Zhēnyán sānmì xiūxíng wèndá 眞言三密修行問答
Question-and-Answer on the Cultivation of the Three Secret Activities of the Mantra by 覺鑁 (撰)
About the work
A single-fascicle doctrinal-meditation manual in question-and-answer form by 覺鑁 Kakuban (1095–1144) on the three-secret cultivation (三密修行 sanmitsu shugyō) — the central Shingon meditation practice in which the practitioner’s body, speech, and mind are aligned with the body-mystery, speech-mystery, and mind-mystery of the Buddha (mudrā, mantra, samādhi).
Abstract
Opening question: “How is the three-secret cultivation practice-aspect of the mantra practitioner?” Answer: “If the mantra-practitioner wishes to cultivate the three-secrets of his root-deity (本尊), he must first know the true-aspect (實相) of the three-secrets. If he is not in accord with the true-aspect, the three-activities and ten-thousand-practices are all empty-aspect and unreal.” Kakuban cites the Mahāvairocana-sūtra Commentary fasc. 10 “Worldly-Accomplishment Chapter” (世間成就品): “He must achieve syllable-by-syllable correspondence (字字相應), line-by-line correspondence (句句相應); thus he forms the heart-imagination of recitation, well-abiding in the one-lakṣa cultivation. The ‘one-lakṣa’ (一洛叉) is, in the shallow gloss, simply ‘one hundred-thousand’; in the secret-gloss it is a coded-word — a Sanskrit-idiomatic ‘one-vision’ (一見) meaning. Make the mind abide in the syllable-and-line true-aspect, in a single-vision-single-condition undisturbed and undispersed — that is what is meant by ‘abiding-in-one-vision.’ This is the ‘one-lakṣa’ meaning. If you abide in one condition, then in the mind various measureless and various images-states may arise into manifest disturbance — but do not seize their image-and-aspect; only contemplate that they themselves are the pure bodhicitta. If you cultivate not thus, then though you should recite for a hundred years and complete ten-million lakṣas, still you would not attain accomplishment — how much less one!”
Doctrinal structure: the work develops a regression of fundamental questions and answers — each successive answer probed by a deeper question:
- What is the true-aspect of the three-secrets? → the pure bodhicitta.
- What is the foundation of the pure bodhicitta? → the originally-eternal Dharma-body of Mahāvairocana, the heart-ground of the Dharma-Dhātu.
- Mahāvairocana pervades the dharma-realm in his complete-body; yet the ten realms have ten different aspects of nature-substance-function and good-evil — how then is he called pure bodhicitta and called true-aspect? → though pervading the dharma-realm, all dharmas are originally Mahāvairocana’s complete-body. The deluded fix on good-evil natures-and-aspects; the awakened see all as equal.
Significance: a foundational Kakuban text on the three-secret cultivation doctrine, central to Shingon meditative practice. The work shows the characteristic Kakuban method of citation-and-gloss with extensive interlinear kuden expansion.
Translations and research
- No substantial Western-language translation located.
- van der Veere, Henny, A Study into the Thought of Kōgyō Daishi Kakuban (2000).
- For the sanmitsu shugyō doctrine see Yamasaki, Taikō, Shingon: Japanese Esoteric Buddhism (1988); Snodgrass, Adrian, The Matrix and Diamond World Mandalas in Shingon Buddhism, New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan, 1988.
Links
- CBETA: T79n2525