The Faithfulness Of Chinese Translations

It is wonderful to look through the large collection of Buddhist books translated into Chinese from the dialects of India, principally by Indian or Indo-Scythian priests. I use this last expression to indicate the nationality of those translators who came to China from Cabul and regions north of the Indus. For 600 years and more a succession of Buddhist teachers and preachers followed one another from India and Central Asia towards China with little interruption. The result is, that the Buddhist Tripiṭaka (canon) as we have it in that. country is a collection of translations without connection of parts, denoting the Buddhism of India and neighbouring countries, in every period of its development. Hence side by side with the early teaching of the faith found in such books as the Dharmapada (Tan poh), we have the gross form of Tantra worship contained in the 'Dhāraṇi of Caṇḍā,' Caṇḍā being in fact the same as Kālī or Durgā or Jagatmātṛ. Nevertheless this collection of translations is a most important one. Its importance has yet to be realised. To the student of Buddhism it is an inexhaustible mine of wealth. And to the student of history some knowledge of it is indispensable.

The question presents itself, therefore, can we rely on the truthfulness of the work done by these men in China? To this question only a qualified answer can be given; we may rely on the work of men of known ability. And in other cases we may test the work done by comparison with the originals. We should have no reluctance, I think, in accepting the translations of men like Kumārajīva, to whom both Chinese and Sanskrit must have been familiar, and whose work may be tested by comparison with Sanskrit texts. And if he may be trusted, so may others also who worked with him or in his time. Amongst these was Dharmarakṣa, the translator of the Buddhacarita of this volume. He was a man of Mid-India, and became a disciple at six years of age, and daily recited 10,000 words of Scripture. At first he belonged to the school of the lesser development, and was well acquainted with the discourses of the five Vidyās. Afterwards he became a follower of the greater development. He arrived in China in the year 412 A.D. and worked at translations till A.D. 454. Now we can hardly suppose that a man of such natural gifts as Dharmarakṣa could have laboured for forty-two years at translations, without being worthy of trust. Moreover we find that Kumārajīva was working at this period in China, and that he translated the work of Aśvaghoṣa called Ta-cwang-yan-king-lun, which appears to be related to the Ta-cwang-yan-king, another name for the Life of Buddha (Lalita Vistara). Is it likely that the two translators were unknown to one another?

It is true, indeed, that I have not been able to test the translation of Dharmarakṣa by comparison with the Sanskrit. As I understand Professor Max Müller, the Sanskrit text is not always easy to interpret, and differs in many places from the Chinese version. Sometimes it is possible to see how it happened that the Chinese translator misunderstood the text before him. Sometimes it would seem that he omitted intentionally whole passages which would be either unintelligible or uninteresting to Chinese readers. As there is some prospect of the Sanskrit text of Aśvaghoṣa's work being published, we may hope to arrive in time at something like certainty on the point under consideration.

But with respect to the trustworthiness of Chinese translations in general, it depends, as I said before, on the character of the individual scholar. There is no reason at all why a Brahman should not have become familiar with Chinese, and when we add to this the extraordinary facilities afforded the Buddhist missionaries in China for executing their work, in the way I mean of royal patronage and able coadjutors, there is no reason to suspect the result of their labours. Yet doubtless there are many unreliable versions of sacred texts to be found. Every zealous Upāsaka who came to China was not thereby duly qualified for the work of translation; and as a rule we should be cautious in attaching entire credence to the literary labours of such persons.