འཕགས་པ་ཡངས་པའ་གྲང་ཁྱར་ད་འཇག་པའ་མད་ཆན་པ intro.4

intro.4

There are several different lists of mahāsūtras in works that recommend their recitation. Compared to the other mahāsūtras in the Kangyur, On Entering the City of Vaiśālī is something of an outlier, in that it is not included with the other nine of that category in the early text inventories. Its title and what is known of its history, however, identify it as closely related to the others. No modern discussion of the mahāsūtras would be complete without reference to Peter Skilling’s two-volume magnum opus on the subject,² and his study of these texts not only covers the nine that are mentioned in some lists but also adds On Entering the City of Vaiśālī as the tenth, with the special status of an “independent mahāsūtra.”³