Toh 272The Sūtra of the Ten Buddhas

The Sūtra of the Ten Buddhas (Daśabuddhakasūtra)

Background

The Sūtra of the Ten Buddhas is an important work of Mahāyāna Buddhism, preserved in the Kangyur—the Northern canon of the Tibetan tradition. This sūtra is classified as a teaching on supreme Buddhology, among the scriptures that honor the Buddhas throughout the ages. According to the Northern Tibetan tradition, this scripture guides those practicing on the bodhisattva path in how to remember and engrave within the mind the image as well as the conduct of ten Buddhas.

The setting of the teaching is imagined as the Western Pure Land or the heavenly palaces of the Buddhas, where the principal bodhisattvas gathered around hear the Tathāgata Buddha teach about the lofty and wondrous conduct of predecessors who had become Buddhas, taking them as radiant examples and as a source of merit and wisdom without limit.

Main Content

The Sūtra of the Ten Buddhas reveals ten Buddhas of the distant past or of different world systems. Each Buddha is wondrously wise, possessing the three Buddha bodies (Dharmakāya—the Dharma body, Sambhogakāya—the enjoyment body, Nirmānakāya—the emanation body); each attained awakening in a different kalpā (겨劫—an immeasurable great eon); each has a pure land, a Sangha, and a distinct period of instruction.

The sūtra often presents the distinctive qualities of each Buddha: the first Buddha may be named Buddha Radiant Light (Ābhāsvara), the second may be Buddha Banner of Indra’s Crest (Indraketudhvaja), and so on until the tenth Buddha; each made immeasurable vows, liberated boundless sentient beings, and fully accomplished perfect awakening. This scripture also often records the methods of practice that bodhisattvas undertake in order to become Buddhas—from the accumulation of merit, from the most excellent wisdom, from loving-kindness, compassion, joy, and equanimity, and from unmixed purity.

Through narrative accounts concerning the crown of the head, the sūtra emphasizes that the path to awakening is one, but its forms of manifestation are diverse according to the capacities of sentient beings and their particular circumstances.