Shìshì yàolǎn 釋氏要覽
Essentials of the Buddhist Order at a Glance by 道誠 (集)
About the work
A three-juan reference manual for monks newly entering the Order, compiled by Dào-chéng 道誠 (style Huì-wù dà-shī 慧悟大師), purple-robed śramaṇa of Yuè-lún Mountain 月輪山 in Qián-táng 錢塘 (modern Hángzhōu), in Tiānxǐ 天禧 3–4 of the Northern Sòng (1019–1020 CE). Twenty-seven piān organized in three juan covering everything a new monk needs to know — surnames and forms of address, residence, ordination, master–disciple relation, head-shaving, monastic robes, the vinaya of the precepts, the noon meal, sutra-recitation, and so on. The work is preserved in the Taishō canon as T54 no. 2127.
Prefaces
Two prefaces are preserved at the head of the text.
(1) A dedicatory preface by the lay patron Cuī Yùlín 崔育林 (style Yújí 愚極), serving as Xuāndéláng 宣德郎, acting Shàngshū túntián yuánwàiláng 尚書屯田員外郎, and bearing the honorary military rank Shàngqīngchē dūwèi 上輕車都尉. Cuī is described as gōngdé zhǔ Xiānlín zhùshān tánzhǔ 功德主仙林住山壇主 — patron-of-merit and platform-master in residence on Xiānlín. His preface (in paraphrase):
Of old our Buddha — sublime and right in the three bodies, perfectly accomplishing the four wisdoms — verified himself without entering nirvāṇa and worked the upāya of upakāya to ferry across people. He spread out the ten thousand dharmas and pointed to the true marginal limit; he guided and taught the various natures and made them apprehend the fundamental emptiness. He set up the gate of samādhi, ornamented the marks of the complete-and-sufficient one, exhausted the conditioned and made the assembly return to the unborn forbearance. The lineage gathers in the sea of awakening, truly multiplying the pure assembly. As for the way down to the demonstration of parinirvāṇa, the gathered transmission of his words: the jīng and lùn are the founding-narrative, the jiào-fǎ are the manifestation. … Now Master Chéng-gōng [Dào-chéng] is broadly rich in what he has heard; he has stayed his intent on the gift of dharma, and supported by Buddha’s authoritative power, has gathered these essentials. Of “knowledge” or “wisdom” — who would say he is not bright? In the time of the August Sòng, Tiānxǐ 4 (1020), the Lǐ-qiū [literary 8th month] jì-wàng (the day after the full moon, i.e. the 16th), this preface is written and presented.
(2) A self-postface by Dàochéng, immediately following the byline at the head of juan 1. In paraphrase:
Dàochéng, having committed himself to lecturing in the capital monastery, returned east to his old place. At first he stayed at the Lónghuá Chán Bureau 龍華禪府 and afterwards resided at the Yuèlún hermitage 月輪蘭若. For ten intervening years he cut off all outside affairs and, day after day as a regular practice, only read through the canon — to repay an old vow. But when faced with the writing the meaning was hidden — like a thirsty fellow drinking from the river: he can fill his belly, but he does not know its depth or breadth. Or where he saw matters that one who has left the household ought to know, he conveniently noted them down. Reaching the autumn of Tiānxǐ 3 (1019):
The August Emperor [Zhēnzōng] extended the wide grace of his enlightened light, universally ordaining all the children-of-conduct of our world. On account of this, I sorted my texts together by category, with additions from the various house traditions’ zhuànjì and shūshū jiéwén, dividing them into 27 piān and analyzing them into three juan, titling it Shìshì yàolǎn. It is to take pity on those who are first entering the dharma-gate — all that they do not yet know. If one studies this canonical book and stores its words in the spiritual treasury, one will for life avoid the reproach of “stealing the robes” [improper wearing of monastic vestments]. Or for the broadly-talented and great-learned — how could the meanness of “Chéng” cause one to set aside the words of the sage? — and so it goes.
The 1019 amnesty referenced is the great empire-wide ordination amnesty of Tiānxǐ 3 issued by Zhēnzōng 真宗, which permitted all already-living tóngxíng 童行 (novice attendants in monastic retinues) to take full ordination. This event provided both the social occasion (a sudden surge of new ordinands needing instruction) and the immediate composition-trigger for the Shìshì yàolǎn.
Abstract
Authorship and dating are unambiguously fixed by the byline (賜紫沙門釋道誠集) and the two prefaces. The compilation work began at Yuèlúnshān during Dàochéng’s ten-year retreat (probably ca. 1009–1019, after his “罷講返鄉” — return from imperial-temple lecturing in Biànjīng 汴京 to his Qiántáng homeland) and was finalized in response to the Tiānxǐ 3 (1019) ordination amnesty, with the gentry preface added in Tiānxǐ 4 (1020). notBefore = 1019, notAfter = 1020. Catalog dynasty 宋.
Dàochéng 道誠 (DILA A001542; fómíng Huìwù dàshī 慧悟大師; native of Qiántáng) is otherwise known as the author of a now-standard annotated edition of Wáng Bó’s 王勃 Shìjiā rúlái chéngdào jì 釋迦如來成道記 (X1509, 釋迦如來成道記註, two juan). The Sòng Fózǔ tǒngjì 佛祖統紀, j. 44, mentions him among the lecturers active in Xiánpíng 咸平 / Jǐngdé 景德 (998–1007) at the imperial-monastery lecture circuit. Two further works attributed to him — the Ní méngqiú 尼蒙求 (one juan) and Shìshì xūzhī 釋氏須知 (three juan) — are listed as lost.
The 27 piān are: 姓氏, 稱謂, 居處, 出家, 師資, 剃髮, 法衣, 戒法, 中食, and continuing through xíngbì 行儀 (deportment), zhāi 齋 (purificatory feast), kěshì 課誦 (recitation), xíngfú 行福 (acts of merit), biànmóu 辨謀 (decisions), jièyǔ 戒語 (precepts of speech), and others. Each piān draws together canonical passages, vinaya citations, and lexical glosses, presenting them in a readable and explicitly didactic form for new entrants. The framing rationale, citing the Huáyánjīng’s “ten kinds of bodhisattva knowledge”, is given in the piānmù 篇目 introduction.
The work circulates throughout East Asia as the standard pre-modern Chinese-Buddhist initiate’s manual. Its closest functional parallel within the canon is the much later Shìmén guījìng yí 釋門歸敬儀 of Dàoxuān (T1896) on the vinaya side, but the Shìshì yàolǎn is broader and more lexicographic.
Translations and research
No substantial dedicated Western-language secondary literature located. Standard Sinophone references:
- Bǎi Huà-wén 白化文, Hàn-huà fó-jiào yǔ fó-sì 漢化佛教與佛寺 (Běi-jīng: Běi-jīng Chū-bǎn-shè, 1989), repeatedly cites the Shì-shì yào-lǎn as a primary witness for Sòng-period sinicized Buddhist ritual practice and monastic vocabulary.
- Yáng Cèng-wén 楊曾文, Sòng-Yuán chán-zōng shǐ 宋元禪宗史 (Zhōng-guó Shè-huì-kē-xué Chū-bǎn-shè, 2006), discusses the work’s transmission within the Northern Sòng monastic-reform context.
- The Foguang dictionary entry (Fó-guāng dà cí-diǎn 佛光大辭典, p. 5939.2) is the standard summary.
Other points of interest
The two-preface arrangement — gentry sponsor first, monastic compiler second — is the pattern of the Northern Sòng officially-printed Buddhist book, and the work belongs at the historical inflection point at which Buddhist canon-printing in Sòng China shifted from the imperial-monastery model to the gentry-patronized commercial-printing model that would dominate in the South. Cuī Yùlín’s preface, written in his official-cum-Buddhist dual capacity (mid-rank Sòng court official + Xiānlín mountain platform-master), is itself a primary witness to the early-Sòng pattern of literati-monk dual identity that would later become characteristic of the jūshì 居士 movement.
Links
- DILA authority: A001542 (道誠)
- CBETA: T54n2127
- Companion work by author: Shìjiā rúlái chéngdào jì zhù 釋迦如來成道記註 (X1509)