Guānwúliángshòu jīng fúxīnlùn 觀無量壽經扶新論
Treatise Upholding the New (Commentary) on the Sūtra on the Contemplation of Amitāyus by 戒度 (Zhuō’ān Jièdù, 述)
About the work
A polemical single-juǎn treatise by the southern Sòng Pure Land / Vinaya commentator 戒度 Jièdù (signing as Zhuō’ān 拙庵). The work defends 元照 Yuánzhào Língzhī’s 元照靈芝 (1048–1116) Guānjīng xīnshū 觀經新疏 (“New Commentary on the Guānjīng”) against the Fǔzhèng jiě 輔正解 of the Tiāntái master Yīngōng 因公法師 (Mǐyīn 謐因 / Bo-xīn 伯心), which had attacked Yuánzhào’s commentary as “destroying Tiāntái doctrine and the temporal teachings of the jiào 教 system.” The author’s preface frames the work in the form of a triple reading of the Tiāntái critique — “first reading, fearsome; second reading, doubtful; third reading, laughable” — and proceeds by rebutting the critique point by point.
Abstract
The dispute concerns the proper exegesis of the Guānwúliángshòu fó jīng 觀無量壽佛經 within the Sòng Pure Land tradition. Yuánzhào — the great Northern-Sòng Vinaya master who in his later years turned to Pure Land — had written the Xīnshū (X22N0420 KR6p0015 for the cognate Ēmítuó jīng commentary; the Guānjīng xīnshū itself is preserved at X22N0418) using a Lǜzōng 律宗 framework that subordinated the sixteen contemplations to the practice of chēngmíng 稱名 (recitation of the name). The Tiāntái scholar Yīngōng’s Fǔzhèng jiě attacked this on three principal grounds: (1) that Yuánzhào’s reading dissolves the Tiāntái doctrine of yīxīnsānguān 一心三觀; (2) that it inverts the proper subordination of phenomenal practice to noumenal contemplation; (3) that it improperly equates guānfó 觀佛 with chēngmíng. Jièdù’s Fúxīn lùn responds by arguing that (a) the Tiāntái doctrine is preserved within Yuánzhào’s framework as a contemplative substrate, not abolished; (b) the apparent subordination is a pedagogical sequence, not a doctrinal demotion; (c) Yuánzhào treats guānfó and chēngmíng as complementary, not identical. The work is a foundational document of the Lǜzōng-Pure Land alliance that defines Yuánzhào’s lineage from the late twelfth century onward.
The dating bracket adopted (c. 1180–1230) is by inference: Yuánzhào died in 1116 and the Fǔzhèng jiě circulated for “many years” (歷年所殆至湮沒) before Jièdù responded — the phrasing in the preface implies a substantial generational gap. Jièdù’s Zhèngguānjì KR6p0010 presupposes the Fúxīn lùn, so the latter is the earlier of the two.
Translations and research
- Getz, Daniel A. “Siming Zhili and Tiantai Pure Land in the Song Dynasty.” In Buddhism in the Sung. University of Hawai’i Press, 1999.
- Welter, Albert. Monks, Rulers, and Literati: The Political Ascendancy of Chan Buddhism. Oxford UP, 2006 — for the broader Sòng Buddhist polemic context.
- Huáng Qǐ-jiāng 黃啟江, Bei Sòng fójiào shǐ lùnshū 北宋佛教史論述. Taipei: Taiwan shangwu yinshuguan, 1997 — for Yuánzhào’s biography and lineage.