By Kurtis Schaeffer (University of Virginia, 2009)
The Sūtra of the Buddhas' Vastness (ཕལ་པོ་ཆེ་, phal po che, avataṃsaka, D.45), also translated as the Flower Ornament Sūtra, might be considered a proto-canon of Mahāyāna writings; it is divided into forty-five individually titled chapters in the Tibetan translation, though it is found in varying lengths in Chinese translation. The Tibetan version bears similarity to a late seventh/early eighth century version redacted by a Khotanese monk, Śīkṣānanda. The majority of chapters were themselves separately circulating sūtras, the most famous of which are the Ten Stages Scripture (Daśabhūmika Sūtra, ས་བཅུ་པའི་མདོ།, sa bcu pa'i mdo), and the Gaṇḍavyūha Sūtra (སྡོང་པོས་བརྒྱན་པའི་མདོ།, sdong pos brgyan pa'i mdo, chapter 45), chronicling the epic journey of Sudhana throughout various celestial realms in search of teachings. The Sūtra of the Buddhas' Vastness incorporates myth of cosmic scale and overwhelming detail, philosophical themes drawing from both Perfection of Wisdom accounts of emptiness and dependent arising as well as Buddha-nature thought, and Mahāyāna ethics and ritual in a framework intended to portray the long path that must be undertaken by the bodhisattva. Never as popular in Tibet as it was in Chinese Buddhist traditions, the scripture nevertheless enjoyed popularity among Nyingma (རྙིང་མ་, rnying ma) writers as a favorite source of quotations.
While ཕལ་པོ་ཆེ། has become the standardized Tibetan translation of the title avataṃsaka, two earlier translations of the title were also used: སྙན་གྱི་གོང་རྒྱན། and རྨ་ག་ཆད།.
Literature: The Sūtra of the Buddhas' Vastness has been translated from Chinese in Thomas Cleary, trans., The Flower Ornament Scripture: A Translation of the Avatamsaka Sutra (Boulder: Shambhala Publications, 1984).