續集古今佛道論衡

Xù jí gǔjīn fódào lùnhéng 續集古今佛道論衡

Continuation of the Collected Records of Past and Present Buddhist-Daoist Disputations

compiled by 智昇 (Zhìshēng, fl. 730, 撰)

About the work

A 1-juan early-Tang continuation of KR6r0139 Jí gǔjīn fódào lùnhéng (Dàoxuān, 661), compiled by Zhìshēng 智昇 — the great early-8th-c. canonical bibliographer of the Xī Chóngfúsì 西崇福寺 in Chángān. The work is conventionally dated to 730 (the same date as Zhìshēng’s other major bibliographic compositions, including the Kāiyuán shìjiào lù). Transmitted in Taishō 52 as T2105.

Prefaces

The text identifies its scope as “西域天竺國事” — i.e., the work specifically gathers materials on the Buddhist position in India and the Western Regions as relevant to the Buddhist-Daoist court debate. The opening section is “出後漢書列傳七十八” — i.e., it begins by extracting the relevant materials from the HòuHànshū 後漢書 (the standard history of the Eastern Hàn) on the introduction of Buddhism into China in Yǒngpíng 永平 era (61 CE) under Hàn Mǐngdì 漢明帝 — establishing the Indian-Hàn historical anchor for the Buddhist tradition.

Abstract

The work supplements Dàoxuān’s Lùnhéng in two ways:

1. Indian-Western-Regions context — Zhìshēng provides extended materials on the Indian setting of the Buddhist tradition, drawing on the HòuHànshū, on Xuánzàng’s Xīyù jì (KR6r0121), and on the broader Tang documentary record of contact with the Indian Buddhist establishment. This grounds the apologetic position in Indian-historical evidence rather than in Chinese-doctrinal argument alone.
2. Late-7th and early-8th c. updates — materials on the Buddhist-Daoist debates of the Wǔ Zétiān 武則天 reign (690–705) and the early Xuánzōng 玄宗 reign (713–730) — which Dàoxuān’s 661 work could not cover.

The work is the principal documentary supplement to Dàoxuān’s Lùnhéng and one of the principal early-8th-c. bibliographic apologetic compositions.

Translations and research

• Stanley Weinstein, Buddhism under the T’ang (1987) — uses the Xù-Lùn-héng alongside the Lùn-héng.
• Antonino Forte, Mingtang and Buddhist Utopias in the History of the Astronomical Clock (Roma / Paris, 1988).
• Tang Yongtong 湯用彤, Suí-Táng Fó-jiào shǐ gǎo 隋唐佛教史稿.
• 雷聞, 《效郊宗廟禮》.

Other points of interest

The work is a relatively brief but documentarily-important supplement to Dàoxuān’s Lùnhéng. Its most distinctive contribution is the systematic incorporation of the HòuHànshū materials on the introduction of Buddhism into China — establishing that the Buddhist tradition has impeccable secular-historiographical credentials on its own terms.

Links

• CBETA: T52n2105