Jīnguāngmíng jīng xuányì shùnzhèng jì 金光明經玄義順正記
Notes on the Profound Meaning of the Sūtra of Golden Light Conforming to the Correct [Reading] composed by 從義 (Cóngyì, 撰)
About the work
X359 is 從義’s three-fascicle Northern-Sòng subcommentary on Zhìyǐ’s [[KR6i0304|Xuányì 玄義]] (T1783), parallel to but distinct from 知禮’s [[KR6i0305|Shíyí jì 拾遺記]] (T1784). The title’s shùnzhèng 順正 (“conforming to the correct”) signals the work’s polemical posture: it claims to be a correction of 知禮’s reading at points where 從義 judged the Sìmíng master’s account divergent from Zhìyǐ’s intent.
Abstract
The opening dialogue of the preface explicitly engages the existing exegetical landscape: “or someone asks: from of old, those who have written jì on this xuányì are many. And the masters of Qiántáng (i.e. the shānwài tradition) have all said that the single section of guānxīn is something later men brashly added — only Sìmíng Fǎzhì (= 知禮) defended it as the master’s own teaching, and to this day no one fails to transmit it. Why now do you alter and rewrite it? I fear no one will adopt your version, and it will be cast out by the road.” 從義’s reply is twofold: (i) he does not abandon the guānxīn shì but follows 知禮 in retaining it; (ii) he nonetheless judges that 知禮’s sectional analysis (“分科釋義頗有疎失”) and his analysis of the title (specifically the reading of 金光明 as a single dharma-name 單法為名) are flawed.
The work is therefore best understood as intra-shān-jiā polemic — 從義 working within 知禮’s broad framework but correcting it at the level of philological detail. Date bracket follows 從義’s mature productive period at the Tiāntái scholastic establishments (1070–1091; he died Yuányòu 6 = 1091, age 50). Together with [[KR6i0315|Wénjù xīnjì 文句新記]] (X360) on the wénjù side, X359 is one of the two principal post-知禮 Sòng subcommentaries on the Suvarṇaprabhāsa.
Related canonical texts: parent commentary KR6i0304 (金光明經玄義 / T1783); paired commentary KR6i0315 (金光明經文句新記 / X360); rival/predecessor KR6i0305 (金光明經玄義拾遺記 / T1784).
Translations and research
- Hibi Senshō 日比宣正. Tōdai Tendaigaku josetsu 唐代天台学序説. Tokyo: Sankibō, 1975.
- Getz, Daniel. Siming Zhili and Tiantai Pure Land in the Song Dynasty. PhD diss., Yale, 1994. Sets the post-知禮 shānjiā internal debates in context.
No book-length English translation located.