Shì chánbōluómì cìdì fǎmén 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門
Explanation of the Sequential Dharma-Gates of the Perfection of Meditation by 智顗 (Zhìyǐ / Tiāntái dàshī, 說)
About the work
A ten-juan Tiāntái meditation manual by 智顗 Zhìyǐ, the second of the four Tiāntái meditation texts (per the typology preserved in KR6d0143). The work is the standard Tiāntái treatment of the jiàncì 漸次 (“gradual-sequential”) approach to meditation — the systematic stage-by-stage cultivation through the standard Buddhist meditative attainments (the dhyānas, samādhis, and prajñā faculties).
Prefaces
The text in the Taishō recension carries a Chánbōluómì xù 禪波羅蜜序 (“Preface to the Dhyānapāramitā”) which provides important biographical-textual data: “[The text of the] Dhyānapāramitā: per the Fǔxíng [the Zhǐguān fǔxíng of Zhànrán], the Cìdì Chánmén catalogue says: the Great Master expounded it at Wǎguānsì. The Dàzhuāngyánsì [scholar] Fǎshèn privately recorded [it]. The Chán Master Zhāngān Dǐng [Guàndǐng] redacted it into ten juan, opening ten great chapters: 1, the great purport; 2, explanation…”
This editorial framing documents the textual history: the work originated in Zhìyǐ’s lectures at Wǎguānsì 瓦官寺 in Jiànkāng (his pre-Tiāntái-shān productive period, c. 575–579), was privately recorded by 法慎 Fǎshèn of Dàzhuāngyánsì in a longer original recension (allegedly thirty juan), and was subsequently redacted by 灌頂 Guàndǐng into the standard ten-juan canonical form.
Abstract
The Chánbōluómì cìdì fǎmén is the most systematic treatment of stage-by-stage Buddhist meditation in pre-modern East-Asian Buddhism, addressing the entire spectrum of Buddhist meditative attainments from the elementary ānbān shǒuyì (mindfulness of breathing) practice through the highest samādhi attainments. The work belongs to Zhìyǐ’s pre-Tiāntái-shān productive period at Wǎguānsì (c. 575–579), when he was still developing the doctrinal-meditative synthesis that would crystallise as the mature Tiāntái system in the Yùquánsì period (c. 587–597).
The work is consequently of substantial historiographical interest as a witness to Zhìyǐ’s early productive period and as the most systematic Sinitic exposition of the gradual Buddhist meditative apparatus.
Translations and research
- Donner, Neal, and Stevenson, Daniel B. The Great Calming and Contemplation. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1993.
- Stevenson, Daniel B. “The Four Kinds of Samādhi in Early T’ien-t’ai Buddhism.” In Traditions of Meditation in Chinese Buddhism, ed. Peter N. Gregory, 45–97. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1986.
- Hurvitz, Leon. Chih-i (538–597). Brussels, 1962.
- Sekiguchi Shindai 関口真大. Tendai shōshikan no kenkyū. Tokyo: Sankibō Busshorin, 1954.
Links
- CBETA online text T1916
- Kanseki DB
- 智顗 DILA
- Dazangthings date evidence (590): Ng 1993 — Ng Yu-Kwan [吳汝鈞]. Tʼien-Tʼai Buddhism and Early Mādhyamika. Tendai Institute of Hawaii and the Buddhist Studies Program, University of Hawaii, 1993. 9.