Shǒulèngyán jīng yìhǎi 首楞嚴經義海
Ocean of Meanings of the Śūraṃgama-sūtra by 懷迪 (證釋), 咸輝 (排經入注)
About the work
A thirty-fascicle (30卷) comprehensive synoptic compilation of Śūraṃgama-sūtra commentaries assembled by the Southern-Sòng monk Xiánhuī 咸輝 咸輝 of Fújiàn, working at the Gūsū Dìnghuìsì 姑蘇定慧寺 in Sūzhōu around the Qiándào 乾道 era (1165–1173). The work uses as its underlying commentary the running interpretation (zhèngshì 證釋) attributed to the Táng monk Huáidí 懷迪 懷迪 — one of the original four members of the Lèngyán translation team at Guǎngzhōu in Shénlóng 1 (705) — and arranges (pái 排) further accumulated Tang-Sòng commentarial materials around the canonical sūtra-text under each successive sentence (pái-jīng rù-zhù 排經入注). The text comes from the Northern Yǒnglè canon (Yǒnglè běizàng) Vol. 168, No. 1581.
Prefaces
The principal preface — Shǒulèngyánjīng yìhǎi zǒngxù 首楞嚴經義海緫序 — is dated Qiándào 8.11.15 (15 December 1172) and signed by the Zuǒ tàizhōng dàfū cānzhīzhèngshì Lǔjùn kāiguó (yān) 左太中大夫參知政事魯郡開國[亶]食邑一千一百戶食實封 (left grand-master, Vice-Council, of the Lǔjùn ducal-establishment, with 1100 households’ fief and real-fief). The preface narrates the Lèngyán’s passage from India to China — Pramiti (Bāncìmìdì 般剌蜜諦) 般剌蜜帝 bearing the seal across the seas; Mégha (彌伽釋迦 Míjiā Shìjiā 彌伽釋迦) translating from Sanskrit; Fáng Róng 房融 房融 receiving by brush; and Chángshuǐ Zǐxuán 主法璿師 子璿 establishing the kētiáo 科條 (“structural-divisions and topical headings”) and providing exegetical shū — and explains the urgency of consolidating “the more-than-five-hundred years” of accumulated commentarial layers into a single comprehensive yìhǎi. Sūzhōu’s Dìnghuìsì abbot Xiǎngōng 顯公 顯公 brought the work to the imperial preface-writer’s attention.
Abstract
The Yìhǎi is the principal Sòng-period synoptic compilation of Śūraṃgama commentaries: it preserves materials from the Táng-period (Huáidí’s reading among them) that would otherwise be lost, and represents a paradigmatic instance of the Sòng-Buddhist huìjiě 會解 (“collected explanations”) commentarial genre that culminates in the Yuán Huìjiě of Tiānrú Wéizé (KR6j0728). Its inclusion in the Northern Yǒnglè canon (rather than in the Sòng or Yuán canons) reflects its later canonical institutionalization in the Míng. Composition: c. 1170–1172.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located.
Other points of interest
The Yìhǎi is one of the few works in the Kanripo Lèngyán commentarial dossier preserved from the Northern Yǒnglè canon rather than from the Xùzàngjīng. Its Tang-period materials make it an important source for the early commentarial reception of the Lèngyán prior to Chángshuǐ Zǐxuán’s eleventh-century synthesis.