Introduction

i.1The Secrets of the Realized Ones (Tathāgataguhya) can be called, without exaggeration, a great work of Mahāyāna Buddhist literature. It deserves to be considered a work of literature in the narrower sense of a form of verbal expression of enduring artistic merit, a work of the creative imagination that may elicit pleasure, wonder, and many other responses from an audience, and not simply in the broader sense of literature as a body of written (or oral) works in general. In that narrower sense, it is comparable to better known works of Mahāyāna Buddhist literature, such as The Teaching of Vimalakīrti (Vimalakīrti­nirdeśa, Toh 176), the literary merits of which are already well established, and The Play in Full (Lalitavistara, Toh 95), which deserves more recognition in this regard. Both of these latter works would seem to bear a close relationship to The Secrets of the Realized Ones in other respects as well, and it to them.

i.2If The Teaching of Vimalakīrti is already recognized as a great work of Mahāyāna Buddhist literature, what should we make of the fact that in The Teaching of Vimalakīrti itself, the goddess who lives in Vimalakīrti’s house informs Śāriputra (and consequently the audience) that among the eight “wonderful and marvelous things” (āścaryādbhuta­dharma) that occur in Vimalakīrti’s house, the seventh is the fact that countless buddhas, including Śākyamuni, come there whenever Vimalakīrti requests it and teach “the point of entry into the Dharma (dharma­mukhapraveśa) named The Secrets of the Realized Ones (Tathāgataguhya)”? Also, earlier in The Teaching of Vimalakīrti, when Mañjuśrī first responds to the Buddha’s request that he visit the sick bodhisattva to inquire about his health, Mañjuśrī describes Vimalakīrti as someone who has gained full access to the secrets (guhya) of all the buddhas and bodhisattvas. From a text-historical point of view, at least, these passages are strong indications that The Teaching of Vimalakīrti knew The Secrets of the Realized Ones, and regarded it highly. In the current context, the fact that it is mentioned by another great work of Buddhist literature could be considered one piece of evidence of its own literary merit and status.

i.3The Secrets of the Realized Ones also seems to have enjoyed a relatively high degree of popularity, for some time at least, among an elite group of Buddhist scholar-monks in India and abroad. It is quoted by Vasubandhu or whoever wrote The Commentary on the Adornment to the Mahāyāna Sūtras (Mahāyāna­sūtrālaṃkāra­bhāṣya), by Candrakīrti in The Clear Words (Prasannapadā), by Kamalaśīla in the third Stages of Meditative Cultivation (Bhāvanākrama), and by the author of the Bṛhaṭṭīkā or The Long Explanation of the longer Perfection of Wisdom sūtras. Several excerpts from it are also found in The Sūtra Anthology (Sūtrasamuccaya), the ancient anthology attributed to Nāgārjuna, and in Śāntideva’s compendium, The Training Anthology (Śikṣāsamuccaya). In addition to the references to it in The Teaching of Vimalakīrti, it also seems to be referenced in The Descent into Laṅka (Laṅkāvatāra). Two longer passages from it also seem to be reworked in The Collected Teachings on the Bodhisattva (Bodhisattvapiṭaka, Toh 56). The sūtra is also quoted several times by whoever was responsible for The Great Treatise on the Perfection of Wisdom (Da zhidu lun 大智度論, *Mahā­prajñā­pāramitopadeśa), the commentary on The Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-Five Thousand Lines attributed to Nāgārjuna and translated into Chinese by Kumārajīva at the beginning of the fifth century ᴄᴇ. While it was undoubtedly a common practice to attribute texts to major figures of the tradition, it is nevertheless the case that Nāgārjuna, Vasubandhu, Śāntideva, Candrakīrti, Kamalaśīla, and even Kumārajīva are regarded as major figures. The fact that they may all have known and cited The Secrets of the Realized Ones is another indication of its degree of influence.

i.4Nonetheless, it may strike some readers as controversial or simply wrong to call such works as these “literature” in the first place, perhaps because of the common association of literature with fiction and religious works with nonfiction. Yet, many of the same arguments that have been used for decades to justify the claim that the Bible, whatever else it may be, is a great work of literature would hold for these works of Buddhist literature, too. Whether or not one believes that religious works such as The Long Discourses of the Buddha (Dīgha Nikāya) or The Secrets of the Realized Ones portray actual historical events or individuals, it is demonstrably the case that these works contain the characteristics of sophisticated literature, such as the artful and carefully crafted use of figurative language, thematic unity, and narrative tension. One could argue further that the recognition and careful study of these literary characteristics enable one to appreciate more deeply the historical, doctrinal, and even practical significance of such literature.

i.5While the literary dimensions of The Secrets of the Realized Ones have been emphasized above, that is not at all to suggest that the doctrinal elements are less worthy of serious and careful consideration. Indeed, the sūtra and the characters in it make some rather remarkable claims, and the doctrinal and literary dimensions are deeply interwoven throughout. For example, among the most striking claims in the sūtra is one made about the Buddha, a claim that is restated in The Descent into Laṅka and is quoted by Candrakīrti and also by the author of the Long Explanation (Bṛhaṭṭīkā) of the longer Perfection of Wisdom sūtras. At one point, Vajrapāṇi says the following:

“During the period of time, Śāntamati, from the night when the Realized One awakens to unsurpassable and perfect awakening until the night when, having relinquished his life force, the Realized One passes into complete cessation, the Realized One has not articulated and will not pronounce even a single syllable.”

i.7If taken at face value, how can such an astonishing claim be true? Vajrapāṇi will explain further that over the same period of time the Buddha does not form any thought whatsoever but dwells in a constant state of meditative absorption. Nevertheless, Vajrapāṇi continues, various beings hear the Dharma and believe that the Buddha is speaking to them in accordance with their own aspirations and motivations. Here is an example of how the sūtra employs a literary device to explain this complex idea with a concrete analogy:

“Śāntamati, this is analogous to a well-crafted musical instrument, a wind bell, which makes a sweet sound without being touched by a hand, but rather when it is moved by the wind. It does not make any special effort to produce a sound, but still it makes a sweet sound because of the special nature of its previous preparation. In the same way, Śāntamati, a realized one’s speech comes out when it is moved by knowledge of beings’ motivations, but a realized one does not make any special effort in this regard to produce it. Rather, a realized one’s speech conforms to the sense perceptions of all beings because of the special nature of a realized one’s previous preparation.”

i.9This is one of three analogies Vajrapāṇi uses to explain this idea, all of which are quoted in Candrakīrti’s Clear Words. It is just one example that serves to illustrate how the sūtra addresses one of the major questions posed by the work: what is the true nature of a buddha? In answering this question, the whole work could be said to promote the idea that a buddha, by the very nature of becoming awakened to the true nature of reality, exists in a state of all-pervasive, unlimited, and pure potentiality, a state that is identical to the true nature of reality itself. As a result, the Buddha simultaneously actualizes an infinite number of different forms while remaining constantly in that state of pure potentiality. The work explains the mechanism behind this process to some extent, using analogies like the one just quoted above, but at the same time it remains to a large degree mysterious or incomprehensible: it is the secret and the mystery of a realized one’s body, speech, and mind.

i.10In this way, The Secrets of the Realized Ones expresses an idea about the Buddha that has sometimes been compared with docetism, which is the early Christian idea that the body of Jesus Christ was not a body of flesh and blood, but a phantasm. On the face of it, The Secrets of the Realized Ones would seem to make a similar claim about the body of the Buddha. Yet, its doctrinal and metaphysical framework is different enough from the one in which docetism arose that one can at least debate the appropriateness of the comparison. Nevertheless, it is a comparison that has been made and continues to be made, and thus it is worth mentioning here.

i.11The title of the sūtra suggests that it discloses the secrets and mysteries of the Buddha, and from the point of view of its narrative, the same could be said about the one who discloses those secrets, namely Vajrapāṇi, the yakṣa who is called throughout the sūtra “the lord of the guhyakas” (guhyakādhipati); that is, the lord of “the hidden ones” or perhaps even the lord of “the guardians of what is hidden.” Narratives tell of events, sequenced, structured into a plot, and featuring characters who perform actions and experience their effects. Since this narrative largely centers on Vajrapāṇi, he could be considered its protagonist or the “hero” of the story. He is called the Buddha’s constant companion, eyewitness to his many deeds, and guardian of his secrets. The Buddha tells of Vajrapāṇi’s past lives, explaining how he came to serve in that capacity and to possess such a capability. In this respect, he is put on the same level with Brahmā Sahāṃpati, who requests the Buddha to teach the Dharma. The Buddha also gives a prediction of Vajrapāṇi’s future awakening as a buddha in his own right, after which the Buddha accepts Vajrapāṇi’s invitation to come to his home for a meal. The sūtra tells of the Buddha’s visit and of the teachings the Buddha offers to the various nonhuman creatures who live in Vajrapāṇi’s abode. In this way, the sūtra develops the character of Vajrapāṇi and explains his close relationship with the Buddha.

i.12Vajrapāṇi has been the subject of previous scholarly research, and yet he remains a mysterious figure. It is noteworthy that he makes an appearance in two suttas of the Pali canon, the Ambaṭṭha Sutta of the Dīgha Nikāya and the Cūḷasaccaka Sutta of the Majjhima Nikāya. Therein, he is described hovering over the heads of Ambaṭṭha and Saccaka, respectively, who are the Buddha’s interlocutors in those suttas, while brandishing his flaming vajra and threatening to break their heads into seven pieces if the proud young men do not answer the Buddha’s questions. Vajrapāṇi appears somewhat more frequently throughout Buddhist narrative literature, such as the avadānas and other story collections, as well as Mahāyāna Buddhist literature. For instance, in The Play in Full, there is a somewhat obscure passage that mentions Vajrapāṇi and “the lord of the guhyakas” together:

“Then Śakra, Lord of the Gods; the Four Great Kings; the twenty-eight great generals of the yakṣas; and the one named ‘Lord of the Guhyakas’ (guhyakādhipati) from whose yakṣa family Vajrapāṇi is arisen, having become aware of the fact that the Bodhisattva had entered his mother’s womb, all became bound to him constantly and perpetually.”

i.14The grammar of this passage doesn’t make it entirely clear whether Vajrapāṇi or the Lord of the Guhyakas is an individual or a class of beings, or whether they are meant to be identified or not. The Indian epic literature, the Mahābhārata and the Rāmāyaṇa, also speak of beings called guhyakas and associate them with Vaiśravaṇa or Kubera, the god of wealth. Vaiśravaṇa is himself sometimes called Lord of the Guhyakas (guhyakādhipati) therein, and the guhyakas carry his chariot. Vaiśravaṇa is also considered to be one of the Four Great Kings in Buddhist literature, and these characters feature in The Secrets of the Realized Ones as well. Furthermore, Vaiśravaṇa’s place of residence is called Alakāvatī in the Mahābhārata, while Vajrapāṇi’s place of residence is called Aḍagavatī in The Secrets of the Realized Ones, and there is even a point in this sūtra in which they seem actually to be the same place. Yet, Vaiśravaṇa and Vajrapāṇi are distinct characters in Buddhist literature. Throughout The Secrets of the Realized Ones, Vajrapāṇi is the one who is called Lord of the Guhyakas, and there seems to be a play on words in the work between guhya, “secret,” and guhyaka , maybe “keeper of what is hidden.” In general, The Secrets of the Realized Ones seems to establish some kind of close relationship between the Buddha and Vajrapāṇi, with the latter being an important representative of the heterogenous class of nonhuman beings that serve and support the Buddha, including guhyakas, yakṣas, kinnaras, nāgas, gandharvas, and asuras.

i.15Before concluding this section, it is also worth making a few further comments about the word tathāgata, translated throughout this work as “realized one” or capitalized “the Realized One,” when it refers specifically to the Buddha or another particular buddha. This term tathāgata has bedeviled translators for many centuries, and many translators today opt to leave it untranslated. The Tibetan translators chose to render it in a way that can be translated as “the one gone thus” (de bzhin gshegs pa), and “thus-gone one” has become a common translation into English, as well. One sometimes also finds “thus-come one,” which the grammar of the compound in Pali and Sanskrit can easily tolerate, and indeed, there is something quite compelling about the specific narrative context in which the Buddha, when he first approaches his five former companions shortly after he has attained awakening, refers to himself in the third person as “the one who has come thus” (tathāgata).

i.16The term also comes to be used well outside this specific narrative context as one of the most common epithets of the Buddha and for the buddhas, generally speaking. In Pali literature, it is the most common way that the Buddha refers to himself, and when he does so in this way he is often also speaking by implication about the nature of a buddha in general. Oftentimes in The Secrets of the Realized Ones, however, as well as in many other contexts, it is not clear whether the speaker, such as the Buddha or Vajrapāṇi in this sūtra, is speaking in particular about the Realized One (the Buddha Śākyamuni himself), often on the basis of something the speaker has himself witnessed, or if a broader generalization is being made about the realized ones. So, when we have felt that the speaker is making a more general claim, we have sometimes translated the term tathāgata as “a realized one.” Even still, it is important for the reader to bear in mind that what goes for the Realized One in particular generally goes for all the realized ones, and vice versa.

i.17Furthermore, the ancient Buddhist scholar-monks and commentators recognized the term tathāgata to have several semantic levels. For instance, in the Pali commentaries, the great scholar-monk Buddhaghosa offers eight different explanations of the meaning of the term. Without going into such depth of explanation here, one may note that the term suggests not only literal movement, “going” (gamana) and “coming” (āgamana), but also a sense of having “understood” (gata) or “realized” something, of becoming it or making it real. In this context, the adverb tathā, “thus” or “in that way,” is connected to tathatā, “the way things truly are.” In this way one can understand the comment made in The Teaching of Vimalakīrti about the love of a bodhisattva: “it is the love of a realized one (tathāgata), because it understands the way things truly are (tathatānu­bodhanatayā).” The point to be kept in mind is that whenever the term “realized one” is found in the translation‍—and it is found over four hundred times in this sūtra‍—it refers to the buddhas, to those who have come and gone in the way they do, and it carries the sense that they have understood directly the way things are, and even that this understanding has made them the way they are.

i.18In summary, The Secrets of the Realized Ones is a work filled with entertaining stories, beautiful poetry, thought-provoking metaphors, surprising and sometimes even strange analogies and images, clever plays on words, sophisticated dialogue and argumentation, and profound insights into the nature of things and the human condition from a Buddhist point of view. It bears the marks throughout of creative imagination at work, an expert grasp of the categories and concepts of Buddhist doctrine and of its narrative and scholastic heritage, and the intent to put Buddhist concepts and concerns into a literary form.

Synopsis of the Sūtra

i.19While the narrative generally flows rather well, maintaining a sense of continuity and movement from beginning to end, The Secrets of the Realized Ones is a fairly long work. It covers just over two hundred pages in the Tibetan translation, which are divided into twenty-five chapters. The same material is divided into eleven chapters in the partially extant Sanskrit manuscript. Thus, it may be helpful for readers to have a short synopsis of its contents here.

i.20The sūtra opens at Vulture Peak with a list of the characters in attendance and their various attributes. The Buddha Śākyamuni gives an opening teaching on the supplies (saṃbhāra) the bodhisattva must accumulate for the purpose of achieving awakening. Vajrapāṇi explains his understanding of what the Buddha has just taught, and then a bodhisattva named Śāntamati asks Vajrapāṇi to explain the secrets of the bodhisattvas and the realized ones. Vajrapāṇi remains silent, but after the Buddha Śākyamuni intercedes on Śāntamati’s behalf, Vajrapāṇi begins to give the teaching.

i.21Vajrapāṇi’s teaching of these secrets of bodhisattvas and of realized ones is structured in terms of their body, speech, and mind, and their mysterious or inconceivable nature. Beginning with an explanation of the secret of the bodhisattva’s body, Vajrapāṇi provides a number of memorable images. He tells a story of the ancient past about the Buddha when he was still a bodhisattva and had been born as Śakra, King of the Gods, a close parallel telling of which is also found in the Collected Teachings on the Bodhisattva. During a great pandemic, Śakra manifests himself as a magical creature that heals everyone by offering them its body to eat. Vajrapāṇi also gives an analogy that is quoted in The Training Anthology in which he compares the healing power of the bodhisattva’s body to the healing powers of a girl made from medicinal herbs by the king of physicians. In his teaching, Vajrapāṇi expounds upon the implications of the fact that bodhisattvas and buddhas possess the Dharma body (dharmakāya) and thereby manifest all forms but are bound by none. [Tibetan chapter 1 ends.]

i.22Vajrapāṇi then goes into an explanation of the secret of the bodhisattva’s speech. The import of the teaching here is that bodhisattvas are capable of speaking and understanding all languages and teach by means of any kind of sound or means of communication whatsoever. Their speech is infused with their extraordinary knowledge and power. In this regard, Vajrapāṇi tells another past life story about Śāriputra when he was a renunciant with the incredible, superhuman knowledge to know how many leaves there are on a huge banyan tree without even looking at it or counting the leaves. [Tibetan chapter 2 ends.]

i.23Vajrapāṇi concludes with an explanation of the secret of the bodhisattva’s mind, focusing again on the superhuman nature of the bodhisattva’s knowledge, and making the connection between the bodhisattva’s extraordinary knowledge and other qualities and traits developed by the bodhisattva over the course of the path. At the conclusion of this teaching, there is an earthquake. [Tibetan chapter 3 ends.] Then, the voice of a bodhisattva from another buddha domain is heard, and this bodhisattva appears and pays homage to the Buddha and to Vajrapāṇi. [Tibetan chapter 4 ends; hypothetical end of Sanskrit chapter 1.]

i.24At this point, an unnamed bodhisattva asks for background information on Vajrapāṇi and how he came to serve as the Buddha’s constant companion and to possess inspired eloquence. In his answer, the Buddha tells a story of the past about a king named Dhṛtarāṣṭra and his thousand sons who take vows to become the buddhas of this Fortunate Eon, different versions of which are told in other sūtras, such as The Fortunate Eon (Bhadrakalpika) and The Lotus of Compassion (Karuṇāpuṇḍarīka). In this version of the story, the Buddha explains not only the original vow of Vajrapāṇi, which explains why Vajrapāṇi is the Buddha’s constant companion, but also that of Brahmā Sahāṃpati, who vows to request all the buddhas of this Fortunate Eon to teach the Dharma. There is also a description of the bodhisattva vow of the last of the other nine hundred and ninety-nine buddhas of this Fortunate Eon. [Tibetan chapter 5 ends.] The Buddha then explains in brief the path to awakening. [Tibetan chapter 6 ends; hypothetical end of Sanskrit chapter 2.]

i.25Śāntamati then asks Vajrapāṇi to explain the secret of the realized ones, and Vajrapāṇi begins by telling him that the secret of the realized ones is threefold, as it pertains to the body, speech, and mind. Vajrapāṇi begins with the body, which he explains can appear as virtually anything, depending on the inclinations of the ones who are seeing it. Vajrapāṇi also explains that the Buddha possesses the Dharma body and therefore does not eat any food, even though the Buddha may appear to eat food. The body of a realized one is vast as space. Vajrapāṇi’s explanation also features a wonderful story about a bodhisattva named Vegadhārin who attempts to look down upon the top of the Buddha’s head and finds himself unable to do so, even after traveling upward through millions upon billions of worlds. [Tibetan chapter 7 ends; Sanskrit chapter 3 ends.]

i.26Vajrapāṇi then explains the secret of a realized one’s speech. Perhaps the main idea of this chapter is that the Buddha never utters a single syllable, while all beings still hear his words and understand his message in their various languages and forms of communication as a result of the operation of their own desires. This statement is quoted in The Descent into Laṅka, by Candrakīrti in his Clear Words, and by the author of the Long Explanation of the longer Perfection of Wisdom sūtras. Vajrapāṇi uses three metaphors to illustrate this idea, perhaps the most famous of which compares the Buddha’s speech to a wind chime or wind bell that makes sound when the wind passes through it. The wind here is analogous to the wishes of beings. The chapter also contains a list of the sixty qualities of a realized one’s speech, which is quoted and explained in the commentary on The Adornment to the Mahāyāna Sūtras.

i.27This chapter also features a rather humorous story about Maudgalyāyana, cited in The Great Treatise on the Perfection of Wisdom (Da zhidu lun 大智度論). He uses his superhuman powers to travel to a distant buddha domain in a futile attempt to measure the limit of the Buddha’s voice. There is also an interesting and somewhat challenging passage in which the names of the four truths of the noble ones are given in all the languages of the different god realms in order to demonstrate the way the Buddha’s message can vary while remaining the same. The chapter also contains a long list of ethnic groups in the world of the reader or imagined audience in order to show the many languages in which the Buddha’s message can be heard here in our world. The chapter concludes with a series of wonders, including an earthquake, the appearance of a great light, and a jet of water that shoots out of the ground and rises up into the heavens. [Tibetan chapter 8 ends; Sanskrit chapter 4 ends.]

i.28Vajrapāṇi then describes, in brief, the secret of a realized one’s mind: it is a mind in which no conceptual thought is generated, and yet it serves the Buddha to meet the demands of all beings. The point is made, similar to the one about the Realized One’s speech, that from the night of the Buddha’s awakening until his final nirvāṇa, the Buddha experiences no modification of mind whatsoever. [Tibetan chapter 9 ends.] This concludes Vajrapāṇi’s explanation of the secrets of the realized ones, after which Śāriputra asks the Buddha whether it is true that Vajrapāṇi appears behind each and every bodhisattva leading the holy life throughout the cosmos. The Buddha enables Śāriputra to see Vajrapāṇi standing not only behind the Buddha himself but also behind Maitreya, and then he explains that Vajrapāṇi stands behind all the magically created forms of all the bodhisattvas of the Fortunate Eon, due to the power of his vow and his superhuman powers. [Tibetan chapter 10 ends; Sanskrit chapter 5 ends.]

i.29The above comprises almost the first half of the sūtra. Next, Śāntamati asks Vajrapāṇi to describe four events in the Buddha’s life: his practice of severe asceticism, his defeat of Māra, his awakening, and his turning of the wheel of Dharma. Vajrapāṇi does so, and describes in detail various wonders and episodes related to these events. In the presentation of these events, there are some close similarities with versions found in other sūtras, particularly The Play in Full, but Vajrapāṇi’s telling emphasizes the fact that different beings perceive these events differently based on their own needs and suppositions. For instance, when the Buddha delivers the first sermon, Vajrapāṇi notes that the innumerable beings on hand to witness the event hear different teachings about different topics, based on their own thoughts and motivations. [Tibetan chapters 11 through 14 end.] After Vajrapāṇi completes his description of these events, the Buddha affirms the accuracy of Vajrapāṇi’s retelling. [Sanskrit chapter 6 ends.]

i.30Then, after being prompted by Śāntamati, the Buddha offers some teachings of his own on the nature of calming the mind or bringing it to rest, as well as bringing one’s emotions and, indeed, all things to rest. It is a highly sophisticated dialogue that takes one deeply into the philosophy of emptiness and its connection to other elements of Buddhist doctrine, including the explanation of the process of cognition whereby the mind generates thoughts on the basis of specific objects or bases of cognition (ālaṃbana). This chapter is quoted at some length by Candrakīrti in The Clear Words, a few lines are quoted by Śāntideva in The Training Anthology, and Kamalaśīla also quotes from it in the third Stages of Meditative Cultivation. [Tibetan chapter 15 ends.] After this teaching, some bodhisattvas desire to know when Vajrapāṇi will become a buddha. Knowing their thoughts in his mind, the Buddha then smiles and gives a prediction of Vajrapāṇi’s future awakening. [Tibetan chapter 16 ends; Sanskrit chapter 7 ends.]

i.31This prediction then becomes the basis for a profound and rather complex dialogue between Śāntamati and Vajrapāṇi, reminiscent of certain dialogues in The Teaching of Vimalakīrti. In this dialogue, Śāntamati makes assertions and poses questions largely from a conventional point of view, beginning with the assertion that Vajrapāṇi has just received a prediction of his future awakening. Vajrapāṇi, on the other hand, responds to Śāntamati’s assertions and answers his questions from the standpoint of emptiness. The logic of the exchange employs a number of puns and plays on words, stretching the ordinary and technical meanings of terms and relying on dual meanings to argue for the nondual and empty nature of all phenomena. In some ways, the dialogue constitutes a further explanation of the paradoxical claims made earlier that the Buddha does not speak a word and yet the Dharma is expressed nonetheless. [Tibetan chapter 17 ends.]

i.32Vajrapāṇi then invites the Buddha to his home for a meal. The Buddha agrees, and Vajrapāṇi goes home to prepare for the Buddha’s visit. The whole episode includes a rather ornate series of miraculous performances, a marvelous display that again bears some similarities with wonders described elsewhere in Buddhist literature. The Buddha arrives and has a meal. [Tibetan chapter 18 ends.] Afterward, he gives a profound and difficult teaching on the Dharma to the nonhuman and divine beings gathered there, touching upon a variety of complex topics in the Buddhist philosophy of the path, organized around a number of themes and concepts, including the nature of faith or strong belief, how a person can know if a teacher is a true companion in the good, the twelvefold chain of dependent arising and its connection to emptiness, and the nature and benefit of being watchful and attentive to one’s thoughts. Parts of this teaching are quoted in both The Sūtra Anthology and The Training Anthology, and there is also a long parallel with The Collected Teachings on the Bodhisattva. Toward the end of the sermon, the four Lokapālas ask for a teaching on how to protect the world, which the Buddha gives to them in such a way that it forms a kind of synopsis of many key elements of Buddhist doctrine. [Tibetan chapter 19 ends.] As the Buddha gets ready to leave Vajrapāṇi’s abode, he asks Vajrapāṇi to recite a dhāraṇī for the protection and preservation of the Dharma, which Vajrapāṇi does, and then the Buddha returns to Vulture Peak. [Tibetan chapter 20 ends.]

i.33Once the Buddha has returned to Vulture Peak, King Ajātaśatru comes to visit him, and he asks him a series of questions about Vajrapāṇi and the reasons why the Buddha visited his home. In response, the Buddha tells a past life story about a bodhisattva named Śūrabala, which serves to explain the reason for or source of Vajrapāṇi’s marvelous inspired eloquence. This story contains some rather complex teachings in the dialogue narrated by the Buddha between Śūrabala and a past buddha named Vaiśramaṇa about the nature of the bodhisattva path and the paradoxical nature of the bodhisattva’s field of action, a dialogue that concludes with a series of artful metaphors by Śūrabala. [Tibetan chapter 21 ends; Sanskrit chapter 9 ends.]

i.34The next chapter features an entertaining episode in which Vajrapāṇi sets his vajra on the ground, and Ajātaśatru, Śakra, and Maudgalyāyana all try to lift it. None of them is able to do so. The Buddha then directs Vajrapāṇi to lift the vajra, which he does as a demonstration of his extraordinary power. He then throws it into the air, and after it circles the cosmos several times, it returns to him, like Thor’s hammer. The episode prompts a discussion of how it is possible for a bodhisattva to attain such incredible power. This, again, leads to another profound dialogue between the Buddha and Ajātaśatru on the natural consequences of practicing the Buddhist path. [Tibetan chapter 22 ends; Sanskrit chapter 10 ends.]

i.35After this dialogue between the Buddha and the king has concluded, Śāntamati and Vajrapāṇi return to the foreground of the narrative. Śāntamati asks Vajrapāṇi to request the Buddha to empower the teachings given in the sūtra so that they will last for a long time. This request forms the basis of a dialogue on the nature and means of remembering the Dharma, taking into account the ultimate perspective that nothing is truly grasped or retained. During the conversation, a god named Bhadrarāja stands up and offers some perspectives on the nature of the inspired eloquence needed to teach the Dharma. [Tibetan chapter 23 ends.]

i.36Śāntamati asks the Buddha to explain how Bhadrarāja could possess such inspired eloquence, and the Buddha responds by exploring the connection between inspired eloquence and the development of a powerful memory and the mnemonic formulas that support it ( dhāraṇī ). The Buddha explains that Bhadrarāja possesses a powerful mnemonic formula that affords him the ability to teach the Dharma with inspired eloquence. What follows is another dazzling display of word play as the Buddha explains how this mnemonic formula provides access to the nature of reality as well as the true teachings. Bhadrarāja underscores the Buddha’s teaching with a series of beautiful analogies about the bodhisattva who has acquired a powerful memory and the formulas that support it. [Tibetan chapter 24 ends.]

i.37The sūtra concludes with the performance of two long dhāraṇīs, one by Vajrapāṇi and a second one by the Buddha. Both of them are spoken for the purpose of preserving the Dharma and seemingly this sūtra in particular. Afterward, the Buddha tells one more brief story from a past life of his own, about the value of remembering the Dharma. He then asks the audience to remember this sūtra. Various characters come forward and promise to do so, and finally the Buddha entrusts the sūtra to Ānanda and directs him to teach it to others. This draws the sūtra to a close. [Tibetan chapter 25 ends; Sanskrit chapter 11 ends.]

The Title of the Sūtra

i.38This sūtra seems to have been known by several different titles, and this has led at times to confusion and the need to disambiguate it from other works. The most stable title of the sūtra, the one most used across a variety of sources, appears to be its shorter title, The Secret(s) of the Realized One(s) (Tathāgataguhya). For this reason, we have referred to the work mostly by this shorter form of the title throughout this introduction and translation.

i.39The question of how to understand and translate its fuller title, as it is given in the Tibetan translation and in a Sanskrit transliteration in the Kangyur, is a somewhat complicated issue. The Tibetan translation gives the title in Tibetan as ’phags pa de bzhin gshegs pa’i gsang ba bsam gyis mi khyab pa bstan pa, and it renders the title in Sanskrit as Ārya­tathāgatācintyaguhya­nirdeśa. These titles correspond closely to one another, except for the fact that the order of the Sanskrit words corresponding to gsang ba and bsam gyis mi khyab pa‍—that is, guhya and acintya, respectively‍—are reversed in the Sanskrit title. There are various ways to account for the difference. The key issue is to decide on an interpretation of the relationship between these words. Since both terms can be used as a noun or adjective, it must be decided if one is functioning as a noun and the other as an adjective, or if they should both be understood as nouns.

i.40To answer this basic grammatical question, it is useful to consider the different titles the Buddha gives for this sūtra at the end of the sūtra itself, other key passages found in the sūtra, and the way other Indian Buddhist texts and authors refer to it. To take the last point first, The Commentary on the Adornment to the Mahāyāna Sūtras refers to the sūtra by the title Guhyakādhipati­nirdeśa, The Teaching of the Lord of the Guhyakas. In The Clear Words, Candrakīrti calls it Ārya­tathāgata­guhya­sūtra, The Noble Sūtra of the Secret(s) of the Realized One(s). So does Kamalaśīla. In Śāntideva’s Training Anthology, too, it is called the Tathāgataguhya Sūtra. And then beyond the Indian Buddhist texts extant in Sanskrit, The Sūtra Anthology (in Tibetan translation) and The Great Treatise on the Perfection of Wisdom (in Chinese) also seem to refer to it in the same way Candrakīrti, Kamalaśīla, and Śāntideva do.

i.41At the end of the sūtra itself, in a passage for which the Sanskrit is not extant, Ānanda asks the Buddha by what title the sūtra should be remembered, and the Buddha gives four different titles: (1) lag na rdo rje’i le’u (*Vajrapāṇi­parivarta, The Chapter of Vajrapāṇi); (2) de bzhin gshegs pa’i gsang ba bstan pa’i le’u (*Tathāgata­guhya­nirdeśaparivarta, The Chapter of the Teaching of the Secret(s) of the Realized One(s)); (3) sangs rgyas kyi chos bsam gyis mi khyab pa bstan pa (*Acintya­buddha­dharmanirdeśa, The Teaching of the Mysterious/Inconceivable Qualities of the Buddha(s)); and (4) bsod nams tshad med pa ’byung ba (*Apramāṇa­puṇyodaya, The Arising of Immeasurable Merit). None of these titles corresponds precisely to the full title of the sūtra as it is given in Tibetan or Sanskrit by the canonical Tibetan translation, nor to the shorter Sanskrit title by which the sūtra is often known.

i.42However, there is another passage found earlier in the text in which the phrase tathāgata­kāyaguhyācintya­nirdeśa is extant in the Sanskrit manuscript. While the corresponding Tibetan translation of this phrase, de bzhin gshegs pa’i gsang ba bsam gyis mi khyab pa bstan pa, lacks the word for kāya (“body”), it is otherwise identical to it, and it is identical as well to the main part of the Tibetan title given for the sūtra as a whole. Furthermore, in another passage near the beginning of the sūtra, for which the Sanskrit is unfortunately lacking, Vajrapāṇi speaks of four “inconceivables” or “mysteries” (bsam gyis mi khyab pa ’di bzhi), one of which is “the mystery of the buddha(s)” (sangs rgyas bsam gyis mi khyab pa). Here, the term translated as “mystery”‍—that is, something incomprehensible or inconceivable‍—would seem to be used as a noun and as a shorter form of the phrase “the mysterious qualities of the buddha(s)” (sangs rgyas kyi chos bsam gyis mi khyab pa, *acintya­buddha­dharma). It also appears to be used here almost as a synonym for the word guhya‍—that is, something “hidden” or “concealed,” or a “secret.”

i.43Based on the evidence above, it looks as though the full title in the Tibetan translation may be the result of a process of development based on a combination of at least two of the ways the text refers to itself and to its subject matter. The terms guhya (gsang ba) and acintya (bsam gyis mi khyab pa) can be used as nouns and as near synonyms or close equivalents. That is to say, “the incomprehensible or mysterious qualities of the buddhas” (acintya­buddha­dharma) are basically equivalent to “the secrets of the realized ones” (tathāgataguhya). At the same time, both terms can function as adjectives of one another, and thus it is still possible to understand the relevant phrases in the title as either “secret/hidden mysteries” or “mysterious/incomprehensible (number of) secrets.” Given all these possibilities, we have simply chosen to translate the phrase as if both terms were used as nouns and as near synonyms, and thus we have translated the long title as The Teaching of the Mysteries and Secrets of the Realized Ones.

i.44At the same time, we should remember that the sūtra has been called The Teaching of the Lord of the Guhyakas (Guhyakādhi­pati­nirdeśa), and the Buddha calls it The Chapter of Vajrapāṇi (*Vajra­pāṇiparivarta) in the sūtra itself. Since Vajrapāṇi is called the Lord of the Guhyakas throughout the sūtra and he is arguably its main protagonist, as well as being the speaker of the majority of the teachings in the sūtra, it is easy to understand why it has acquired these titles. However, they also highlight the need to understand the relationship between the words guhya and guhyaka , as well as the relationship between the guhyakas and Vajrapāṇi, which is not a straightforward matter, as we have seen above.

i.45There is still one more wrinkle to mention regarding the titles of the sūtra. At some point, it seems that the sūtra also came to be known by the title Tathāgata­guhyaka. This is the title given to the manuscript G10765 by the archivists at the Asiatic Society in Bengal, perhaps because this phrase is part of the description of the work in the colophon to the final chapter, or perhaps it was because the first page of the manuscript seems to be from the Guhyasamāja Tantra, which for some reason also seems to have gone by the name Tathāgata­guhyaka in Nepal. This has given rise to some confusion, such that Maurice Winternitz, who translated a couple of the passages from The Secrets of the Realized Ones that are quoted in The Training Anthology, felt it necessary to disambiguate this work from the Guhyasamāja Tantra. Precisely why the Guhyasamāja Tantra came to be known as the Tathāgata­guhyaka in Nepal, apart from the fact that it also discusses the secrets of the body, speech, and mind of the realized ones, as well as the precise nature of the broader intertextual relationship between the Tathāgata­guhya Sūtra, translated here, and the various Buddhist tantras, are topics that await further investigation.

Later Reception History and Modern Scholarship

i.46One might still pose the question, if The Secrets of the Realized Ones is such a great work of Buddhist literature and had such an influence, why does it seem to have fallen into obscurity at a later point in time, even as the transmission and study of other Buddhist sūtras continued to flourish? It is true that a text called the Tathāgata­guhyaka came to be listed among the nine dharmas or books (grantha) of Newari Buddhism in Nepal sometime in the early to middle of the second millennium, which suggests it may have continued to enjoy a high status there for some time. This conclusion, however, is mitigated by the fact that it is not clear whether this title was initially meant to refer to this sūtra or to the Guhyasamāja Tantra, which also came to be known in Nepal as the Tathāgata­guhyaka. So, the popularity of this sūtra in Nepal is not a given; yet, neither can the possibility of its popularity there be entirely discounted. If it was meant to be one of the nine dharmas at one time, then perhaps the lack of availability of the sūtra as a complete manuscript contributed to its replacement by the Guhyasamāja Tantra in the list of nine dharmas at a later point, or perhaps it was not meant to be one of the nine dharmas in the first place. These historical questions require more research, as do the questions of its reception and influence in the Buddhist traditions of Tibet and East Asia.

i.47If the lack of attention it has so far received from modern scholarship is any indication, however, then evidently the sūtra fell into relative obscurity at some point. If one were to indulge in further speculation, perhaps the fact that The Teaching of Vimalakīrti features a wealthy layman contributed to its popularity in China, which in turn led to the greater attention it has received to this point from modern scholars in Japan and the West. By contrast, the main character of The Secrets of the Realized Ones is a powerful, enigmatic, and somewhat threatening nonhuman creature who brandishes a mighty weapon. While Vajrapāṇi may be a crucial figure in the history of Buddhist literature for several reasons, including his association with the preservation and promulgation of the tantras, perhaps The Secrets of the Realized Ones came to be superseded at some point by other works, or perhaps Vajrapāṇi’s enigmatic status lessened its popularity over time. Then again, maybe it is just an accidental occurrence over the long history of Buddhism that The Secrets of the Realized Ones has only recently begun to receive the renewed attention it deserves.

i.48Whatever the case may be, apart from a few notable exceptions, it is only since 2012 or so that the sūtra has begun to receive much more than a cursory footnote or simple acknowledgement of its existence in published scholarly research. The most sustained scholarly attention has come from Japanese and Chinese scholars, particularly from the Japanese scholar Ikuma Hiromitsu 伊久間洋光, who has published more than fifteen articles on the sūtra since 2012, as well as completing a doctoral dissertation on it in 2019. During this time, a handful of other scholars in East Asia have also published short studies of it, while Hamano Tetsunori 滨野哲敬 published a brief article on it in 1987. Among scholars in Europe, the Belgian scholar Étienne Lamotte devoted a short section to it in his longer article on the history of Vajrapāṇi in India, which he published in 1966. Additionally, in December 2021, a complete English translation of the eleventh-century Chinese translation of the sūtra was self-published by Shaku Shingan and made available online. About a month earlier, Péter-Dániel Szántó, then of the Open Philology Project at Leiden University, made available online his unpublished diplomatic edition of the partial Sanskrit manuscript of the sūtra held by the Asiatic Society in Kolkata, on which see below.

Source Texts and Classical Translations

i.49A single, incomplete Nepalese manuscript of the sūtra in the original Sanskrit is held in the library of the Asiatic Society in Kolkata, India. This paper manuscript has been dated to approximately the seventeenth century, and it preserves about 47 percent of the whole sūtra, according to Szántó’s estimation based on a comparison with the complete Tibetan translation. The various citations of the sūtra in other texts for which there is Sanskrit, including The Clear Words, The Training Anthology, The Collected Teachings on the Bodhisattva, and the third Stages of Meditative Cultivation, increase this percentage slightly, while the repetition of words and phrases within the sūtra also increases the percentage of the text for which one can be fairly confident about the underlying source text.

i.50The colophon to the complete canonical Tibetan translation states that the sūtra was translated by Jinamitra, Dānaśīla, and Munivarman, along with the translator-monk Yeshé Dé, all of whom flourished in the late eighth and early ninth centuries ᴄᴇ. Its relatively early date of translation into Tibetan is also supported by its inclusion in the Denkarma (lhan kar ma) and Phangthangma (’phang thang ma), the catalogs of Tibetan translations compiled in the ninth century. According to Lalou, there are also a few pages from an unidentified commentary found at Dunhuang, Pelliot tibétain 2101, which contains some quotations from this sūtra, as well as several other Mahāyāna sūtras.

i.51The Secrets of the Realized Ones was also translated into Chinese twice. The first translation (Taishō 310–3) is said to have been completed in 280 ᴄᴇ, and is among those attributed to the early translator Dharmarakṣa (竺法護). A second translation (Taishō 312) was done in the eleventh century by another translator named Dharmarakṣa or Dharmapāla (法護).

i.52This English translation has been made on the basis of the preserved Sanskrit manuscript, the quotations preserved in other texts for which there is Sanskrit, and the complete Tibetan translation. For the Tibetan text, the Degé edition was used as the basis, but variations attested in the Comparative Edition (dpe bsdur ma) were also consulted, and for large portions of the text, the Stok Palace edition was also read for comparison. The footnotes to the translation primarily describe differences between these various witnesses to the text, while also giving various notes on the translation of specific terms and phrases, intertextual references to other primary sources, and references to scholarly work. Unfortunately, the two Chinese translations were not taken into account as part of the translation or editing process.