Mayajala – sutra–a Unique Text of the Gilgit Dirghagama

The Mayajala-sutra is a unique Buddhist sutra which is contained in the newly discovered manuscript of the Sanskrit Buddhist canonical collection called the Dirgha-agama (The Long Collection). The discovery of this Sanskrit manuscript in the 1990s was a major development in early Buddhist studies (only Pali and Chinese versions were previously available). In the first part of this work Gleb Sharygin presented a transliteration, reconstruction and translation of the Mayajala-sutra, No. 18 in the Dirgha-agama manuscript, as well as an overview of its content. The text of the sutra is in a seriously deteriorated state, but a great deal of repetition helped to reconstruct it safely. It is the meaning of the text that presented difficulties. The second part of this work grew from his attempts to understand it. The main result that the study brought is that the text likely constitutes an intermediate link that unites the older ways of canonical writing and thinking with the newer types of Buddhist literature and structures of thought. In particular, the study revealed that the Mayajala-sutra likely was the source of the first chapters of the Samdhinirmocana-sutra, the first Yogacara-Vijñanavada text.