Introduction

i.1The Noble King of Spells, the Dhāraṇī of Agrapradīpa is a text of the dhāraṇī genre that presents a series of six dhāraṇī formulas that can be recited to guard against disease, grant security from danger, and ensure harmony with beings. The narrative of the text begins in Jeta’s Grove near the city of Śrāvastī, where the Buddha Śākyamuni is teaching a gathering of monks, bodhisattvas, devas, and ordinary people. Two bodhisattvas‍—Amitābha and Great Light‍—arrive at that assembly and announce that they are emissaries of Agrapradīpa, the titular buddha who lives in the buddhafield Infinite Flowers located many millions of buddhafields away. After conveying Agrapradīpa’s greetings and well-wishes to Śākyamuni, the two bodhisattvas present Agrapradīpa’s main offering: a dhāraṇī that will protect and benefit all the people of Śākyamuni’s buddhafield. When their recitation of the dhāraṇī is complete, the Buddha addresses Ānanda, exhorting him to remember, recite, and uphold the dhāraṇī. He then describes the rarity of receiving such a dhāraṇī and the benefits that will accrue from using it.

i.2Five additional dhāraṇīs are recited in the text: one each by the bodhisattvas Maitreya and Mañjuśrī, both of whom are already present in the audience; two by Śākyamuni himself; and a final dhāraṇī recited in unison by the Four Great Kings‍—Kubera, Dhṛtarāṣṭra, Virūpākṣa, and Virūḍhaka. These dhāraṇīs are presented the same way as before: first it is announced that a dhāraṇī will be recited for the health, happiness, and protection of all beings; next, the dhāraṇī is recited before the assembly; finally, the Buddha encourages Ānanda to uphold the dhāraṇī while explaining to him the rarity of the occasion and the benefits of reciting and transmitting the dhāraṇī. Also included in these descriptions are the number of past lives the reciter will be able to remember, the number of buddhas who have taught the dhāraṇī, and a statement about its secrecy.

i.3Śākyamuni gives his most detailed account of the benefits of dhāraṇī recitation following the second of the dhāraṇīs that he himself recites. In this passage, the Buddha lists the types of supernatural beings who will no longer influence the reciter, the classes of animals that will not be a threat, the types of diseases the dhāraṇī will alleviate, and specific life-threatening circumstances it will protect against. The Buddha completes this description by declaring that it is not possible for anyone under the protection of these dhāraṇīs to be reborn among the gods, humans, asuras, or māras. The Buddha offers a similarly detailed description of the benefits of dhāraṇī recitation, this time in verse, following the presentation of the dhāraṇī by the Four Great Kings. In this passage the Buddha places more emphasis on spiritual benefits, noting that one who recites the dhāraṇī will be free of the obstacles created by Māra, purify billions of eons of karmic deeds, and amass an incredible amount of merit in an exceedingly short time. Following these verses, the text comes to a close as the entire assembly, including the bodhisattvas and Four Great Kings, rejoice and praise Śākyamuni’s discourse.

i.4As a text of the dhāraṇī genre, The Dhāraṇī of Agrapradīpa features teachings by Śākyamuni and others on the use of dhāraṇī, formulas of syllables and words recited to accomplish mundane goals and to progress on the path to liberation. Derived from the Sanskrit root √dhṛ, which means to “hold” and “retain,” both in the sense of physically holding something and keeping something firmly in mind, as a verbal formula a dhāraṇī can be described as that which “holds” or encodes the teachings or blessings of the buddhas, and so it is extremely efficacious for those who memorize and recite it. Because dhāraṇīs are very often used to achieve the worldly goals of health, protection, and prosperity, they can be used and understood as “spells.” In this and similar texts, the term dhāraṇī is often used synonymously with the terms mantra (sngags), vidyā (rig), and vidyāmantra (rig sngags). This can be seen in the full title of the text, which identifies it as a vidyārāja (rig sngags kyi rgyal po), a “king of spells,” and in the body of the text, where the verbal formulas are consistently referred to as dhāraṇī­mantrapāda, translated here as “dhāraṇī-mantra formula.” Much like spells, the formulas in this text are intended to be recited aloud to produce their effects, but in other works a dhāraṇī can also be written down so that it can be worn or otherwise used as a physical protective talisman. While many dhāraṇīs convey clearly articulated meaning, they just as often consist entirely of words with no obvious semantic content. This is the case in The Dhāraṇī of Agrapradīpa, where it is the alliterative force of the formulas, rather than their meaning, that conveys their power to heal and protect.

i.5Though dhāraṇīs are used to bring about a wide range of effects from the mundane to the transcendent, it is often the mundane benefits of dhāraṇī recitation that are given priority. The Dhāraṇī of Agrapradīpa is no different in this regard. Here, we are told that the dhāraṇīs can protect the reciter from a host of threatening forces, including bhūtas, nāgas, yakṣas, rākṣasas, vetālas, and similar supernatural beings, as well as from the danger posed by biting insects, snakes, spiders, and predatory animals. These dhāraṇīs will protect one from a wide range of infectious diseases and skin disorders and will even avert the effects of hostile magic. By reciting these dhāraṇīs one will remain safe wherever one is, be it at home, in a royal palace, out in the wilderness, or in situations where one’s life is threatened by fire and water. One can even escape criminal punishment through the use of these dhāraṇīs. Among the spiritual benefits of reciting the dhāraṇīs is the ability to remember multiple past lives, to mitigate the effects of eons of accumulated karma, and to amass in a short period of time the same merit bodhisattvas accumulate over millions of eons. Such is the power of a dhāraṇī as the distillation of the Dharma into short, potent, and broadly applicable formulas to heal, protect, and facilitate one’s progress to awakening.

i.6A complete version of The Dhāraṇī of Agrapradīpa is not presently available in Sanskrit, but several lines of the text are extant in a fragment of a paper manuscript written in the Brāhmī script that was recovered in Khotan. The fragment, which dates to roughly the eighth or ninth century, was unearthed by Aurel Stein at Khadalik, Khotan in 1906 and is presently held by the British Library. The Dhāraṇī of Agrapradīpa was translated into Chinese multiple times over a span of several centuries. The earliest translation is the Chiju shenzhou jing (Taishō 1351; 持句神呪經), which was translated by Zhi Qian and completed in the third century. The Tuoluonibo jing (Taishō 1352; 陀隣尼鉢經) was translated by Zhu Tanwu lan, also known as Dharmarakṣa, who was active between 381 and 395. There are also two versions of Jñānagupta’s Donfang zuisheng dengwang tuoluoni jing (Taishō 1353 and 1354; 東方最勝燈王陀羅尼經) preserved in the Chinese canon. Jñānagupta was a Gandharan monk who spent time in Khotan and prepared his translations during his residence at the Xingshan Temple in Chang’an between 592 and 594. A fourth translation, the Sheng zuishang dengming rulai tuoluoni jing (Taishō 1355; 聖最上燈明如來陀羅尼經) was completed centuries later by Dānapāla, who was active between 982 and 1017. The range of dates of the Chinese translations, as well as the discovery of a Sanskrit fragment of the dhāraṇī in Khotan, demonstrate the enduring popularity and geographic diffusion of The Dhāraṇī of Agrapradīpa.

i.7Included in this wide geographic and temporal range is the Tibetan translation of The Dhāraṇī of Agrapradīpa. The text lacks a translator’s colophon, making it challenging to determine the precise date of its translation and to identify its translators. The text is recorded in both the Denkarma and Phangthangma imperial-period catalogs, indicating that it was translated no later than the Tibetan Empire’s collapse in the mid-ninth century. This would place its translation roughly approximate to the Khotanese fragment, and falling between the Chinese translations of Jñānagupta and Dānapāla. As is often the case with works of the dhāraṇī genre, The Dhāraṇī of Agrapradīpa appears twice in the Kangyur, once in the Tantra section (Toh 528), and once in the Dhāraṇī section (Toh 858). There is practically no difference between these two versions, apart from minor orthographic variants.

i.8The present translation was completed based on the Tibetan translation of The Dhāraṇī of Agrapradīpa preserved in the Tantra and Dhāraṇī sections of the Degé Kangyur as the representative of the Tshalpa (tshal pa) group of Kangyurs, and in consultation with the version in the Stok Palace Kangyur as representative of the Thempangma (them spangs ma) group. This translation also utilized the comparative apparatus of the Comparative Edition (dpe bsdur ma) of the Degé Kangyur. The Tibetan translations are remarkably stable across versions, with no substantive variants to report. The six dhāraṇīs recorded in transliterated Sanskrit have been reported as they are written in the Degé version, with no attempt made to emend or standardize the Sanskrit reported therein.