འཕགས་པ་ཁྱའ་སྣང་བ་བསམ་གྱས་མ་ཁྱབ་པས་བསྟན་པ་ཞས་བྱ་བའ་ཆས་ཀྱ་རྣམ་གྲངས intro.11

intro.11

There is also a unique version of the sūtra preserved among the cache of manuscripts discovered at Dunhuang. Bearing the title The Scripture of Inconceivable Radiance (snang ba bsam du med pa zhes bya’i chos kyi gzhung), the manuscript contains a different translation than is found in the Kangyur, one that appears to be based on a different recension of the sūtra. Unfortunately, the final folios of the manuscript are missing and with them the colophon that would provide more precise information on the manuscript’s textual and translation history. We can, with some confidence, date the manuscript, if not the translation it contains, to a period between the mid-eighth and mid-ninth centuries, the time when Dunhuang was under Tibetan control.³ The translation was certainly completed prior to the eleventh century, when the manuscript depositories at Dunhuang were sealed.⁴ Because it is an entirely different translation from the canonical version taken as the basis here, only the most significant variations have been noted.