Dōngdàsì shòujiè fāngguǐ 東大寺受戒方軌
Procedures for Receiving the Precepts at Tōdaiji by 法進 (撰)
About the work
A single-fascicle 8th-century Tōdaiji ordination procedure by Faxin 法進 (Jp. Hōshin; 709–778), the first ordination master (shoshi kaiwajō 最初戒和上) at the Tōdaiji Kaidan-in 戒檀院 and disciple of Jianzhen 鑑真. The work is the earliest surviving Japanese ordination manual and the foundational document of the Japanese kaidan (ordination platform) tradition — written by the Chinese monk who personally established the ordination platform at Tōdaiji in 754 CE.
Abstract
Authorship and dating: The header identifies the author as “Tang Daisōzu (Tang court [Greater Sōzu] of the [Lesser-Senior] rank), Faxin’s procedure” (唐大僧都法進式). Faxin (709–778; DILA A000728) was a Tang monk of Shēnzhōu 申州 (modern Henan); he travelled from China to Japan in Tenpyōshōhō 6 = 754 as part of the Jianzhen mission and remained as the first ordination master at the new Tōdaiji platform. He died in Japan in 778. notBefore = 754, notAfter = 778 is exact.
The work is structured in ten chapters: (1) the initial procedure — including the dining-hall procedure; (2) the śrāmaṇera ordination chapter; (3) the lecture on the Sūtra of Bequeathed Teachings (the Yí-jiào jīng 遺教經) chapter; (4) the inviting of the three masters and seven witnesses chapter; (5) the formal-bestowal-of-the-great-precepts procedure — including the platform-entry procedure; (6) the explanation-of-characteristics teaching chapter — including the six recollections and five contemplations methods; (7) the nuns’-ordination procedure; (8) the nuns’ precept-explanation chapter; (9) the inviting of the Dharma-explaining master chapter; (10) the inviting of the ācārya chapter. The last two are common to both monks and nuns.
Doctrinal-procedural content: the text is in essence a liturgical manual detailing each step of the Tōdaiji upasampadā ceremony. Chapter 1 specifies the timing (preceded by a temple-wide notice; the bettō of Tōdaiji is summoned together with the 威儀師 iigi-shi and the 省寮使 of the State Buddhist Affairs Bureau); chapter 5 contains the actual formula of the bestowal of the bhikṣu precepts (“formal-bestowal of the great precepts via a one-statement-three-karman procedure”). The closing chapter records the verses of receiving and returning the ordination tokens (chóu 籌, the wooden tally-tickets that were physically passed during ordination): “The diamond-unobstructed liberation token, hard to obtain and hard to encounter as the present fruit; I now receive it crowning my head with joy; may all sentient beings likewise.”
The work is the unique witness to the 8th-century Sino-Japanese ordination tradition at Tōdaiji and the model for all later medieval Japanese kaidan manuals.
Translations and research
- Paul Groner, Saichō: The Establishment of the Japanese Tendai School (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2000) — discusses the Tōdaiji kaidan tradition and the Faxin manual as background.
- Heiko Aoyama 青山博 and the modern Japanese Buddhist-ordination scholarship treat the work as the foundational document.
- Mochizuki, Bukkyō daijiten, s.v. Hōshin 法進 and Tōdaiji jukai hōki 東大寺受戒方軌.
Other points of interest
The work is the oldest surviving Japanese Buddhist liturgical manual in the Taishō canon (along with the Shōmangyō gisho attributed to Shōtoku, which is doctrinal rather than liturgical). Its preservation testifies to the continuity of the Tōdaiji ordination tradition from the 8th century through to the medieval period — and ultimately to the modern Tōshōdai-ji custodianship of the Jianzhen lineage’s documentary heritage.