Yúmìshèn shīshí zhǐgài 於密滲施食旨槩
Permeating-the-Esoteric Cardinal Outline of the Food-Bestowal Liturgy by 法藏 Sānfēng Hànyuè Fǎzàng (著)
About the work
A one-fascicle (1卷) doctrinal-and-ritual exposition of the yànkǒu food-bestowal liturgy by 法藏 Sānfēng Hànyuè Fǎzàng 三峰漢月法藏 (1573–1635), the principal late-Míng / early-Qīng Línjì-school Chán master and central figure in the Wǔzōng polemical controversy. The catalog meta entry assigns the work to dynasty qīng 清; Fǎzàng’s death in 1635 places the work firmly in the late Míng (Chóngzhēn era), so the dating is corrected here. Preserved as X59 no. 1082 in the Xùzàngjīng.
Abstract
The work opens with Fǎzàng’s characteristic Chán-school doctrinal frame for the yànkǒu ritual: “Without participating in Chán, there is no entry to awakening; without awakening, no deep entrance to the Dharma-gate; without entering the Dharma fully, no forgetting the Dharma; without complete forgetting of the Dharma, no application; without supreme application, no resonance; without resonance, no benefit to sentient beings; benefit to sentient beings has many gates. Each gate has all of the seven preceding affairs. I have once seen this in the yànkǒu shīshí 燄口施食 method.” Fǎzàng then derives the meaning of yúqié 瑜伽 (Skt. yoga) as xiāngyìng 相應 (“resonance”): “the three karmas of body, mouth, and mind, resonating with the realized Dharma — only thus can the great function manifest, and the broad benefit-path be performed.” The work integrates the yànkǒu ritual with Línjì-school zōngzhǐ 宗旨 (cardinal purport) doctrine: “When zōngzhǐ is penetrated, then immeasurable differentiated dharma-gates …”
The Yúmìshèn (“Permeating-the-Esoteric”) aspect refers to Fǎzàng’s project of integrating the Esoteric yànkǒu ritual fully into the Línjì Chán framework — explicitly different from Yúnqī Zhūhóng’s Pure Land-aligned Wǔtáijiǎo reform tradition. The work pairs with KR6j0756 as the doctrinal zhǐgài (cardinal outline) of the practical altar-ritual. Composition: 1620s–1635 (Fǎzàng’s mature scholarly period).
Catalog correction: the meta entry assigns the work to dynasty 清, but Fǎzàng died in 1635 and the work belongs to the late Míng (Chóngzhēn era). The dating is corrected here.
Translations and research
- Jiang Wu, Enlightenment in Dispute: The Reinvention of Chan Buddhism in Seventeenth-Century China (Oxford University Press, 2008) — the standard treatment of Fǎzàng and the seventeenth-century Línjì controversy.