Lotus Sutra

The Lotus Sūtra (Sanskrit: Saddharma Puṇḍarīka Sūtra, literally Sutra on the White Lotus of the Sublime Dharma) is one of the most popular and influential Mahayana sutras, and the basis on which the Tiantai, Tendai, Cheontae, and Nichiren schools of Buddhism were established. For many East Asian Buddhists, the Lotus Sūtra contains the ultimate and complete teaching of the Buddha and the recitation of the text is understood to bring auspicious fortune and eradicate ones accumulated negative karma.

The earliest known Sanskrit title for the sūtra is the Saddharma Puṇḍarīka Sūtra, which translates to Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma. In English, the shortened form Lotus Sūtra is common. The Lotus Sūtra has also been highly regarded in a number of Asian countries where Mahāyāna Buddhism has been traditionally practiced. Translations of this title into the languages of some of these countries include:

In 1934, based on his text-critical analysis of Chinese and Sanskrit versions, Kogaku Fuse concluded that the Lotus Sutra was composed in four main stages. According to Fuse, the verse sections of chapters 1-9 and 17 were probably created in the first century BCE, with the prose sections of these chapters added in the first century CE. He estimates the date of the third stage, chapters 10, 11, 13-16, 18-20 and 27, around 100 CE. Chapters 21-26 belong to the last stage (around 150 CE).

According to Teiser and Stone, there is consensus about the stages of composition but not about the dating of these strata.

Tamura argues that the first stage of composition, chapters 2-9, was completed around 50 CE and expanded by chapters 10-21 around 100 CE. He dates the third stage, chapters 22-27, around 150 CE.

Karashima proposes another modified version of Fuse´s hypothesis with the following sequence of composition:

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