Jīngāngjīng gǎnyìng fēnlèi jíyào 金剛經感應分類輯要
Selected Essentials of [Tales of] Sympathetic Response to the Diamond Sūtra, Classified by Type
compiled by 王澤泩 (Wáng Zéshēng / Guīyī jūshì 歸一居士 / Jùchuān 巨川, fl. 1700–1740, 編集)
About the work
A 1-juan mid-Qīng Diamond Sūtra miracle-tale anthology, compiled by the Shāndōng lay-Buddhist scholar Wáng Zéshēng 王澤泩 (hào Guīyī jūshì 歸一居士, Jùchuān 巨川) of Pénglái 蓬萊. Dated by the author’s own preface to 乾隆二十六年二月八日 = 1761.3.13. The work is conceived as a typological re-organisation of the Diamond Sūtra miracle-tradition: where the prior anthologies (notably KR6r0180 Chíyàn jì) are organised chronologically, Wáng’s compilation arranges 50 selected tales under 18 thematic categories — anticipating the typological logic of modern reference works while drawing on the same Tang-Sòng-Yuán-Míng-Qīng source-base. The compilation is the typologically most sophisticated of the late-imperial Diamond Sūtra miracle-anthologies. Transmitted in the Xùzàngjīng as X1636.
Prefaces
The author’s preface (Jīn-gāng jīng gǎn-yìng gù-shì fēn-lèi jí-yào xù), dated 乾隆二十六年二月八日 = March 1761, opens: “The Diamond Sūtra is the orthodox principle of the Mahāyāna. As the Tathāgata says: All the various Buddhas, and the Dharma of anuttarā samyak-saṃbodhi of the various Buddhas, all proceed from this sūtra. This sūtra is the marrow of the holy teaching; its merit is inconceivable. Those who recite it can illuminate and break through the various forms, see clear to the fount of [their] nature, and pass straight to the further shore of nirvāṇa — how could it be merely [a matter of] all sorts of meritorious karmic-reward and unfailing sympathetic response? Yet, while [we] make clear his Way without calculating his merit, those of sharp faculties and superior understanding may indeed accomplish this. But those of middle and lower [faculties], if they do not see merit-reward, their faith-mind is not firm — how shall we make them delight in recitation without weariness? Hence I, having previously composed [my line-by-line] 句解, again [now] compile this Sympathetic-Response-by-Category compilation. The events recorded in ancient and modern accounts that are firmly documentable are no fewer than several thousand entries; to record them all would burden the reader and risk that the [reader] could not remember [them]. I have therefore selected the essentials — fifty entries — divided into eighteen categories, all such that as soon as there is sympathy, there is response, more swiftly than shadow and echo. Truly sufficient to convert the unfaithful and to inspire the heart of joyful recitation in others.”
The author identifies himself as Pénglái Wáng Zéshēng Jùchuānfù biānjí 蓬萊王澤泩巨川甫編集 (“compiled and edited by Wáng Zéshēng Jùchuānfù of Pénglái”).
Abstract
The work consists of 50 selected miracle-tales organised into 18 thematic categories (shíbā lèi 十八類). The categorisation supplies a systematic typology of Diamond Sūtra responses, refining and extending Mèng Xiànzhōng’s Tang-period 6-category scheme (rescue, life-prolongation, etc.). Categories include: rescue from physical danger; restoration of health; protection in war; auspicious birth and rebirth; protection in childbirth; restoration of sight or hearing; underworld-court rescue; visions of the Buddha; auspicious death; karmic-rebirth correction; and others.
A representative case: a Kāngxī 5 = 1666 episode at Tiāntóngsì 天童寺, in which a Huáyán repentance-rite produced five-coloured manifestations on the mountain in confirmation of the Diamond Sūtra recitation. Other cases include accounts of late-Míng / early-Qīng identifiable persons drawn from the contemporary lay-Buddhist informant tradition.
The work is the most concise and pedagogically-focused of the late-imperial Diamond Sūtra miracle-anthologies, and its 18-category typological scheme has had lasting influence on the popular-Buddhist reception of the Diamond Sūtra tradition into the modern era. Wáng Zéshēng’s earlier 《金剛經句解易知》 Jīngāngjīng jùjiě yìzhī (the line-by-line commentary referenced in the preface) and the present companion compilation form a paired doctrinal-and-devotional pedagogical apparatus for lay Diamond Sūtra practice in the mid-Qīng.
Translations and research
- Cynthia Brokaw, The Ledgers of Merit and Demerit (Princeton: Princeton Univ. Press, 1991) — context for the mid-Qīng moral-bookkeeping and miracle-tale literature.
- 廖肇亨, 〈清代居士佛教研究〉 (various essays) — context for Wáng Zé-shēng in the mid-Qīng lay-Buddhist scholarly milieu.
- 鄭阿財, 《敦煌佛教靈驗記研究》(Táiběi: Xīn-wén-fēng, 2010) — broader context of the genre.
- No dedicated monographic study of the present work has been located.
Other points of interest
The work’s explicit pedagogical purpose — directed at “those of middle and lower faculties, [whose] faith-mind is not firm” — and its concise, classified format have made it the most widely-circulated of the late-imperial Diamond Sūtra miracle-anthologies in modern Chinese-Buddhist popular publishing. The 18-category scheme is reproduced in many modern Diamond-Sūtra devotional handbooks.
Links
- CBETA: X87n1636