The Long Explanation of the Noble Perfection of Wisdom in One Hundred Thousand, Twenty-Five Thousand, and Eighteen Thousand Lines

The Long Explanation of the Noble Perfection of Wisdom in One Hundred Thousand, Twenty-Five Thousand, and Eighteen Thousand Lines (Skt. Āryaśatasāhasrikāpañcaviṃśatisāhasrikāṣṭādaśasāhasrikāprajñāpāramitābṛhaṭṭīkā; Tib. འཕགས་པ་ཤེས་རབ་ཀྱི་ཕ་རོལ་ཏུ་ཕྱིན་པ་འབུམ་པ་དང་། ཉི་ཁྲི་ལྔ་སྟོང་པ་དང་། ཁྲི་བརྒྱད་སྟོང་པའི་རྒྱ་ཆེར་བཤད་པ།, Wyl. ‘phags pa shes rab kyi pha rol tu phyin pa ‘bum pa dang/ nyi khri lnga stong pa dang/ khri brgyad stong pa’i rgya cher bshad pa/) is a detailed explanation of the Long Prajnaparamita sutras, presenting a structural framework for them that is relatively easy to understand in comparison to most other commentaries based on Maitreya-Asanga’s Abhisamayalankara. After a detailed, word-by-word explanation of the introductory chapter common to all three sutras, it explains the structure they also all share in terms of the three approaches or “gateways”—brief, intermediate, and detailed—ending with an explanation of the passage known as the “Maitreya chapter” found only in the Eighteen Thousand Line and Twenty-Five Thousand Line sutras.

It goes by many different titles, and its authorship has never been conclusively determined, some Tibetans believing it to be by Vasubandhu, and others that it is by Damshtrasena.

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The Tibetan translation of this sutra can be found in the Prajnaparamita section of the Tibetan Dergé Tengyur, Toh 3808.

• English translation: Gareth Sparham, The Long Explanation of the Noble Perfection of Wisdom in One Hundred Thousand, Twenty-Five Thousand, and Eighteen Thousand Lines