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般若心經述義

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Text ID
KR6c0196
Date
750–780
Dynasty
日本

Bānruò xīnjīng shùyì 般若心經述義

Exposition of the Meaning of the Heart Sūtra by 智光 (撰)

About the work

A one-juan Nara-period Japanese commentary on the Prajñāpāramitā-hṛdaya (the Heart Sūtra, KR6c0128, Xuán-zàng’s translation, T8n0251). Composed by the Nara-era Gangō-ji 元興寺 Sanron 三論 scholar Chikō 智光 (709–c. 780). It is one of the earliest substantial Japanese Buddhist sūtra-commentaries in any genre — predating 空海 Kūkai by some seven decades and representing the mature scholastic culture of the Nara Sanron school. The work is structured as a shù-yì (述義) — literally “narration of the meaning” — a Mādhyamika exegetical genre attempting to capture the doctrinal essence of a scripture in continuous prose rather than line-by-line gloss. Preserved in Taishō Vol. 57, No. 2202.

Abstract

The work opens with a substantial autobiographical preface — bìng-xù 幷序 — which is itself a major document of Nara-period Buddhist culture. Chikō recounts that from his ninth year he withdrew from worldly turmoil and meat-eating, taking residence in the saṃghārāma (元興寺), and that from his scholarly debut (志學, age 15) until the Tenpyō-shōhō era 4 (= 752 CE, 天平勝寶四年), a total of thirty years, he applied himself to scriptural study at the Pine-Grove (松林, the Nara monastic forest), “polishing body and refining spirit.” This dates the preface (and presumably the composition of the Shù-yì shortly after) to circa 752 or shortly later — Chikō was approximately 43 years old. Among all the bù-jīng he surveyed, “the most essential is this scripture; in words concise, in meaning rich, in expression skillful, in intent profound — gathering the secret depths of the doctrinal corpus into the central pivot of the Wide-Canon (廣典之玄樞).”

The opening doctrinal frame is the classical Mādhyamika-Sanron praise-formula: the Great Way is hidden and subtle, far and difficult to fathom; without wisdom-and-mark, neither arising nor cessation; principle severed from the hundred negations, way forgetting the four phrases (lǐ jué bǎi-fēi, dào wàng sì-jù 理絕百非道忘四句). The Heart Sūtra’s title is then expounded: Mahā = broad-encompassing, prajñā = wisdom (which, because it knows nothing, knows everything), pāramitā = crossing-over (which goes nowhere, hence goes everywhere) — yielding the Great Wisdom-Crossing 大慧度. The word xīn (heart) is glossed as central-essential (zhōng-shí 中實): “among all the Prajñāpāramitā sūtras this one serves as the principal pivot,” and the word jīng (scripture) as dharma, since “color and the other dharmas are ultimately empty: this is the true norm for returning the stream to the source.”

The body of the commentary unfolds in four gates (四門分別): (1) zhāng yìdài 彰譯代, identifying the historical translation lineage; (2) biàn zōngzhǐ 辨宗旨, distinguishing the doctrinal essence; (3) shì tímù 釋題目, glossing the title; (4) suíwén jiěshì 隨文解釋, line-by-line gloss of the sūtra body. The translation-history section is unusually informative for an 8th-century Japanese commentary — it reviews the three Chinese versions: (a) the Māhē bānruò bōluómì dàmíngzhòu jīng of 鳩摩羅什 Kumārajīva (Hóngshǐ 4–14 = 402–412), with 僧叡 Sēngruì, 僧肇 Sēngzhào, and the 800-member translation committee of the YáoQín capital; (b) 玄奘 Xuánzàng’s Bānruò bōluómìduō xīnjīng of Zhēnguān 19 (645 CE), translated at the Hóngfúsì 弘福寺 with the named members of the Tang translation committee (靈因 Língyīn, 文備 Wénbèi, 靖邁 Jìngmài, etc.); and (c) presumably a third version (the text breaks off; the surviving fragment is one-juan).

The doctrinal positioning is firmly Mādhyamika/Sanron: the Heart Sūtra is read as the condensed essence of the Mahā-prajñāpāramitā (Kumārajīva’s 100-juan Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra tradition), with the central operation being the Mādhyamika negation of the hundred negations and forgetting of the four phrases. There is no trace of the Esoteric maṇḍala-deity-mapping that 空海 Kūkai would introduce three quarters of a century later in KR6c0199 — Chikō reads the Heart Sūtra as the Madhyamika treatise par excellence.

Dating: the preface anchors the composition to circa 752 CE or shortly after (the thirty-year scholarly career terminus from age 15 to Tenpyōshōhō 4 puts Chikō at age 43–45 at composition); a notAfter of c. 780 covers the upper bound of his uncertain death-date. The 35–46-year window represented in the frontmatter (750–780) is the tightest defensible bracket given the preface evidence and Chikō’s uncertain death date.

Translations and research

  • Donald S. Lopez, Jr., The Heart Sūtra Explained: Indian and Tibetan Commentaries (SUNY, 1988) — surveys the early Heart Sūtra commentarial tradition; mentions Chikō.
  • Jan Nattier, “The Heart Sūtra: A Chinese Apocryphal Text?” JIABS 15.2 (1992): 153–223 — the foundational modern critical study of the Heart Sūtra’s textual history; treats the early East Asian commentarial reception.
  • Japanese-language scholastic literature on the Nara Sanron tradition and the Chikō corpus; standard reference works on Gangō-ji.
  • Pratapaditya Pal and others on the Chikō Mandala for the visual / iconographic side of Chikō’s career.

Other points of interest

The autobiographical opening (the thirty-year scholarly career announcement) is among the earliest substantial Japanese-Buddhist authorial self-statements and is a significant document for the cultural history of the Nara monastic culture. The text also illustrates the Nara-period Mādhyamika-Sanron / HossōYogācāra dual-curriculum of the major Nara monasteries — Chikō was capable in both — at a moment before the Heian-era school-divisions hardened. The combination, in a single figure, of this conventional Mādhyamika Heart-Sūtra commentary with the visionary iconographic creation of the Chikō Mandala (the earliest Japanese Pure Land mandala) is a remarkable testimony to the rich and synthetic religious culture of 8th-century Nara Buddhism.

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