Jiākē Zhàolùn xù zhù 夾科肇論序注
Annotation on the Preface to the Treatises of [Sēng-]Zhào, with Interlinear Structural Outline by 曉月 (Xiǎoyuè, 注)
About the work
A single-fascicle Northern-Song annotation by the Yúnménzōng Chán master 曉月 Xiǎoyuè 曉月 (the Lètán Chánshī 泐潭禪師) on Huìdá’s preface to KR6m0038 Zhào lùn T1858. The jiākē 夾科 (“interlinear structural outline”) format combines an inline structural-outline (kēwén) with line-by-line glosses (zhù); the result is a pedagogical text that simultaneously breaks the source-preface into doctrinal divisions and supplies brief glosses on each unit.
Structural Division
CANWWW does not list this Xù zàngjīng witness; no structural-division block is given.
Abstract
X869 transmits Huìdá’s preface to T1858 in full, with Xiǎoyuè’s structural divisions in kēwén form (organised as a hierarchical tree) and his line-by-line glosses inserted as inline annotations. The work opens with a structural division of Huìdá’s preface into two sections: “first, clarifying the original cause of the composition of the treatises” (前明作論元由) and “second, properly clarifying the principal doctrinal intent of the treatises” (後正明論之宗旨). The first section is then broken into six sub-units: naming the treatises, praising the persons and the doctrine, celebrating the fortunate occasion, dispelling slander, expressing the original intent, and announcing the prefatory purport.
The annotation supplies fine-grained philological and doctrinal glosses on the preface, including a gloss on Huìdá’s self-deprecating shuàiyú 率愚 (“hastily and stupidly”) and a definition of xù 序 “preface” drawn from the Ěryǎ (the same gloss given by 元康 Yuánkāng in KR6m0039 T1859 — suggesting Xiǎoyuè had T1859 to hand as a source).
The work is one of the principal Northern-Song Chán-school engagements with the Zhàolùn tradition and a useful witness to the Yúnménzōng Chán-school appropriation of pre-Chan doctrinal literature.
Translations and research
- Tsukamoto Zenryū 塚本善隆, ed. Jōron kenkyū 肇論研究. Kyoto: Hōzōkan, 1955.
Other points of interest
The jiākē 夾科 genre — combining structural outline and inline annotation — is characteristic of Sòng-period Buddhist commentarial practice and is found in both Chán and Huáyán milieux. X869 is one of the principal extant examples of the genre applied to a pre-Tang source-text.