The preface of the scripture attributes authorship to Zangchuan 藏川 of Chengdu 成都, but scholars are in general agreement that vernacular Japanese terms in the scripture and the pairing of the Ten Kings with honji butsu 本地佛 (original ground Buddhist deities) are firm grounds for assuming that the scripture was composed in Japan sometime between 1100 and 1300 based on earlier Chinese texts on the Ten Kings. The purely Japanese origin of the Ten Kingʼs honji butsu, however, has been questioned recently by scholars who argue that Song dynasty Chinese paintings depicting the Ten Kings with honji butsu, such as the Nara National Museum Ten Kings paintings by Lu Xinzhong 陸信忠 (J. Riku Shinchū, late 12th–early 13th C), are evidence that the pairing of the Ten Kings with honji butsu may have originated in China.

References:

Kajitani Ryōji 梶谷亮治. 1979. “Riku Shinchū hitsu Jūōzu 陸信忠筆十王図 .” Kokka: 22–38.

Phillips, Quitman E. 2003. “Narrating the Salvation of the Elite: The Jōfukuji Paintings of the Ten Kings.” Ars Orientalis 33 : 120–145.

Shimizu Kunihiko 清水邦彦. 2002. “Jizō Jūō kyō kō 『地蔵十王経』考 .” Indogaku Bukkyōgaku kenkyū 51 (1): 189–194.

Teiser, Stephen F. 1994. The Scripture on the Ten Kings and the Making of Purgatory in Medieval Chinese Buddhism. Honolulu:  University of Hawai`i Press.

Tokuno Takayuki 徳野崇行. 2018. Nihon Zenshū ni okeru tsuizen kuyō no tenkai 日本禅宗における追善供養の展開 . Tokyo:  Kokusho Kankōkai.