Chuán Shànwúwèi suǒyì sānbù mìjiào yíguǐ chūchù jí niándài kǎo 傳善無畏所譯三部密教儀軌出處及年代考
A Study of the Provenance and Date of Three Esoteric Ritual Manuals Attributed to Śubhakarasiṃha by 陳金華 (Jinhua Chen)
About the work
A scholarly article (not a primary text but a modern research essay), included as item No. 044 in Zàngwài fójiào wénxiàn vol. 4. The paper investigates the origins and dating of three short esoteric yí-guǐ 儀軌 (“ritual manuals”) all traditionally ascribed to Śubhakarasiṃha 善無畏 (Shàn-wúwèi, 637–735) and admitted to the Japanese Taishō canon: T18n0905 Sān zhǒng xī-dì pò dìyù zhuǎn yèzhàng chū sānjiè bì-mì tuóluóní fǎ 三種悉地破地獄轉業障出三界秘密陀羅尼法; T18n0906 Fódǐng zūn-shèng xīn pò dìyù zhuǎn yèzhàng chū sānjiè bì-mì sānshēn fó-guǒ sān zhǒng xī-dì zhēn-yán yí-guǐ 佛頂尊勝心破地獄轉業障出三界秘密三身佛果三種悉地真言儀軌; and T18n0907 Fódǐng zūn-shèng xīn pò dìyù zhuǎn yèzhàng chū sānjiè bì-mì tuóluóní 佛頂尊勝心破地獄轉業障出三界秘密陀羅尼.
Abstract
The three texts are vital documents for the history of Tendai 天台宗 esoteric (Taimitsu 台密) Buddhism in Japan because they appear to underwrite the so-called “Mìjiào fùfǎ-wén” 密教付法文 — the esoteric transmission certificate that Saichō 最澄 (767–822) is said to have received in China from his Chinese teacher Shùnxiǎo 順曉, in which the three sets of five-syllable dhāraṇī (a-vaṃ-raṃ-haṃ-khaṃ; a-vi-ra-hūṃ-khaṃ; a-ra-pa-ca-na) are correlated with the upper, middle, and lower grades of siddhi — a doctrinal scheme found only in this trio of manuals. Japanese Tendai scholarship from Ōmura Seigai 大村西涯 onward (Nasu Masataka 那須政隆, Kanbayashi Ryūsei 神林隆靜, Yoshioka Yoshitoyo 吉岡義豐, Osabe Kazuo 長部和雄, Matsunaga Yūmi 松永有見, Matsunaga Yūkei 松長有慶, Misaki Ryōshū 三崎良周, Kiuchi Hiroshi 木內央, Mizukami Fumiyoshi 水上文義 and others) has unanimously concluded that the three are Chinese-composed pseudepigrapha and not Śubhakarasiṃha translations. Three principal arguments: (1) absence from Kāiyuán shìjiào lù 開元錄 (730) and Zhēnyuán xīndìng shìjiào mùlù 貞元錄 (799–800), unthinkable for an officially sponsored translator; (2) heavy Sinitic doctrinal furniture (the wǔ-zàng 五臟 viscera-mapping, wǔ-xíng 五行 cosmology, and a dozen other native Chinese wǔ-chóngxìng fànchóu 五重性範疇 — five tastes, five seasons, five directions, etc.); (3) the doctrinal content presupposes the Vajra-Garbha (jīn-tāi) interpenetration synthesis post-Śubhakarasiṃha. Chén’s article systematises this Japanese scholarship for a Chinese-language audience and adds new arguments on dating.
Translations and research
- Chen, Jinhua, Making and Remaking History: A Study of Tiantai Sectarian Historiography (Tokyo: International Institute for Buddhist Studies, 1999) — broader context of the Saichō-Tendai textual base.
- Misaki Ryōshū 三崎良周, Taimitsu no riron to jissen 台密の理論と實踐 (Tokyo: Sōbunsha, 1994).
- Mizukami Fumiyoshi 水上文義, Taimitsu shisō keisei no kenkyū 台密思想形成の研究 (Tokyo: Shunjūsha, 2008).
- Buswell, Robert E., ed., Chinese Buddhist Apocrypha (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1990) — methodological backdrop.
Other points of interest
The three manuals are a key case-study in trans-canonical Buddhist apocrypha: doctrinally peripheral in China (no Chinese commentary tradition; never institutionally promoted), but doctrinally central in Japan (the foundation of Saichō’s esoteric transmission claim against Kūkai 空海 of Shingon 真言宗). The case shows how marginal Chinese texts can become canonical pillars when transposed into a different sectarian environment.
Links
- CBETA
- T18n0905, T18n0906, T18n0907 (the three texts under examination)
- Cf. T74n2376 Bǐrúi yùnlüèjì 鞞奈耶藥略集 — Saichō’s transmission record materials