A Study on the Ratnagotravibhaga (Uttaratantra)

by Jikido Takasaki

ABOUT THE BOOK: The Ratnagotravibhaga, also known as the Uttaratantra, is the only Indian treatise devoted to the Mahayana doctrine of Tathagatagarbha, or the notion that all beings possess within themselves the virtues and wisdom of a Tathagata, or Buddha, albeit in embryonic form (garbha). The present work, first published in 1966 and here reprinted for the first time, provides the only complete English translation of this important text.

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Jikido Takasak was a specialist in Indian Buddhism, especially the Philosophy of Mahayana Buddhism. After graduating from the University of Tokyo in 1950, he studied at the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute at Poona, making a special study of the Ratnagotravibhaga, for which he received a Ph.D Degree in 1959 from the University of Poona. He began his teaching career in 1957 at Komazawa University, Tokyo and after a period of teaching at Osaka University he eventually gained a professorship at the University of Tokyo in 1977, from where he retired in 1987.