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The Diamond Sutra Paperback – November 18, 2002

by Red Pine (Author)
4.7 4.7 out of 5 stars 289 ratings
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Zen Buddhism is often said to be a practice of mind-to-mind transmission without reliance on texts --in fact, some great teachers forbid their students to read or write. But Buddhism has also inspired some of the greatest philosophical writings of any religion, and two such works lie at the center of Zen: The Heart Sutra, which monks recite all over the world, and The Diamond Sutra, said to contain answers to all questions of delusion and dualism. This is the Buddhist teaching on the perfection of wisdom and cuts through all obstacles on the path of practice. As Red Pine explains: The Diamond Sutra may look like a book, but it's really the body of the Buddha. It's also your body, my body, all possible bodies. But it's a body with nothing inside and nothing outside. It doesn't exist in space or time. Nor is it a construct of the mind. It's no mind. And yet because it's no mind, it has room for compassion. This book is the offering of no mind, born of compassion for all suffering beings. Of all the sutras that teach this teaching, this is the diamond.
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Previous page
  1. Print length
    480 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Counterpoint
  4. Publication date
    November 18, 2002
  5. Dimensions
    5.48 x 1.28 x 8.14 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    1582432562
  7. ISBN-13
    978-1582432564
  8. Lexile measure
    1150L
  9. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

Review

Winner of the 2018 Thornton Wilder Prize for Translation

About the Author

Bill Porter (aka "Red Pine") is widely recognized as one of the world's preeminent translators of Chinese poetry and religious texts; he assumes the pen name "Red Pine" for his translations.

Writing as Red Pine, he was the first translator to ever translate the entirety of Han-shan's oeurve into English, published as The Collected Songs of Cold Mountain. Red Pine was also the first to translate into English the entirely of The Poems of the Masters. He has also translated several of the major Buddhist sutras, including the Heart Sutra, Diamond Sutra, and Platform Sutra.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Counterpoint; Revised ed. edition (November 18, 2002)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 480 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1582432562
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1582432564
  • Lexile measure ‏ : ‎ 1150L
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.03 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.48 x 1.28 x 8.14 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.7 4.7 out of 5 stars 289 ratings

About the author

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Red Pine

Red Pine

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Bill Porter (aka "Red Pine") is widely recognized as one of the world's preeminent translators of Chinese poetry and religious texts; he assumes the pen name "Red Pine" for his translations.

Bill Porter was born in Los Angeles in 1943 and grew up in the Idaho panhandle. He served a tour of duty in the U.S. Army (1964-67), graduated from the University of California with a degree in anthropology in 1970, and attended graduate school at Columbia University. Uninspired by the prospect of an academic career, he dropped out of Columbia and moved in 1972 to a Buddhist monastery in Taiwan. After four years with the monks and nuns, he struck out on his own and eventually found work at English-language radio stations in Taiwan and Hong Kong, where he produced over one thousand programs about his travels in China. In 1993 he returned to America with his family and has lived ever since near Seattle, Washington.

Writing as Bill Porter, he is the author of several travelogues, including Road to Heaven, which focuses on his interactions with Taoist hermits in the mountains of China; Zen Baggage; and his Guggenheim project, Finding Them Gone: Visiting China's Poets of the Past.

Writing as Red Pine, he was the first translator to ever translate the entirety of Han-shan's oeurve into English, published as The Collected Songs of Cold Mountain. Red Pine was also the first to translate into English the entirely of The Poems of the Masters. He has also translated several of the major Buddhist sutras, including the Heart Sutra, Diamond Sutra, and Platform Sutra.

Customer reviews

4.7 out of 5 stars
4.7 out of 5
289 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

me
5.0 out of 5 stars Bliss
Reviewed in the United States on March 3, 2023
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The book itself (mine is paperback) is good quality; pages are thick enough and not that migraine inducing whiteish color. The commentary is very, very helpful. Red Pine does a masterful job parsing and explaining this great work, but he also includes many other translator's interpretations. This book is simply a joy to read. Thanks so much!
3 people found this helpful
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OneTaste
5.0 out of 5 stars The Sharpest (Zen) Samurai Sword !
Reviewed in the United States on April 21, 2024
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WOW! I REALLY LOVE this book!

It always AMAZES me how much things can change! When I was a teen, I loved books that could entertain me, that could take me to realms that I'd never experienced before. Fantasy, fiction, mystery, etc. However, just as I eventually left the large wood blocks that entertained me as a toddler, I left fiction books.

Now, the best of books are those that have to power to slice right through the roots of my delusions, my inner fictions, my false perceptions, my egoistic identifications! Right through the me and the I that entangle in all sorts of temporal nonsense.

I loved Red Pine's commentary and translation of the Diamond Sutra for so many reasons. For one, it was beautifully clear. Exquisitely simple and clear. I had purchased a different version, by a different translator, in Kindle format and it was replete with foreign words that confused and frustrated. I couldn't make it past the first few pages of that book.

Red Pine's version was BRILLIANT! It had my jaw dropping and eyes turning into perfect saucers! Let me share with you just two out of so many very powerful quotes by Zen masters, offered to us in this amazing book:

"Hu-neng says, 'Those who understand the dharma of formlessness don't think about attaining any goal. If the slightest thought of attaining a goal existed, they would not be called srota-apanas. Srota-apannas are free from the coarser, heavier passions. Thus they are able to find the river of holy living. But they don't find anything because they don't think about attaining a goal. This is the first fruit of practice."

For me, this slices right through mental conditioning. Because there is this very subtle sense within, of attaining a goal. The goal of enlightenment, the final liberation. The mind conjures up notions of what that must feel like. How will I know that it's happened? it asks. Logic entangles itself up in knots!

Here is another, again, by Hui-neng: "No contention means the practice of purity. The practice of purity is intended to rid oneself of the mind that possesses. if the mind that possesses remains, there is attachment. Attachment is not the way of purity. To always possess the mind that possess nothing is to practice no contention."

However, the most powerful words to me where when the Buddha spoke of the non-existence of the self. And then the Zen sword made contact with even deeper weed roots. Seng-chao: "But since neither self nor an other exist, who is liberated? It is only a fiction."

There is an energy in this book! It clears you out at the psychological/spiritual level. You feel so much lighter as you read. All psychological tensions become helium balloons that are released onto the ether. I love that the pages are thick, allowing me to take notes on the side margins, without the ink bleeding through to the other side of the page.

I was so moved, so inspired, so in awe, in almost every single page of this book, that I found myself underlining something almost in every single page!

There is a very simple beauty to this book. In many, many books that I've read in the past, I noticed that the Diamond Sutra was mentioned with great reverence. As if it was the ULTIMATE Sutra. I now know why.

I HIGHLY recommend this book to my brothers and sisters out there who are on this journey of self-evaporation and genuine Liberation.
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outdoor worker
5.0 out of 5 stars Red Pine scores another goal!
Reviewed in the United States on January 23, 2024
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Using a soccer metaphor - this is perhaps the most difficult translation Bill has undertaken. Standing on the shoulders of past translators in both Sanskrit and Chinese, Porter aims at the heart of Zen. This book is to be used as a partner with a meditation practice. As Red Pine often says: "Taste the Tea", don't just read the book!
3 people found this helpful
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AndrewT
5.0 out of 5 stars The Diamond Cutter
Reviewed in the United States on November 13, 2010
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The amount of work that Red Pine must have put into this is staggering. The Diamond Sutra is about 30 pages long, but he spends 400 pages breaking the Sutra down and making it accessible. There are many stories from Zen masters and their interpretations of each chapter. This wouldn't be the first book on Buddhism I would dive into however. The sutra itself can be hard to understand, and requires a lot of contemplation on what it means. It is a book I believe I will come back to later in life as I felt quite a bit of it was over my head. For the price, it has an immense amount of information, and perhaps the power to free you from your misconceptions on life.
26 people found this helpful
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Bodhidharma
5.0 out of 5 stars Very well organized, useful to include multiple commentaries
Reviewed in the United States on April 13, 2019
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The translation is very readable, and the commentary opens up the text quite well. Being able to get various perspectives from previous commentaries is especially helpful. I skipped the 'textual notes' sections and they are printed in smaller font as I suspect most will not be interested in such detail, but it's there for those who do.
8 people found this helpful
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Preston Davis
4.0 out of 5 stars Diamond Sutra
Reviewed in the United States on April 3, 2012
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Coming from the point of view of the Tibetan tradition, there's often a dearth of study of actual sutras, at least where I come from. And in my experience, reading sutras can sometimes be a little dry. Red Pine's translation, and his commentary were lively, and actually made me want to keep reading chapter after chapter. Obviously he has done a lot of work on this text, and as someone who has a little experience in academia in this area, I appreciated his thoroughness of citing sources and text discrepancies. His quotes from masters in his commentary were priceless, as was his own interpretation (for the most part). I didn't always agree 100% of where he took his own personal commentary on some chapters, but reasonable people can disagree on things, so it wasn't a major issue for me. I gave this four stars because I felt his citation of masters was a little too limited for my taste; I'm biased, I wanted to see some Tibetan masters (past or present) quoted. I really appreciated the Indian masters cited, as I am familiar with them from my own Tibetan tradition. And I realize Red Pine obviously is primarily trained in the Zen tradition, so I understand that's where his focus is. But, if he reads this, include some Tibetan masters next time, Red Pine!
22 people found this helpful
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Kindle Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Insights to The Diamond Sutra
Reviewed in the United States on September 9, 2018
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Thank you, Red Pine, for the heroic effort in translating and compiling this marvelous book. In addition to your subtle humor, new and deeper insights were experienced into this non-teaching from which all Buddhas flow. May all beings benefit, and may the food stamp program continue to endow. Recommended reading.
8 people found this helpful
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Herman
5.0 out of 5 stars Buy it , don’t listen to the bad reviews .
Reviewed in the United States on March 12, 2021
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It’s a great book ! I read the reviews . So I bought it . They were all right . It is a little over explained but it’s a good thing that way , you really do understand the body body of the Buddha .
5 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

josh mitchell
5.0 out of 5 stars Best book ever written.
Reviewed in Canada on October 3, 2023
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For anyone that has gone beyond the self the life the soul and the dharma. To emptiness oneness void silence peace love and compassion.
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Super
5.0 out of 5 stars Service
Reviewed in India on August 12, 2023
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Nice
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Mark T.
5.0 out of 5 stars Extremely valuable work
Reviewed in Australia on December 26, 2023
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Thank you, Red Pine, for your fantastic commentary on the Diamond Sutra. Your work has made this most amazing of sutra’s infinitely more accessible!
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Matt Jenkins
5.0 out of 5 stars Another Great Red Pine Translation
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 31, 2010
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The Diamond Sutra, along with  The Heart Sutra  (also available translated by Red Pine), are arguably the two most popular works of the Prajnaparamita group of Sutras. Indeed they are among the most popular Sutras within the Mahayana cannon as a whole.

I own a number of copies of the Diamond Sutra but this is my favourite. It is certainly the one I come back to the most. Red Pine, an award winning translator, always seems to take great care and give a good deal of thought to all his translations. I certainly value all the works of his that I own. I don't think that any translation of a text can be considered definitive but I think this one may come as close as any translation can.

Unlike most English translations of the Diamond Sutra, which are typically based on a single text, Red Pine has consulted a wide range of source texts. The texts consulted were the Sanskrit texts of Muller and Conze; two incomplete editions (the Stein and Gilgit editions); six Chinese translations and Tibetan and Khotanese translations. The result is an excellent rendering of the text. Included within the commentary is a comprehensive list of variant readings from the various sources used, for those who are interested. For those who are specifically after a translation of Kumarajiva's text, which is probably the most widely used single source for translations of the Diamond Sutra, I recommend  Describing the Indescribable: A Commentary of the Diamond Sutra . Red Pine does, however, include Kumarajiva's variations, as this is one of the six Chinese translations consulted for this edition.

Not only do I like the translation of the core text but I find the introduction, extensive commentaries and glossary extremely helpful and interesting too. The commentary draws on the work of a number of Buddhist commentators on the Sutra, including Hui-neng (638-713), the sixth patriarch of Zen, who produced one of the most influential commentaries on the Diamond Sutra. In  The Platform Sutra: The ZEN Teaching of Hui-Neng  (Hui-neng's most well known work, which is also available in a fine translation by Red Pine), Hui-neng relates how it was upon first hearing this Sutra that he first left home and it was upon hearing this Sutra that he later became enlightened.

An excellent work. Thank you Red Pine.
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Simon Rompre
5.0 out of 5 stars Insightful
Reviewed in Canada on February 2, 2020
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Excellent exploration of the diamond sutra, with quotes from various translators and commentators, a must for anyone interested in the diamond sutra.
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