Early-eighth-century Huáyán 華嚴 exegete and senior dharma-disciple of the third Huáyán patriarch Fǎzàng 法藏 (643–712). Born 673 CE in Jīngzhàofǔ 京兆府 (the metropolitan capital prefecture of Cháng’ān). Death date not preserved (active first quarter of the eighth century, certainly past 700; conventional bracket “fl. 690–720”). The personal name appears in the sources variously as 慧苑, 慧宛, 慧菀, 慧花 — all the same person.
He resided successively at Jìngfǎsì 靜法寺 in Cháng’ān and at the imperial Fóshòujìsì 佛授記寺 in Luòyáng. Within Fǎzàng’s circle he was conventionally counted shàngshǒu ménrén 上首門人 (“foremost disciple”) — a title preserved as one of his alternate persona-names in DILA.
Two principal works survive:
- The two-juan Xīn-yì Dà-fāng-guǎng fó Huá-yán jīng yīn-yì 新譯大方廣佛華嚴經音義 (KR6s0011, A1066) — the standard yīn-yì (phonological-semantic glossary) for Śikṣānanda’s 80-juan new translation of the Avataṃsaka-sūtra (695–699). Written after “nineteen years of study under the master” Fǎ-zàng, dating ca. 700–720. Universally cited as the Huì-yuàn yīn-yì 慧苑音義.
- The fifteen-juan Xù Huá-yán jīng luè-shū kān-dìng jì 續華嚴經略疏刊定記 — a continuation of Fǎ-zàng’s incomplete short commentary on the new-translation Avataṃsaka. In this work Huì-yuàn proposed a four-vehicle (sì-jiào 四教) classification differing from Fǎ-zàng’s canonical five-teaching system. The deviation became the principal lineage-internal controversy of the next Huá-yán generation; Chéng-guān 澄觀 (738–839) criticized Huì-yuàn directly in his sub-commentaries.
Source: DILA Buddhist Person Authority A001713; Sòng gāosēng zhuàn 宋高僧傳, j. 5 (T50n2061_p0739a09); Fóguāng dà cídiǎn p. 6037; Bǔ jiào fójiào dàcídiǎn p. 5214.2.