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ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་སྟོང་ཕྲག་ཉི་ཤུ་ལྔ་པ།

The Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-Five Thousand Lines
Chapter 15

Pañcaviṃśatisāhasrikāprajñāpāramitā

འཕགས་པ་ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་སྟོང་ཕྲག་ཉི་ཤུ་ལྔ་པ།

’phags pa shes rab kyi pha rol tu phyin pa stong phrag nyi shu lnga pa

The Noble Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-Five Thousand Lines

Āryapañcaviṃśatisāhasrikāprajñāpāramitā

Toh 9

Degé Kangyur, vol. 26 (shes phyin, nyi khri, ka), folios 1.b–382.a; vol. 27 (shes phyin, nyi khri, kha), folios 1.b–393.a; and vol. 28 (shes phyin, nyi khri, ga), folios 1.b–381.a

Translated by the Padmakara Translation Group
under the patronage and supervision of 84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha

First published 2023

Current version v 1.1.12 (2024)

Generated by 84000 Reading Room v2.25.1

84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha is a global non-profit initiative to translate all the Buddha’s words into modern languages, and to make them available to everyone.

This work is provided under the protection of a Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND (Attribution - Non-commercial - No-derivatives) 3.0 copyright. It may be copied or printed for fair use, but only with full attribution, and not for commercial advantage or personal compensation. For full details, see the Creative Commons license.

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Summary

s.1

The Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-Five Thousand Lines is among the most important scriptures underlying both the “vast” and the “profound” approaches to Buddhist thought and practice. Known as the “middle-length” version, being the second longest of the three long Perfection of Wisdom sūtras, it fills three volumes of the Kangyur. Like the two other long sūtras, it records the major teaching on the perfection of wisdom given by the Buddha Śākyamuni on Vulture Peak, detailing all aspects of the path to enlightenment while at the same time emphasizing how bodhisattvas must put them into practice without taking them‍—or any aspects of enlightenment itself‍—as having even the slightest true existence.

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Acknowledgements

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Translation by the Padmakara Translation Group. A complete draft by Gyurme Dorje was first edited by Charles Hastings, then revised and further edited by John Canti. The introduction was written by John Canti. We are grateful for the advice and help received from Gareth Sparham, Greg Seton, and Nathaniel Rich.

This translation is dedicated to the memory of our late colleague, long-time friend, and vajra brother Gyurme Dorje (1950–2020), who worked assiduously on this translation in his final years and into the very last months of his life. We would also like to express our gratitude to his wife, Xiaohong, for the extraordinary support she gave him on so many levels.

The translation was completed under the patronage and supervision of 84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha.

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The generous sponsorship of Kris Yao and Xiang-Jen Yao, which helped make the work on this translation possible, is most gratefully acknowledged.

Introduction

i.1

The Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-Five Thousand Lines is one of the three so-called “long” sūtras on the Perfection of Wisdom, or Prajñāpāramitā.1 It fills three complete volumes of the Degé Kangyur, and of all the Prajñāpāramitā sūtras it is second in length only to the massive Perfection of Wisdom in One Hundred Thousand Lines (Toh 8),2 which fills twelve volumes. The third and shortest of the three “long” sūtras, the Perfection of Wisdom in Eighteen Thousand Lines (Toh 10),3 fills two and a half volumes.4

The Early Spread of the Prajñāpāramitā Sūtras

The Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-Five Thousand Lines in Central Asia and China

Meanwhile in India…

The Prajñāpāramitā Takes Root in Tibet

The Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-Five Thousand Lines in Tibet

Kangyur and Tengyur Versions of the Sūtra

Sanskrit Texts of The Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-Five Thousand Lines

Structure and Content

The Structure and Its Correspondences with the Other Long Sūtras

The Content and Its Topical Divisions

The Protagonists: Śāriputra, Subhūti, Śakra, and the Others

Selected Features of the Sūtra

English Translation

The Translation

The Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-Five Thousand Lines

Chapter 1: The Context

[V26] [F.1.b] [B1] {Dt.4}

1.1

Homage to all the buddhas and bodhisattvas!

1.2

Thus did I hear at one time. The Blessed One 91 was staying on Vulture Peak near Rājagṛha, with a large monastic gathering comprising some five thousand monks. All of them were arhats who had attained the cessation of contaminants, free of afflicted mental states, fully controlled, their minds thoroughly liberated, their wisdom well liberated, thoroughbreds, mighty elephants, their tasks accomplished, their work completed, their burdens relinquished, their own objectives fulfilled, the fetters binding them to the rebirth process completely severed, their minds thoroughly liberated through perfect instruction,92 supreme in their perfection of all mental powers, with the exception of just one person‍— [F.2.a] the venerable Ānanda, still a trainee who had entered the stream. Also present were some five hundred nuns headed by Yaśodharā and Mahāprajāpatī, and a great many laymen and laywomen, all of whom had seen the Dharma.93

The Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-Five Thousand Lines Chapter 15

Toh 9

Imprint

Text Body

The Perfection of Wisdom in Twenty-Five Thousand Lines
Chapter 15