This is another in a series of weekly blog posts comparing and contrasting the Sanskrit and Chinese Lotus Sutra translations.
Beyond the question of whether the chapter seeks to help ordinary bodhisattvas, there are only minor differences between H. Kern’s Peaceful Life chapter and the English translations of Kumārajīva’s Peaceful Practices chapter.
For example, at the conclusion of the first section of gāthās, Kern has:
24. Let the sage first, for some time, coerce his thoughts, exercise meditation with complete absorption, and correctly perform all that is required for attaining spiritual insight, and then, after rising (from his pious meditation), preach with unquailing mind.
25. The kings of this earth and the princes who listen to the law protect him. Others also, both laymen (or burghers) and Brahmans, will be found together in his congregation.
Senchu Murano’s translation of Kumārajīva’s Chinese has similar language:
A Bodhisattva will be peaceful,
And free from timidity
If he stays in a quiet room
For some time,
Recollects the Dharma correctly,
Understands the Dharma
According to the meanings of it,
And then emerges
From his dhyāna-concentration,
And leads kings, princes,
Common people and brahmanas
By expounding this sūtra to them.
But Murano concludes this section of gāthās with:
Mañjuśrī, all this is the first set of things
That the Bodhisattva should do
Before he expounds the Sūtra
Of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma
In the world after [my extinction].
All of the English translations of Kumārajīva’s Chinese offer this summary graph at the conclusion of these gāthās. For example, Gene Reeves offers:
Mañjuśrī, this is called the first teaching
In which bodhisattvas should dwell at peace,
Enabling the, in future generations,
To teach the Dharma Flower Sutra.
In the prose section immediately following these gāthās, Kern has:
Further, Mañjuśrī, the Bodhisattva Mahāsattva who, after the complete extinction of the Tathāgata at the end of time, the last period, the last five hundred years, when the true law is in a state of decay, is going to propound this Dharmaparyāya, must be in a peaceful state (of mind) and then preach the law, whether he knows it by heart or has it in a book. In his sermon he will not be too prone to carping at others, not blame other preaching friars, not speak scandal nor propagate scandal.
All of the English translations of Kumārajīva’s Chinese skip this point of “whether he knows it by heart or has it in a book.” In Murano’s translation, we get:
“Second, Mañjuśrī! A Bodhisattva-mahāsattvas who wishes to expound this sūtra in the age of the decline of the teachings after my extinction should perform the following peaceful practices. When he expounds or reads this sūtra, he should not point out the faults of other persons or sūtras.
In comparing the translations, Kern’s translation often has additional details.
Here’s how Murano’s translation of Kumārajīva’s Chinese begins the second section of gāthās:
The Bodhisattva should wish
To make all living beings peaceful,
And then expound the Dharma to them.
He should make a seat in a pure place,
Apply ointment to his skin,
Wash dirt and dust off himself,
Wear a new and undefiled robe,
Clean himself within and without,
Sit on the seat of the Dharma peacefully,
And then expound the Dharma in answer to questions.
Kern renders this same scene with much more detail:
26. The wise man is always at ease, and in that state he preaches the law, seated on an elevated pulpit which has been prepared for him on a clean and pretty spot.
27. He puts on a clean, nice, red robe, dyed with good colors, and a black woolen garment and a long undergarment;
28. Having duly washed his feet and rubbed his head and face with smooth ointments, he ascends the pulpit, which is provided with a footbank and covered with pieces of fine cloth of various sorts and sits down.
29. When he is thus seated on the preacher’s pulpit and all who have gathered round him are attentive, he proceeds to deliver many discourses, pleasing by variety, before monks and nuns,
Again, as pointed out repeatedly in this comparison of Kern’s translation of an 11th century Sanskrit document and Kumārajīva’s fifth century Chinese version of the Lotus Sutra, the details may be different but the message remains the same.
Next: Ether and the Sky
