Dámó dàshī xuè mài lùn 達磨大師血脉論
Treatise on the Blood-Lineage by Master Bodhidharma
A short didactic treatise attributed to Bodhidharma on the “blood-lineage” (xuè mài 血脈) of direct mind-to-mind transmission; preserved in the Xù zàng jīng under KR6q0112 Èrrù sìxíng lùn and KR6q0114 Wù xìng lùn, and also as gate 6 of KR6q0084 Shǎoshì liù mén
About the work
A one-juan short Chán treatise, X63 n1218. Parallel recension preserved as gate 6 of the Shǎoshì liù mén. Non-commentary; commentedTextid omitted. The Xuè mài lùn is the latest-composed of the Bodhidharma-attributed pseudepigraphic treatises, likely dating from the late-8th or 9th century — well after Bodhidharma’s actual 6th-century period but presented as his composition under the post-hoc lineage-legitimating practice of late-Táng and Five-Dynasties Chán.
The text’s central concern is the metaphor of xuè mài 血脈 (“blood-lineage”) for the mind-to-mind transmission of dharma from Buddha to Chán patriarchs. The text closes with the classical transmission-gatha “Wú běn lái cí tǔ, chuán fǎ jiù mí qíng; yī huā kāi wǔ yè, jié guǒ zìrán chéng 吾本來茲土，傳法救迷情；一華開五葉，結果自然成” (“I came to this land to transmit the dharma and save the confused; one flower opens five petals, the fruit ripens of itself”) — the Ur-text for the Five Houses (wǔ jiā 五家) lineage-thinking of mature Chán.
Tiyao
Not a WYG text; no 四庫 tíyào exists. No editorial preface. The attribution to Bodhidharma is by the title-line only.
Abstract
The Xuè mài lùn cannot predate the Southern-School / Five-Houses lineage-consolidation of the late 9th and early 10th centuries, since its “one flower opens five petals” gatha presupposes the Five-Houses schema. The text is accordingly the latest stratum in the Bodhidharma-attributed corpus, with its composition dated most plausibly to the early Five Dynasties (ca. 900–950) or perhaps late Táng (mid-to-late 9th c.). Its pseudepigraphic attribution serves the retrospective Chán project of claiming direct Bodhidharma-warrant for the Five-Houses framework.
Dating bracket: notBefore 750 (earliest plausible composition of the wǔ yè doctrinal stratum), notAfter 950 (the completion of Five-Houses consolidation). Catalog dynasty 梁 reflects the traditional Bodhidharma-attribution; the actual compositional period is late Táng to early Five Dynasties.
Translations and research
- Red Pine. 1987. The Zen Teaching of Bodhidharma. North Point Press.
- Broughton, Jeffrey L. 1999. The Bodhidharma Anthology. California.
- Yanagida Seizan 柳田聖山 1969. Daruma no goroku.
Other points of interest
The wǔ yè (“five petals”) gatha, here presented as Bodhidharma’s own final prophecy, is the single most-cited verse in later East-Asian Chán lineage-literature. Its function in the Xuè mài lùn context — placing the Five Houses under direct Bodhidharma-warrant — is the canonical legitimating gesture for the Tang-Song Chán lineage-system.