Both of those links are broken, but it does suggest that an HTML version exists. So I tried using the search, and I found that that way I could get results in HTML. It appears as a popup <div>, charmingly styled to look like a window in XP! There’s no URL for the search result, so it’s still not particularly accessible, but at least we know there’s something there.
I’m maintaining the master XML of Yinshun Agama, but it is not publicly available.
right now it is in TEI P5 format but the apparatus is inline, like this: (Taisho SA sutra 203)
I wonder about what the copyright status is of this type of text, though? Are ancient texts not automatically in the public domain?
For example, some organizations try to lay claims on the Taisho Tripitaka, or even CBETA. But all new canons are simply based on public domain texts from older canons, with some punctuation and spacing added or revised…?
Taisho and FGS Tripitaka claim for plate rights (layout, page number, etc).
which means reprint is prohibited without permission.
According to Taiwan copyright law, plate rights for ancient text (author passed away for more than 50 years) is 10 years.
you can get from https://github.com/dhamma/fgs_agama , I only keep the core agama text, preface and appendix are removed. Please fork and watch it if you want to build anything on top of it as I am going to change it in near future.
Now that I have the Yinshun version on hand (which I got from here), this might actually be possible in the future. I’ll be cross-referencing the Yinshin and Taisho versions to perhaps make it possible to view either on Dharma Pearls. Even if I don’t go that far, I’ll need to do it just for my own reference, so I’ll bake it into my data files.
This html version is also useful in a pinch. The Taisho sutra numbers are the one’s in parentheses, and the abbreviated sutras that the Taisho skipped are numbered, which is how Yinshun ended up with over 10,000. I’ll be implementing a numbering system like SA1.1 etc on my site with these other numbering systems in the data files for reference.
It probably depends on how exactly you interpret some of the abbreviated sutra descriptions. It’s not like the Pali, rather there are just comments indicating the extra texts (E.g. “Like this sutra above, substitute x, y, z for a.”). It can be less than obvious how many total sutras you end up with sometimes.
I think what I’ll do is input the different numbering systems into the Excel sheet that I had already created to track Pali parallels to the Taisho text. Once I have it all laid out with Yinshun’s 51 samyuktas, I’ll upload it somewhere and post a link.
If anyone is curious about how we end up with 13,000+ sutras, here it is: SA.174-186 have between a couple thousand and a couple hundred variants each. It was a little humorous. I was going along, 2/3 done with the data entry, and it was still only in the 1800s for Yinshun’s count. Then I hit 174, which has almost 3,000 variants by itself. I took Yinshun’s word for it: I think there’s a several different passage variations in different combinations.
I wonder if the extra numbers as compared to the Pali signifies lateness, or whether if you looked closer we might find the Pali can be expanded just as much; it wouldn’t take a lot, a few extra rounds of permutations.
That’s a good question. It’s an anomaly compared to the rest of the Samyukta. I think the most variants any other sutra had was maybe 100, most were between 1 and 50.
It reminds of the time I sat down and surveyed the Satasahasrika Prajnaparamita Sutra a couple years ago. It’s the largest expansion of the Astasahasrika. There’s one chapter in Xuanzang’s translation that goes on for 100 fascicles that’s like that: Just a long set of endless permutations listed out of the same formula. That one chapter is 1/4 of the whole thing.
I’m going to clean up the spreadsheet and see if I can’t finish adding some of the parallels to it, but I’ll post a link to it soon. With the data filters, you can easily switch between the Taisho and Yinshun order and use it to present the reconstruction on SuttaCentral.
