Yàoshī sānmèi xíngfǎ 藥師三昧行法
Practice Method for the Medicine Master Samādhi by 受登 Shòudēng (集)
About the work
The Yàoshī sānmèi xíngfǎ is a one-fascicle Tiantai-tradition meditation manual centered on the Bhaiṣajyaguru-sūtra cycle, compiled by the late-Ming Tiantai monk Shòudēng 受登 (受登; 1607–1675), abbot of Yúshān 玉山 in Sìmíng 四明 (Níngbō). It belongs to the genre of xíngfǎ 行法 — ritual-meditation manuals on the Tiantai sìzhǒng sānmèi 四種三昧 (four kinds of samādhi) model that includes such canonical texts as 智顗 Zhīyǐ’s Făhuá sānmèi chànyí 法華三昧懺儀 (T1941). The Yakuṣī version applies the fāngděng sānmèi 方等三昧 / qǐngguān 請觀 ritual structure to Bhaiṣajyaguru worship.
Prefaces
The text opens with a xù 序 by Shòudēng himself, framing the issue of why a sānmèi (samādhi) text is also called a chànfǎ (repentance text): “三昧。菩薩道之正行也。而復以懺法名者” — “Samādhi is the proper practice of the bodhisattva path, but [this text] is also called a chàn-fǎ (repentance method).” The answer is that repentance is integral, not adventitious, to samādhi: “懺法非外方便也” (“the repentance method is not an outward expedient”). Shòudēng then exposits the Tiantai xíngfǎ genre theory, drawing parallels with 智顗 Zhīyǐ’s Făhuá sānmèi, the Pǔxián guān 普賢觀 (Universal Worthy contemplation), the Qǐngguānyīn 請觀音 (Inviting Avalokiteśvara), and the Fāngděng tuóluóní 方等陀羅尼 — each of which operates on a fixed ritual structure that includes confession.
Abstract
Shòudēng 受登 (also known by his courtesy name Hóngwèn 弘聞) was a major late-Ming Tiantai master active at Yúshān (Sìmíng), Zhèjiāng — the heartland of the SòngYuán Tiantai tradition that he sought to revive. He was a disciple of 傳燈 Yōuxī Chuándēng (1554–1628; cf. KR6i0104) and continued his master’s project of reviving Tiantai liturgy.
The Yàoshī sānmèi xíngfǎ compiles a sevenfold ritual program: (1) yán-jìng tánchǎng 嚴淨壇場 (purifying the altar); (2) qǐngshèng 請聖 (inviting the holy ones); (3) gòngyǎng 供養 (offerings); (4) qǐngfó 請佛 (inviting the Buddha); (5) zhèngxiū 正修 (proper practice); (6) fāyuàn 發願 (vow-making); and (7) huíxiàng 迴向 (transferring merit) — closely paralleling the architecture of 智顗 Zhīyǐ’s Făhuá sānmèi chànyí. The actual ritual texts include the seven Bhaiṣajyaguru dhāraṇī from Yìjìng’s translation (KR6i0049 = T451), drawn especially from the seven-Buddha cosmology, plus the Dàbēi zhòu 大悲咒 and Xīnjīng 心經 standard liturgical pieces. The work testifies to the late-Ming integration of Yakuṣī worship into Tiantai contemplative practice.
The catalog gives no precise composition date; Shòudēng’s known activity period (he died in 1675) and the style of the prose suggest a date in the second quarter of the seventeenth century, before the Manchu conquest of 1644. The companion text KR6i0058 (X1484, Cíbēi Yàoshī bǎochàn) is a related but anonymous bǎochàn 寶懺 in three fascicles.
Translations and research
- Stevenson, Daniel B. “The Four Kinds of Samādhi in Early T’ien-t’ai Buddhism.” In Traditions of Meditation in Chinese Buddhism, edited by Peter N. Gregory. Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press, 1986 — frames the xíngfǎ genre.
- Stevenson, Daniel B. “Protocols of Power: Tz’u-yün Tsun-shih and T’ien-t’ai Lay Buddhist Ritual in the Sung.” In Buddhism in the Sung, edited by Peter N. Gregory and Daniel A. Getz, Jr. Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press, 1999.
- Yoritomi Motohiro 頼富本宏. Yakushi shinkō 薬師信仰. Tokyo: Yūzankaku, 1986.
- Birnbaum, Raoul. The Healing Buddha. Shambhala, 1979.
Other points of interest
The Yàoshī sānmèi xíngfǎ is structurally one of the earliest Yakuṣī repentance liturgies built on the full Tiantai xíngfǎ model and is foundational for the modern Bhaiṣajyaguru repentance ritual still in active use in Chinese Buddhist temples.