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普照國師語録

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Text ID
KR6t0311
Date
1654–1673
Dynasty
明/日本

Pǔzhào Guóshī yǔlù 普照國師語録

Recorded Sayings of the Universal-Illumination National Master by 隆琦 Yǐnyuán Lóngqí (Ingen Ryūki) (語), 性瑫 Mokuan Shōtō (編)

About the work

A three-fascicle Recorded Sayings collection of 隆琦 Yǐnyuán Lóngqí (Ingen Ryūki, 1592–1673), Late-Ming Chinese LínjìYángqí Chan master, founder of the Japanese Ōbaku 黄檗 school, and posthumous Daikō Fushō Kokushi 大光普照國師 (the title was conferred posthumously by Emperor Reigen in 1693, hence the work’s title; the Taishō recension reflects this 1693+ titling). Edited by his principal Japanese-Chinese dharma-heir 性瑫 Mokuan Shōtō (1611–1684).

Abstract

The opening fascicle records Ingen’s Japanese ministry:

“In Shōō 2 / 11 (承應二年癸巳冬十一月 = winter 1653-12), the abbot Itsunen 逸然 of Tōmei-zan Kōfuku-ji 東明山興福禪寺 in Hizen 肥前 province in Japan, together with the patrons, sent a monk with letter and ceremonial gifts to invite the master to cross to the East. — In Shōō 3 / 7 / 6 (甲午秋七月初六日 = 1654-08-12 NS) he entered the temple.”

The text then preserves the jōdō sermons at the major Ōbaku-line temple-installations:

  • Tōmei-zan Kōfuku-ji 東明山興福禪寺 in Hizen (Nagasaki, the first Japanese abbacy at Itsunen’s invitation, 1654-08-12).
  • Fumon-ji 普門寺 near Osaka (his second Japanese abbacy, from 1655).
  • Mount Ōbaku-zan Manpuku-ji 黄檗山萬福禪寺 at Uji 宇治 south of Kyoto (his foundation, established 1661 with shogunal land-grant from Tokugawa Ietsuna and imperial patronage from Emperor Go-Sai).

The opening incense-rite of his Kōfuku-ji entry is exemplary of the Sino-Japanese transmission identification of Ōbaku Zen:

“This single-piece incense, burned facing-the-furnace. Specifically for: lengthening the present-Imperial Sovereign’s sacred-life without limit. — This single-piece incense — specifically for: the Great General [the shogun]. — This single-piece incense — specifically for: the local-Hugh-patron [the Nagasaki Hizen daimyo]. — This single-piece incense — specifically for: the temple-inviter [Itsunen] and the lay-protectors. — This single-piece incense — flowing forth from the bosom, the fourth-time taken-out specifically for: the currently-residing Master at Mount Wànshòu Chánsì at Yúháng County in Hangzhou Prefecture in Zhèjiāng Province in China — the 35th Generation Cao-xī Right-Lineage transmitter — Reverend Fèiyǐn Yuán [my master Fèiyǐn Tōngróng 費隱通容] — for repaying the dharma-milk-kindness.”

This fifth-incense (dharma-incense) for Fèiyǐn explicitly anchors the Ōbaku transmission as the 35th-generation Caoxi-Línjì line — the foundation-claim of Ōbaku Zen against contemporary Japanese Rinzai-line (Daitō / Kanzan) and Sōtō-line claims to legitimate Chinese Chan transmission.

The three fascicles cover Ingen’s complete Japanese ministry in jōdō, shōsan, fa-yǔ, kōan-dialogues, nenkō memorial-rites, and jìsòng, all in classical Linji-school yulu form.

The dating bracket runs from Ingen’s Japanese ministry (1654) through to his death (1673). The Taishō recension is the standard Edo-period printing.

The work is the principal founder-text of Japanese Ōbaku Zen in the Taishō and is the central source for reconstructing the transmission-narrative that the Ōbaku school used to position itself as the third — and the most directly Chinese — of the three major Japanese Zen sects (alongside Rinzai and Sōtō).

Translations and research

The principal English-language treatment is Helen J. Baroni, Ōbaku Zen: The Emergence of the Third Sect of Zen in Tokugawa Japan (Univ. of Hawai’i Press, 2000), with discussion of the yulu and its institutional reception. The recent monograph Jiang Wu, Leaving for the Rising Sun: Chinese Zen Master Yinyuan and the Authenticity Crisis in Early Modern East Asia (Oxford UP, 2015), is the most extensive scholarly study of Ingen and the Sino-Japanese transmission. Ingen’s recorded sayings have not been comprehensively translated into Western languages.

Other points of interest

The dharma-incense identifying Fèiyǐn Tōngróng as the master is one of the principal source-witnesses for the Sino-Ōbaku transmission. Ingen’s emphasis on the 35th-generation Cao-xī-zheng-mai (Caoxi-right-lineage) framing positioned Ōbaku as inheriting the correct LínjìYángqí line from continental China — a positioning that became contentious among Japanese Rinzai-line authorities (Bankei Yōtaku and others) who held that the Daitō-Kanzan line was the legitimate Linji transmission for Japan.

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