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觀音義疏

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Text ID
KR6d0048
Date
587–597
Dynasty
隋

Guānyīn yìshū 觀音義疏

Doctrinal Subcommentary on the Avalokiteśvara [Chapter] spoken by 智顗 (Zhìyǐ / Tiāntái dàshī, 說); recorded by 灌頂 (Guàndǐng, 記)

About the work

A two-juan (printed: 上 / 下) phrase-by-phrase running commentary on the Pǔmén pǐn 普門品 — chapter 25 of Kumārajīva’s translation of the Lotus Sūtra (KR6d0001, T262), the Avalokiteśvara chapter — by Zhìyǐ 智顗 (538–597), recorded by Guàndǐng 灌頂. The companion text to the Guānyīn xuányì (KR6d0046, T1726): the Xuányì provides the systematic doctrinal exposition of the Pǔmén chapter through Tiāntái’s wǔzhòng xuányì framework, while the Yìshū provides the running phrase-by-phrase commentary on the same chapter. The pair constitutes Zhìyǐ’s separate Tiāntái treatment of the Pǔmén chapter outside the Wénjù’s 文句 sequential exposition — an extraordinary level of attention afforded to no other chapter of the Lotus.

Prefaces

The text in the Taishō recension carries no separate translator’s preface. The work opens directly with Zhìyǐ’s editorial framing of the Pǔmén’s structural division: “Since this text is separately extracted from the great work [the Lotus Sūtra], some have made a tripartite division: the opening [passage ‘Then’] is the xù (preface); the [Buddha’s] reply onward is the zhèng (the principal section); the [bodhisattva] Chídì onward is the liútōng (transmission).” The work proceeds to apply Zhìyǐ’s standard four-fold sìzhǒng shì 四種釋 (four kinds of explanation) hermeneutic to each significant pericope of the Pǔmén.

Abstract

The Yìshū provides the line-by-line running commentary on the Pǔmén chapter that the Xuányì — which is structured around topical doctrinal points — does not. Its method is parallel to the Wénjù’s 文句 treatment of the other chapters of the Lotus: it deploys the yīnyuán 因緣 (causes-and-conditions), yuējiào 約教 (with-respect-to-doctrinal-classification), běnjì 本跡 (origin-and-trace), and guānxīn 觀心 (contemplating-the-mind) explanations for each significant phrase, producing a comprehensive Tiāntái doctrinal interpretation of every element of the Pǔmén chapter.

The work is of substantial historical importance both as the first systematic Chinese exegesis of an Avalokiteśvara text and as an early stratum of the Tiāntái commitment to the Pǔmén chapter as a focal point of devotional and doctrinal practice. The Tiāntái-derived Guānyīn jīng 觀音經 — the Pǔmén chapter circulating as a separate text — became the most widely diffused Avalokiteśvara scripture in pre-modern East-Asian Buddhism, and the textual basis for that separate circulation was largely Tiāntái.

The composition is generally dated, with the Xuányì, to the late lecture-period of Zhìyǐ at Jīnlíng 金陵 c. 587 or the Yùquánsì 玉泉寺 period c. 593, with redaction by Guàndǐng after Zhìyǐ’s death. The work generated a substantial Sòng subcommentary tradition, principally through Sìmíng Zhīlǐ’s Guānyīn yìshū jì (KR6d0049, T1729).

Translations and research

  • Yü, Chün-fang. Kuan-yin: The Chinese Transformation of Avalokiteśvara. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001.
  • Stevenson, Daniel B. “Buddhist Practice and the Lotus Sūtra in China.” In Readings of the Lotus Sūtra, eds. Stephen F. Teiser and Jacqueline I. Stone, 132–150. New York: Columbia University Press, 2009.
  • Andō Toshio 安藤俊雄. Tendaigaku — kompon shisō to sono tenkai 天台学：根本思想とその展開. Kyoto: Heirakuji Shoten, 1968.
  • Hurvitz, Leon. Chih-i (538–597): An Introduction to the Life and Ideas of a Chinese Buddhist Monk. Mélanges chinois et bouddhiques 12. Brussels: Institut Belge des Hautes Études Chinoises, 1962.
  • Stone, Jacqueline I. “Just Open Your Mouth and Say ‘A’: A-Syllable Practice for the Time of Death in Early Medieval Japan.” Pacific World, 3rd ser., no. 8 (2006): 167–189.
  • Sǎ-bā-líng 撒巴領. Guānyīn xìnyǎng yánjiū 觀音信仰研究. Taipei: Shāngwù yìnshū-guǎn, 1995.

Other points of interest

The Tiāntái treatment of the Pǔmén as a separable doctrinal-ritual unit — embodied in the pairing of the Xuányì and the Yìshū — was a major institutional factor in the subsequent separate circulation of the Pǔmén as the Guānyīn jīng and in the development of the elaborate East-Asian Avalokiteśvara devotional cult. The Tiāntái pair provided both the doctrinal framework (the Xuányì) and the devotional-textual apparatus (the Yìshū) that allowed the Pǔmén to function as an independent scripture for liturgical use.

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