Xíngfǎ gānyè chāo 行法肝葉鈔
Compendium of the Heart-and-Leaf [Essentials] of Ritual Practice by 道範 (記)
About the work
A three-fascicle Shingon ritual-practice manual by Dōhan 道範 (1184–1252), the great Kamakura-period Kōyasan master who was famously exiled to Sanuki in his late years. The work is precisely dated by its closing colophon: composed in Hōji 2 (= 1248), 2nd month, 21st day, at the grass-thatched hermitage in the Birthplace of the Great Master at Zentsū-ji 善通寺 in Sanuki — i.e. while Dōhan was in his Shikoku exile. He was 65 years old (he records his “tear-wiping seventy-aged eyes”, roughly accurate). notBefore = notAfter = 1248 is exact.
Abstract
Authorship and dating: the colophon is unusually explicit and personal. It reads: “Hōji 2, 2nd month, 21st day. Composed at the grass-thatched hermitage in the Birthplace of the Great Master at Zentsū-ji. This is at the encouragement of the Sage of the Mitani Valley, hastily noted following the intentions of the various oral decisions; not having my reference books with me, I cannot give the matter the detail it deserves. If later wise readers see this, they may revise it. I have undertaken this solely for the sake of receiving compassionate guidance toward rebirth, in order to wipe my full seventy-aged eyes — by my own hand.” (寶治二年二月二十一日。於善通寺大師御誕生所之草菴抄記之…阿闍梨道範記之). The colophon thus places the work within Dōhan’s Sanuki exile, which is itself a major event in 13th-century Shingon history.
Doctrinal content: the work opens with the dais-construction procedure (壇場莊嚴事), grounded in the five-family ritual-implements as embodiments of the five Buddha-families: the four-corner vajra-pillars are the four-quarter Vajra-family; the single-pronged vajra-pestle-tipped pillars represent the Vajra-family also; the five-coloured lotuses represent the Lotus-family — the five colours symbolizing the five-family Wisdom-Life Span (五部惠命), i.e. Aparimitāyus (Amitābha); citing the Yoga-bead Sūtra (“the bead-cord is the Avalokiteśvara”); the Great Sun Sūtra Commentary: “because the realms of sentient beings are inexhaustible, the methods of the Buddhas are also without end — hence the name Aparimitāyus (Infinite Lifespan)”; this is the Aparimitāyus in the upāya mode. The four jewel-jars represent the Ratna-family — the jewel-jar abhiṣeka being the southern-direction practice.
The body of the work proceeds through the full ritual-practice sequence, with Dōhan’s characteristic emphasis on the unity of contemplative-meditative content and outward-ritual form. The work closes with the one-thousand-time mudrā-and-mantra recitation at all times contemplation.
The text is a precious document of mid-13th-century Kōyasan Shingon as practiced in exile — and a moving record of one of the great medieval Shingon masters in his last years.
Translations and research
- No substantial Western-language secondary literature located.
- Dōhan and his Sanuki exile are treated in Japanese scholarship: Mikkyō daijiten s.v. Dōhan; Kōyasan-shi.
- George Tanabe, Myōe the Dreamkeeper (1992), treats the broader landscape of Kamakura Shingon scholasticism in which Dōhan operated.