Sìshíèrzhāng jīng zhù 四十二章經註
An Annotated Sūtra in Forty-Two Sections (Sòng commentary with Míng supplements) annotated by 守遂 (Shǒusuì, 註); supplemented by 了童 (Liǎotóng, 補註)
About the work
X37 No. 669 in one fascicle is the Chán-tradition commentary on the Sìshíèrzhāng jīng 四十二章經 (KR6i0483) (T784) by the Southern Sòng Chán master 守遂 (Shǒusuì, fl. late 12th – early 13th c.), with supplementary annotations 補註 added by the Míng-period monk 了童 (Liǎotóng). It is preserved in the Manji Zoku-zōkyō 卍續藏經 (CBETA X37 No. 669).
Abstract
Shǒusuì’s commentary represents the Chán recension of the Sìshíèrzhāng jīng 四十二章經, in which the text has been substantially reworked under the influence of Linji-school Chán doctrines. This recension — distinct from the textual form transmitted in the Taishō main edition — adds Mahāyāna-Chán material on the bodhi-mind, the prajñā-pāramitā, and upāya-kauśalya to several of the forty-two sections, recasting the original largely śrāvaka-oriented digest as a Mahāyāna-Chán manual for monastic practice. Shǒusuì’s commentary glosses each section in turn and emphasises the underlying Chán reading of the sūtra; the work was widely used in Chán monasteries from the late Sòng onward and effectively supplanted the older recension in the practical monastic curriculum.
Liǎotóng’s Míng-period 補註 (supplementary annotations) provide additional doctrinal cross-references and clarifications of points that had become obscure in the centuries since Shǒusuì wrote, and fold the work more fully into the late-imperial “Three Sūtras of the Buddha-Patriarchs” (佛祖三經) curriculum. The combined Sòng commentary + Míng supplement is one of the standard exegetical works on the sūtra in late-imperial China.
The dating window 1187–1644 brackets Shǒusuì’s likely active period through the end of the Míng (when Liǎotóng’s supplements would have been added). The precise dates of both authors are uncertain.
Translations and research
No standalone Western translation located. For the Chán recension of the Sìshíèrzhāng jīng see:
- Sharf, Robert H. “The Scripture in Forty-Two Sections,” in Religions of China in Practice (Princeton, 1996), 360–371. (Discussion of the recension issue.)
- Foulk, T. Griffith. “Sung Controversies Concerning the ‘Separate Transmission’ of Ch’an,” in Buddhism in the Sung, ed. Peter N. Gregory and Daniel A. Getz Jr. (Honolulu, 1999). (For the Sòng Chán context in which Shǒusuì worked.)