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xxviii
FO-SHO-HING-TSAN-KING.
show the mixed character of Buddhist books in China, and the difficulty of classifying them in any distinct order.
We come now to notice a life of Buddha translated by a native Chinese priest. It is called the (9) Fo-pen-hing-king.
佛本行經 and was translated by Pao-yun, a companion of Fa-hien in his travels in India, about A. D. 420. It is in seven chapters, and composed in varying measures or verses of 4, 5 or 7 symbols to the line. We have no means of determining the name of the original work from which Pao-yun translated his book, but it evidently was not the Buddhakarita-kavya of Asvaghosha. It resembles it in no particular, except that it is in verse. The contents of this work I have already given elsewhere (Abstract of Four Lectures, p. 100); so that there is no need to allude to it here at any length.
Nor need I refer, except to name it, to the Chinese version of the Lalita Vistara. This translation was made by the Sramana Divakara during the Tang dynasty. He was a native of Mid-India, and flourished in China A.D. 676. It is in 12 chapters and 27 sections. The headings of these chapters have been given elsewhere (Catalogue, pp. 18, 19). The contents of the Chinese version agree in the main with the Tibetan. It is named (10) Fang-kwang-tai-kwang-yan-king.
方廣大莊嚴經 There is a life of Buddha translated by an Indian priest of Cophene, about A. D. 445, which is called (11) Săng-kia-lo-c'ha-sho-tsih-fo-hing-king.
僧伽羅剎所集佛行經 This appears to have been written by a priest called Sangharaksha, who was born in the kingdom of Su-lai, and came to Gandhâra when Kanishka flourished. This monarch is called in the text Kien-to-ki-ni-wang. The
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