Yúqiéshīdì kāishì fēnmén jì 瑜伽師地開釋分門記
Notes on the Sectional Outline of Xuánzàng’s Yogācārabhūmi-translation lecture-notes by 法成 (Wǔ-cùe-gjuk-bzhi-rab-gsal Chos-grub, ?–c. 865); critical edition by 徐紹強 (整理)
About the work
A Tang-period Chinese Buddhist scholastic fēnmén 分門 (“section-divisional outline”) of Xuánzàng 玄奘’s translation of the Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra (T30n1579 Yúqié-shī-dì lùn 瑜伽師地論) and the accompanying Yogācārabhūmi-vyākhyā (T30n1580 Yúqié-shī-dì-lùn shì 瑜伽師地論釋), composed by the Tibetan-Chinese bilingual monk Fǎchéng 法成 (Tibetan name ‘Gos Chos-grub, ?–ca. 865) of late-Táng Dūnhuáng. The text is a student’s lecture-notes (bǐlù 筆錄), recording Fǎchéng’s exegetical breakdown of the Yogācārabhūmi-corpus into hierarchical mén 門 (“topical headings”) — a standard tool of Chinese Buddhist scholasticism.
Abstract
The work is unrecorded in any Buddhist catalog and absent from all canonical editions. It surfaced through Pelliot 2035 in the British Library Dūnhuáng collection (head and tail intact, with explicit head-title “Yúqié-shī-dì kāishì fēnmén jì — Wǔ-shí-shēn xiāngyīng dì děng qián shí’èr dì tóng juǎn 瑜伽師地開釋分門記．五識身相應地等前十二地同卷”). The text covers the fēnmén of (a) the entire Yogācārabhūmi-vyākhyā and (b) the first twelve of the seventeen bhūmi of the Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra’s Běn-dì-fēn 本地分 (Maulī Bhūmi). A second related Dūnhuáng manuscript, Stein 2552, is a parallel fēnmén by two further Fǎchéng-students, Tánxùn 談迅 and Fúhuì 福慧, covering the 11th–12th bhūmi; both Dūnhuáng witnesses (P.2035 and S.2552) were already published in Taishō vol. 85. Xú Shàoqiáng’s edition uses P.2035 alone (as the Fǎchéng-attributed witness), with S.2552 used only for cross-reference.
The composition window is bracketed by Fǎchéng’s known Dūnhuáng activity: he is documented teaching at Dūnhuáng under the Tǔfān 吐蕃 (Tibetan) administration from the early 9th c. and continuing under Guīyìjūn 歸義軍 rule until ca. 865. Fǎchéng was the most prolific bilingual Chinese-Tibetan translator-scholar of the Táng period; he produced Chinese versions of Tibetan-canon texts (the Sa-skya-pa lo-rgyus-stratum Drum-dum kyi-mdo etc.) and Tibetan versions of Chinese Yogācāra. Yúqiéshīdì kāishì fēnmén jì is direct evidence of his activity as a Yogācāra exegete teaching from Xuánzàng’s Chinese translations to a Sino-Tibetan student community.
Translations and research
- Ueyama Daishun 上山大峻, Tonkō bukkyō no kenkyū 敦煌佛教の研究 (Kyoto: Hōzōkan, 1990) — extensive treatment of Fǎchéng and the Tibetan-Chinese bilingual Buddhist scholarship of late-Táng Dūnhuáng.
- Apple, James B., “The fGos chos-grub Translation Group,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 78.3 (2015) — recent overview.
- Xú Shàoqiáng 徐紹強, “Yúqié-shī-dì kāishì fēnmén jì zhěnglǐ qián-yán,” in Zàngwài fójiào wénxiàn vol. 5 (1998).
- Sørensen, Henrik H., “Chos-grub,” in Buddhist Translators of Tang China (forthcoming).
Other points of interest
The text is one of very few surviving Chinese Yogācāra exegetical works post-dating Kuíjī 窺基 (632–682) and his immediate students. Fǎchéng’s outline is methodologically continuous with the Cí’ēn 慈恩 (i.e. KuíjīYogācāra) school’s fēnmén tradition but transmits it through the lens of a Tibetan-Buddhist-trained scholar working in the bilingual Hexi corridor environment.
Links
- CBETA
- T30n1579, T30n1580 (Xuanzang’s Yogācārabhūmi translation and its vyākhyā)
- IDP record for P.2035 and S.2552
- Cf. KR6v0030 Púsà zǒngchí fǎ (also a late-Táng Dūnhuáng work, ed. Ueyama)