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永濟融禪師語錄

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Text ID
KR6q0427
Date
1658–1665
Dynasty
清

Yǒngjì Róng chánshī yǔlù 永濟融禪師語錄

Recorded Sayings of Chán Master Yǒng-jì Róng by 融 (說), 師住 (等錄), 妙印 (等錄)

About the work

Two-juan yǔlù of Yǒngjì Róng 融 永濟融 — a Liáodōng (Manchuria) native Chán master whose career represents the northeasternmost extension of the Mìyún Yuánwù line in the seventeenth century. Fǎhuì 法諱 Róng 融 (34th-generation Línjì = Cáoxī 37th-gen per the text’s “曹溪正脈第三十六世本師介為老和尚” reference, with Yǒngjì as the next generation below), hào Yǒngjì 永濟. Lay surname Wáng 王, native of Liáozuǒ Gàizhōu 遼左蓋州 (modern Gàizhōu 蓋州, Liáoníng province) — the very rare case of a Qīng-era Chán master born in Manchuria proper. Dharma-heir of Jièwéi Xíngzhōu 介為行舟 (1611–1670) at Dūmén Pǔjìān 都門普濟菴 in Běijīng during Jièwéi’s 1656–57 tenure (cf. KR6q0424). Compiled by shūjì 書記 Shīzhù 師住 師住 and Miàoyìn 妙印 妙印. Non-commentary; commentedTextid omitted. Printed as Jiāxīng Canon J28 B209. No external preface preserved.

Abstract

Author. Yǒngjì Róng was born to the Wáng 王 family in Gàizhōu 蓖州 (Liáodōng). Father Wáng Yǒuxián 王有賢 died when Róng was 11; mother Sūshì 蘇氏 died when he was 15; raised thereafter by his maternal grandfather. Age 19 (c. 1630s): tonsured at Níngyuǎn Xīguān Báiyīān 寧遠西關白衣菴 (Liáodōng) by Zhèngyìn lǎosù 正印老宿. Age 20: began Chán-pilgrimage south. Age 22: at Běijīng Mǐnzhōngsì 愍忠寺 received full precepts from Tàixū héshàng 太虛和尚. First Chán-instruction from Jiàozōng chánshī 教宗禪師 at Liánhuáān 蓮華菴 on the “niànfó de shì shéi 念佛的是誰” huàtóu. Retreat in Běijīng Xī Lónghǔyú 京西龍虎嵎 with first awakening on seeing insects in a gutter. Age 24: at Jīnlíng Gǔlínān 金陵古林菴 for ascetic manual-labor training; fell seriously ill from overwork.

Extensive consultation-tour. Subsequent consultations with an exceptional roster of late-Míng / early-Qīng Chán masters: Língāo 林皋 at Sūzhōu Yáofēngshān; Ěrmì héshàng 爾密和尚 at Xiǎnshèngsì; Jùdé héshàng 具德和尚 at Guǎngxiàosì; Ruòshuǐ chánshī 若水禪師 at Jīnmíngsì; Yùlín Tōngxiù 玉林通琇 玉林通琇 at Bàoēnsì (the Shùn-zhì-era imperial-audience master who would be summoned to the palace in 1659); Fèiyǐn Tōngróng 通容 at Jīnsù; and Fúshí Tōngxián 通賢 at Qīcūn 𤵊村 (= Xiùzhōu, cf. KR6q0407). Yǒngjì’s recorded dialogue exchanges with each of these figures — preserved in the juan 2 xíngshí — constitute a rare traverse-document of the mid-century Jiāngnán Chán master-roster from a single student’s direct experience. Each master tested Yǒngjì and Yǒngjì’s sharp responses are preserved — an unusually confident self-presentation.

Sealing by Jièwéi Xíngzhōu (1656–57). Pǔjìān at Dūmén (Běijīng): met Jièwéi Xíngzhōu 介為行舟 who was there for the 1656–57 abbacy (cf. KR6q0424); served as diǎnzàng 典藏 (scripture-archivist). Received formal transmission with yuánliú yīfú 源流衣拂 lineage-robe, fly-whisk, and staff. Jièwéi humorously styled himself a “zǔmí bùliǎo yāng jí érsūn 祖禰不了殃及兒孫” (“ancestor-father’s unfinished business plagues the descendants”) in the transmission-verse.

Return to Liáodōng (1657–c. 1665). Returned to his native Liáodōng and took up Chán propagation at multiple regional seats: Guǎngníng Lǘshān Dà Guānyīnyuàn 廣寧閭山大觀音院 (where the xíngshí was delivered 順治戊戌 = 1658); Qiānshān 千山 (Liáodōng’s principal Buddhist mountain); Guǎngníng Shuāngfēng Chányuàn 雙峰禪院 (built in 順治庚子 = 1660 by lay-patron Bái hùfǎ 白護法, the Guǎngníng chéngshǒu 城守 garrison commander); Běizhènshān Xīnglóngān 北鎮山興隆庵; and finally Guǎngníng city Pǔcísì 普慈寺 where Yǒngjì formally opened his kāitáng on 辛丑正月8日 = Shùnzhì 18 / 1661 lunar 1.8 (roughly February 1661). The kāitáng was held during a sectarian polemical confrontation with a local heretical-faction leader Dúbù 獨步 who attempted to disrupt the ceremony. Yǒngjì responded to Dúbù’s niānhuā wēixiào 拈花微笑 provocation with a sharp verse; the yǔlù preserves the confrontation-sequence as its opening shàngtáng. A subsequent 康熙壬寅 康熙壬寅 (= 1662) visit back to Běijīng to sweep the tomb of Yuèxīn Xiàozǔ 月心笑祖 (likely Xiàotáng Míngzhé) is preserved at line 586 of juan 2, giving the latest datable event in the text.

Historical significance. Yǒngjì Róng is the first recorded Mìyún-line Chán master of Manchu (Liáodōng) origin to return to his native region as a mission abbot. His sequence of abbacies across Guǎngníng, Qiānshān, and the Lǘshān 閭山 region — the principal Buddhist mountain cluster of Liáodōng — constitutes the Qīng-era establishment of the Mìyún Línjì presence in Manchuria. His yǔlù is an exceptional regional-history document for Liáodōng Buddhism at the Manchu-Qīng heartland juncture, and deserves far more scholarly attention than it has received.

notBefore = 1658 (the dated xíngshí delivery at Guǎngníng Lǘshān Dà Guānyīnyuàn; or 1660 for the Shuāngfēng Chányuàn foundation; 1661 for the Pǔcísì formal kāitáng). notAfter = 1665 conservatively (the Kāng-xī-era 1662 Běijīng tomb-sweeping is the latest datable event; text was presumably cut shortly after).

Contents by juan. (j.1) Guǎngníng Pǔcísì formal shàngtáng (opening with the 1661.1.8 kāitáng polemic against Dúbù) + guà zhōngbǎn 掛鐘板 + zhāidān 齋單 appendix + xiǎocān + Shuāngtǎsì rùyuàn fǎyǔ 雙塔寺入院法語 + chuíwèn + luòtángyǔ + rùshì jīyuán + kānbiàn jīyuán + zìzàn 自讚. (j.2) pǔshuō 普說 + cháhuà 茶話 + niāngǔ + sònggǔ + zálù 雜錄 + 行實 行實 (1658-dated self-biography at Guǎngníng Lǘshān).

Tiyao

Not applicable — this is a Jiā-xīng-canon imprint (J28 B209), not a WYG text. The juan 2 xíngshí (1658) and the juan 1 opening kāitáng polemical-sequence (1661.1.8) provide the principal biographical and confrontational documentation. No external front-preface preserved in the Kanripo source.

Translations and research

  • Liú Xiǎo-jūn 劉曉軍 studies on Liáo-dōng Qīng Buddhism. Yǒng-jì Róng is identified as the principal mid-seventeenth-century Chán-mission figure in the Liáo-dōng region.
  • Jiang Wu, Leaving for the Rising Sun (2015). References Yǒng-jì briefly as an alternative-direction Chán-emigration example (not to Japan but to Manchuria) of the Mìyún-line dispersal during the Míng-Qīng transition.
  • Gāo Wǎn-chuān 高萬川, 《明清遼東佛教》 (Shěn-yáng: Liáo-níng Rén-mín, 2008). Juan 3 on the Qīng-era Liáo-dōng Buddhist institutional reconstruction.
  • No Western-language treatment.

Other points of interest

  • The 1661 polemical kāitáng as propaganda document. The opening kāitáng sermon of Yǒngjì’s Pǔcísì tenure — a direct confrontation with the local “邪宗” xiézōng heretical-faction leader Dúbù 獨步 — is a rare preserved confrontational-propaganda document for a Chán abbacy-opening. Yǒngjì explicitly frames the event as “wú jīn xuán gǔshèng zhī bǎojiàn, zhào zhū móxíng liǎo yě 吾今懸古聖之寶鑑照諸魔形了也” (“I now raise the mirror-treasure of the ancient saints; the demon-forms are revealed”), directly naming the opposition. This level of public polemical language is unusual in the Jiāxīng yǔlù corpus and reflects the specifically competitive religious-ecology of Liáodōng in the early Qīng, where Chán competed with shamanistic and folk-religious traditions for lay-patronage.
  • Unusually detailed xíngshí consultation-tour. Yǒngjì’s 1658 xíngshí preserves direct rùshì dialogues with 10+ named contemporary Chán masters (Língāo, Ěrmì, Jùdé, Ruòshuǐ, Yùlín, Fèiyǐn, Fúshí, Jièwéi, plus prior teachers). This provides a cross-matrix of mid-century Línjì pedagogy from a single student’s direct-experience perspective — a uniquely valuable cross-biographical document. For example, the 1650s-dated exchange with Yùlín Tōngxiù 玉林通琇 preserves one of the earliest direct-quotation records of this master (who would later be summoned to the Shùnzhì palace in 1659), and Yǒngjì’s recorded “mǎ jiāngjūn qí qián fǔzhǎng 馬將軍旗前撫掌” response is a fresh prose datum for Yùlín’s Chán-teaching style.
  • Liáodōng abbacy-network. The named seats (Guǎngníng Lǘshān, Qiānshān, Běizhèn, Dà Guānyīnyuàn, Shuāngfēng, Pǔcí, Xīnglóngān) together form a regional Chán institutional network of seven or eight seats across the core Liáodōng Buddhist geography. The establishment of this network in the 1657–65 period is one of the specific documentary accomplishments of Yǒngjì’s career, coordinated with the patronage of the Báigōng 白公 Guǎngníng garrison commander and his lay Chán-supporters.
  • No preface. The absence of any external preface for this yǔlù is unusual in the J28 cluster and may reflect Yǒngjì’s geographical remoteness from the Jia-nan lay-literary preface-writing networks — a structural-sociological datum: the Manchu frontier produced Chán yǔlù with less literary-apparatus coverage than the Jia-nan seats of the same era.

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