house is ambiguous; it could mean “the best of houses” or “the (roof)top of a house.” Clues for how to translate the line were found in a similar line from the Newari version of the Candra­prabhāvadāna (The Exemplary Tale of Candraprabha). This line reads: etāś candranibhānanā yuvatayo rodanti veśmottame (Matsumura 1980, p. 101, n. 34). This line could be translated as: “These young women, whose faces resemble the moon, cry on the (roof)tops of their houses.” As this text provides more context for the young women’s actions, we have rendered mchog as “(roof)top.” We thank our anonymous reviewer for this reference.

n.15rdo rje lhung is a Tibetan translation of the Sanskrit term vajrapāta, which means “the fall of a thunderbolt” or a “lightning strike.”

n.16We have read gzhin bzangs as bzhin bzang. The Lhasa edition of the text reads bzang.

n.17This stanza is widely quoted in Buddhist literature across traditions. It is found, for example, in the Vinayavastu and Udānavarga.

n.18Here the Tibetan reads phyir lus, which usually means “turn back” but can also be a Tibetan translation of the Sanskrit term avapṛṣṭhīkṛtaḥ. A synonym of paścān­mukhīkṛtaḥ, avapṛṣṭhīkṛtaḥ also has the figurative meaning of “surpassed, outdone.” This is the only meaning that makes sense in the context of this story, so we have chosen to translate phyir lus as “surpassed.” The obtuseness of this usage is most probably compensated for by the familiarity most readers of the avadāna would have with the story of the Buddha offering his body to the tigress.

n.19The Tibetan grammar in this short rendition of a famous tale is less than clear. It could be read to suggest that Maitreya lengthened his period as a bodhisattva by offering his life to the tiger. The idea that such an action would increase the time it took to attain buddhahood runs counter to the rest of the narrative, however, in which Śrisena, a past rebirth of the Buddha Śākyamuni, is trying to hasten buddhahood by offering his body. It also contradicts several other renditions of this tale, all of which explain that a previous incarnation of Maitreya could not offer himself to the tigress but a previous incarnation of the Buddha Śākyamuni did, thereby surpassing the deeds of the bodhisattva Maitreya, who had set out for buddhahood forty eons earlier than the Buddha Śākyamuni. This tale is not only told in both the Śrīsenāvadāna and the Candra­prabhāvadāna, but also in the Suvarṇaprabhāsa Sūtra (See translation in Emmerick 1970, pp. 85–97). This last work identifies Maitreya as the older brother Mahāpraṇāda, who had set out for buddhahood forty eons earlier, but does not offer his body to the tigress and is consequently surpassed by his younger brother who does make this sacrifice. Ohnuma (2007, pp. 9–14) discusses this story. She concludes (p. 14) that “[i]t was his (Maitreya’s) failure to act in the same exalted manner as Śākyamuni that made him lose the cosmic race toward perfect buddhahood.” Among all the other retellings of the tigress tale, one that is particularly helpful for understanding this passage is a parallel passage in the Sanskrit and Tibetan editions of the Candra­prabhāvadāna (Matsumura 1980). This avadāna includes a reminiscence by another of the Buddha Śākyamuni’s incarnations, Candraprabha, about the same offering to the tigress. The passage in question reads, in Sanskrit: esa eva devate sa pradeśo yatra mayā vyāghryātmanam parityajya catvārimsat-ka[lpa sam]prasthito maitreyo bodhisatvaḥ ekena śirasā parityāgena avapṛṣṭhīkṛtaḥ (Matsumura, pp. 111–12). And, in Tibetan: lha mo gang du ngas stag mo la bdag nyid yongs su btang ste / lus yongs su gtong ba gcig gis byang chub sems dpa’ byams pa bskal pa bzhi bcur zhugs pa / phyir ’dums par byas pa’i sa phyogs ni ’di yin no // (Matsumura 1980, p. 267). It could be translated: “Goddess, this is the very place in which I gave myself to the tigress. By this one act of completely giving my head (body in Tibetan), I surpassed the bodhisattva Maitreya who had set out (for buddhahood) forty eons earlier (than I).” In this passage, the use of the Sanskrit pronoun mayā clearly indicates that it was Candraprabha’s previous incarnation (and, therefore, the Buddha Śākyamuni’s and Śrīsena’s previous incarnation) who offered his body (or head) to the tigress, not the previous incarnation of the bodhisattva Maitreya. As explained in the preceding note, the use of ambiguous phrases in the present rendition of this tale was probably compensated for by the familiarity most readers had with the tale of the hungry tigress. We are much indebted to one of our anonymous reviewers for helping to understand this short but complicated vignette and to refine our translation of it.

n.20Puṇḍarīka is a white lotus flower, Nelumbium speciosum. Agaru is agarwood, taken from the inside of the Aquilaria and Gyrinops trees after they have been attacked by mold. Tagara incense is made from the milky sap of Tabernaemontana divaricata. Indian tradition has it that the mandārava tree growing in Indra’s garden is the Erythrina variegata, or Indian coral tree.

n.21Translated based on Narthang and Lhasa, which read bzod par mdzod.