Sometime before the 800s a shAkta text under a tAthAgatan garb known as the Arya-shrI-mahAdevI-vyAkaraNa was transmitted to the Tibetans. In it the cosmic buddha of sukhAvatI vyUha declared that the H goddess mahAdevI would become a future buddha & called upon the saMgha& others
to worship her with a 108 names. One has to ask if it was a missionary ploy on part of the bauddha-s to appropriate mahAdevI or whether they simply could not avoid the growing H influence and had to simply accommodate it saying it was being sanctioned by the cosmic buddha.
A version of the text in Sanskrit is found in the famous Gilgit manuscripts & was already present by the gupta. Along with the bauddha material the Gilgit manuscripts also contains a fragment of the shaiva tumburu-chaturbhaginI tantra; we shall touch upon that later. The mahAdevI
aShTottara-shata-nAmAni are also found in the above noted complete Tibetan text; a chIna translation& a Mongol one (probably derived from Tibetan). In the text the cosmic buddha tells the bodhisattva avalokiteshvara that recitation of the names of mahAdevI explicitly aid a v2 to
counter epidemics in his kingdom along with the silencing of robbers & rogues. 1 of the names is aShTa-grahAShTaviMshati-nakShatra-shrI. By gupta age the navagraha, 27 nakShatra system was standard among H. Hence, this appears like a sign of the saugata anxiety to sound different
Following the recitation of the names, the buddha recommends a series of mantras- for fire offerings including: chaturveda-nakShatra-graha-gaNAdimUrtyai svAhA | The reference to the shruti transparently points to a H origin but the grouping of the veda-s with nakShatra-s& graha-s
is again an odd one suggesting a bauddha rework. The final offering is made with sarva-kR^ityA-kakkhoDa-vinAshanyai svāhā | The second pada is a variant of khArkhoDa, the ghost prayoga first seen in charaka's medical saMhitA.
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
