Huìyuǎn 慧遠 (334–416), conventionally styled Lúshān Huìyuǎn 廬山慧遠 (“Huìyuǎn of Lúshān” / Lúshān Yuǎngōng 廬山遠公), was the most consequential southern Chinese Buddhist of the late fourth century and the founder of the Lúshān 廬山 / Mt. Lú Buddhist establishment. Native of Yànmén 雁門 (modern Shānxī), of the Jiǎ 賈 family. According to the Gāosēng zhuàn 高僧傳 (T2059, juan 6), he became a disciple of 道安 Dàoān at age 21, accompanied Dàoān to Xiàngyáng during the southern Buddhist diaspora, and in 380 settled at the Dōnglínsì 東林寺 on Lúshān where he remained for the rest of his life.
Huìyuǎn established Lúshān as the principal southern Chinese Buddhist intellectual and devotional centre. He convened the famous Liánshè 蓮社 (“Lotus Society”) of 123 lay and monastic devotees who took the Báilián 白蓮 (“White Lotus”) oath in 402 to seek rebirth in Sukhāvatī — the foundational moment of Chinese Pure Land devotional practice. His correspondence with 鳩摩羅什 Kumārajīva (preserved as the Dà chéng dà yì zhāng 大乘大義章 / T1856) is one of the seminal documents of early Chinese Buddhist doctrinal scholarship: an extended dialogue between two of the great minds of fifth-century Chinese Buddhism on the questions of the dharma-kāya, bodhisattva-doctrine, and Mahāyāna soteriology.
Huì-yuǎn was the patron of 佛馱跋陀羅 Buddhabhadra in his Lúshān period (410 – 413), under whose direction Buddhabhadra translated the Dámóduōluó chán jīng 達摩多羅禪經 (T0618, the great early-Chinese meditation manual). He also patronised the early translation work of Sēng-jiā-tí-pó 僧伽提婆 / Saṃghadeva, who at Huì-yuǎn’s request produced new translations of the Abhidharma and Madhyamāgama. He died at Lúshān in Yì-xī 義熙 12 (416), aged 83.
(Note: This person 慧遠 of Lúshān (334–416) is to be distinguished from the much later 淨影慧遠 Jìngyǐng Huìyuǎn / Suí Yuǎn (523–592, DILA A002000), the Dìlùn-school master and Suí imperial Buddhist scholar; in the secondary literature, Lúshān Huìyuǎn and Suí Huìyuǎn are sometimes confused. They are distinct persons. Suí Huìyuǎn’s person note follows below as a separate entry.)
name: 慧遠 pinyinName: Huìyuǎn (Suí) alternateNames: [淨影慧遠, 釋慧遠, 隋遠, 大遠, 小遠, 北遠, 惠遠, 淨影法師] dynasty: 隋 birthDate: 523 deathDate: 592 cbdbId: dilaAuthorityId: A002000 created: 2026-04-28 updated: 2026-04-28
淨影慧遠 Jìng-yǐng Huì-yuǎn 淨影慧遠 / Suí Yuǎn 隋遠 / Dà Yuǎn 大遠 (“Big Yuǎn”) / Běi Yuǎn 北遠 (“Northern Yuǎn”) (523–592), the great Dìlùn 地論-school master and one of the most important Buddhist scholars of the Suí imperial period. He was the principal disciple of 法上 Fǎ-shàng (495–580), the head of the Northern Qí Dìlùn school, and after his master’s retirement and death he carried the Dìlùn tradition into the early Suí. Resident at the imperial Jìng-yǐng-sì 淨影寺 (“Pure Reflection Monastery”) in Cháng’ān (whence his epithet Jìng-yǐng Huì-yuǎn), he produced an immense corpus of doctrinal works including [[KR6e0063|Shí dì jīng lùn yì jì 十地經論義記]] (X753) — the great Suí commentary on the Daśabhūmika-vyākhyāna — the Dà chéng yì zhāng 大乘義章 (T1851), the Dà niè-pán jīng yì jì 大涅槃經義記 (T1764), and many others.
Huìyuǎn (Suí) is the immediate scholarly predecessor of the great Tang Buddhist synthesis: his Dìlùn-school articulation of six characteristics, tathāgatagarbha, and dharmakāya doctrine provided the conceptual scaffolding on which 智儼 Zhìyǎn and 法藏 Fǎzàng would build the mature Tang Huáyán scholasticism. His Dà chéng yì zhāng in 14 fascicles is the most important systematic exposition of mature Northern-Dynasties / Suí Mahāyāna doctrine.