Yìyún Héshàng yǔlù 義雲和尚語録
Recorded Sayings of Reverend Gi’un by 義雲 Gi’un (語), 卍山 Manzan Dōhaku (序)
About the work
A two-fascicle Recorded Sayings collection of 義雲 Gi’un (1253–1333), fifth-generation patriarch of Eihei-ji 永平寺 and the principal architect of the post-sandai sōron restoration of the Eihei-line of Japanese Sōtō-Zen. The Taishō recension is the Shōtoku 5 / 1715 editio princeps prepared by Manzan Dōhaku 卍山道白 (1636–1715), the great late-17th-century Sōtō reformer, with his preface dated Shōtoku 5 / 6 (正徳乙未季夏祥旦 = 1715-07) “written at the Takagamine grass-cottage in north Kyoto”. Hōkei-ji 寶慶寺 (Gi’un’s first abbacy in Echizen) was the institutional source of the manuscript material.
Abstract
Manzan’s preface frames the work theoretically:
“Some say: When the Buddha raised the flower and Mahākāśyapa subtly smiled, the true lineage was silently disclosed; when facing the wall standing in the snow, the mystic intent was secretly verified. The Way of words is cut off, the mind’s progress is extinguished. The only thing is: the latecomers do not maintain the original-portion; they drum their cinnabar-lips proclaiming Zen-and-Way. Therefore the true lineage and the mystic intent are almost about to be swept from the ground. Is this not lamentable? I respond: As described, certainly. But it cannot be said comprehensively. The patriarchal-essence is purely in subtle-awakening — it is not obliged to depend on words or silence. If indeed one arrives at the ground of subtle-awakening, both words and silence return together to the nature-source; there is fundamentally no two-fold quality. Long ago, the yellow-faced old fellow [the Buddha] delivered the entire Tripiṭaka — heaven, earth, the dragon-palaces, the ocean-realms; there is no place [his teaching] did not circulate. Yet at the close, he himself declared: In forty-some years I have never spoken a single word. Again, our Eihei high-patriarch [Dōgen] said: The ‘way of words is cut off’ means all words; the ‘mind’s progress is extinguished’ means all mind-progress. The Buddhas, patriarch by patriarch — what they personally said, with their personal mouths — is like eating honey: edges and centre are all sweet. Who would on the one taste falsely distinguish thick from thin?”
Manzan then introduces Gi’un:
“Zenji Gi’un is the direct heir of Jakuen [寂圓嫡子] — his vision-and-knowledge high in a single time, his Way-reputation thundering through a thousand antiquities. First he filled the dharma-seat of Hōkyō-ji [寶慶寺], wonderfully continuing the previous-master’s pulse; later he sat at the Tangrai-of-Eihei, well able to revive the high-patriarch’s Way. In his day the four-quarters celebrated him as the Tōjō Chūkō (洞上中興 — restorer of the Caodong-school). He may be called a standout old lineage-master.”
The two-fascicle text:
- Fasc. 1: jōdō sermons at Hōkyō-ji (the Jakuen-line foundation in Echizen, Gi’un’s first major abbacy), and Eihei-ji (the Dōgen-foundation, Gi’un’s restored mother-temple).
- Fasc. 2: shōsan (小參), fa-yǔ, zàn (賛), xiǎo butsuji (小佛事), jisàn (自賛), sònggǔ (頌古), jìsòng (偈頌), and closing prosopographical appendices.
The dating bracket: composition window 1313 (Gi’un’s installation at Eihei-ji) — 1333 (his death). Editorial recovery and printing 1715 by Manzan. The Taishō recension is the 1715 editio princeps.
The work is the principal late-Kamakura Sōtō yulu in the Taishō and is of major importance for reconstructing the sandai sōron schism and its resolution — the institutional struggle in the 1280s–90s between the 徹通 Tettsū-Gikai line (which produced the Sōji-ji branch through Keizan) and the Jakuen-Gi’un line (which produced the Eihei-ji branch in its later form).
Translations and research
No book-length English translation located. For Gi’un’s career and the sandai sōron context, see William Bodiford, Sōtō Zen in Medieval Japan (Univ. of Hawai’i Press, 1993), ch. 3, and Bodiford, “The Eihei-ji Sandai sōron: The Three-Generation Dispute,” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 1991.
Other points of interest
The work is among the most important sources for the historical relationship between Jakuen 寂圓 (1207–1299, the Sòng-Chinese disciple of Tiāntóng Rújìng who followed Dōgen back to Japan) and the early Eihei-ji-line. Manzan’s preface explicitly identifies Gi’un as Jakuen’s chakushi 嫡子 (direct heir), restoring a lineage-claim that had been somewhat obscured during the Keizan-line consolidation. This is one of the principal source-texts for Manzan’s own fukko (return-to-ancient) reform programme.
Links
- CBETA online
- Related: KR6t0286-KR6t0290 (Dōgen’s works); KR6t0298-KR6t0299 (other Sōji-ji-line yulu)