Jìngtǔ zhēnyào chāo 淨土眞要鈔
Anthology of the True Essentials of the Pure Land by 存覺 Zonkaku (撰)
About the work
A two-fascicle Shinshū doctrinal-introductory treatise by Zonkaku 存覺 存覺 (1290–1373), composed in Ryakuō 1 / 1338 — the year of his second disinheritance by his father Kakunyo. The Jōdo shin-yō-shō is one of Zonkaku’s most carefully argued works and provides his systematic exposition of the differences between true and provisional Pure Land teachings — i.e. between Shinshū (the shinshū = “true sect”) and the other Pure Land schools (Hōnen’s Jōdoshū, the Yūzū-nenbutsu, the Ji-shū, etc.).
Abstract
The first fascicle establishes the doctrinal criteria by which “true” Pure Land teaching is to be distinguished: the doctrine of tariki shinjin as Buddha-given gift, the doctrine of hongan-jōju (the already-accomplished primal vow), the doctrine of ōchō 横超 (sudden-crosswise rebirth bypassing graded path-stages), and the doctrine of aku-nin shō-ki (the bad-person primacy). The second fascicle applies these criteria to the principal Pure Land schools of mid-Kamakura Japan, distinguishing the Shinshū position from each.
The work is doctrinally distinctive for two reasons: (1) it is systematic in a way few earlier Shinshū texts attempt — Zonkaku consciously aims to give the complete doctrinal scaffolding in two fascicles, in the manner of a Tendai scholastic kyō-han (doctrinal classification); (2) it is irenic in tone — Zonkaku consistently maintains that the other Pure Land schools are not wrong but less developed than Shinshū, a stance which contributed to his disinheritance by Kakunyo (who insisted on more polemical demarcation).
Date. Internally Ryakuō 1 / 1338 (Zonkaku age 49). The work circulated initially in manuscript among Zonkaku’s own disciples and was canonized in the Shinshū corpus only in the Rennyo period (late 15th c.).
Structural Division
The CANWWW entry (div29.xml, T83N2667) records the work as a 2-fascicle text by Zonkaku Kōgen with no internal toc sub-list and no related-text cross-references tabulated.
Translations and research
Critical edition: Shinshū shōgyō zensho, vol. 3. No English translation. Studies: Inaki Sen’e, Zonkaku kyōgaku no kenkyū (Hongan-ji, 1980); Mori Sotetsu, Zonkaku no shōgai to shisō (Hōzōkan, 1959); Hirata Atsushi, Chūsei Shinshū shisō-shi no kenkyū 中世真宗思想史の研究 (Hōzōkan, 1994).
Links
- CBETA online
- Author: 存覺 (Zonkaku)
- Companion: KR6t0377 (Tan-toku-mon)