99.1979.4.D.8

1. This text is compiled in Dainihon zokuzōkyō大日本続蔵経 (vol.3 – 388d~389a), the compilation of the Buddhist texts not included in the Japanese Tripitaka and published in 1912. It is not included in the Japanese, Chinese, or Korean Tripitaka (大蔵経). But a similarly titled text「却温気神呪経」was recorded to be in the Heian-period Shingon monk Shōei's (宗叡, 809-884)list of Buddhist literature that he brought back to Japan from China. The translator of the text from Sanskrit into Chinese cannot be identified.[1]
    
2. The text could be read as part of the Buddhist literature centering on the Buddha's charity project on the Vaiśālī's plague incident in the Buddhist history. Elements of the text's content were selected from other disease-related dhāraṇī sutras and combined into one to deal specifically with acute infectious plagues or diseases accompanied by fevers.[2] The opening sentences of the text describing the time and place the Buddha preached the sutra, for example, is very similar to “Sutra on Elimination of Terror and Disaster 仏説除恐災患経.” And the names of the seven demons are almost the same in “Sutra on Incantation at the Time of Disease仏説呪時気病経.”[3]

[1]The Committee for Zen Buddhism Studies at the International Research Institute for Zen Buddhism 教学委員会, “kyakuun shinju wo dokuju suru kouka 却温神呪を読誦する効果,” in Bulletin of Myōshinji School, 2007. 

[2] Kobayashi Enshō 小林圓照, “Vaiśālī ekibyō kyūsaiden to kyakuun shinju no hensei ヴァイシャーリー疫病救済譚と『却温黄神呪経』の編成,”in the Japanese Association of Indian and Buddhist Studies,vol. 57, 2009.

[3] Shengjian聖堅 trans., “Sutra on Elimination of Terror and Disaster仏説除恐災患経,” in Taishō shinshū daizōkyō 大正新修大蔵経, ed. Takakusu Junjirō and Kaigyoku Watanabe, vol. 17, no. 744. Tokyo: Taishō yissaikyō kankou kai, 1934; “Sutra on Incantation at the Time of Disease仏説呪時気病経,” in Taishō, vol. 21, no. 1326.