The seventeenth patriarch of the Tiāntái 天台 school and the central figure of the Northern-Sòng shānjiā 山家 (orthodox-house) Tiāntái revival; one of the most consequential figures of Sòng Buddhism. DILA Authority A000756. Zì Yuēyán 約言. Lay surname Jīn 金; native of Míngzhōu 明州 (modern Níngbō), whence his honorific Sìmíng zūnzhě 四明尊者 (“Venerable of Four-Brightnesses [= Míngzhōu]”). Born 960; died Tiānshèng 天聖 6, 1st month, 5th day (= 9 February 1028), aged 69, with 54 years of monastic seniority.
At seven took ordination at the Tàipíng Xīngguósì 太平興國寺 under Hóngxuǎn 洪選; received full ordination at fifteen and devoted himself first to the Vinaya. At twenty he entered the school of Bǎoyún Yìtōng 寶雲義通 (927–988) — the Tiāntái patriarch who had been the dharma-heir of Tiāncí WǔchéngYìjì 天慈無城義寂 — and there mastered the Tiāntái doctrinal system. He took residence first at the Chéngtiānsì 承天寺, then transferred to the Yánqìngsì 延慶寺 in Sìmíng in Zhìdào 至道 2 (996), which became the principal Northern-Sòng Tiāntái centre under his leadership for the subsequent thirty-two years.
In Tiānxǐ 天禧 1 (1017) he gathered ten monks to perform the Lotus Sūtra samādhi (法華三昧), with the firm intention of self-immolation at the period’s conclusion three years later as an offering to the Lotus. The Hànlín scholar Yáng Yì 楊億 (974–1020), one of the leading literary figures of the Northern Sòng, wrote a personal letter urging Zhīlǐ to “remain in the world” and continue teaching. Zhīlǐ acceded; the imperial court conferred the purple kasaya and the honorific title Fǎzhì dàshī 法智大師 (“Great Master of Dharma-Wisdom”) in the same year.
Zhīlǐ is the principal Northern-Sòng systematiser of Tiāntái doctrine and the figure most responsible for the establishment of the shānjiā 山家 (orthodox-house) Tiāntái lineage against the rival shānwài 山外 (off-mountain) tradition of Gūshān Zhīyuán 孤山智圓 (智圓, 976–1022) and others. His central polemical contributions include the defense of (1) the doctrine of xìngjùè 性具惡 (“buddha-nature inherently includes evil”) as a strict reading of Zhànrán’s mature thought; (2) the doctrine that contemplation of the mind (guānxīn 觀心) involves both the zhēnxīn 真心 (true mind) and the wàngxīn 妄心 (deluded mind), against the shānwài tendency to dissolve the wàngxīn into the zhēnxīn; and (3) the strict identity of meditative practice (xíng 行) with doctrinal classification (jiào 教) in the Tiāntái yuánjiào 圓教.
Major works: the Shíbùèrmén zhǐyào chāo 十不二門指要鈔 (T1937, the standard Tiāntái subcommentary on Zhànrán’s Shíbùèrmén); the Guānyīn xuányì jì (KR6d0047, T1727); the Guānyīn yìshū jì (KR6d0049, T1729); the Miàozōng chāo 妙宗鈔 (T1937, the central exegesis of Zhìyǐ’s Móhē zhǐguān); the Guāngmíng wénjù shíyí jì 光明文句拾遺記 (T1786); and the Sìmíng zūnzhě jiàoxíng lù 四明尊者教行錄 (X1937, his disciples’ compilation of his correspondence and writings). Principal disciples include Shàngxián 尚賢, Běnrú 本如, and Fànzhēn 梵臻.
Sources: Sìmíng zūnzhě jiàoxíng lù (X1937) juan 7 (especially the Sòng gù Míngzhōu Yánqìngsì Fǎzhì dàshī xíngyè bēi 宋故明州延慶寺法智大師行業碑); Réntiān bǎojiàn 人天寶鑑 juan 1; Fózǔ tǒngjì 佛祖統紀 (T2035); DILA A000756.