Notes
n.1dkar chag ’phang thang ma (2003), 28.
n.2Denkarma, folios 302.a.7 and 302.b.4-5; see also Yoshimura (1950), 151; 152.
n.3Note that there is a discrepancy among various databases for cataloging the Toh 855 version of this text within vol. 100 or 101 of the Degé Kangyur. See Toh 855, n.3, for details.
n.4For a complete listing see Resources for Kanjur and Tanjur Studies: http://www.rkts.org/cat.php?id=514&typ=1.
n.5Butön Rinchen Drup (1965–1971), folios 246.b–247.a.
n.6玄奘 Xuanzang. For more information on this figure, see Lewis R. Lancaster, “K 444,” The Korean Buddhist Canon, accessed November 16, 2018, http://www.acmuller.net/descriptive_catalogue/files/k0444.html.
n.7法天 Fatian. For more information on this figure, see Lewis R. Lancaster, “K 1134,” The Korean Buddhist Canon, accessed November 16, 2018, http://www.acmuller.net/descriptive_catalogue/files/k1134.html.
n.8Two sets of folio references have been included in this translation due to a discrepancy in volume 88 (rgyud ’bum, na) of the Degé Kangyur between the 1737 par phud printings and the late (post par phud) printings. In the latter case, an extra work, Bodhimaṇḍasyālaṃkāralakṣadhāraṇī (Toh 508, byang chub snying po’i rgyan ’bum gyi gzungs), was added as the second text in the volume, thereby displacing the pagination of all the following texts in the same volume by 17 folios. Since the eKangyur follows the later printing, both references have been provided, with the highlighted one linking to the eKangyur viewer.
n.9Tibetan: dbang phyug chen po dka’ thub bzang po la sogs pa. This translation interprets dbang phyug chen po and dka’ thub bzang po as two separate deities, the Śaiva godhead Maheśvara and Suvrata (also rendered as munisuvrata), the twentieth Jain arhat of the present descending period of the cosmic cycle (avasarpiṇī). The reader should note that it is possible to interpret the term dka’ thub bzang po/ suvrata as an epithet for Maheśvara, but this is likely not the correct interpretation in this case. The setting for this text, Śuddhāvāsa, is the highest heavenly realm of existence that, in Buddhist traditions, is accessed by attaining the fourth and highest level of meditative absorption (dhyāna, bsam gtan). This places the setting at the zenith of reality, which various Śaiva traditions identify with the Maheśvara form of Śiva. It is also the realm in which the Jain traditions locate those arhats who, like Suvrata/Munisuvrata, have ascended to the highest reality where they await the arrival of the next Tīrṭhāṅkara and final liberation. In this work, the point of listing the two divine beings that occupy the highest level of reality in the Śaiva and Jain traditions is both to identify them among the worldly deities occupying the highest level of saṃsāra that can carry on the Buddha’s teaching after his parinirvāṇa and to place them in a position that is subordinate to the Buddha himself.
n.10Tibetan: thos pa rgya mtsho thams cad kyi gzungs. The term gzungs/dhāraṇī is translated here as “the power of retaining” instead of being left in the Sanskrit. In this case it refers to a specific power that bodhisattvas gain, not a dhāraṇī in the sense of a set of verses that are recited as a means to attain some form of benefit.