Introduction

i.1This Mahāyāna sūtra in the Heap of Jewels (Tib. dkon brtsegs, Skt. ratnakūṭa) collection recounts the story of its titular character, Aśokadattā, who was a daughter of King Ajātaśatru, the famed lord of Rājagṛha and a major patron of the Buddhist community during the latter part of the Buddha’s life.

i.2One day, while the Buddha was staying at nearby Vulture Peak, a large group of śrāvaka disciples including such eminent figures as Śāriputra, Mahāmaudgalyāyana, Mahākāśyapa, Subhūti, Rāhula, and others go into the city of Rājagṛha to collect alms, eventually arriving at the palace of King Ajātaśatru. When the king’s daughter Aśokadattā sees the disciples arriving, she neither rises from her seat nor makes any sign of greeting or respect. Her father is dismayed by her rudeness and chastises her for her impudence, but Aśokadattā is unrepentant. She defends her behavior with a series of eloquent analogies, illustrating for her father that those who follow the śrāvaka path are not worthy of respect or veneration, since they have failed to accept the full wealth offered by the Buddha’s Dharma. This, she says, is in contrast to bodhisattvas, who are motivated to help others on the path to liberation, and who have embraced the more profound teachings on the emptiness of all phenomena. Śrāvakas, she says, are like physicians concerned only with treating themselves, or travelers who depend on the hospitality of others. Bodhisattvas, on the other hand, are like physicians who care for others just as they care for themselves, or like those who generously share their provisions with others while on the road. Śrāvakas, she says, are like passengers on a boat, while bodhisattvas are like the captains of ships. While the light of a bodhisattva shines like the sun, the light of a śrāvaka is as dim as a firefly, and “who,” Aśokadattā asks, “would relinquish the sun and the moon to pay homage to fireflies?”

i.3In turn, each of the eminent śrāvakas engages the girl in debate, but each is left speechless by her responses and expresses awe at the eloquence and confidence with which she is able expound the Dharma and her acumen in deconstructing conventional distinctions from the perspective of the emptiness of all phenomena. On hearing her insightful and eloquent teachings, the mind set on complete awakening (Skt. bodhicitta) is stirred in twenty of the ladies of the royal household, including Aśokadattā’s own mother, the queen consort Moonlit. Aśokadattā then descends from her throne and humbly serves the śrāvakas with food and drink, and they all go together to Vulture Peak for an audience with the Buddha himself.

i.4When the Buddha is informed of the girl’s extraordinary eloquence and confidence, he explains that she has already cultivated roots of virtue with countless buddhas in former lives. Śāriputra then inquires why, if she has already accumulated such roots of virtue, does she still have a female form? The Buddha rebuffs Śāriputra’s question, saying that bodhisattvas may manifest in whatever form they wish. Aśokadattā adds the rejoinder that in truth “all phenomena are neither male nor female,” and to illustrate the point she transforms in front of them into a male form and in a state of ecstasy rises into the sky to the height of seven palm trees. The Buddha then prophecies Aśokadattā’s future awakening as a truly complete buddha and that her mother, too, will attain awakening in the same future world system. The bodhisattva Aśokadattā then descends from the sky and takes the form of a monk, illustrating for the king that all experienced phenomena are the contrivances of perception. The Buddha then instructs Ānanda to memorize and widely propagate the discourse.

i.5Aśokadattā’s Prophecy is among several sūtras that have a female bodhisattva as their main protagonist. Several of these feature the daughters of kings. Another daughter of King Ajātaśatru, Vimalaprabhā, is the main protagonist in The Questions of Vimalaprabhā (Vimala­prabha­pari­pṛcchā, Toh 168). Daughters of King Prasenajit are the main protagonists in The Questions of the Girl Vimalaśraddhā (Dārikāvimala­śraddhā­pari­pṛcchā, Toh 84), The Questions of Vimaladattā (Vimaladatta­pari­pṛcchā, Toh 77), and The Lion’s Roar of Śrīmālādevī (Śrīmālā­devīsiṃhanāda, Toh 92). In The Prophecy of Kṣemavatī (Kṣemavatī­vyākaraṇa, Toh 192), King Bimbisāra’s queen Kṣemavatī receives a prediction of future awakening, as do the main protagonists in The Questions of Śrīmatī the Brahmin Woman (Śrīmatī­brāhmaṇī­pari­pṛcchā, Toh 170) and The Prophecy of the Girl Candrottarā (Candrottarādāri­kāvyākaraṇa, Toh 191). Laywomen of lesser social status who are likewise prophesied to achieve awakening are the main interlocutors in The Questions of the Girl Sumati (Sumatidārikā­pari­pṛcchā, Toh 74), The Questions of Gaṅgottarā (Gaṅgottara­pari­pṛcchā, Toh 75), The Questions of an Old Lady (Mahallikā­pari­pṛcchā, Toh 171), and The City Beggar Woman (Nāga­rāvalambikā, Toh 205). In The Miraculous Play of Mañjuśrī (Mañjuśrī­vikrīḍita, Toh 96), a courtesan also receives such a prophecy. While some of the women in these sūtras aspire to be reborn as males as they progress toward awakening, the point emphasized in many of these discourses, including this one, is that there is no gender in the awakened state. Nevertheless, the accounts all culminate in the prediction that the female protagonist will ultimately become an apparently male buddha.

i.6Aśokadattā’s Prophecy does not appear to have been widely referenced by the Buddhist scholar-monks in ancient India. However, it is cited at some length in The Compendium of Sūtra Teachings on the Stages of Meditation (Bhāvanākrama­sūtra­samuccaya), one of four compendia included in the Middle Way (dbu ma) section of the Tengyur. The section cited there includes the following:

i.9Bodhidhara (fl. 1000 ᴄᴇ), a teacher at Nālandā University and a guru of the famed Atiśa, also references this passage in passing in his Text on the Tools for Concentration (Samādhi­sambhāra­pari­varta), stating that it contains “methods for averting the activity of demons” (Tib. bdud kyi las bzlog pa'i thabs). Both The Compendium of Sūtra Teachings on the Stages of Meditation and The Text on the Tools for Concentration are essentially meditation manuals, so it is interesting to find them quoting Aśokadattā’s Prophecy, which itself gives no specific instructions on meditation.

i.10There is no extant Sanskrit witness to this text. It was translated twice into Chinese, first by Dharmarakṣa in 317 ᴄᴇ (Taishō 337) and then again by Buddhaśānta in 539 ᴄᴇ (Taishō 310/32). Though Buddhaśānta’s Chinese version, as translated into English in Chang 1983, is close in narrative structure to the Tibetan, there are also some differences in the order of events and many divergences in detail. For example, there is a notable difference between the Tibetan and the Chinese in the treatment of Aśokadattā’s gender transformation. While the Tibetan version leaves us with Aśokadattā in the form of a male monk for the final exchange with the king, the Chinese has her transforming back again into her female form, confusing her father: “I do not [know how to] see you as you physically appear, because I just saw you as a monk, before seeing you now as a maiden again.” Such discrepancies may reflect different Sanskrit source texts.

i.11Aśokadattā’s Prophecy was translated into Tibetan by the Indian preceptors Jinamitra and Surendrabodhi, along with the senior editor and translator Bandé Yeshé Dé, indicating a translation made from Sanskrit during the height the Tibetan imperial sponsorship of Buddhism in the late eighth or early ninth century ᴄᴇ. This dating is supported by the title’s listing in both the Phangthangma and Denkarma imperial catalogs of translated texts.

i.12This is the first English translation of the Tibetan to be published. It is based on the Tibetan text as found in the Degé Kangyur, in consultation with the Stok Palace Kangyur and the variants listed in the Comparative Edition (dpe bsdur ma). Where variant readings have been preferred, this has been recorded in the notes.