Fǎjù jīng shū 法句經疏
Commentary on the Fǎjù jīng Anonymous Chinese composition, commenting on the apocryphal KR6u0037 (T85n2901).
About the work
A commentarial text on the apocryphal Fǎjù jīng KR6u0037 (not on the canonical Dharmapada). The opening is one of the most striking instances of mid-Táng Chán-style commentarial prose: “Now the ultimate principle is wordless, the appellations of which are cut off; the mysterious principle is silently quiescent, with which the mind’s activity has no connection. Because appellations are cut off, words injure its meaning; because the mind’s activity is unconnected, intentional thought misses its truth. Therefore he closed the chamber at Magadha [Vimalakīrti] to open the bondless track of stilled-words, and he stopped the mouth at Vaiśālī to clear the path of attaining the meaning. All this is principle reigning over the spirit, hence the sage falls silent — yet how can it be said that he has no debate? It is debate of which words cannot speak.”
Abstract
T85n2902 is paired with T85n2901 in the Tàishō and circulates with it in Dūnhuáng manuscripts. The CANWWW listing cross-references T85N2901 and T85N2902 explicitly. The commentary is generally regarded by modern scholarship (Yanagida; Cao Ling 2011) as a Chán-affiliated work whose author is unknown but whose stylistic and doctrinal range fits the late-7th to mid-8th-century early Chán milieu — note the explicit invocation of the Vimalakīrti silence, a classic early Chán topos. The commentary’s “wordless principle” doctrinal kernel is shared with the Fǎwáng jīng KR6u0019 and the Fóxìng hǎizàng sūtra KR6u0021, placing all three in the same proto-Chán doctrinal stratum. Cataloguers register both jīng and shū as 偽 from the early Táng onward.
Translations and research
- Yanagida Seizan 柳田聖山, Yanagida Seizan shū (Kyōto: Hōzōkan) — multiple studies on early Chán apocrypha.
- Makita Tairyō 牧田諦亮, Gikyō kenkyū 疑經研究 (Kyōto: Jinbun Kagaku Kenkyūsho, 1976).
- Cao Ling 曹凌, Zhōngguó fójiào yíwěijīng zōnglù 中國佛教疑偽經綜錄 (Shànghǎi: Shànghǎi gǔjí, 2011).