Píní tǎoyào 毗尼討要
Investigating the Essentials of Vinaya by 道世 (Dàoshì, 纂)
About the work
A three-fascicle Tang Vinaya digest by Dàoshì 道世 (道世, d. 683), the encyclopedist co-disciple of Dàoxuān 道宣 (道宣, 596–667). The Manji edition signs the work as 玄惲 Xuányùn — Dàoshì’s zì — using the variant 玄惲 / 元惲 / 玄暉 standard in Sòng witnesses. Author signature: 長安弘法寺沙門釋 玄惲 纂 (Compiled by Dàoshì, monk of Hóngfǎsì in Cháng’ān).
Prefaces
The Manji edition opens with Dàoshì’s own xù: 夫毗尼之典蓋闕隨葉所以運終木叉之教蔚興 (“the Vinaya texts are absent for as long as the leaves of the kalpa; therefore the prātimokṣa-teaching springs up in profusion at the close of the era”) — the standard Tang Vinaya rationale. The preface argues that jiè 戒 is the gāngjì 綱紀 (regulating principle) of the Right Dharma and the precondition for dìng 定 (samādhi).
Abstract
The Tǎoyào compresses the Sìfēnlǜ into a working compendium organised around Dàoshì’s own thematic schemes; the work belongs together with his much larger encyclopedic compilations KR6s0002 Fǎyuàn zhūlín (T2122) and KR6s0003 Zhūjīng yàojí (T2123) as part of the same Xīmíngsì 西明寺 / Hóngfúsì 弘福寺 programme of canonical-citation systematisation produced under Tang imperial patronage during the Xiǎnqìng 顯慶 era and after. The original full work, as recorded in catalogues, was probably six juan; what survives in the Manji canon is three. Dating: composition belongs to the period of Dàoshì’s residence at Hóngfǎsì and Xīmíngsì in the second-half of the seventh century. The author signature Xuányùn and the explicit zhuàn form mark this as Dàoshì’s own intentional first-person Vinaya project, distinct from the encyclopedic Fǎyuàn compilation; the bracket here gives a defensible composition window during his mature scholarly career.
Translations and research
- Funayama Toru 船山徹. Studies on Tang Vinaya scholarship.
- Wáng Jiànguāng 王建光. Zhōngguó lǜzōng tōngshǐ 中國律宗通史.