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西源徳芳和尚語録

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Text ID
KR6t0279
Date
1506–1719
Dynasty
日本

Xīyuán Défāng Héshàng yǔlù 西源徳芳和尚語録

Recorded Sayings of Reverend Tokuhō of Saigen[-in] by 禪傑 Tokuhō Zenketsu (語), 慧寛 Ekan (序)

About the work

A three-fascicle (plus appendix) Recorded Sayings collection of 禪傑 Tokuhō Zenketsu (1419–1506), one of the four principal dharma-heirs (Shihatsu 四派) of 宗深 Sekkō Sōshin and founder of the Saigen-in 西源院 sub-cloister at Myōshin-ji 妙心寺. Posthumous title Daijaku Jōshō Zenji 大寂常照禪師. The work is titled the Saigen Tokuhō Oshō yǔlù; the editorial-recovery story parallels KR6t0275–KR6t0278.

Abstract

The principal preface by the remote dharma-nephew Ekan 慧寛 (a “kō-mago-line elder”) of Myōshin-ji, dated Kyōhō 4 / 9 / 10 (享保己亥重陽翌旦 = 1719-10-22 NS), records the textual problem and the recovery:

“The great gem is not polished; the perfect text is not adorned. The Saigen recorded sayings of the Founder of one of the four streams of the True Dharma, Daijaku Jōshō Zenji [Tokuhō Zenketsu], are the polishing-without-polishing and the writing-without-writing. They were warmly received in their day. An old record [古記] says three fascicles circulated in the world. As the world changed and the patriarch passed, copying errors and lacunae crept in. His direct lineal heir, who dwells at Myōshin-ji and singly presides at the Great-Cloud-Peak now in office — Saigen Ryōkoku Reverend 西源梁谷和尚 — has spent recent years collating and consulting various sources. He recovered Honkō Kokushi’s 宗休 paper-robe broken-fragment [紙衣之斷簡, i.e. a manuscript copy Daikyū had personally annotated in Daikyū’s paper-cassock period], and a copy made personally by Sakuhen Hen Oshō 策彦和尚 (the Tenryū-ji eminent monk Sakuhen Shūryō 策彦周良, 1501–1579), to recover the original draft. Now [the text] is being put to the engraver to lengthen the dharma-life, and I have been asked to inscribe the front. After declining three times, I have given way and submitted to the imposition.”

This is the most explicit recovery-chronicle of any of the Shihatsu yulu in the Taishō: two specific manuscript sources are named — Daikyū Sōkyū’s annotated copy from the 1530s–1540s, and the great Gozan monk-diplomat Sakuhen Shūryō’s personal manuscript (Sakuhen was a recognized authority on late-Muromachi Zen documents).

The three-fascicle table of contents:

  • Fasc. 1: jōdō at Daitoku-ji 大徳寺 (Tokuhō’s Ryūhō-zan abbacy) and Zuisen-ji 瑞泉寺 (Owari), suiyǔ 垂語 (instructions), butsuji jō 佛事上 (memorial-rites — upper).
  • Fasc. 2: butsuji ge 佛事下, míng 銘 (inscriptions), xiàngzàn 像賛 (portrait-encomia).
  • Fasc. 3: xiàngsòng 像頌 (portrait-verses), dàohào 道號 (way-name bestowals), shū 疏 (memorials), a hòuxù 後序 afterword, shíyí 拾遺 gleanings, the imperial chokusho 勅書 (title-bestowal edict), and a zhuàn 傳 (biography).
  • Appendix (附錄): shū 疏 supplemental, jìwén 祭文 funerary essays.

The dating bracket runs from Tokuhō’s death (1506) to the editio princeps (1719).

Significance: this is the shortest and most narrowly preserved of the four Sekkō-heirs’ yulu in the Taishō, reflecting the smaller historical footprint of the Tokuhō sub-line compared with the Reiun-ha (Sōton), Shōrin-ha (Eichō), and Ryūsen-ha (Sōryū) sub-lines. Its principal value is documentary: the verbatim preservation of Tokuhō’s portrait-encomia and dàohào bestowals supplies prosopographical evidence on late-Muromachi monk-disciples otherwise undocumented.

Translations and research

No substantial Western-language secondary literature located. See the references for KR6t0275.

Other points of interest

The recovery-chronicle’s reference to Sakuhen Shūryō 策彦周良 (1501–1579) is one of the few attested Taishō Japanese yulu witnesses to the involvement of late-Muromachi Gozan-bungaku eminent monks in cross-temple yulu-collection: Sakuhen, twice a Kenmin envoy (1539, 1547) and a major Gozan poet, was clearly a focal node for circulating manuscript copies of Sengoku-period Zen texts.

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