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Table of Contents

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Summary

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While resting in a park outside the city of Vaiśālī, the Buddha is approached by the bodhisattva Prāmodyarāja, who requests meditation instruction. The Buddha proceeds to give a teaching on a meditative absorption called elucidating the way of all phenomena and subsequently delivers an elaborate discourse on the six perfections. Prāmodyarāja then learns that all the future buddhas of the Good Eon are now present in the Blessed One’s audience of bodhisattvas. Responding to Prāmodyarāja’s request to reveal the names under which these present bodhisattvas will be known as buddhas in the future, the Buddha first lists these names, and then goes on to describe the circumstances surrounding their birth, awakening, and teaching in the world. In the sūtra’s final section, we learn how each of these great bodhisattvas who are on the path to buddhahood first developed the mind of awakening.

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Acknowledgements

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Translated by the Dharmachakra Translation Committee under the guidance of Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche. Thomas Doctor produced the translation and Andreas Doctor, Anya Zilman, and Nika Jovic compared the draft translation with the original Tibetan and edited the text. The introduction was written by Thomas Doctor and the 84000 editorial team.

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 Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche, Zhou Tian Yu, Chen Yi Qin, Zhou Xun, Zhao Xuan, Chen Kun, and Zhuo Yue, which helped make the work on this translation possible, is most gratefully acknowledged.

Text Body

The Translation
The Noble Great Vehicle Sūtra
The Good Eon
2.A.

The names

2.A.­1

When the Blessed One had said this, the bodhisattva Prāmodyarāja asked, “Revered Blessed One, within this gathering of attending bodhisattva great beings, are there any who have attained these absorptions, these applications of the perfections, these eighty-four thousand gateways of absorption?”

2.A.­2

The Blessed One answered the bodhisattva Prāmodyarāja in the following way: [F.96.a] “Prāmodyarāja, except for the four thus-gone ones who in this Good Eon have already awakened to perfect buddhahood, all the rest of those who will awaken to perfect buddhahood in this Good Eon are present within this retinue of bodhisattva great beings, and they have attained those absorptions, those applications of the perfections, and those eighty-four thousand gateways of absorption.”

2.A.­3

The bodhisattva Prāmodyarāja now replied to the Blessed One, “Wonderful, wonderful! Revered Blessed One! I request that you please state the families and names of those bodhisattvas. In that way numerous people may be healed and be happy. By showing your love for the world in this way, gods and humans will be successful, healed, and happy, and the sacred Dharma will be protected and remain for a long time. In the future, the bodhisattvas will gain understanding and practice without complacency for the sake of unexcelled and perfect awakening.”

2.A.­4

The Blessed One then said to the bodhisattva Prāmodyarāja, “Prāmodyarāja, listen very closely and keep my words correctly in mind; I shall explain it to you.”

2.A.­5

“Blessed One, I shall do so,” answered the bodhisattva Prāmodyarāja, and he listened accordingly.

2.A.­6

The Blessed One now pronounced in verse the names139 of the thus-gone, worthy, perfect buddhas, as well as the names of the bodhisattvas: [F.96.b] [B9]

2.A.­9
“The buddha Muktiskandha
Completes this section.
Vairocana, Sūryagarbha,
Candra, Arciṣmat, Suprabha,