Yuánsǒu Xíngduān chánshī yǔlù 元叟行端禪師語錄
Eight-juan yǔlù of Yuánsǒu Xíngduān 行端 元叟行端 (zì Yuánsǒu 元叟, self-style Hánshí / Hánshānzǐ 寒拾 / 寒山子; imperial titles Huìwén Zhèngbiàn chánshī 慧文正辯 (1303) and Fórì Pǔzhào 佛日普照 (1312); posthumously Jìzhào 寂照; 1 April 1255 – 23 September 1341), Yángqí-branch Línjì master and 48th abbot of Jìngshān Xīngshèng Wànshòu chánsì 徑山興聖萬壽禪寺 (1322–1341, thirty years). Xuzangjing X71 no. 1419. Compiled by four of his major dharma-heirs: 法林 Zhúquán Fǎlín 竹泉法林 (1284–1355, later of Língyǐn), 曇噩 Mèngtáng Tánè 夢堂曇噩 (1285–1373, zì Wúmèng 無夢, 酉庵 Yǒuān, imperial title Fózhēn Wényì 佛真文懿, author of the 30-juan Xīnxiū kēfēn liùxué sēngzhuàn 新修科分六學僧傳), 祖銘 Gǔdǐng Zǔmíng 古鼎祖銘 (1280–1358, later 49th Jìngshān abbot under the title Huìxìng Wénmǐn Hóngjué Pǔjì 慧性文敏宏覺普濟), and 梵琦 Chǔshí Fànqí 楚石梵琦 (1296–1370; see KR6q0353). Juan 1 covers the Húzhōu Xiángfèngshān Zīfú chánsì 翔鳳山資福禪寺 abbacy (from Dàdé 4 / 1300); juan 2 the Hángzhōu Zhōngtiānzhú Wànshòu chánsì 中天竺萬壽禪寺; juan 3 Hángzhōu Língyǐn Jǐngdé chánsì 靈隱景德禪寺 (from Huángqìng 1 / 1312); juan 4 Jìngshān Xīngshèng Wànshòu (from Zhìzhì 2 / 1322); juan 5 fǎyǔ; juan 6 jìsòng; juan 7 more jìsòng, zàn, zìzàn; juan 8 the xíngzhuàng 行狀 and tǎmíng 塔銘.
Abstract
The present text is a post-war chóngkān 重刻 recension. The original printed edition, produced shortly after Xíngduān’s death in 1341, was destroyed in the mid-Zhì-zhèng wars. Three of his rùshì dìzǐ 入室弟子 — Qīngliáng Zǐpián 清涼子楩 (zì Yòngtáng 用堂), Jīnshān Huìmíng 金山慧明 (zì Xìngyuán 性原), and Tiānníng Zǔchǎn 天寧祖闡 (zì Zhòngyóu 仲猷) — pooled resources to commission a re-cutting, which was executed by the Yìnshēng 印生 print shop; they asked Sòng Lián 宋濂 to supply a second preface, which he did on the 1st of the 10th month of Hóngwǔ 7 (1374). Sòng Lián retains Xíngduān’s original prefatorial framing by Yú Jí 虞集 (Wēixiào jūshì 微笑居士 of Shǔjùn, dated the 13th of the 3rd month of Zhìzhèng 1 / 3 April 1341, seven months before Xíngduān’s death) — solicited directly from Yú Jí by Xíngduān’s dìyī zuò 第一座, the Mongol monk Zhèngyìn 正印 (entirely distinct from 正印 Yuèjiāng Zhèngyìn). Yú Jí’s text is the earliest dated content in the collection’s front-matter; the tǎmíng in juan 8 by the leading Yuán official-scholar Huáng Wénxiàn 黃文獻 (Huáng Jìn 黃溍) — whose biographical detail overlaps with the xíngzhuàng but adds specific neural-historical material — dates also to the 1341–1343 period; Sòng Lián’s preface closes the brackets in 1374.
Xíngduān was a native of Línghǎi 臨海 (Táizhōu), lay surname Hé 何; he is also styled Hánshānzǐ 寒山子 for his many Cold-Mountain-style verse-suites. Tonsured at twelve at Yúháng Huàchéngyuàn 化城院 by his paternal uncle Mào Shàngrén 茂上人 (the same Mào Shàngrén who later took 清欲 Liǎoān Qīngyù to Jìngshān as a tóngzǐ); formally ordained at eighteen; attained his first awakening under Cángsǒu Shànzhēn 藏叟善珍 at Jìngshān, and received dharma-transmission from Cángsǒu. His circle of co-trainees — Xūgǔ Xīlíng 虛谷希陵, Dōngyǔ Hǎi 東嶼海, Huìjī Xī 晦機熙, Dōngzhōu Yǒng 東州永, Zhúgé Zhēn 竹閣真 — is unusually well attested; his cohort later spread through the key Zhèjiāng abbacies of the transition period. His abbacies mapped the top rung of the Yuán Chán establishment: Zīfú 資福 (1300) → Zhōngtiānzhú Wànshòu (from Huángqìng 1) → Língyǐn (1312) → Jìngshān (1322, thirty years until death). Three imperial title-bestowals accompanied his career: Huìwén Zhèngbiàn chánshī (1303, at Zīfú), Fórì Pǔzhào (1312, after presiding over a shuǐlù 水陸 assembly at Jīnshān), and a third jīnlán 金襴 robe-gift from the Yuán court. He died on the 4th of the 8th month of Zhìzhèng 1 (23 September 1341), shìshòu 88, sēnglà 76.
Named dharma-heirs were many, including the four editors of the present yǔlù plus Língyǐn Huìmíng 靈隱慧明, Jìngshān Zhìjí 徑山智及, Xíngzhōng Zhìrén 行中至仁, Fúbào 福報, Yuánjìng 原瀞, and Xìngyuán Huìmíng 性原慧明 of Jīnshān (the same who edited the re-cutting, and who in 1377–1378 would receive the young 普莊 Dāiān Pǔzhuāng into the Jīnshān sūtra-lecture programme). The yǔlù is, with 梵琦’s, the principal documentary monument of the Yuán Línjì establishment at its height.
Translations and research
No substantial Western-language secondary literature located. In Chinese, see Bǔ-xù gāo-sēng zhuàn juan 12 (X77 no. 1524), Zēng-jí Xù-chuándēng-lù juan 5 (X83), Wǔ-dēng huì-yuán xù-lüè juan 1 (X80), Nán-Sòng Yuán-Míng chán-lín sēng-bǎo zhuàn (X79). The tǎ-míng by Huáng Jìn is also collected in his Jīn-huá Huáng xiān-shēng wén-jí 金華黃先生文集; Yú Jí’s preface is in Dào-yuán xué-gǔ-lù 道園學古錄.
Other points of interest
Xíngduān’s epithet Hánshānzǐ 寒山子 — he composed a set of over a hundred verses “imitating Hánshān” during his residence at a Línggāshì 楞伽室 cell on Jìngshān — links him into the Tang-poetry-revival current running through Yuán Chán monastic verse, and inflects the literary-historical interpretation of his jìsòng in juan 6–7.