Fúshī Yìgōng chánshī yǔlù 伏獅義公禪師語錄
Recorded Sayings of Chán Master Yì-gōng of Fú-shī [-yuàn] by 超珂 (說), 明元 (記錄), 高以永 (序), 超琛 (跋)
Single-juan yǔlù of Yìgōng Chāokē 超珂 義公超珂 (1615 – 1661-03-02, age 47, fǎlà 39), one of the major female Chán masters of mid-17th-century Jiāngnán. LínjìYángqí dharma-heir of Qíyuán Xínggāng 行剛 (1597–1654), and second abbess of Méixī Fúshī chányuàn 梅溪伏獅禪院 (Jiāxīng) — the foundational female-Chán institution of the Méixī community established by Xínggāng under triple-refusal in 1647 and succeeded by Chāokē in 1654. Native of Méilǐ 梅里 (Jiāxīng).
Recorded by her female disciple Míngyuán 明元 jìlù. Front preface by lay scholar Gāo Yǐyǒng 高以永 of Zuìlǐ dated 康熙戊午桂月 = 1678 (8th lunar month). Closing bá (postface) by Chāokē’s sister-disciple and successor Yīkuí Chāochēn 超琛 of Cāntóngān 參同庵 dated 康熙拾柒年蒲月 = 1678 (5th lunar month — pre-dating the front-preface by a few months) — i.e. the same Chāochēn whose own yǔlù is KR6q0553. notBefore = 1654 (succession to abbacy); notAfter = 1678 (printing). Printed as Jiāxīng Canon J39 B435 — beginning of the J39 supplement.
Contents. Single juan: preface (Gāo Yǐyǒng); Fúshī Yìgōng chánshī yǔlù proper, organized as a sequence of poems and jì including 義川法兄伏獅有省贈偈 (verse to her sister-disciple Yìchuān), 一揆法弟住靜有懷 (verse to her sister-disciple Yīkuí), poems on Língyǐn temple, on the Císhòu temple, dirges for her teacher Xínggāng (哭本師和尚, 本師忌辰), occasional poems on monastery construction (鑄大鐘, 施主送法鼓作偈, 西禪堂掛板), and dharma-funeral verses for fellow nuns and monks; the 諸祖源流頌古 zhūzǔ yuánliú sònggǔ — verses on each of the patriarchs of the Línjì lineage from Nányuè Huáiràng to her teacher’s generation; fóshì; and the closing xíngzhuàng + bá by Chāochēn.
Tiyao
Not applicable — Jiā-xīng-canon imprint (J39 B435).
Translations and research
- Beata Grant 2009. Eminent Nuns: Women Chan Masters of Seventeenth-Century China. University of Hawaiʻi Press — chapter 4 on the Fú-shī community translates and discusses the yǔ-lù of Xíng-gāng, Chāo-kē, and Chāo-chēn together.
- Beata Grant 2003. Daughters of Emptiness: Poems of Chinese Buddhist Nuns. Boston: Wisdom Publications — anthologizes several poems from this text.
- 丁敏 1997. 《中國佛教比丘尼傳》. Táiběi: Dōng-dà.
Other points of interest
KR6q0552 and KR6q0553 are the two principal female-authored yǔlù of the Jiāxīng Canon J39 supplement; together with the teacher’s KR6q0428 they constitute one of the most complete inter-generational female Línjì lineage documentary records in the Chinese Buddhist canon. The 17th-century Méixī Fúshī community is a major focus of Beata Grant’s Eminent Nuns (2009). The patriarchal zhūzǔ yuánliú sònggǔ in this volume is notable as a female-authored full-Línjì-genealogy poetic sequence — a deliberate genre claim of full equal-rank participation in the patriarchal tradition.