Shì Móhēyǎn lùn kānzhù 釋摩訶衍論勘注
Critical-Annotation Compendium on the Mahāyāna Commentary by 頼寶 (Làibǎo / Raihō, 撰)
About the work
A twenty-four-fascicle critical-annotation compendium on KR6o0084 Shì móhēyǎn lùn 釋摩訶衍論 (T1668) by the late-Kamakura Mount Kōya Shingi-Shingon scholar 頼寶 (Raihō, 1279–1330). Preserved in Taishō vol. 69 (no. 2290). The Japanese title is Shaku Makaen-ron kanchū. At twenty-four fascicles, it is by far the longest single commentary on the Shakuron and the standard Shingi-Shingon reference work on Nāgārjuna’s text. The work was composed at the Kongō-in 金光院 within Isshin-in 一心院 of Mt. Kōya over a period of four years, completed in Gen’ō 2 (元應二年, 1320).
Prefaces
The work opens with a substantial scholastic preface on the Shakuron’s “序” (preface) — quoting at length from 元照 (Yuánzhào)‘s Zīchí jì 資持記 (T1805) on the three-fold sense of xù (序 “preface”): as a physical preface-spot, as a literary preface-form, and as a clue-thread-preface. The opening lemmatic gloss runs:
文。釋摩訶衍論序 資持記上一上云。序有三訓隨義以釋。一爾雅云。東西牆謂之序。如世牆序在堂奧之外。即喩序文冠一鈔之表。此端序義也。二序即訓舒叙。謂撰述始終十門例括三行條流使一部文義歴然不混。此即次序義也。三訓緒者。如繰繭得緒則餘絲可理。學者觀序則諸篇可求。此謂由序義也
“Text: ‘Preface to the Commentary on the Mahāyāna’. The Zīchí jì (juǎn 1, fasc. 1, top) states: A ‘preface’ has three glosses to be applied according to context. (1) The Ěryǎ says: ‘The east-and-west wall is called the xù.’ Just as the world’s wall-preface is outside the central hall, this is a metaphor for the preface-text adorning the surface of the entire digest: this is the edge-preface meaning. (2) ‘Xù’ means to unfold and narrate: that is, the work of composition from beginning to end has ten gates by which it organises the three line-streams and renders the entire work’s meaning clearly without confusion. This is the sequence-preface meaning. (3) The gloss ‘clue’ (緒): just as in reeling silk-cocoons, finding the clue-thread lets the remaining filaments be put in order, so the student observing the preface can locate all the chapters. This is called the thread-preface meaning.”
The colophon at the end of the work records the composition history: “本云元應二年八月十九日。於高野山一心院内金光院抄之畢。以東寺二季談義講讀之。次首尾四箇年之間連連終功者也 金剛資頼寶生年四十二” — “Master-copy: completed on the 19th day of the 8th month of Gen’ō 2 (1320) at the Kongō-in within the Isshin-in of Mt. Kōya. For four whole years I successively lectured upon and read it through at the biennial seminar at Tōji 東寺二季談義 from beginning to end; I completed the merit. The Vajra-disciple Raihō, in his 42nd year of life.” A second colophon: “暦應二年十二月九日。於東寺西院僧坊。以先師法印自筆之本書寫挍合畢 權律師杲寶 執筆春玉丸生年十三” — “On the 9th day of the 12th month of Ryakuō 2 (1339), at the Tōji Sai-in monks’ quarters, the autograph manuscript of the late master Hōin (= Raihō) was copied and collated. Provisional Risshi 杲寶 (Gōhō); copyist Shungyokumaru, age 13.”
Abstract
The Kānzhù is the most extensive medieval Japanese engagement with the Shakuron and the principal Shingi-Shingon scholastic reference work. The genre-marker 勘注 (“critical annotation”) indicates a comprehensive lemmatic commentary that collates all major prior readings, identifies textual variants, and adjudicates contested points. Raihō proceeds through the Shakuron’s preface and body lemma by lemma, citing the entire prior commentarial tradition: Kūkai KR6o0091, Kakuban KR6o0092, Saisen KR6o0093 KR6o0094, Dōhan KR6o0095, and the broader Shingon and Tendai literature, including the Chinese Awakening of Faith commentarial tradition through Fǎzàng KR6o0105 and others.
The composition history recorded in the colophon — “for four whole years I successively lectured upon and read it through at the biennial seminar at Tōji” — documents the work’s institutional setting: the Tōji ni-ki dangi 東寺二季談義 (the biennial scholastic seminar at the Eastern Temple in Kyoto), the central Shingon doctrinal institution of the Kamakura-Nanboku-chō period. The Kānzhù was developed pedagogically through repeated cycles of seminar-teaching and finalised in 1320; Raihō’s transmission of the work to his disciple Gōhō 杲寶 (1306–1362), who collated it in 1339 with the help of his thirteen-year-old assistant Shungyokumaru 春玉丸, documents the Kongō-in-to-Tōji transmission line that became central to the post-Kamakura Shingi-Shingon scholastic establishment.
Date: Gen’ō 2.8.19 (= October 1320), completed and dated by Raihō’s own authorial colophon, age 42. The four-year seminar-cycle that produced the work places its initial composition around 1316.
Translations and research
- Inaya Yūsen 稲谷裕宣. Shingi shingon-shū kyōgaku no kenkyū 新義真言宗教學の研究. Kōyasan: Kōyasan Daigaku, 1978.
- Iyanaga Nobumi 彌永信美. Daikokuten henne shi 大黒天変化史. Tokyo: Hōzōkan, 2002. — Treats Raihō within the late-Kamakura Shingi-Shingon establishment.
Other points of interest
The 1339 collation by 杲寶 (Gōhō, 1306–1362) with the thirteen-year-old Shungyokumaru is a vivid documentary witness to the Shingon scholastic transmission practice: Raihō’s autograph (法印自筆之本) was used as the textual base, Gōhō (then 33) made the collation, and his very young disciple was given the manual copying-out work. This collation-event places the work at the centre of the early Nanboku-chō Tōji scholastic establishment that, under the leadership of Gōhō and his successors, produced the standard medieval reference works on Shingon doctrine, including the great encyclopaedia Hōbōgirin 法寶義林.
Links
- CBETA
- DILA Person Authority (Raihō): A001829