Shòu wǔjiè bājiè wén 受五戒八戒文

Liturgy for Receiving the Five Precepts and Eight Precepts

About the work

A one-fascicle anonymous liturgical text giving the ceremony for the lay-Buddhist reception of the Five Precepts (wǔjiè 五戒) and the Eight Precepts (bājiè 八戒) — the basic Buddhist lay observances — adapted for an Esoteric ritual context. Its preservation in volume 18 of the Taishō (the Esoteric volume) reflects the Esoteric framework of the ceremony rather than the ordinary monastic-vinaya framework.

Abstract

The text provides the Esoteric-framework version of the lay precept-ordination ceremony. Where the standard vinaya tradition (preserved in the Sìfēn-lǜ 四分律 and parallels) gives the lay ordination as a simple saraṇa-gamana (refuge-taking) with precept-formulas, this text frames the ceremony with Esoteric mudrā-mantra-visualisation elements that consecrate the lay precepts as Esoteric samaya. The text is conventionally dated to the Tang to Sòng period.

Translations and research

No substantial secondary literature located.