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佛頂國師語録

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Text ID
KR6t0271
Date
1641–1718
Dynasty
日本

Fódǐng Guóshī yǔlù 佛頂國師語録

Recorded Sayings of the Buddha-Crown National Master by 文守 Daibai Bunshu (語), 文光 Bunkō (重編)

About the work

A five-fascicle (plus kanshu prefatory volume) Recorded Sayings collection of 文守 Daibai Bunshu (1608–1646), founder (開山) of Hōjō-ji 法常寺 at Mount Daibai-zan 大梅山 in Tanba 丹波 and of Reigen-ji 靈源寺 at Mount Seiryō-zan 清涼山 in north Kyoto. Posthumous title Jōe Myōkō Butchō Kokushi 定慧明光佛頂國師 — hence the work’s title — bestowed by Emperor Reigen 靈元天皇 in Enpō 6 / 1678-03-19, 32 years after Bunshu’s death, at the urging of his great patron Retired Emperor Go-Mizunoo 後水尾上皇 (1596–1680). The Taishō recension is the Kyōhō 3 / 1718 edition compiled by Bunshu’s dharma-grandson Bunkō 文光 (the jūhen 重編 “second editing”), with an imperial preface (勅序) by Emperor Nakamikado 中御門天皇 dated Kyōhō 3 / 8 / 19 (1718-09-13 NS).

Abstract

Bunshu was a dharma-heir of 東寔 Gudō Tōshoku 愚堂東寔 (1577–1661), the great Myōshin-ji-line restorer of early-Edo Rinzai-Zen. Born Keichō 13 / 2 / 27 (1608-04-12 NS), tonsured young, he founded Hōjō-ji at Daibai-zan in Tanba in Kan’ei 18 / 1641 (the lower date-bound) under the patronage of Retired Emperor Go-Mizunoo. The patron was the dominant feature of Bunshu’s career: Go-Mizunoo bestowed an imperial residence-name plaque, sent court physicians during Bunshu’s illnesses, donated relics including a Śākyamuni-Kāśyapa-Ānanda triad and an imperial inkstone, and personally arranged for Bunshu’s daughter-disciple Princess Bunchi 文智女王 (1619–1697; tonsure-name Daitsū 大通) to receive the tonsure at Bunshu’s hand. Imperial poems by Go-Mizunoo on themes Bunshu set were exchanged in matched pairs.

The recorded sayings preserve all this in detail — the full catalogue:

  • Kanshu 卷首: imperial preface by Emperor Nakamikado (Kyōhō 3 / 8 / 19 = 1718-09-13).
  • Fasc. 1: jishū 示衆 (instructions to the assembly), fushaku 普説 (general talks).
  • Fasc. 2: fa-yǔ 法語, shomon 書問 (question-letters).
  • Fasc. 3: sònggǔ 頌古, zàn 賛, bukushi 佛事 (Buddha-rites).
  • Fasc. 4: xù 序, jì 記, míng 銘, shuō 説, bá 跋, bǎng 榜, biàn 辨, jǐngcè 警策, jìwén 祭文, shījì zátǐ (mixed verse forms — 排律, 五言律, 七言律, 五言絶).
  • Fasc. 5: shījì 七言絶, plus nenpyō 年譜 (chronological biography) and the Hatsutō meimei 髮塔銘 (hair-relic-pagoda inscription) composed by Prince Shōkaku 正覺親王 of Kōfuku-ji 興福寺 in Nara — the latter the principal source for Bunshu’s biography.

The hair-relic inscription confirms Bunshu’s death-age as 39 with 20 summer-retreats. It also names his principal heirs: Sekitei Ganjo 石鼎頑如 of Setsugan-ji 雪巖寺, the lay-disciple Hōun-in Taiō Sankō Daikoji 法雲院泰翁山公大居士 (= the courtier Konoe Iezane?), and a sub-line through Funkō 明因, who taught Zen’gan Shinkyū 禪岩心 of Hōjō-ji and Kōin Settsu 功隱拙 of Reigen-ji. The compiler Bunkō was a fourth-generation gensun 玄孫 in this line.

The dating bracket runs from the founding of Hōjō-ji (1641) on the low side to the editio princeps prepared by Bunkō and prefaced by Emperor Nakamikado (1718) on the high side. The work is one of two early-Edo Myōshin-ji-line yulu in the Taishō with explicit imperial-court patronage as its institutional context (the other being the contemporary Daikan Seki of Takuan); together they document the unusual intimacy between Go-Mizunoo’s circle and the Myōshin-ji Rinzai establishment in the mid-seventeenth century.

Translations and research

No substantial Western-language secondary literature located. For the Go-Mizunoo / Bunshu / Bunchi nexus, see Karen Gerhart, The Eyes of Power: Art and Early Tokugawa Authority (Univ. of Hawai’i Press, 1999), ch. 5; Tsuji Zennosuke 辻善之助, Nihon bukkyō-shi 日本仏教史, vol. 8 (Iwanami, 1955), §V on the Myōshin-ji restoration; Funaoka Makoto 船岡誠, Nihon zenshū no seiritsu 日本禅宗の成立 (Yoshikawa Kōbunkan, 1987).

Other points of interest

The text is one of the principal source-bases for the biography of Princess Bunchi 文智女王, daughter of Emperor Go-Mizunoo, who was tonsured by Bunshu and later founded the imperial-convent Enshō-ji 圓照寺 in Yamato. The Reigen-ji and Hōjō-ji temples remain extant; Reigen-ji is famous as the site of the Reigen-ji yu-gake-byōbu 靈源寺湯掛屛風, a folding screen recording one of Go-Mizunoo’s bath-house visits with Bunshu in attendance.

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