Dàrìjīng gòngyǎng chísòng bùtóng 大日經供養持誦不同
Variant Procedures for Worship and Recitation in the Mahāvairocana-sūtra by 安然 (撰)
About the work
A seven-fascicle systematic catalogue of the variant ritual procedures for worship and mantra-recitation derived from the Mahāvairocanasūtra (Dàrì jīng 大日經 = KR6j0001, T18n0848), compiled by Annen 安然 (841–c.915). The work documents six distinct ritual schemes that can be extracted from various chapters of the Mahāvairocanasūtra, providing the Taimitsu practitioner with a complete catalogue of canonical practice-variants.
Abstract
Authorship. Annen. Date. Post-876 to pre-915.
The opening section sets out the work’s framework: “In the various chapters of the sūtra there are six worship-procedures, prior and subsequent supplementing each other. I now briefly extract them. The first is the Seven-Day Practice-Method for the Performance of the Consecration at the Great-Compassion-Garbha Excellent-Assembly Altar; the second is the Six-Day Practice-Method.*”
The work then proceeds through detailed exposition of each of the six ritual procedures:
- The Seven-Day Practice-Method for consecration at the Great-Compassion-Garbha altar — drawn from the Mandala-with-Conditions-Mantra Chapter (出入漫荼羅具縁眞言法品) and the Wheel-of-Letters Transformation Chapter (轉字輪品).
- The Six-Day Practice-Method — a slightly abbreviated variant. 3-6. Further variants drawn from other chapters of the Mahāvairocana-sūtra, including the mantra-section daily practice, the continuous recitation cikīrṣā, the post-attainment confirmation rites, and the abridged recitation for special-circumstance practice.
Each procedure is documented in comparative format: Annen lists the canonical mudra, mantra, and meditation for each station of the ritual, noting where the Mahāvairocanasūtra differs from the Guhya-tantra (Qúxī jīng 瞿醯經) or from the supplementary commentaries (Yi-xíng’s Yìshì 義釋 / Shù 疏 — see KR6j0007 for the latter). The work is therefore both a procedural catalogue and a comparative philology of the Mahāvairocanasūtra ritual sections.
The work is the most systematic Taimitsu exposition of the Mahāvairocanasūtra ritual variants and the canonical Hiei-zan reference for the practitioner’s selection among the procedure-options.
Translations and research
- No complete Western-language translation located.
- Misaki Ryōshū 三崎良周, Taimitsu no kenkyū (Tokyo: Sōbunsha, 1988).
- Mizukami Fumiyoshi 水上文義, Annen no taimitsu shisō (Hōzōkan, 2008).
- Ronald M. Davidson, Indian Esoteric Buddhism: A Social History of the Tantric Movement (New York: Columbia University Press, 2002), for the Mahāvairocana-sūtra’s ritual setting.
Other points of interest
The seven-fascicle scope and the careful comparative-philological method mark this as one of Annen’s most mature scholarly works. The Mahāvairocanasūtra itself is notoriously difficult to use as a practitioner’s manual because its ritual prescriptions are scattered across chapters and presuppose different ritual contexts; Annen’s compilation here resolves this difficulty by extracting and systematizing the procedures.