Wǔlín fànzhì 武林梵志
Buddhist-Monastery Gazetteer of Wǔlín (Hángzhōu) by 吳之鯨 (Wú Zhījīng, fl. 1609) — zhuàn 撰
About the work
A 12-juan late-Míng Buddhist-monastic gazetteer of Hángzhōu — comprehensive coverage of 426 Buddhist temples and monasteries divided by location into intra-mural city, extra-mural city, Nánshān (Southern Mountain) cluster, Běishān (Northern Mountain) cluster, and the various subordinate counties. Each entry gives founding date and circumstances, mountain-and-water topography, then the four sub-categories Tiāncháo chǒngcì (Imperial Bestowals), Zǎiguān hùchí (Ministerial Patronage), Gǔdé jīyuán (Past Worthies’ Encounters), Lìdài xūnjì (Successive Ages’ Achievements). Each preserves substantial gāosēng (high-monk) sub-school biographies. Title from Wǔlín 武林 (the classical name for Hángzhōu) and fànzhì (Buddhist gazetteer). Composed by Wú Zhījīng during his Wàn-lì-era career as a Hángzhōu literatus and jǔrén.
Tiyao
We respectfully note: this is the work of Wú Zhījīng 吳之鯨 of the Míng. Zhījīng, zì Bóyì 伯裔, of Qiántáng (Hángzhōu); jǔrén of Wànlì jǐyǒu (1609); served as Magistrate of Fúliáng County. This compilation, because Hángzhōu Buddhist-temples flourished in the Southern Sòng — and to the Míng many were dilapidated and broken — fearing the bequeathed traces would gradually fade, he therefore broadly examined documentary registers and divided into intra-city, extra-city, Nánshān, Běishān, and the various subordinate counties. Total: 426 temples-and-monasteries gained.
All are detailed-recorded in their establishment beginning-and-end and the mountain-and-river topographical details. Then divided into four categories: Tiāncháo chǒngcì, Zǎiguān hùchí, Gǔdé jīyuán, Lìdài xūnjì — fully recording famous-streams’ eminent-traces, high-monks’ sub-schools — each compiled with brief biographies. The preface-and-record is well-ordered and has rather systematic order.
Within: in selecting SòngYuánMíng poetry and prose — for example, the Xiānlín and Chóngxiān two-monasteries record, in Cáo Xūn 曹勛’s Sōngyǐn jí; the Zhìguǒsì record, in Xú Yīkuí 徐一夔’s Shǐfēng gǎo — the gazetteer all has not recorded; cannot avoid slight omission. Further, like Sòng Zhāng Dūnlǐ’s bestowing of the bell to Fǎyúnsì — not the Hángzhōu Fǎyúnsì — but as the same name was misentered. Further, the writer of the Fǎxiàngsì stele record — earlier writes Fàn Kǎi 范楷, later writes Shěn Kǎi 沈楷 — also has contradictory text.
Yet his searching-out of hidden-recondite, indeed many are not recorded in the Wǔlín jiùshì and Xīhú yóulǎn zhì. Such as the Míngyuǎntáng shī, listed after Sū Shì’s various compositions, but the Dōngpō jí does not have it. Zhāng Jiǔchéng’s YùMítuó tǎ míng also does not appear in the Héngpǔ jí. Zhāng Bóyǔ’s Tiānchílóu shī differs from the original collection. Sufficient to enable verification of his bequeathed lore and lost matters; also sufficient as a resource for examining-the-old and discussing-art. Truly not merely supplying qiélán (monasteries) with old-matters.
Abstract
The Wǔlín fànzhì is the principal Míng-era Buddhist-monastic gazetteer of Hángzhōu and one of the most comprehensive single-city Buddhist-temple monographs of the late-Míng era. Its author Wú Zhījīng (CBDB has homonymous entries 559833 and 565674 with no concrete dates; fl. 1609 per jǔrén date) was a Hángzhōu native who served as Magistrate of Fúliáng County (Jiāngxī).
The 426 temples and monasteries the work documents represent a near-comprehensive survey of late-Míng Hángzhōu Buddhist topography — exceeding both Zhōu Mì’s Wǔlín jiùshì (Sòng-loyalist) and Tián Rǔchéng’s Xīhú yóulǎn zhì (KR2k0086) (Míng) in monastic coverage. The Sìkù tíyào notes the work’s literary value (preserving otherwise-lost verses by Sū Shì, Zhāng Jiǔchéng, Zhāng Bóyǔ) alongside its documentary contribution to Hángzhōu Buddhist topography.
The Sìkù tíyào also identifies two specific scholarly defects: (i) misattribution of the Sòng-era Zhāng Dūnlǐ’s bell donation to Hángzhōu’s Fǎyúnsì (when in fact Zhāng’s donation was to a different Fǎyúnsì); (ii) inconsistent attribution of the Fǎxiàngsì stele record (Fàn Kǎi versus Shěn Kǎi). The text is preserved in the Wényuāngé Sìkù quánshū (vol. 588.1).
Translations and research
No comprehensive English translation. Cited in: Beata Grant, Eminent Nuns: Women Chan Masters of Seventeenth-Century China (Hawaii, 2009); Marsha Weidner, Cultural Intersections in Later Chinese Buddhism (Hawaii, 2001); Daniel Stevenson, “The Pure Land School in Modern Chinese Buddhism,” in Heart of Buddha, Heart of China (Princeton, 2009). For Hángzhōu Buddhist topography see Ge Zhaoguang 葛兆光, Zhōngguó sī-xiǎng-shǐ 中國思想史 (Fùdàn dàxué, 2000), §10. Standard Chinese reference: Cháo Tāo, Hángzhōu fàn-jiǎn cóng-shū 杭州梵剎叢書 (Zhèjiāng gǔjí, 2005).
Other points of interest
The work is a principal source for Sū Shì’s lost Hángzhōu-period Buddhist-temple poetry — preserving the Míngyuǎntáng shī and other poems that did not survive into the standard Sū Dōngpō jí. This literary-archival dimension distinguishes it from the more historiographical Sūzhōu and Cháng’ān monographs of the genre.