十門辯惑論

Shímén biànhuò lùn 十門辯惑論

Treatise Resolving Confusions through Ten Gates

written by 復禮 (Fùlǐ, fl. late 7th c., 撰)

About the work

A 3-juan early-Tang Buddhist apologetic treatise by 復禮 Fù-lǐ 復禮 — the great Tang Buddhist scholar of Xìng-shàn-sì 興善寺 in Cháng’ān, brush-holder for the Dì-pó-hē-luó 地婆訶羅 (Divākara, 613–687) and Shí-chā-nán-tuó 實叉難陀 (Śikṣānanda, 652–710) translation projects of the Wǔ Zé-tiān era. The work was composed in Yǒng-lóng 2 = 681 in direct response to a set of 20 questions about Buddhism posed by the imperial Tài-zǐ wén-xué 太子文學 (Crown-Prince’s Literary Companion) Quán Wú-èr 權無二. Transmitted in Taishō 52 as T2111.

Prefaces

The opening section of juan 1 reproduces the 20 questions of Quán Wúèr (the imperial-prince literary companion), which Fùlǐ then answers across the three juan in 10 successive question-and-answer “gates” (十門 shí mén) — hence the title.

Abstract

The 10 gates address the principal Confucian and secular-philosophical objections to Buddhism:

1. The objection that Buddhism is foreign and recent (Buddhist counter: the doctrine of universal salvation makes the geographical-cultural origin irrelevant).
2. The objection that monastic celibacy is anti-natural / anti-filial (response: monastic life serves filial piety on a higher karmic register).
3. The objection that Buddhist abstention from political-administrative service is anti-civic (response: monastic withdrawal serves the public good through religious means).
4. The objection that the doctrine of rebirth and karma lacks empirical-evidential basis (response: appeal to the Indian-Buddhist documentary record and to the canonical zhìguài materials of Chinese Buddhism).
5. The objection that the bodhisattva path is unrealistically demanding (response: the path is graduated and accommodates different levels of practitioner).
6. — 10. Additional specific doctrinal-philosophical objections, each answered with extensive scholastic apparatus.

The work is one of the principal documents of late-7th-c. Tang Buddhist apology, and is unique among the major Tang apologetic texts in being specifically designed to answer secular-Confucian objections rather than the Buddhist-Daoist polemical focus of KR6r0142-KR6r0143 Fǎlín. It anticipates the Sòng Buddhist-Confucian apologetic synthesis (cf. KR6r0147 Hùfǎ lùn, KR6r0148 Tánjīn wénjí) by some four centuries.

Translations and research

• Stanley Weinstein, Buddhism under the T’ang — uses the Shí-mén biàn-huò lùn in the broader treatment of Tang apologetics.
• Thomas Jülch, Apologetik und Polemik im Buddhismus Chinas (Wiesbaden, 2014).
• 牧田諦亮 and other Japanese-language treatments of Tang Buddhist apologetics.

Links

• CBETA: T52n2111