Huáyán jīng pǔxián xíngyuàn pǐn shū kē 華嚴經普賢行願品疏科
Sectional Outline of the Commentary on the Pǔxián Practice-Vow Chapter by 宗密 (Zōngmì, 述) and 遵式 (Zūnshì, 治定)
About the work
This one-fascicle text is the structural-outline (kē 科) of the [[KR6e0071|Bié xíng Shū Chāo]] (X229), originally composed by 宗密 Zōngmì and edited by the Northern Sòng Tiāntái master 遵式 Zūnshì 遵式 (964–1032) of the Sūzhōu Ruìguāngsì 姑蘇瑞光寺. It serves as the navigational map for the joint Chéngguān–Zōngmì commentary on the Pǔxián xíngyuàn pǐn 普賢行願品.
Prefaces
The work opens with the title-line “大方廣佛華嚴經普賢行願品別行疏科文 / 圭峯草堂寺沙門宗密述姑蘇瑞光沙門遵式治定” — “Sectional outline of the Pǔxián xíngyuàn pǐn biéxíng shū 普賢行願品別行疏. Composed by the śramaṇa Zōngmì of the Cǎotángsì 草堂寺 on Mt. Guīfēng 圭峯; editorially established by the śramaṇa Zūnshì of the Ruìguāngsì 瑞光寺 of Sūzhōu 蘇州.”
Abstract
The bracket adopted here (990 – 1052) reflects the period of Zūnshì’s editorial activity at the Ruìguāngsì. Zūnshì (964–1032) was the most important Tiāntái-school revival figure of the early Northern Sòng; his patronage of Buddhist publishing and his own substantial doctrinal and devotional writings (including the Tiāntái sì jiào yí 天台四教儀, T1929, the standard schematic Tiāntái doctrinal manual) made him a major figure in the Sòng Buddhist textual landscape. The fact that he edited Zōngmì’s kē outline of the Chéngguān–Zōngmì Bié xíng Shū Chāo 別行疏鈔 is one piece of evidence for the cross-school cooperation between Tiāntái and Huáyán scholasticism in the early Northern Sòng — paralleling the Táng-period collaboration of 湛然 Zhànrán and 澄觀 Chéngguān (see T1742).
The work is preserved in the Manji Xù zàng jīng 續藏經 (X230) collection.
Translations and research
- No substantial Western-language translation located.
- Stevenson, Daniel B. “The Four Kinds of Samadhi in Early T’ien-t’ai Buddhism,” in Traditions of Meditation in Chinese Buddhism (1986).
- Penkower, Linda L. T’ien-t’ai during the T’ang Dynasty. Ph.D. dissertation, Columbia, 1993.
- Yoshizu Yoshihide 吉津宜英. Kegon zen no shisōshi-teki kenkyū (1985) — for the Sòng Tiāntái–Huáyán cooperation.
Other points of interest
- Zūnshì’s editorial activity on this work — and his parallel projects — is a key piece of evidence for the early Northern Sòng’s deliberate consolidation of the Táng Buddhist exegetical heritage; like 淨源 Jìngyuán’s contemporary projects on the Huáyán Shū–Chāo 疏鈔, it reflects a self-consciously antiquarian approach to recovering and preserving the Táng scholastic apparatus.