Bócǎozǐ kǒujué 薄草子口決
Oral Transmission on the Thin-Grass Booklet by 頼瑜 (撰)
About the work
A massive twenty-one fascicle ritual oral-transmission record by 頼瑜 Raiyu (1226–1304) — by extent the largest of his Daigo Sanbō-in ritual-handbook series. The transmission was received at the Daigo-ji Hō’on-in beginning on Kōchō 2 / Jinjutsu 1 (1262), 1st month, 9th day (弘長二年壬戌正月九日) in the Sanbō-in Sho-ryū Henchi-in-fuhō (三寶院正流遍智院付法) lineage. The internal title gives 薄雙紙遍知院御記口決第一 (“Thin-Paper Booklets, Henchi-in Personal Record, Oral Transmission, First”).
Abstract
Dating: explicit colophon — Kōchō 2 (1262), 1st month, 9th day — places the transmission to Raiyu (age 37) at the Daigo-ji Hō’on-in. The twenty-one fascicles were compiled over the subsequent years; Raiyu’s death in 1304 sets the latest possible terminus.
Etymology of the title (master’s oral-instruction): “In ancient times these were called origami (folded papers). On the folded-papers were noted the seed-syllables, three-sacred-deities, mudrās and mantras for the transmissions. Recently, however, the late Sōjō [Henchi-in Sōjō] bound the folded-papers together; following the usage he wrote down the deity-method-citations, dedicating a separate booklet for each deity to serve as the transmission-master copy. These are then called usu-zōshi (thin booklets) — that is this present work.”
Method: a comprehensive ritual-handbook organized deity-by-deity. Each fascicle treats a distinct honzon (root-deity) of Shingon ritual practice — Acalanātha, Mahāvairocana, the Five Wisdom Buddhas, the various Vidyārāja (明王), the Eight Great Bodhisattvas, the Twelve Devas, etc. — with the full ritual-sequence (mudrā, mantra, visualisation, honzon iconography, ritual-purpose) and the corresponding oral-instructions of the master.
Transmission protocol: the opening Q&A — “What is the transmission-procedure?” — describes the rite by which the master-and-disciple, contemplating respectively Mahāvairocana and Vajrasattva, mutually visualise each other in the seed-syllable [A] and [Vaṃ] at the heart, in imitation of the iron-stūpa transmission of the dharma.
Significance: the most extensive of Raiyu’s late-Kamakura Shingon ritual-scholastic compilations and a principal documentary source for the Daigo Sanbō-in Henchi-in transmission-lineage.
Translations and research
- No substantial Western-language translation located.
- For the Sanbō-in Henchi-in transmission lineage: Kushida Ryōkō, Zoku Shingon Mikkyō seiritsu katei no kenkyū (1979).
Links
- CBETA: T79n2535