The Bhadramayakara Vyakarana

by Konstanly Regamey

The Bhadramayakaravyakarana is part of the great collection entitled Ratnakuta, "Multitude of Jewels", a collection much revered in the Buddhist Mahayana traditions of Tibet and China. The work possesses rather a literary value than a doctrinal one. It is one of the texts, so rare in Mahayana, where the narrative and the doctrinal subjects contains the story of juggler Bhadrs who wanted to deceive the Buddha with magical tricks in order to prove that the claim of the Tathagata to omniscience was false. But the Buddha foiled his attempt by performing such a magic that Bhadra could not revoke his charms, and was finally converted.