"Verses on the Perfection of Wisdom” is an English translation of the Buddhist text, Prajñāpāramitā-Ratnagunasamcayagāthā, in verse form from a Sanskrit origin, translated by Edward Conze, published in the book of "The Perfection of Wisdom in Eight Thousand Lines & Its Verse Summary" in 1975. Prajñāpāramitā-Ratnagunasamcayagāthā is a summary of Aṣṭasāhasrikā Prajñāpāramitā. The second part of the book is a translation in prose format. For details of the verse and prose version, please read the Preface of the book. The corresponding classic Chinese translation, entitled "fo mu bao de cang ban ruo bo luo mi jing佛母寶德藏般若波羅蜜經 ," was completed in Sung Dynasty, around the turn of the 10th century, by Master Fa-xian (法賢法師), who translated 18 Buddhist canons in total between 982~987 CE. There is no evidence shows that the translation in two different languages were using the same text, however the similarity are very high. The line by line comparison of the two translation texts is made for readers to read and find the differences. The classic Chinese text of the Sutra is arranged in three parts, this presentation follows accordingly. (Day of Vesak 2019, Hahn Yang)

 

佛母寶德藏般若波羅蜜經 (Prajñāpāramitā-Ratnagunasamcayagāthā 直譯《寶德藏般若波羅蜜偈》)是《小般若經》或《八千頌般若經》(Aṣṭasāhasrikā Prajñāpāramitā)的詩偈體摘要，是所有般若經中唯一以詩偈體呈現的經，令人彌足珍貴。可惜自宋朝法賢法師譯出以來(982-987年間)，似乎未曾受到應有的重視。末學因讀Edward Conze 《Aṣṭasāhasrikā Prajñāpāramitā八千頌般若經》1975年的英譯本"The Perfection of Wisdom in Eight Thousand Lines & Its Verse Summary" 才發現本經，隨手就把漢英兩本相距幾乎上千年的譯本一行一行列出。原漢譯經分三卷，本文隨例，以饗同好，也希望在藏經閣睡了千年的佛母寶德藏般若波羅蜜經能廣流通於世，以利眾生圓滿智慧般若到彼岸。(2019年佛誕日，翰聲誌)