The Awakening of Faith in Mahāyāna

Awakening of Faith in the Mahāyāna (reconstructed Sanskrit title: Mahāyāna śraddhotpādaśāstra;Chinese: 大乘起信論; pinyin: Dàshéng Qǐxìn Lùn; Japanese: 大乗起信論; Korean: 대승기신론; Vietnamese: Đại thừa khởi tín luận) is a text of Mahayana Buddhism. Though attributed to the Indian master Aśvaghoṣa, the text is now partly regarded as a Chinese composition.

While the text is attributed to Aśvaghoṣa, no Sanskrit version of the text is extant. The two earliest existing versions are written in Chinese, and contemporary scholars widely accept the theory that the text is a Chinese composition. However, D.T. Suzuki accepted its Indian Sanskrit origin, while acknowledging that it was unlikely the first historical Aśvaghoṣa was the author, and it is more likely that the attribution to Aśvaghoṣa was an honorific appellation due to the profundity of the treatise.

There is no doubt that the Lanka is closely connected in time as well as in doctrine with The Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana generally ascribed to Asvaghosha. While he may not have been the author of this most important treatise of Mahayana philosophy, there was surely a great Buddhist mind, who, inspired by the same spirit which pervades the Lanka, the Avatamsaka, the Parinirvana, etc., poured out his thoughts in The Awakening. Some scholars contend that The Awakening is a Chinese work, but this is not well grounded."

Paramartha (499-569) is traditionally thought to have translated the text in 553. However, many modern scholars now opine that it was actually composed by Paramartha or one of his students. King remarks that, although Paramartha undoubtedly was among the most prolific translators of Sanskrit texts into Chinese, he may have originated, not translated, the East Asian Yogācāra text of the Buddha-nature Treatise (Chinese: 佛性論) as well as the Awakening of Faith. Other experts dispute that it has anything to do at all with Paramartha.

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