聞分館君 Ask BunKanKun

虎穴録

4 min read

Text ID
KR6t0276
Date
1500–1721
Dynasty
日本

Hǔxué lù 虎穴録

Tiger-Cave Record by 宗頓 Gokei Sōton (語), 麟祥通方 Rinshō Tsūbō (編)

About the work

A two-fascicle Recorded Sayings collection of 宗頓 Gokei Sōton (1416–1500), one of the four principal dharma-heirs (Shihatsu 四派) of 宗深 Sekkō Sōshin and founder of the Reiun-ha 靈雲派 sub-lineage of Myōshin-ji 妙心寺. Posthumous title Daikō Shinshū Zenji 大興心宗禪師, bestowed by Emperor Go-Tsuchimikado 後土御門天皇 in Meiō 6 / 5 / 24 (1497-06-23 NS), three years before Sōton’s death — the original imperial edict 勅書 is preserved in the present text. The title Tiger-Cave Record (Kogetsu-roku 虎穴録) is a Zen idiom: the master’s teaching-place is the lair where dragons and tigers are born — only those who dare enter the tiger’s mouth can obtain the tiger-cub.

Abstract

The text was edited by Rinshō Tsūbō 麟祥通方, eight-generation dharma-descendant in the Reiun-ha sub-lineage, with a preface by Nyōgen 如幻 of Myōshin-ji dated Kyōhō 6 / 2 (享保第六辛丑歳仲春 = 1721-02 / -03 NS). Nyōgen’s preface explicitly identifies the work as a corrective: “Our remote patriarch Reverend Daikō Shinshū Zenji personally received the seal of the venerable [Sekkō Sōshin] of Heibai-in. He newly founded Zuiryū-ji 瑞龍 at Mount Kinpō-zan 金寳山 in Mino. He further taught at Daitoku-ji, Myōshin-ji, and Zuisen-ji. In each place he raised up the sōnshū lineage straightforwardly — thunder roared and lightning-staves flashed. However, the yǔlù that survive are wrongly arranged and badly muddled. The dharma-master Gounnyū Jū-shi 鰲雲什和尚 of Zuiryū-ji laboured to correct them; the Rinshō Tsūbō-shinshi-no-shi Mahoroba 麟祥通方眞公 is his true heir, and wishing to preserve [the text] at the present hermitage to repay the kindness of the remote patriarch … has prepared this edition.”

The text preserves two principal documents with their full text:

  • The Go-Tsuchimikado-in jundenju benrinshi 後土御門院準十刹便綸旨 dated Bunmei 2 / 3 / 14 (1470-04-16 NS), conferring on Zuiryū-ji at Mount Kinpō-zan in Mino the status of junjissatsu 準十刹 (deputy-decasterion temple) under Daitoku-ji and the right to perform the bansai-no-hōzo ten-thousand-year imperial-blessing rite.
  • The tokushi kikaku chokusho 特賜徽號勅書 dated Meiō 6 / 5 / 24 (1497-06-23 NS), the title-conferral edict — written in a strikingly Buddhist literary register: “The mountain bears the gold-treasure, the sun illuminates the purple phoenix-seal; on muddy ground a bowl-flower arises, the temple senses the green-dragon’s omen. … [The Reverend Gokei] is the Western Heaven Bhikṣu’s old custom; Buddha-illness and patriarch-illness have both healed in him. The vision-eye is already penetrating, the human-view and self-view are suddenly cut off. Sharpening the secret-essence-blade, he opens to the moon-on-the-peak-of Kanzan, the true-line undropping; sipping the waves on the left-bank of Sekkō … I now confer upon him the title Daikō Shinshū Zenji.”

A third document, an imperial shinkan (宸翰) by the reigning emperor at the time of printing (i.e. Emperor Nakamikado 中御門天皇), dated 1721, is included as a re-confirmation. The dating bracket runs from Sōton’s death (1500) to the editio princeps (1721).

The contents proper are the standard Myōshin-ji yulu sections (jōdō, fa-yǔ, sònggǔ, jìsòng, nenkō) organized by the master’s successive abbacies at Zuiryū-ji, Daitoku-ji, Myōshin-ji, and Zuisen-ji.

Translations and research

No substantial Western-language secondary literature located. See the references for KR6t0275; specifically for the Reiun-ha sub-line, Ogisu Jundō 荻須純道, Myōshinji-shi 妙心寺史 (Myōshinji honjo, 1975), §IV.

Other points of interest

The 1470 junjissatsu edict for Zuiryū-ji is one of the rare survivals of a deputy-decasterion temple-charter in pre-Sengoku Mino, and is regularly cited as evidence in studies of the Muromachi gozan-jissatsu temple-administration system. The 1497 imperial title-edict for Gokei is unusually flowery — much longer than the typical gakuden — and is studied as a high-water-mark of imperial-court Buddhist literary style in the Higashiyama era.

Graph View

Backlinks