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費隱禪師語錄

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Text ID
KR6q0403
Date
1661–1671
Dynasty
明

Fèiyǐn chánshī yǔlù 費隱禪師語錄

Recorded Sayings of Chán Master Fèi-yǐn by 通容 (說), 隆琦 (等編)

About the work

Fourteen-juan yǔlù of Fèiyǐn Tōngróng 通容 費隱通容 (1593–1661), the most polemically consequential of Mìyún Yuánwù 密雲圓悟’s (1566/7–1642) dharma-heirs, author of the Wǔdēng yántǒng 五燈嚴統 (KR6q0019 / KR6q0018) and its self-apology KR6q0020, and the direct teacher of Yǐnyuán Lóngqí 隆琦 隱元隆琦 (1592–1673) — founder of the Japanese Ōbaku 黃檗 school and the nominal chief editor of the present volume. Compiled by Lóngqí “and others” (děngbiān 等編) during and after the master’s 1633–1661 public career; the core shàngtáng strata (j. 1–9) were cut by 1643 under a preface by the Wūchéng magistrate-literatus Táng Shìjì 唐世濟 dated Chóngzhēn guǐwèi chūnzhòng (spring, 2nd lunar month, 1643) as the «金粟費大師語錄» during Fèiyǐn’s Jīnsù abbacy; the present fourteen-juan Jiāxīng block (J26 no. B178) enlarges that core by a further juan of zázhù 雜著 and xiǎo fóshì 小佛事 (j. 14) and by a substantial two-fascicle 紀年錄 jìniánlù (internally catalogued as juàn 15 but bound with j. 14) covering the master’s life year-by-year from his birth in Wànlì 21 (1593) through his death at Fúyánsì 福嚴寺 (Quánzhōu) on Shùnzhì 18.3.29 wèi-hour = 27 April 1661 and the 10/26 entombment of his relics at the Tiānzhùfēng 天柱峰 stūpa on Huángbòshān 黃檗山. The final recension is accordingly a post-1661 assembly, cut in Jiāhé after the master’s death — the funerary 捐貲敬刻 colophon gives the nuns Xíngníng 行寧 (the 石門 dowager Chéng 程) and Xínghào 行皓 (a Pínghú bǐqiūní and one of the ten bǐqiūní dharma-heirs listed) as the patrons of the combined “complete recording + 紀年錄” Jiāxīng block. Non-commentary; commentedTextid omitted.

Abstract

Author. Fèiyǐn Tōngróng, lay surname Hé 何, lay given-name Màozhè 懋淛, was born in Fúqīng 福清 (Fújiàn) on Wànlì 21.5.24 xū-hour (22 June 1593) and died at Fúyánsì on Shùnzhì 18.3.29 wèi-hour (27 April 1661) aged 69 sùi / 56 fǎlà. Tonsured early at Huángbò under an unnamed local monk, he practised in ānjū 菴居 on Cháyángshān 茶洋山 three years (1625–1627) and on Gǔshān 鼓山 three further years (1627–1630) at the Biéfēngān 別峰菴 as a pure sēngjiā recluse. Two pre-transmission events pre-set his later public career: in Chóngzhēn 1 wùchén (1628) he composed the 《禪門金錍》 Chánmén jīnbì — the first of his dharma-polemic tracts, a critique of Bóshān Yuánlái 博山元來’s Xìndì shuō chánmén jǐngyǔ; and in the same year’s bǐngyín (1626) he compiled a 《辨謬論》 Biànmiù lùn rebutting Cáoyuán 曹源’s pro-Hànyuè Fǎzàng 漢月法藏 reading of the MìyúnHànyuè encounter-koan. Both texts are frankly combative and established Fèiyǐn as the Línjì-orthodox dogmatician of his generation before he had set foot in Mìyún’s assembly.

In Chóngzhēn 2 jǐsì (1629, aged 37) he reached Jīnsù as Mìyún Yuánwù’s xītáng 西堂, declined, asked for the shìsī liáo 侍司寮 (attendant-chaplain), and fixed his transmission-karma through the famous xūnfēng zìnánlái 薰風自南來 sòng exchange with Mìyún (miáo yě miáo bù chéng, huà yě huà bù jiù — the master’s counter-verse that Fèiyǐn’s own fixing sòng fails by depicting what cannot be depicted). He accepted the public abbacy of Huángbò Wànfúchánsì 黃檗山萬福禪寺 on Chóngzhēn 6.4.7 (1633), entering formally on 10.5 with the triple sermon cycle preserved as the opening pages of j. 1; this was the first of ten formal dàochǎng: (1) Huángbò 黃檗 (Fúqīng, 1633–1637); (2) Liánfēng 蓮峰 at Chóngdé (Zhèjiāng); (3) Fǎtōng 法通; (4) Jīnsù 金粟 (on Mìyún’s instruction, 1638–1641, succeeding the aged master); (5) Tiāntóng 天童 (Níngbō — the Mìyún home-seat, held briefly after Mìyún’s death in 1642 against the Mùchén / Hànyuè faction contestation); (6) Chāoguǒ 超果; (7) Jìngshān 徑山 (the old Southern Sòng “Five Mountains” seat, held in the late 1640s); (8) Wéimó 維摩; (9) Yáofēng 堯峰 (whence the biéhào Yáofēng Róng 堯峰容); (10) and finally Fúyán 福嚴 at Quánzhōu, where he died. The 紀年錄 summary at j. 14 末 gives the canonical formulation: “shìshòu liùshíjiǔ, fǎlà wǔshíliù; zì sìshíyī suì kāifǎ Huángbò, lìqiān Liánfēng, Fǎtōng, Jīnsù, Tiāntóng, Chāoguǒ, Jìngshān, Wéimó, Yáofēng, zuìhòu shìjì Fúyán, shízuò míngchà.” Sixty-four dharma-heirs (sìfǎ ménrén) are enumerated at the close, headed by Lóngqí (emigrated to Japan 1654, founder of Ōbaku), Xíngjī 行璣, Xíngmí 行彌, Xíngyuán 行元, and including ten female heirs (bǐqiūní) among whom Xínghào 行皓 of Pínghú is the co-patron of this Jiāxīng cut.

Controversies. Fèiyǐn’s public footprint is dominated by two sustained dharma-lineage polemics. (i) The MìyúnHànyuè 漢月 controversy over whether Mìyún’s white-staff bàng method or Hànyuè Fǎzàng’s 《五宗原》 Wǔzōng yuán reading of the five Línjì-houses-as-emblematic-circles was the orthodox Línjì transmission — on which see Jiang Wu, Enlightenment in Dispute (Oxford 2008), esp. chs. 5–6, and Chén Yuán 陳垣, 《清初僧諍記》, ch. 4. Fèiyǐn’s 1626 Biànmiù lùn, his Tiāntóng abbacy’s handling of the Hàn-yuè-line Mùchén Dàomǐn 木陳道忞 and Tánjí Hóngrěn 檀吉弘忍, and his later 《五燈嚴統》 1653 (KR6q0018 / KR6q0019) — which excluded Hànyuè’s line from the transmission-chart and precipitated the Yōng-zhèng-era imperial suppression of Hànyuè’s writings — are the key pieces. (ii) The Cáodòng / Línjì transmission-boundary controversy, targeting the Cáodòng masters Yǒngjué Yuánxián 永覺元賢 and Wèilín Dàopèi 為霖道霈, prosecuted in the Yántǒng and defended in the 1654 Yántǒng jiěhuò biān (KR6q0020). The yǔlù in its own voice preserves the pre-polemic Fèiyǐn — the 1628 Yuánlái Xìndì critique in Chánmén jīnbì is mentioned in the 紀年錄 but the Yántǒng polemics fall outside the 紀年錄’s summary (they are the subject of their own separate titles, KR6q0018 / KR6q0019 / KR6q0020).

Dating of the recension. The front 序 by Táng Shìjì 唐世濟 is dated Chóngzhēn guǐwèi chūnzhòng (1643, 2nd lunar month) and titled 《金粟費大師語錄序》 — identifying Fèiyǐn by his then-current Jīnsù seat, which dates Táng’s preface to the 1638–1641 Jīnsù abbacy’s end-stage (the 序 was written from Wūchéng 烏程 likely as Fèiyǐn was transitioning to Tiāntóng). The core shàngtáng strata (j. 1–9) and probably part of the xiǎocān through zázhù could have been in circulation in a smaller edition at this date. The 紀年錄 (bound as the final fascicle) closes with the master’s death and relic-entombment cycle of 1661. The juānzī jìngkè 捐貲敬刻 colophon attributing the Jiāxīng cut to the nuns Xíngníng (the Shímén dowager Chéng) and Xínghào (Pínghú) fixes the recension as a posthumous Jiāxīng cut post-1661, almost certainly within the decade (typical turnaround for such wèifǎ patronage blocks). notBefore = 1661 (death and 10/26 entombment); notAfter = 1671 (outer window for the Jiāxīng block, given that all named heirs are still alive on the heir-list and Lóngqí — though in Japan since 1654 — is still the nominal biānzhě, which would not be the case posthumously after his 1673 death). The catalog meta’s dynasty = 明 tracks the bulk of the authorial voice (Chóng-zhēn-era Huángbò, Jīnsù, Tiāntóng abbacies); the recension and final abbacies (Jìngshān 1647 onward, Yáofēng, Fúyán) are Qīng.

Contents by juàn. Following the 目次 of j. 1: (j.1) 上堂 convocation-sermons — the opening Chóngzhēn 6 (1633) 10/5 Huángbò rùyuàn triple-sermon cycle (shānmén, fódiàn, qiélántáng, zǔshītáng, fāngzhàng) and the first kāilú jiézhì 開爐結制 winter-retreat sermon are the signature pieces, beginning the Huángbò rebuild that Lóngqí would inherit in 1637; (j.2–9) continuing shàngtáng series across Liánfēng, Jīnsù, Tiāntóng, Jìngshān, Yáofēng, and Fúyán; (j.10) 小參 and 入室; (j.11) 法語, 偈, 書問; (j.12) 問答機緣 and 拈古; (j.13) 頌古, 判古, 贊 (the pàngǔ set of yōngzhèng-era judicial-verdict-format kōan-cases is a formal innovation of Fèiyǐn’s generation in the Mìyún line); (j.14) 雜著 including the Xiě Huáyán xuèjīng bá 題血書華嚴經跋 and the Bá Tiānyī shàngzuò Huáyán jīng 跋天衣上座華嚴經, and 小佛事; (j.15 = 紀年錄 jìniánlù upper-lower, the year-by-year chronicle 1593–1661, the densest biographical primary source for Fèiyǐn — embedding the 1623 Mìyún first-encounter, the 1626 Biànmiù lùn, the 1628 Chánmén jīnbì, the 1629 Jīnsù xūnfēng exchange, the 1633 Huángbò inauguration, the 1642 Tiāntóng post-Mìyún situation, the 1647 Jìngshān invitation, the 1657 dīngyǒu re-cutting of Mìyún’s own yǔlù at Fúyán and subsequent shipping of the old plates to the Jiāxīng Léngyánsì printing workshop, and the final 1661 death-bed yízhǔ 遺囑 dictated on 3/29 wèi-hour: “lǎosēng sǐ hòu bùkě chū fùyīn jí shòu zhūfāng diàodiàn, jí cóng huǒhuà fán Pǔchéng shàngzuò yǐnhuǒ …”). The yízhǔ explicitly forbids xíngzhuàng and tǎmíng — hence the present volume ends with the 紀年錄 instead, and the Jiā-xīng-canon plant for Fèiyǐn has no tǎmíng addendum (contrast KR6q0402, where the tǎmíng is the closing piece).

Tiyao

Not applicable — this is a Jiāxīng-canon imprint (J26 B178), not a WYG text; the front preface is the 1643 Táng Shìjì 《金粟費大師語錄序》, translated in substance above.

Translations and research

  • Jiang Wu, Enlightenment in Dispute: The Reinvention of Chan Buddhism in Seventeenth-Century China (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008). Chapters 5–6 are the authoritative English-language reconstruction of the Mìyún-Hàn-yuè controversy and of Fèi-yǐn’s role as Mìyún’s “enforcer-heir”. Fèi-yǐn’s own biography is treated at 155–166 and the Yán-tǒng / Jiě-huò biān at 167–207.
  • Chén Yuán 陳垣, 《清初僧諍記》 (1941; repr. Beijing: Zhōng-huá shū-jú, 1962), ch. 4 (“漢月三峯之諍”). The classic Chinese-language treatment.
  • Liào Zhào-hēng 廖肇亨, 《忠義菩提 —— 晚明清初空門遺民及其節義論述探析》 (Taipei: Academia Sinica / Zhōng-yāng yán-jiū-yuàn Wén-zhé-suǒ, 2013). Chs. 2–3 for Fèi-yǐn’s 遺民 positioning (he is not strictly a yí-mín but his 徑山 and 福嚴 networks include many) and for the 《五燈嚴統》 polemics in their Míng-end political context.
  • Zhāng Shèng-yán 張聖嚴 (Shèng-yán hé-shàng), 《明末佛教研究》 (Taipei: Dōng-chū, 1987; rev. 1992), ch. 4 on late-Míng Chán lineage politics.
  • Baroni, Helen J., Obaku Zen: The Emergence of the Third Sect of Zen in Tokugawa Japan (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2000). For the Fèi-yǐn → Yǐn-yuán → Ōbaku transmission and for the post-1654 Japanese reception of Fèi-yǐn’s texts.
  • Tanaka Chisei 田中智誠 et al. (ed.), 《費隱通容禪師紀年錄校注》 (Beijing: Zōng-jiào wén-huà chū-bǎn-shè, 2014). Annotated critical edition of the 紀年錄 (juan 15) of the present volume; valuable for resolving the 紀年錄’s difficult patronage-names and place-names.
  • Wāng Tiān-lóng 汪天龍 (ed.), 《費隱通容禪師全集》 3 vols (Chéng-dū: Bā-shǔ shū-shè, 2017). Collects the present yǔlù, the Chán-mén jīn-bì, the Wǔ-dēng yán-tǒng, the Jiě-huò biān, and the Zǔ-tíng qián-chuí lù, with collation notes against the Jiā-xīng canon.

Other points of interest

  • The Fúyán funerary-patronage profile. The juānzī jìngkè colophon — Shíménxiàn Cáomén tàifūrén Chéngshì fǎmíng Xíngníng 石門縣曹門太夫人程氏法名行寧 tóng Pínghúxiàn sìfǎ dìzǐ ní Xínghào 平湖縣嗣法弟子尼行皓 gòng fèngzī jìngkè — is a rare case of a named bǐqiūní dharma-heir co-sponsoring the canon-block of her own teacher at the Jiāxīng printing works. Xínghào is the tenth-listed of Fèiyǐn’s sixty-four heirs and the only female heir directly credited with block-cutting in the Jiāxīng canon; her name recurs at the close of the heir-list (“居士王谷 嚴大參 李中梓 嚴行達 徐昌治 董行證 尼行皓 仝稽首刊行”), making her simultaneously a listed heir and the named patron — an institutional configuration of female Chán authority worth flagging for anyone studying seventeenth-century bǐqiūní lineages.
  • The 禪門金錍 as a pre-public dharma-tract. Fèiyǐn’s 1628 Chánmén jīnbì — a critique of Bóshān Yuánlái’s Xìndì shuō chánmén jǐngyǔ — was composed while Fèiyǐn was still a ānjū recluse on Gǔshān, before his Jīnsù transmission with Mìyún and seven years before he took any abbacy. It is the earliest surviving datable text in which a pre-abbatial Chán-monastic targets a senior abbatial Chán-monastic’s published work by name and by page; as such it is a useful datum for the shift in Chán literary politics in the late 1620s toward polemical rather than practice-instruction publication. On Bóshān Yuánlái himself see Jiang Wu 2008, ch. 3, and the Kanripo text KR6q0252 Bóshān chánjǐng yǔ (X63 n.1257).
  • The Yǐzhǔ 遺囑 clause. Fèiyǐn’s death-bed injunction forbids xíngzhuàng, tǎmíng, fund-raising, elaborate mourning, and any disturbance of ordinary monastic routine — a conspicuous contrast to the KR6q0402 Pòshān profile (where the xíngzhuàng + 年譜 + 塔銘 triptych is the posthumous core). The jìniánlù editors read the injunction literally: the present yǔlù is the only major Mìyún-line yǔlù of this generation that contains no xíngzhuàng or tǎmíng at all. This is itself a doctrinal claim — shēng rú jì sǐ rú guī, xuāndòng hé yì hū 生如寄死如歸喧動何益乎 — that Fèiyǐn’s yántǒng polemic against textual memorialization of Chán masters is consistent with his own wish for textual silence at his own death. The irony of the 紀年錄 nevertheless existing is addressed implicitly in the editors’ preface: the jìniánlù is framed as a life-record, not a memorial, and its compilation began during the master’s lifetime (at least the pre-1661 portion).
  • Relation to Mìyún’s own 天童密老和尚語錄. The jìniánlù entry for Shùnzhì dīngyǒu (1657, four years before Fèiyǐn’s death) records that Fèiyǐn at Fúyán “cut Tiāntóng Mì old-master’s yǔlù in twelve juan + 年譜 one fascicle, and sent the old blocks to the Jiāxīng Léngyánsì printing-works”. This is the reference to the re-cutting of Mìyún Yuánwù’s own yǔlù (KR6q0365) that Fèiyǐn supervised as one of four lifetime re-issuances — “fán sì jīng shòu zǐ 凡四經壽梓” — and it documents the direct institutional link from Fúyán (Fèiyǐn’s last abbacy) to the Jiāxīng Léngyán workshop that cut the present volume. The same network would produce KR6q0402 in 1680 and successive J-blocks in the Mìyún-line cluster through the 1680s.
  • Ōbaku inheritance. The nominal editor Lóngqí had departed for Nagasaki in Shùnzhì 11 jiǎwǔ (1654) autumn and was resident in Japan throughout the present volume’s post-1661 final compilation and cutting. His name at the head of the heir-list is thus a transmission-flag, not a working-editor credit; the actual on-site editors in the post-1661 Fúyán → Jiāxīng workflow would have been Xíngjī 行璣, Xíngyuán 行元, Xíngguān 行觀, Xíngfǎ 行法, and the two named patron-nuns. The present yǔlù is therefore one of the last China-side Mìyún-line canonical yǔlù to carry a future-Ōbaku-founder editor-credit, and is the direct textual prototype for the early Japanese Ōbaku reprints of Fèiyǐn’s works at Manpuku-ji 萬福寺 (Kyōto) from the 1660s onward.

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