Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v1.c8.s4.t3.3

v1.c8.s4.t3.3

two of the *Traveling Notes of the Western Regions in the Great Tang Dynasty* that the most useful materials for the Indians to learn Sanskrit were incorporated in chapter 12 of the book Siddharastu which also had an enlightened message. The fourth chapter titled *Learning Dharma in the West* of Yi Jing’s *An Account of the Inner Law Sent Home from the South Sea* pointed out that Siddharastu occupies the first place among the five main Shabdavidya (sheng-ming lun) works. The Chinese term Xi-tan-zhang (《悉谈章》) is also otherwise named Xi-di-luo-su-du (《悉地罗窣覩》)– the transliteration of the Sanskrit book - Siddharastu. The title also stands for the chapter to begin with and it means "achievement" and "auspiciousness". It is a specialised book of 18 chapters containing 49 Sanskrit letters as the fundamental ones and large number of words and vocabularies formed out of series of mutual combinations. It had over 300 slokas with over 10,000 words in total. Children of the age of six can finish reading Siddharastu within a time period of six months. Yi Jing believed that this book was used by Maheśvara while teaching. Along with the spread and propagation of Buddhism in China during late Han Dynasty, Siddharastu and other relevant texts were introduced to China, and the texts that was exposed earlier were all about the 14 Sanskrit sounds (14 Sanskrit initials) and 42 syllables (42 alphabets). Siddharastu propagated by Hui Yuan was also known as *Siddharastu of Script of Mahayana Mahaparinirvana Sutra* which was quite popular in most of the areas of the land. Multiple transcripts (S.4583, P.2204, P.2212, P.3082 and P.3099 etc.) of Siddharastu have been unearthed in Dun Huang cave with different titles such as *Popular Siddharastu* and *Chan Siddharastu of Lankavatara Sutra Preached by Buddha* etc. Many monks and men of letters studied *Siddharastu* in the Sui and Tang Dynasties, Buddhist masters such as Xuanzang, Yi Jing, Buddhapālita and Kong Hai propagated *Siddharastu* and Indian monks including Bao Yue and Nanda also orally propagated it. The Chinese monk Zhi Guangshi learned *Siddharastu* from South Indian *Tripitaka Prajna-bodhi* and wrote a book named *Records of the Siddham Script*.