Rénwáng jīng héshū 仁王經合疏
Combined Subcommentary on the Rénwáng-jīng spoken by 智顗 Zhìyǐ (說), recorded by 灌頂 Guàndǐng (記), and combined by 道霈 Dàopèi (合)
About the work
A three-fascicle Qīng-era combined subcommentary (héshū 合疏) on the Rénwáng-jīng (KR6c0202 = T245), in which the early-Qīng Cáodòng-school master Wèilín 道霈 Dàopèi (1615–1702) of Gǔshān 鼓山涌泉寺 has combined Tiāntái Zhìyǐ-and-Guàndǐng’s earlier Rénwáng jīng shū (T1705 = KR6c0204, Suí period) with subsequent commentarial materials and his own connecting glosses to produce an integrated reading. Preserved in the Wàn xùzàng / Manji zoku-zō as X513. Three fascicles.
The genre marker — héshū “combined subcommentary” — signals an integrated compilation that brings together earlier commentary materials with the editor’s own contributions to produce a unified interpretive framework.
Abstract
X513 is a primary witness to the early-Qīng Cáodòng-school’s continuing engagement with the Rénwáng-jīng tradition. Doctrinally Dàopèi works within the standard late-Míng / early-Qīng jiàozōng héyī (doctrine-and-Chan unity) framework, integrating the canonical Tiāntái doctrinal apparatus (from T1705) with Cáodòng-school Chan-style readings and the broader Mahāyāna doctrinal synthesis characteristic of the Yuánxián-Dàopèi Gǔshān lineage.
The work’s significance lies in its demonstration that the Rénwáng-jīng commentary tradition continued actively through the Míng-Qīng transition, even as the imperial state-Buddhist ritual programme that the sūtra had originally supported was entering decline. Dàopèi’s reformulation of the Tiāntái commentary in the early-Qīng Cáodòng-school context represents the broader pattern of late-imperial Chinese Buddhism’s reception of Suí-Tang doctrinal heritage.
For the wider history, X513 is significant as: (i) one of the few late-imperial Rénwáng-jīng commentaries; (ii) a primary witness to Dàopèi’s commentarial output (paralleling his Heart Sūtra commentary X563 = KR6c0182); and (iii) a documentation of the Gǔshān Cáodòng-school’s continuing scholastic engagement with state-Buddhist scriptural traditions.
Composition date: no internal dating in the catalog. The work belongs to Dàopèi’s mature commentarial career at Gǔshān, c. 1640–1686. The bracket notBefore 1640 / notAfter 1686 reflects this. The catalog meta retains the Suí dynasty designation (reflecting the underlying Tiāntái source) but the combined version is decisively early-Qīng.
Translations and research
- No substantial Western-language translation located.
- For Dàopèi and the Gǔshān Cáodòng-school, see the references for KR6c0182 (Dàopèi’s Heart Sūtra commentary).
- For the Rénwáng-jīng tradition, Charles D. Orzech, Politics and Transcendent Wisdom (1998).
Other points of interest
The combined subcommentary (héshū) genre is one of the more interesting late-imperial commentarial formats, presenting the doctrinal continuity from Suí-Tang through Sòng-Yuán to Míng-Qīng as a single integrated reading. Dàopèi’s Rénwáng-jīng héshū exemplifies this long-arc commentary tradition, which would become an important model for early-twentieth-century Buddhist modernist commentary projects.