འཕགས་པ་རྡ་རྗའ་སྙང་པའ་གཟངས་ཞས་བྱ་བ་ཐག་པ་ཆན་པའ་མད intro.4

intro.4

The sūtra opens in the town of Viśvā near the Himalayan mountains,³ where a large gathering of monks, gods, and celestial bodhisattvas have assembled to receive teachings from the Buddha. The Buddha’s main interlocutor throughout the teaching is the bodhisattva of wisdom, Mañjuśrī. The central discourse of the text is preceded by several miracles, great and small. First, the Buddha enters a special meditative state that renders him invisible to his audience. He then summons all the followers of the Mahāyāna in the universe and they miraculously assemble in the sky. At this point, the great bodhisattvas Mañjuśrī, Maitreya, Ratnaketu, and Avalokiteśvara each enter special meditative absorptions that evoke miraculous changes in the minds of their audience. Finally, the Buddha emits a vast array of multicolored light rays and proceeds to smile, with brilliant light rays emanating from his mouth. When asked by Mañjuśrī what has pleased him, the Buddha says that he is smiling because ten thousand buddhas in the sky have taught the dhāraṇī of the vajra quintessence. Mañjuśrī then requests the Buddha to teach that same dhāraṇī to all the assembled bodhisattvas, and the remainder of the text consists of the Buddha’s teaching and his intermittent replies to Mañjuśrī’s many questions on important doctrinal points.