Liǎngbù dàfǎ xiāngchéng shīzī fùfǎ jì 兩部大法相承師資付法記
A Record of the Master-and-Disciple Transmission of the Two Sections of the Great Dharma
recorded by 海雲 (Hǎiyún, fl. mid-9th c., 記)
About the work
A 2-juan late-Táng Esoteric-Buddhist (mìjiào 密教) lineage-transmission compilation by the Táng monk Hǎiyún 海雲, recording the master-and-disciple succession of the Two Sections (liǎngbù 兩部) of the great dharma — i.e., the Vajradhātu (Jīngāngjiè 金剛界) and Garbhadhātu (Tāizàngjiè 胎藏界) Esoteric transmissions. Per the Japanese editorial colophon (preserved in the Taishō recension) the work was originally composed in Tàihé 8 大和八年 = 834. Transmitted in Taishō 51 as T2081 — the principal Chinese-language source for the Tang-period Esoteric lineages.
Abstract
The text is structured in two halves, mirroring its title:
Juan 1: the Vajradhātu (Jīngāngjiè dà jiàowáng jīng 金剛界大教王經) lineage. The lineage opens with Vajrasattva (received the dharma from Vairocana), then Nāgārjuna, then Nāga-bodhi (Lóngzhì 龍智), then Vajrabodhi (Jīngāngzhì 金剛智, fl. 671–741, the great Esoteric translator-master in Táng China), then Amoghavajra (Bùkōng 不空, 705–774), then Hùiguǒ 惠果 (746–805) of Chāng’ān Qīnglóngsì 青龍寺 — through whom the lineage passed to the great Japanese inheritor Kūkai 空海 (774–835).
Juan 2: the Garbhadhātu (Tāi-zàng-jiè 胎藏界) lineage. The lineage opens with Vairocana through Vajrasattva, then Nāgārjuna, Śubhakarasiṃha (Shàn-wú-wèi 善無畏, 637–735), and onward through the Táng-period transmission.
The work also preserves the canonical chain by which the Esoteric school understood itself to descend from Vairocana / Mahāvairocana (= Pílúzhēnà 毘盧遮那 / Śākyamuni dharmakāya) directly through Vajrasattva and Nāgārjuna (here imagined as the Mahāyāna Nāgārjuna, c. 150–250) — a lineage-claim that the text explicitly defends. The work was carried to Japan and there became the principal Chinese-language documentary source for the Shingon-school lineage understanding.
The Japanese transmission-history is preserved in the colophon: a copy was prepared in Yǒngrén 5 永仁五年 (Japanese Eira / Yoŭnin 5 = 1297, by Cíxīn shàngrén 慈心上人) at Tō-ji Kanchi-in 東寺觀智院; further copies were made in Kāng’ān / Yánwén 6 = 1361 by Jīngāngzī Xiánbǎo 金剛資賢寶生.
Translations and research
- Robert H. Sharf, Coming to Terms with Chinese Buddhism (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2002) — discusses the Tang Esoteric lineages and their doctrinal-historiographical status.
- Charles D. Orzech, Politics and Transcendent Wisdom: The Scripture for Humane Kings in the Creation of Chinese Buddhism (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1998).
- Charles D. Orzech, Henrik H. Sørensen, and Richard K. Payne, eds., Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia (Leiden: Brill, 2011) — the principal handbook on Tang and East-Asian Esoteric Buddhism.
- 大村西崖, 密教發達志 (Mìjiāo fādázhì) — the classic Japanese reference for Esoteric historiography.
Other points of interest
The work is one of the principal Sino-Japanese trans-cultural transmission documents: composed in Táng China in 834, lost (or never widely circulated) in China, but preserved by the Tō-ji 東寺 (Heian-era Shingon establishment) and re-transmitted to Chinese Esoteric scholarship through the Japanese Tripiṭaka compilations. It is therefore alongside KR6r0108 Cáo-xī dà-shī bié-zhuàn one of the documentary cases of Japanese custodianship preserving early Chinese Buddhist materials lost on the continent.
Links
- CBETA: T51n2081