Introduction

i.1The Blessed One’s Praise of Sharp Mañjuśrī is the first of two short Mañjuśrī praise texts in the Tantra section of the Degé Kangyur that immediately follow a group of six concise Mañjuśrī dhāraṇī scriptures. The text describes in detail the physiognomy, ornamentation, vestments, and general splendor of Mañjuśrī while skillfully maintaining a tension between two frames of reference: the bodhisattva Mañjuśrī of the sūtras and the tathāgata Mañjuśrī who appears in various manifestations in tantric literature. The verses also employ tropes that integrate features characteristic of the devotional and philosophical genres of Sanskrit literature, in a manner reminiscent of Buddhist belle-lettres such as Aśvaghoṣa’s Buddhacārita and Kṣemendra’s Avadāna­kalpalatā.

i.2A Sanskrit version of the text is to our knowledge no longer extant, and no record of its Sanskrit title has yet been identified. It also appears that the text was never translated into Chinese. The Tibetan translation lacks a colophon, so we have no information about the history of its transmission or the identity of its translators. The text’s absence from the Denkarma and Phangthangma imperial catalogs suggests that it was translated into Tibetan later than the beginning of the ninth century but before the flourishing of the scholar Butön Rinchen Drup (bu ston rin chen grub, 1290–1364), who listed its title in his History of Buddhism.

i.3This English translation is based on the Degé Kangyur version (Toh 551) in consultation with the variant readings recorded in the Comparative Edition (dpe bsdur ma), with all major divergences recorded in the notes.