Prajñāpāramitā
| Translations of Prajñāpāramitā |
|
|---|---|
| English | Perfection of Transcendent Wisdom |
| Sanskrit | प्रज्ञापारमिता (IAST: Prajñāpāramitā) |
| Burmese |
ပညာပါရမီတ (IPA: [pjɪ̀ɴɲà pàɹəmìta̰]) |
| Chinese |
般若波羅蜜多 (Pinyin: bōrě bōluómìduō) |
| Japanese |
般若波羅蜜多 (rōmaji: hannya-haramitta) |
| Korean |
반야바라밀다 (RR: Banyabaramilda) |
| Mongolian | Төгөлдөр билгүүн |
| Sinhala | |
| Tibetan | ་ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་ (shes rab kyi pha rol tu phyin pa) |
| Thai | ปรัชญาปารมิตา |
| Vietnamese | Bát-nhã-ba-la-mật-đa |
| Glossary of Buddhism | |
Prajñāpāramitā means "the Perfection of (Transcendent) Wisdom" in Mahāyāna Buddhism. Prajñāpāramitā refers to this perfected way of seeing the nature of reality, as well as to a particular body of sutras and to the personification of the concept in the Bodhisattva known as the "Great Mother" (Tibetan: Yum Chenmo). The word Prajñāpāramitā combines the Sanskrit words prajñā "wisdom" with pāramitā "perfection". Prajñāpāramitā is a central concept in Mahāyāna Buddhism and is generally associated with the doctrine of emptiness (Shunyata) or 'lack of Svabhava' (essence) and the works of Nagarjuna. Its practice and understanding are taken to be indispensable elements of the Bodhisattva path.
According to Edward Conze the Prajñāpāramitā Sutras are "a collection of about forty texts...composed in India between approximately 100 BC and AD 600." Some Prajñāpāramitā sūtras are thought to be among the earliest Mahāyāna sūtras.
One of the important features of the Prajñāpāramitā Sutras is anutpada (unborn, no origin).
Western scholars have traditionally considered the earliest sūtra in the Prajñāpāramitā class to be the Aṣṭasāhasrikā Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra or "Perfection of Wisdom in 8,000 Lines", which was probably put in writing in the 1st century BCE. This chronology is based on the views of Edward Conze, who largely considered dates of translation into other languages. The first translation of the Aṣṭasāhasrikā Prajñāpāramitā into Chinese occurred in the 2nd century CE. This text also has a corresponding version in verse format, called the Ratnaguṇasaṃcaya Gāthā, which some believe to be slightly older because it is not written in standard literary Sanskrit. However, these findings rely on late-dating Indian texts, in which verses and mantras are often kept in more archaic forms.
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