Introduction

i.1Determining the Vinaya: Upāli’s Questions (hereafter Determining the Vinaya) is a sūtra from the Heap of Jewels (Skt. Ratnakūṭa; Tib. dkon brtsegs) section of the Kangyur that explores the relationship between the prātimokṣa vows and the conduct of a bodhisattva. The sūtra can be loosely divided into two parts: a first section for which the monk Śāriputra is the main interlocutor, and which contains the pledge by numerous bodhisattvas to work for the benefit of beings, followed by a general discourse by the Buddha on the conduct of a bodhisattva. In the second section, the titular Upāli poses a series of questions that prompt a more in-depth discourse from the Buddha on the relationship between monastic codes of conduct and the commitments of a bodhisattva, with a focus on the views that guide the followers of the śrāvaka, pratyekabuddha, and bodhisattva vehicles.

i.2The sūtra opens in the north Indian city of Śrāvastī, where the Buddha resides among a vast assembly of monks and bodhisattvas in Prince Jeta’s Grove, Anāthapiṇḍada’s Park. Addressing the bodhisattvas in the assembly, the Buddha asks who will uphold the Dharma and bring beings to maturity in future times. A number of the bodhisattvas present in the assembly voice their desire to uphold various aspects of the Dharma or to help beings through specific powers. At Śāriputra’s prompting, the Buddha next describes the special means that bodhisattvas utilize to bring beings to spiritual maturity, and how the three poisons‍—desire, anger, and delusion‍—are to be understood in the context of bodhisattva conduct. It is at this point that the Buddha teaches a special method for confessing misdeeds: the “Three Sections” rite, which will be discussed below. He offers this rite of confession as a potent means for bodhisattvas to purify their faults and attain samādhi.

i.3Following this, the eponymous Upāli emerges from meditative seclusion and joins the assembly to address questions to the Buddha about the relationship between the prātimokṣa vows as they are observed by śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas, and the conduct of bodhisattvas who follow the Mahāyāna. Upāli is a famous figure in Buddhist literature and is regarded as foremost among the Buddha’s disciples in upholding the monastic discipline detailed in the Vinaya. Such was Upāli’s mastery of the Vinaya that he was selected to recite the Vinaya at the first full assembly of the saṅgha after the Buddha’s passing. As a recurring figure in Pāli literature, Upāli is more generally linked to the rules of monastic conduct of non-Mahāyāna Buddhism; here, however, Upāli’s questions primarily concern the observation of monastic discipline in the context of a bodhisattva’s conduct according to the Mahāyāna tradition. Upāli’s close connection to the Vinaya and the code of monastic conduct thus make him a particularly potent interlocutor in exploring the relationship between these two overlapping but seemingly contradictory modes of Buddhist conduct.

i.4At Upāli’s prompting, the Buddha clarifies the relationship between these two modes of conduct. He explains that the training of a śrāvaka and that of a bodhisattva are both aimed at the highest goal, but their respective practices are essentially different. For bodhisattvas, the training of śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas is limiting because they do not engage with other beings, and they seek a quick exit from saṃsāra instead of returning life after life to continue helping beings. Moreover, the core of the bodhisattva’s training is the mind of awakening (Skt. bodhicitta), an aspiration that guides a bodhisattva’s conduct and that, if violated, can easily be mended by again turning the mind toward awakening. A follower of the Śrāvakayāna, on the other hand, is bound by vows, especially serious ones, that once broken cannot be easily repaired. The relationship between these two modes of conduct is further clarified by a question posed by the bodhisattva Mañjuśrī: If phenomena themselves are already “inherently tamed,” i.e., if there is nothing inherent in phenomena that causes affliction within beings, then what is the purpose of the rules of monastic discipline? The Buddha responds by saying that if beings already knew this, then the Tathāgata would not have to continually explain the rules of monastic discipline; the rules, therefore, are provisional, and meant to help beings gradually understand that all phenomena are innately disciplined.

i.5As part of its focus on the conduct of a bodhisattva, Determining the Vinaya includes a version of the “Three Sections” rite, a confessional practice for mending breaches of a bodhisattva’s discipline. This sūtra, along with the Ugra­paripṛcchā Sūtra (Toh 63), serves as one of the principal canonical sources for the rite, but the rite presented here (1.­43–1.­52) is distinctive for the set of thirty-five buddhas before which bodhisattvas are directed to make their confession. That the “Three Sections” became an important practice in Indian Buddhism is attested by the fact that it is referenced in Śāntideva’s Śikṣāsamuccaya and was commented on by Nāgārjuna in his Bodhyāpatti­deśanāvṛtti . Nāgārjuna mentions details of the occasions and setting (nidāna) for the Buddha’s teaching the “Three Sections” that, he says, are not found in the Ratnakūṭa version of the text, suggesting that a separate version may have circulated in India. The Indian Buddhist master Kṛṣṇa composed a liturgical text (Skt. sādhana), the Skandha­tri­sādhana , that explains a full procedure for the confession ritual. Kṛṣṇa’s text and the rite it describes were deemed important by the Bengali master Atiśa Dīpaṅkaraśrījñāna (982–c. 1055 ᴄᴇ), who worked with Tibetan translators to make it available to a Tibetan audience. Another commentary was written by the tenth century Indian master Jitāri.

i.6There are several extant Sanskrit witnesses for portions of this sūtra: a lengthy citation drawn from the sūtra’s second section is preserved in the Bodhisattva­prātimokṣa Sūtra, which was studied and reproduced by Nalinaksha Dutt in 1931, and verses from Determining the Vinaya are cited by Śāntideva in his Śikṣāsamuccaya and by Candrakīrti in the Prasannapadā. The Pāli Canon contains a text called Upāliparipucchāsutta, which has been studied by Valentina Stache-Rosen in comparison to a Chinese version, but it does not appear to be the same text translated here. Chinese translations of the whole or part of the text can be found in the Chinese Buddhist Canon (Taishō 310, 325, and 326).

i.7Determining the Vinaya was translated into Tibetan during Tibet’s imperial period by the Tibetan translator and monk Yeshé Dé, with the assistance of the Indian masters Jinamitra, Prajñāvarman, and Surendrabodhi. This is evidenced not only by the colophon of the text, but also by its mention in the two extant imperial-period catalogs, the Denkarma and Phangthangma catalogs. According to the fourteenth-century Tibetan Chronicles of Padma (padma bka’ thang), the “Three Sections” part of the text (see i.­5 above) was included among the “Ten Royal Sūtras” (Tib. rgyal po mdo bcu), the recitation of which was prescribed by Padmasambhava to the Tibetan king Trisong Detsen (Tib. khri srong lde bstan, 755–97 ᴄᴇ) to prolong his life. It is also traditionally placed in a subset, the “Five Royal Sūtras.”

i.8A French translation of Determining the Vinaya was made by Pierre Python (1973) based on the available Sanskrit, Tibetan, and Chinese versions. Garma C. C. Chang translated the Chinese version into English in A Treasury of Mahāyāna Sūtras: Selections from the Mahāratnakūṭa Sūtra (1983).

i.9This English translation was prepared based on the Tibetan translation in the Degé Kangyur in consultation with the Pedurma comparative edition (Tib. dpe bsdur ma) and the version of the translation recorded in the Stok Palace Kangyur. We also consulted the Sanskrit fragments listed above, along with Python’s French translation and the Mongolian canonical translation.