Bǔtuóluòjiāshān zhuàn 補陀洛迦山傳
Records of Mount Pótalaka (i.e., Mount Pǔ-tuó)
written by 盛熙明 (Shèng Xīmíng / Xuányī dàorén 玄一道人, fl. early-mid 14th c., 述)
About the work
A 1-juan late-Yuán gazetteer of Mount Pǔ-tuó 普陀山 — the canonical Chinese identification of the bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara’s 觀音 mountain abode (Sanskrit Potalaka) — written by the Yuán literatus Shèng Xī-míng 盛熙明 (號 Xuán-yī dàorén 玄一道人) in Yuán Zhì-zhèng 至正 21 = 1361. The author was originally from Kucha / Qiūcí 龜茲 (modern Kuqa, Xinjiang), later resident in Yù-zhāng 豫章 (Nánchāng, Jiāngxī); under the Yīng-zōng 英宗 he had served as a Bīng-bù and Kuí-zhāng-gé 奎章閣 official. In 1361 he came to Sì-míng 四明 (Níngbō region) for medical reasons; pilgrim-friends invited him to Mount Pǔ-tuó’s Cháo-yīn-dòng 潮音洞 (“Tide-Sound Cave”), where he stayed several months and composed the gazetteer. Transmitted in Taishō 51 as T2101.
Abstract
The work is structured in seven sections (七品) covering:
- The mountain’s geographic location — an island in the Zhōushān 舟山 archipelago off the Sìmíng coast;
- The canonical identification with the Sanskrit Potalaka (per the Avataṃsaka / Huá-yán sūtra’s identification of Avalokiteśvara’s southern-ocean residence);
- The mountain’s principal sites — the Cháo-yīn-dòng (“Tide-Sound Cave”), the Bù-kěn-qù Guān-yīn-yuàn 不肯去觀音院 (“Avalokiteśvara-who-Refused-to-Go Hall”), the Mei-fú-tā 梅福塔 (“Méi-fú Pagoda”), and other established sites;
- The foundational legend — the Japanese monk Egaku 慧鍔 (active 838–860s), who acquired an Avalokiteśvara image at Mount Wǔ-tái in 858 and was bringing it back to Japan when his ship was repeatedly stopped by storms in the Pǔ-tuó waters; recognising this as Avalokiteśvara’s own refusal to leave China, Egaku established the Bù-kěn-qù Guān-yīn-yuàn (“Avalokiteśvara-who-Refused-to-Go Hall”) on the island, founding the cult;
- Subsequent history — SòngYuán imperial patronage, the establishment of the major monasteries;
- Recent miracles — Yuán-period Avalokiteśvara apparitions documented by named witnesses;
- Verses and dedicatory writings — including the author’s own pilgrimage-poem.
The work is the foundational gazetteer of Mount Pǔtuó — and remains so, in the sense that all subsequent Pǔtuóshān gazetteer literature (the great Míng and Qīng Pǔtuóshān zhì 普陀山志 compendia) draws on it as the principal documentary base.
Translations and research
- Chün-fang Yü, Kuan-yin: The Chinese Transformation of Avalokiteśvara (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001) — the standard English-language treatment of the Avalokiteśvara cult, with extensive use of the Bǔ-tuó-luò-jiā-shān zhuàn.
- Marcus Bingenheimer, Island of Guanyin: Mount Putuo and Its Gazetteers (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016) — the principal English-language treatment of the Pǔ-tuó-shān gazetteer tradition.
- Susan Naquin and Chün-fang Yü, eds., Pilgrims and Sacred Sites in China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992) — context.
- 王連勝 (Wáng Lián-shèng), 《普陀洛迦山志》校點 — modern Chinese critical edition with extensive notes.
Other points of interest
The Qīng-period (光緒甲申 = 1884) Jiǎng Qīng-yì 蔣清翊 critical edition (preserved in the Taishō paratext) notes that Shèng’s original work had only 5 chapters and that the additional 2 chapters (the Wáng Bó Avalokiteśvara-zàn 王勃觀音讚 and the appended dignitary-poems) are late-Yuán Buddhist interpolations. The Qīn-dìng quán-Táng-wén 欽定全唐文 editorial principles already identified the Wáng Bó zàn as a forgery; the work is therefore a textbook case of Yuán-period Buddhist canonical accretion.