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彌沙塞部和醯五分律

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Text ID
KR6k0001
Date
423–424
Dynasty
劉宋

Míshāsāibù héxī wǔfēn lǜ 彌沙塞部和醯五分律

The Mahīśāsaka Five-Part Vinaya, Sect of the Mahīśāsakas (commonly Wǔfēn lǜ 五分律, “Five-Part Vinaya”) by 佛陀什 (Buddhajīva, 等譯) and 竺道生 (Zhú Dàoshēng, 等譯)

About the work

The Wǔfēn lǜ 五分律 is the complete Vinaya-piṭaka of the Mahīśāsaka school (Skt. Mahīśāsaka-vinaya; 彌沙塞部 Míshāsāibù transliterates Mahīśāsaka; 和醯 héxī approximates the Pali title Pañca-vagga / Skt. pañca-varga “five sections”), one of the four complete Vinayas preserved in Chinese (alongside the Sìfēn lǜ of the Dharmaguptakas, the Móhēsēngqí lǜ of the Mahāsāṃghikas, and the Shísòng lǜ of the Sarvāstivādins). Translated at Jiànkāng 建康 in 423–424 CE by the Kashmiri vinayācārya Buddhajīva 佛陀什 (佛陀什), assisted by the Khotanese monk Zhìshèng 智勝 as oral interpreter, the Chinese disciple Zhú Dàoshēng 竺道生 (竺道生) as scribe-redactor, and the upāsaka Lóng Guāng 龍光. The thirty-fascicle text is structured in five “parts” (五分): (1) the Bhikṣu-vibhaṅga (the Pātimokkha rules for monks with their case-narratives); (2) the Bhikṣuṇī-vibhaṅga (rules for nuns); (3) the Mahāvagga-equivalent skandhakas on ordination, uposatha, vassa, and the like; (4) the Cullavagga-equivalent skandhakas on legal procedures, dwellings, and saṅgha-bheda; (5) the Pari-vāra-equivalent appendix.

Prefaces

The Taishō text opens with a brief translator’s colophon: 宋罽賓三藏佛陀什共竺道生等譯 — “Translated by the Tripiṭaka-master Buddhajīva of Kashmir under the [Liú] Sòng, jointly with Zhú Dàoshēng and others.” The standard documentation of the translation circumstances is the entry in Sēngyòu’s Chū sānzàng jìjí 出三藏記集 (T55n2145) j. 3 and j. 14, and Huìjiǎo’s Gāosēng zhuàn 高僧傳 (T50n2059) biography of Buddhajīva. According to those sources, Fǎxiǎn 法顯 (法顯) had brought back a Sanskrit manuscript of the Mahīśāsaka Vinaya from his Indian journey (399–414); after his death the manuscript lay unused at Jiànkāng until Buddhajīva arrived from Kashmir in 423, when the upāsaka Lóng Guāng 龍光 sponsored its translation at the Lóngguāngsì 龍光寺. The translation was completed in the second year of the Jǐngpíng reign-period (424).

Abstract

The Wǔfēn lǜ is the only complete Vinaya of the Mahīśāsaka school preserved in any language. Its position in the four-Vinaya schema is central: it represents the Sthavira lineage closest in substantive content to the Pāli Vinaya-piṭaka of the Theravāda — Buddhaghosa’s commentaries occasionally use the term Mahiṃsāsaka in ways suggesting a perceived affinity — yet it shows substantive divergence from the Pāli in the formulation of certain pārājika and saṅghādisesa clauses, and in the order of skandhakas. Comparative studies (Frauwallner 1956, Hirakawa 1970, Clarke 2014) treat the Wǔfēn lǜ as the indispensable Sanskritic-school check on the Pāli’s idiosyncrasies. The first chapter, on the pārājika “expulsion offences,” establishes the textual genre of vibhaṅga (分別 fēnbié) — case-narrative + rule-formulation + word-by-word gloss — which becomes the structural template of all four Chinese Vinayas.

The school identification is well-attested. Mahīśāsaka (Pali Mahiṃsāsaka) was one of the principal Sthaviravāda schools according to the Samayabhedoparacanacakra; its homeland was traditionally in the south of India and in Sri Lanka, and according to Faxian’s account (高僧法顯傳, T51n2085) Faxian obtained the manuscript at Anurādhapura in 411–412 during his sojourn in Sri Lanka. The school’s name derives from the founder Mahīśāsaka (“ruler of the earth”). The Wǔfēn jièběn 五分戒本 (KR6k0002) is the Mahīśāsaka prātimokṣa extracted as a separate text; the Wǔfēn bǐqiūnī jièběn (KR6k0004) is the corresponding nuns’ prātimokṣa; and the Míshāsāi jiémó běn (KR6k0005) is the karma-vācanā extract by Ài Tóng 愛同 of the Tang. Together these four texts constitute the complete Mahīśāsaka practical Vinaya in Chinese.

In Chinese Buddhist history the Wǔfēn lǜ never became the dominant practical Vinaya — that role was taken by the Sìfēn lǜ of the Dharmaguptakas (KR6k0009) under the influence of Dàoxuān 道宣 (道宣) and the Nánshān 南山 vinaya school. The Wǔfēn lǜ nevertheless remained an indispensable reference, especially for textual comparison and philological work; Yìjìng 義淨 (義淨) cited it extensively in his Mūlasarvāstivāda translations and his Nánhǎi jìguī nèifǎ zhuàn 南海寄歸內法傳.

Translations and research

  • Heirman, Ann. Rules for Nuns according to the Dharmaguptakavinaya (3 vols., Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 2002). — Comparative apparatus uses the Wǔfēn lǜ throughout.
  • Pachow, W. A Comparative Study of the Prātimokṣa, on the Basis of its Chinese, Tibetan, Sanskrit, and Pāli Versions. Santiniketan: Sino-Indian Cultural Society, 1955. Reprint Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 2000. — Includes the Mahīśāsaka prātimokṣa in synoptic comparison.
  • Hirakawa Akira 平川彰. Ritsuzō no kenkyū 律藏の研究. Tokyo: Sankibō, 1960; revised edn. 1970. — Standard Japanese-language treatment of all four Chinese Vinayas including the Wǔfēn.
  • Clarke, Shayne. Family Matters in Indian Buddhist Monasticisms. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2014. — Substantial use of the Wǔfēn lǜ in comparative analysis of Vinaya school divergence.
  • Frauwallner, Erich. The Earliest Vinaya and the Beginnings of Buddhist Literature. Rome: IsMEO, 1956. — Classic comparative reconstruction; treats the Wǔfēn as a Sthaviravāda witness.
  • Demiéville, Paul. “Le bouddhisme chinois”, in Encyclopédie de la Pléiade: Histoire des religions I, Paris: Gallimard, 1970, pp. 1249–1319. — Concise discussion of the four-Vinaya tradition.
  • Sasaki Shizuka 佐々木閑. Indo bukkyō hen’i ron インド仏教変移論. Tokyo: Daizō shuppan, 2000. — On schism narratives drawing on the Wǔfēn skandhaka on schism.

Other points of interest

The text records (j. 30) the famous narrative of the First Council at Rājagṛha and the Second Council at Vaiśālī, with a unique Mahīśāsaka redaction of the schism-narrative that diverges in detail from the Pāli Cullavagga. This recension has been a key witness in the long-running debate (Frauwallner, Lamotte, Bareau, Sasaki) about the historicity and chronology of the early councils. The Wǔfēn lǜ schism-narrative does not mention the disputed “ten points” of Vaiśālī as a distinct cause of the Sthavira-Mahāsāṃghika split, which has been read either as an archaic recension or as a school-specific elision.

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