PACIFIC WORLD - The Institute of Buddhist Studies

Willams: Seeing through Images 41
ister and is preceded, as we move back eastward toward the cave’s entrance,
by lists of buddhas’ names: the buddhas of the ten directions beginning
with Sumerupradīpaprabhāsa Tathāgata (Xumi deng guangming,
) in the east; the thirty-five buddhas; the fifty-three buddhas.
The “Buddha Names in Seven Registers” is what we might term a
“hybrid canonical” text: while all of its components are canonical, the text
itself as a combination of these components, and the liturgies associated
with it, were composed in China. 27 As a ritual text the “Buddha Names in
Seven Registers” may be defined as a genre. Perhaps uniquely, we may
define this genre by the fixed number and order of the groups of buddhas’
names. Usually litanies of buddhas’ names are the most flexible part of a
ritual; they may be expanded and contracted as the situation requires. In
the “Buddha Names in Seven Registers” these registers are fixed. Subgenres
here are defined by the different repentance prayers used. In the subgenre
examined in this article the repentance prayer, including the verses at the
end in the Dunhuang and canonically transmitted versions, is taken from
the “Thirty-Five Buddha Repentance” found in the early (i.e., 266–420 CE)
Chinese translation of the Vinaya-viniścaya (hereafter VV). 28 The prayer itself
is composed of two parts: the confession and repentance of various groups
of offenses; a transfer of merit.
For purposes of reference and to facilitate discussion I present a translation
of the “Mt. Bao Lingquan Monastery Repentance Ritual” below. Since
the last part of the prayer in the inscription is missing, I have supplied the
remaining section through comparison with the Dunhuang and canonical
versions.
The Text of the Abridged Repentance for Venerating [the Buddha
Names] of the Seven [Registers]: 29
1. Homage to All of the Buddhas of the [Ten] Directions [Beginning
with] the Buddha of the Eastern [Direction] [*Sumerupradīpa]
prabhāsa;
2. Homage to All of the Seven Buddhas of the Past [Beginning
with] [Vapaśin];
3. Homage to All of the Fifty-Three Buddhas [Beginning with]
Dīpamkara;
4. Homage to All of the Buddhas of the Ten Directions [Beginning
with] Bhadraśrī Tathāgata;
5. Homage to All of the Thousand Buddhas of the Bhadrakalpa
[Beginning with] Krakucchanda Tathāgata;