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顯揚聖教論

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Text ID
KR6n0077
Date
645–646
Dynasty
唐

Xiǎnyáng shèngjiào lùn 顯揚聖教論

Treatise Manifesting the Holy Teaching (Asaṅga, Āryadeśanā-vikhyāpana) by 無著菩薩 (Wúzhuó púsà = Asaṅga, 造) and 玄奘 (Xuánzàng, 譯)

About the work

A twenty-fascicle systematic Yogācāra treatise by Asaṅga, conventionally regarded as a digest or summary of the much larger KR6n0001 Yogācārabhūmi. Translated into Chinese by 玄奘 in 645–646, very early in his Cháng’ān translation activity (immediately following his return from India in 645). Twenty fascicles, organised into eleven chapters covering the full Yogācāra path. The Sanskrit title — reconstructed as Āryadeśanā-vikhyāpana (the manifesting / making-evident of the noble teaching) — is sometimes also given as Prakaraṇāryavāca-śāstra.

Structural Division

CANWWW (T31N1602) does not preserve a per-fascicle internal table. The twenty juǎn are internally organised into eleven pǐn 品 (chapters): (1) Shèshì pǐn 攝事品 / Inclusion of Events; (2) Shèjìng pǐn 攝淨品 / Inclusion of the Pure; (3) Chéng wúcháng pǐn 成無常品 / Establishing Impermanence; (4) Chéng kǔ pǐn 成苦品 / Establishing Suffering; (5) Chéng kōng pǐn 成空品 / Establishing Emptiness; (6) Chéng wúxìng pǐn 成無性品 / Establishing No-Self; (7) Chéng xiànguān pǐn 成現觀品 / Establishing Direct Realisation; (8) Chéng yújiā pǐn 成瑜伽品 / Establishing Yoga; (9) Chéng bùsīyì pǐn 成不思議品 / Establishing the Inconceivable; (10) Shè juézé pǐn 攝決擇品 / Inclusion of the Determinate Distinctions; (11) Shèyī jiào pǐn 攝依教品 / Inclusion of the Reliance on Doctrine.

Abstract

The Xiǎnyáng shèngjiào lùn is one of the principal independent works of Asaṅga (alongside the KR6n0058 / KR6n0059 / KR6n0060 Mahāyāna-saṅgraha and the KR6n0081 Abhidharma-samuccaya) and traditionally regarded as Asaṅga’s own digest of the Yogācārabhūmi. The eleven pǐn recapitulate the principal doctrinal positions of the Yogācārabhūmi in compressed form, which makes the work a particularly valuable curricular text. The Cí’ēn school treats it as one of the two essential systematic Yogācāra references (alongside the Yogācārabhūmi itself), and Kuījī cites it extensively in KR6n0026 Chéng wéishí lùn shùjì.

The translation is firmly dated to Zhēnguān 19 (645) – Zhēnguān 20 (646), per the Kāiyuán shìjiào lù j. 8 and the Dà Táng dà cí’ēnsì sānzàng fǎshī zhuàn j. 6 — among the very first Yogācāra translations Xuánzàng undertook on his return from India, completed before the major Yogācārabhūmi translation campaign (646–648) and before KR6n0022 Wéishí sānshí lùn sòng (648). Xuánzàng’s choice to translate the Xiǎnyáng before the Yogācārabhūmi itself reflects the Indian tradition of presenting the digest as the introductory text and the larger encyclopedic Yogācārabhūmi as the reference.

The companion verse-text KR6n0078 Xiǎnyáng shèngjiào lùn sòng (T31n1603) preserves the kārikā (extracted by Xuánzàng’s circle) of the same work, presented as an aide-memoire. The work is heavily cited in subsequent Cí’ēn / Hossō literature; modern critical study has been particularly attentive to its relationship with the Yogācārabhūmi (Kragh 2013; Yoshimura 2013).

Translations and research

  • Kragh, Ulrich Timme, ed. The Foundation for Yoga Practitioners: The Buddhist Yogācārabhūmi Treatise and Its Adaptation in India, East Asia, and Tibet. 2 vols. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2013.
  • Schmithausen, Lambert. Ālayavijñāna: On the Origin and the Early Development of a Central Concept of Yogācāra Philosophy. Tokyo: International Institute for Buddhist Studies, 1987.
  • Yoshimura Makoto 吉村誠. Chūgoku Yuishiki shisōshi kenkyū. Tokyo: Daizō shuppan, 2013.
  • Suguro Shinjō 勝呂信靜, Shōyōshōkyōron no kenkyū 顕揚聖教論の研究. Tokyo, multiple volumes.

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