Chéng wéishí lùn lüèshū 成唯識論略疏
Abridged Commentary on the Cheng weishi lun, with Preliminary Discussion by 普寂 (Fujaku, 撰)
About the work
A six-fascicle Edo-period (江戶時代) Japanese commentary on the Chéng wéishí lùn (KR6n0016, T31n1585), composed by 普寂 (Fujaku, 1707–1781) of the Chōsen Ritsu-in 長泉律院 in Edo. Preserved as T2267 (Taishō vol. 68). The colophon signs the author as “長泉律院苾芻普寂撰” — “composed by the bhikṣu Fujaku of the Chōsen Ritsu-in.” The work’s subtitle bìng xuántán 幷懸譚 (“with appended preliminary discussion”) indicates that the body of the commentary is preceded by a substantial ten-gate kuànpán introduction (kenban / kentan 懸譚) — a standard East-Asian commentarial preface format.
Structural Division
CANWWW (T68N2267) lists two related texts: KR6n0016 Chéng wéishí lùn 成唯識論 (T31n1585) and KR6n0020 Wéishí xùnlùn rìjì 唯識訓論日記 (T66n2265, Kōin). The 6 kan track the 10 juǎn of the master text.
The opening xuántán is structured as a ten-gate prolegomenon:
- 明論敎興 — On the rise of the doctrine of the treatise (with three sub-gates: rise of Mahāyāna, rise of the Yogācārabhūmi, rise of the present treatise);
- 時敎分齊 — Demarcation of the time-period of the teaching (the three-time scheme of the Saṃdhinirmocana);
- 藏乘所攝 — Subsumption under the piṭaka and the vehicles;
- 能詮敎體 — Substance of the expressive teaching;
- 所詮宗趣 — Doctrinal aim of what is expressed;
- 敎所被機 — The faculties addressed by the teaching;
- 傳譯不同 — Differences in transmission and translation;
- 弘通得失 — Gains and losses in propagation;
- 日域傳來 — Transmission to the realm of Japan;
- 隨文別釋 — Lemma-by-lemma exposition (i.e. the body of the commentary).
Abstract
Fujaku’s Lüèshū is one of the two pillars of the Edo Yogācāra revival alongside his pendant work KR6n0062 Shōdaijōronshaku ryakusho 攝大乘論釋略疏 (T2269) on the Mahāyāna-saṃgraha commentary KR6n0061 (T1595). The two together established a fresh Tokugawa scholarly engagement with the Indian Yogācāra commentaries, written from an explicitly cross-school standpoint that drew on Hossō, Sanron, Kegon, Tendai, and Vinaya traditions while professing Pure Land 浄土 doctrinal commitments.
The dating bracket adopted here (1740–1781) covers Fujaku’s mature productive period from age 33 through his death; a tighter date cannot be defended without an internal colophon. The work is widely cited in modern Japanese surveys of Tokugawa Buddhist scholasticism as the principal Edo-period commentary on the Chéng wéishí lùn, marking a deliberate return to the Indian-Yogācāra reading-tradition after the Muromachi kikigaki school exemplified by 光胤 KR6n0019.
The “ninth gate” 九日域傳來 — “Transmission to Japan” — is doctrinally significant: it formally incorporates the Japanese transmission-history of the Cí’ēn school (Dōshō 道昭 → Chitsū 智通 → Genbō 玄昉 → the Kōfuku-ji Northern and Southern Temple lineages) into the prolegomenon of a Yogācāra commentary, treating Japanese reception as part of the canonical transmission rather than as an extra-canonical appendix.
Translations and research
- Niwa Kiichirō 丹羽喜一郎. “Fujaku no Daijō-kan 普寂の大乗観 — Living the Classification of the Doctrines: Fujaku’s Theory of Mahāyāna.” CiNii Research crid 1390001205950527104. The principal modern study of Fujaku’s doctrinal classification (kyōhan).
- Treated in general surveys of Tokugawa Buddhist scholasticism and the daijō hibussetsu-ron 大乗非仏説論 debates.