Avatamsaka-sutra

Avatamsaka-sutra, voluminous Mahayana Buddhist text that some consider the most sublime revelation of the Buddha’s teachings. Scholars value the text for its revelations about the evolution of thought from early Buddhism to fully developed Mahayana.

The sutra speaks of the deeds of the Buddha and of their resulting merits that blossom much like a garland of flowers. The discourse begins with the Buddha’s enlightenment, attended by an anthem chorus of bodhisattvas (buddhas-to-be) and divine beings as numerous as the atoms of all the worlds. There follows a great assembly in the palace of the god Indra, whom Buddha instructs, and similar assemblies in other celestial regions accompanied by manifestations of great glory. In such settings the Buddha teaches that all beings have the Buddha nature, that all phenomena are mutually originating and interdependent, and that, finally, all is Buddha.

Several versions of the text seem to have existed, one reputedly containing as many as 100,000 verses. A translation titled Huayan jing first appeared in China about 400 ce. There it gave rise in the 6th century to the Avatamsaka school, otherwise known as the Huayan sect—a movement that reached its climax, as the Kegon school, in 8th-century Japan. The text has also given rise to a large number of commentaries.