Fǎhuá jīng sāndàbù dújiào jì 法華經三大部讀教記
Reading-the-Teaching Notes on the Three Great Treatises of the Lotus by 法照 Fǎzhào (Huìyán Fǎzhào / Fóguāng fǎshī, 撰)
About the work
A twenty-juan comprehensive Southern-Sòng study guide to the Tiāntái sāndàbù 天台三大部 — 智顗 Zhìyǐ’s Xuányì (KR6d0006), Wénjù (KR6d0014), and Móhē zhǐguān — and to 湛然 Zhànrán’s three subcommentaries on them (KR6d0007, KR6d0015, and the Zhǐguān fǔxíng zhuànhóngjué). Composed by Huìyán Fǎzhào 晦巖法照 (1185–1273), the most celebrated Southern-Sòng Tiāntái master at Hángzhōu Shàngtiānzhúsì 杭州上天竺寺. The work is preserved as X28n0585 in the Xùzàngjīng.
Prefaces
The text opens with Fǎzhào’s brief autobiographical note: “Jì dújiào — [I composed this] of myself for the recording-and-noting of forgotten material; [it is] not [intended] for transmission to others. In Jiādìng 嘉定 1 [= 1208], at Fólǒng [Tiāntáishān], when I was just commencing the draft, there were already those who transmitted it. At Dōngshān and Nánhú, those who transmitted it were also many. Late, while at Tiānzhú [-sì], in the course of lecturing I made revisions; on the sūtra-subcommentary, where various masters’ comparisons differed, I deleted them. There were students who requested it be cut into wood-blocks, in order to correct the old transmission. What of it? — [I said,] ‘May it be transmitted!’
“Bǎoyòu 4 spring jiǎzǐ, Tiāntái Huìyán Fǎzhào.” (= 1256 CE)
This dating colophon is one of the most important documents of Southern-Sòng Tiāntái scholastic productive culture: Fǎzhào dates the commencement of the draft to 1208 (during his early productive period at Fólǒng / Tiāntáishān) and the authorisation of formal printing to 1256 (his mature period at Hángzhōu Tiānzhúsì), giving a clear 48-year timeline for the work’s gestation. The closing colophon also documents the work’s pre-printing manuscript circulation: it was already being copied and transmitted by his students at Dōngshān, Nánhú, and Tiānzhúsì even while he was still revising it.
Abstract
The Dújiào jì is the most extensive Southern-Sòng study guide to the Tiāntái triple-treatise corpus and one of the most influential Sòng Tiāntái pedagogical productions. The work’s method combines (1) selective citation and analysis of Zhìyǐ’s three foundational treatises; (2) detailed engagement with Zhànrán’s three subcommentaries; (3) topical exposition of central Tiāntái doctrinal points (the yīniàn sānqiān 一念三千, the xìngjùè 性具惡, the yuánjiào 圓教); and (4) refinement of the kēpàn sectional analysis of the corpus.
The work was sufficiently celebrated in its own time that the Japanese Tendai 天台 monks 延慶 Enkei and 海順 Kaijun came to China specifically to study it; they had Fǎzhào’s portrait painted and brought it back to Japan, where the Dújiào jì was extensively studied in the medieval Tendai tradition. The Korean prime minister 崔丞相 Cuī chéngxiàng also wrote requesting Buddhist instruction from Fǎzhào, demonstrating the work’s broader East-Asian reception even before its formal printing.
The composition spans Fǎzhào’s mature productive period at Fólǒng / Tiāntáishān, then at Tiānzhúsì in Hángzhōu under 理宗 Lǐzōng’s imperial patronage. The dating bracket of 1208–1256 covers the entire forty-eight-year gestation from initial draft to authorised publication.
Translations and research
- Brose, Benjamin. Patrons and Patriarchs: Regional Rulers and Chan Monks during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2015.
- Yang Cengwen 楊曾文. Sòng-Yuán Chánzōng shǐ 宋元禅宗史. Beijing: Zhōngguó shèhuì kēxué chūbǎnshè, 2006.
- 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.
- 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.
- Sueki Fumihiko 末木文美士. Heian shoki Bukkyō shisō no kenkyū 平安初期仏教思想の研究. Tokyo: Shunjūsha, 1995. (For the Japanese Tendai reception of Fǎzhào’s apparatus.)
Other points of interest
Fǎzhào’s Dújiào jì is one of the few Southern-Sòng Tiāntái productions that achieved substantial international circulation in its own time, with Japanese Tendai students travelling specifically to China to study it and bringing the text back to Japan. The work’s reception in Japan and Korea demonstrates the continuing East-Asian Tiāntái scholastic network in the late Sòng and the institutional vitality of Tiānzhúsì as a major international Buddhist centre.