The Fanwang jing is a Sinitic apocryphal text composed sometime during the mid to late fifth century mainly to provide an alternative set of the bodhisattva precepts in imitation of the Yogācāra text Bodhisattvabhūmi-śāstra. Despite early concerns about its dubious provenance, the sutra was greatly utilized by the Chinese Buddhists and eventually overtook the Chinese translations of the Bodhisattvabhūmi as the most popular source for understanding and practicing the bodhisattva precept. This study attempts to account for such success of this apocrypha in Chinese Buddhism.If we compare the Fanwang jing with Chinese translations of the Bodhisattvabhūmi such as the Pusa dichi jing and the Yuopose wujie weiyi jing(which the resemblance of the latter to the apocrypha is newly attested to in this study), we find that the apocrypha did not only imitate these translated texts, but also attempted to redefine the purport of the bodhisattva precept by introducing the idea of universal Buddha-nature. The translated texts tend to present the bodhisattva precepts as prohibitions of wrongdoings that result from defiled minds ―a view which pertains to the Yogācāra school’s interest in explicating various obstructions (varaṇa) that hamper a being from reaching the Enlightenment. The Fanwang jing, on the other hand, terms the bodhisattva precepts in the form of promotions of good deeds resulting from virtuous motives. This new, positive approach has its foundations on the Buddha-nature thought which holds human beings to be no different from the Buddha in their essence or nature.The significance of this difference is critical when we consider the socio-cultural context of the time. Prompted by the rapid growth of the Buddhist Order in China, anti-Buddhist movements and propaganda prevailed during this period. One of the Chinese literati’s preferred method of criticizing Buddhism as an inferior religion was to point out its negative approach to human morality; that it seeks to rectify a person by unnatural manipulation of human nature, as opposed to Chinese teachings that encourage spontaneous good deeds through development of innate virtues.Given such circumstances, it is natural to conclude that Chinese Buddhists preferred the apocryphal Fanwang jing over the translated bodhisattva precept texts of the Yogācāra school for its emphasis of the positive and active aspect of Buddhist precept practice based on the Buddha-nature thought.