Lèngyán jīng móxiàng jì 楞嚴經摸象記
Records of Groping the Elephant on the Śūraṃgamasūtra by 袾宏 (述)
About the work
A short single-fascicle (1卷) commentary on the Śūraṃgamasūtra (KR6j0118) by Yúnqī Zhūhóng 雲棲袾宏 袾宏 (1535–1615), the late-Míng “Four Great Masters” Pure-Land–Chán synthesizer and abbot of the Yúnqīsì 雲棲寺 in Hangzhou. The title alludes to the well-known parable in the Nirvāṇasūtra of blind men groping different parts of an elephant and disputing its true form — a self-deprecating frame for any commentary that can claim only partial apprehension of the sūtra’s full purport. Preserved as X12 no. 276 in the Xùzàngjīng.
Prefaces
The author’s self-preface explicitly takes up the parable: “As the sūtra says, there were several blind men who in a group felt an elephant; he who felt the trunk said the elephant is like a winnowing-basket; he who felt the thigh said the elephant is like a pillar; he who felt the tail said the elephant is like a broom; he who felt the belly said the elephant is like a stone; or he who felt the eye said it is like a drum-pumped-bellows; he who felt the ear said it is like a drooping leaf; he who felt the foot said it is like an inverted earthen cup. Each holding to what he had felt, mutually contradicting one another — the bystander holding his belly [in laughter]. Today’s expounding of the sūtras — how is it any different? The Buddha has long entered parinirvāṇa; we have no way to ask. We use feelings-and-cognitions in place of hands; we draw forth what we imagine; standing oppositely like the blind men. I [Zhūhóng], in my heart, sigh — knowing that I, too, am a blind man. Yet to remedy the deficit is urgent; therefore I joined the company of blind men, groping together. Especially the Śūraṃgama among the various sūtras has more places of doubtful sense; therefore the various blind men compete in beating drums and clapping arms with no decisive resolution …” (如經所言有諸盲人群手摸象其摸鼻者云象如箕其摸股者云象如柱其摸尾者云象如帚其摸腹者云象如石乃至摸眼則云如鼓風槖摸耳則云如倒垂葉摸蹄則云如覆地杯人執所摸互相是非觀者捧腹今日譚經何以異是佛巳涅槃咨詢無繇出情識手為想像摸彼此角立如盲譏盲予實慨焉知巳亦盲救獘為急因入盲侶與眾同摸唯首楞嚴於諸經中更多疑義由是諸盲競共鼓噪交臂[打-丁+(兟/曰)]指莫可 …).
Abstract
The work is selective rather than comprehensive: it does not cover the whole Lèngyánjīng lemma-by-lemma but addresses the points of doubtful sense (疑義) where Zhūhóng believes earlier commentators have failed to reach a satisfactory resolution. As such it is a hermeneutic intervention in the late-Wànlì Lèngyán commentarial debate — characteristically humble in tone, in keeping with Zhūhóng’s general literary persona, but doctrinally aligned with the broad Pure-Land–Chán synthesis for which he was known.
The dating bracket is set to 1572 – 1615, the productive period of Zhūhóng’s monastic career at the Yúnqīsì. He is reported, with characteristic self-effacement, to have hesitated long before composing any commentary on the Lèngyán, owing to the daunting weight of the existing commentarial tradition; the work is therefore most plausibly placed in his middle-to-late career.
Translations and research
- Chün-fang Yü, The Renewal of Buddhism in China: Chu-hung and the Late Ming Synthesis (Columbia UP, 1981) — the standard Western-language monograph on Zhūhóng, with extensive treatment of his Pure-Land–Chán synthesis and his commentarial corpus.
- Shèngyán 聖嚴, Míngmò fójiào yánjiū 明末佛教研究 (Taipei, 1987), chap. 2 — discusses the Móxiàng jì among the Wànlì-era Lèngyán commentaries.
- No complete Western-language translation located.