འཕགས་པ་སངས་རྒྱས་བདན་པ་ཞས་བྱ་བ་ཐག་པ་ཆན་པའ་མད intro.19

intro.19

The text was first translated into Chinese in the early half of the sixth century ce, and there are three Chinese translations that preserve separate titles for the text. The Liáng translation (Taishō 1333, c. 502–557 ce), whose translator is unknown, refers to the work as the *Ākāśa­garbha­paripṛcchā­sapta­buddha­dhāraṇī­sūtra (虛空藏菩薩問七佛陀羅尼咒經).¹⁴ The Jñānagupta translation (Taishō 1334, 587 ce) refers to the text as the *Tathāgata­upāya­kauśalya­mantra­sūtra (如來方便善巧咒經).¹⁵ And finally, the Fatian translation (Taishō 1147, 984 ce) refers to the work as the Āryākāśa­garbha­bodhisattva­dhāraṇī­sūtra (聖虛空藏菩薩陀羅尼經).¹⁶ As in the Tibetan imperial inventories of translated works, this text’s Chinese translations appear to have been classified variously as sūtra or dhāraṇī.