Zhāng suǒ zhī lùn 彰所知論
Treatise Manifesting What Should Be Known by 發合思巴 (Fāhésībā / ʼPhags-pa Blo-gros rgyal-mtshan, 造) and 沙羅巴 (Shāluóbā / Saraba, 譯)
About the work
A two-juǎn doctrinal compendium composed in 1278 by the Tibetan Sa-skya hierarch and Yuán Imperial Preceptor 發合思巴 (ʼPhags-pa, 1235–1280) for the Yuán heir-apparent Činggim 真金 (Crown Prince, son of Khubilai Khan), and translated into Chinese in the same year by his disciple 沙羅巴 (Saraba, 1259–1314). The work is structured as a systematic introduction to Buddhist doctrine in the manner of a Tibetan grub-mthaʼ (philosophical-systems treatise), covering five topics: (1) the World-system (器世間), (2) Sentient beings (有情世間), (3) the Path (道), (4) Result (果), and (5) Doctrine of the Unconditioned (無為). It is the only Tibetan-authored śāstra to enter the canonical Chinese Tripiṭaka, and represents the high point of Tibetan-Chinese intellectual exchange under Mongol patronage.
Structural Division
CANWWW (T32N1645) records five sections corresponding to the five topics listed above.
Abstract
The Taishō text prefixes a 彰所知論序 by Lián Fù 廉復 (元正奉大夫同知行宣政院事), a Yuán-period official of the Bureau of Buddhist and Tibetan Affairs, dated to the year of translation. The work was composed in Tibetan by ʼPhags-pa and immediately translated into Chinese by his disciple Saraba; the relationship between author and translator is one of guru and direct disciple. The Tibetan original survives in the Sa-skya bkaʼ-ʼbum collection; comparison with the Chinese shows that the translation is generally accurate, with the Chinese sometimes adding clarifying glosses for Chinese readers unfamiliar with Tibetan idiom. The work is one of the most important documents of Yuán-period Buddhism: it represents the first time a Tibetan philosophical treatise was made fully accessible in Chinese, and it served as the standard textbook of Tibetan-style Buddhist philosophy at the Yuán court during the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. The treatise is also a key witness to the late-thirteenth-century Sa-skya synthesis of Yogācāra-Madhyamaka philosophy with the vajrayāna tantric system.
Translations and research
- Hoog, Constance. Prince Jiṅ-Gim’s Textbook of Tibetan Buddhism: The Śes-bya rab-gsal. Leiden: Brill, 1983. — English translation of the Tibetan original with comparison to the Chinese.
- Sperling, Elliot. “ʼPhags-pa Blo-gros rgyal-mtshan and the Mongol Court.” In Tibetan Studies (Proc. PIATS), various editions.
- Heller, Amy. Tibetan Art: Tracing the Development of Spiritual Ideals and Art in Tibet 600–2000 A.D. Milan, 1999. — Provides historical context.
- Petech, Luciano. Central Tibet and the Mongols: The Yüan – Sa-skya Period of Tibetan History. Rome, 1990.
Other points of interest
The Zhāng suǒ-zhī lùn is unique in the East Asian Buddhist canon: it is the only Tibetan treatise to be canonized in the Chinese Tripiṭaka. Its placement in T32 alongside the yīnmíng materials reflects the Taishō editors’ classification of late-period Indo-Tibetan-Chinese śāstras by formal genre rather than by content. The work is also of considerable historical interest as a documentary witness to the relationship between Khubilai Khan and his Imperial Preceptor: it represents a Tibetan religious authority composing a foundational doctrinal text for a future Mongol emperor.
Links
- CBETA
- Dazangthings date evidence (1306): T = CBETA, Taishō shinshū daizōkyō 大正新脩大藏經, ed. Takakusu Junjirō 高楠順次郎 and Watanabe Kaigyoku 渡邊海旭 (Tokyo: Taishō shinshū daizōkyō kankōkai / Daizō shuppan, 1924–1932); CBReader v 5.0, 2014. Dazangthings source
- Kanseki DB