Avataṃsaka Meditation in Khotan: Samādhi, Visualization, and the Cult of Buddha Images

This article examines Khotan’s role in the transmission and reception of Avataṃsaka/Huayan Buddhism, arguing that the Buddhāvataṃsaka-sūtra’s exceptional prestige and royal protection in Khotan provided favourable conditions for the circulation—and possibly the redaction—of large Mahāyāna compilations. It then analyses two Avataṃsaka-group meditation texts translated by the Khotanese monk Devendraprajñā (The Section on the Cultivation of Loving-Kindness and The Section on the Inconceivable Buddha-Realm), showing how they combine Huayan cosmology and non-obstruction with visualization-based contemplative techniques. Finally, by reading these texts alongside The Mahāyāna Sūtra on the Merits of Creating Images Spoken by the Buddha, the article highlights a functional differentiation within Khotanese practice: the meditation texts prioritise cognitive and visionary transformation and largely omit formal repentance, whereas the image-making sūtra explicitly requires repentance as a precondition for karmic purification, promising the elimination or mitigation of karmic consequences through the making of Buddha images.