Shifting Shape, Shaping Text: Philosophy and Folklore in the Fox Koan

Appendix II: Translation of “Pai-chang’s Monastic Rules”

Appendix II Appendix II Translation of “Pai-chang’s Monastic Rules” Translation of “Pai-chang’s Monastic Rules” The Ch’an-men kuei-shih first appeared as a passage appended to the hagiography of Pai-chang in the Ching-te ch’uan-teng lu. Nearly all of the material in this version, however, is included though in different sequence in the section on Pai-chang in the monk biography text, the Sung kao-seng chuan, chüan 10, published sixteen years earlier.1 The Ch’an-men kuei-shih, sometimes referred to by Dògen and other commentators as the Hyakujò shingi (C. Pai-chang ch’ing-kuei) or Hyakujò koshingi (C. Pai-chang ku-ch’ing-kuei), apparently became the inspiration for the much lengthier sets of monastic codes: the Ch’an-yüan ch’ing-kuei (J. Zen’en shingi) of 1103 and the Yüan-dynasty rules text completed by Te-hui and others of Mount Pai-chang in 1338 (variously dated 1333), the Ch’ih-hsiu Pai-chang ch’ing-kuei (J. Chokushû Hyakujò shingi). (Pai-chang in this case, five centuries after the patriarch, refers to the mountain temple.) Although these texts, especially the latter, claim to have been modeled on the Ch’an-men kuei-shih, both contain much more detail meticulously defining and regulating the duties of the abbot and the daily functions of monks. Moreover, both texts reflect the absorption of certain elements of popular religiosity—including the rules for the enshrinement of local earth gods in the Ch’an-yüan ch’ing-kuei and tantric prayer formulas and explanations of cultic buildings in the Ch’ih-hsiu pai-chang ch’ing-kuei. 217 The Ch’an-men kuei-shih text may well be apocryphal. The picture of Pai-chang as the founder of the first pure Zen monastic system does not emerge in his biography in the Tsu-t’ang chi of 952, over a hundred years after his death, or even in the main section on his life in the Ching-te ch’uan-teng lu. The roots of the work can be traced to a couple of short texts produced at the Mount Pai-chang temple in the 880s that got integrated into the Sung kao-seng-chuan and then the Ching-te ch’uan-teng lu a century later. These late-ninth-century bridge texts seem to reflect a series of dramatic political upheavals affecting the temple—including its devastation during the severe suppression of the Hui-ch’ang era (841–846) at the hands of imperial authorities under Wu-tsung, followed by a rebuilding of the temple and the establishment of new, productive associations with the government administration.2 Since the detailed instructions provided in the later rules texts are missing, it appears that significant parts of the text attributed to Pai-chang were either lost or anachronistic. In any case, Pai-chang’s rules advocate rituals that revolve around the deeds and words of “a spiritually insightful and morally superior” abbot who guides his disciples by exemplary behavior and a variety of instructional methods that target the needs of individual monks: formal sermons and open debates with the entire assembly in the Dharma Hall as well as individual pedagogy in the abbot’s quarters. Several key aspects of Zen religious life are spelled out in the rules: 1. Zen Lineage: Zen declares its separateness and independence from the heretofore dominant Lü school—a term that literally means Vinaya but is used here and elsewhere to refer to private rather than public monastic lineages. The Zen regulations at once represent an admixture and transcendence of Hinayana and Mahayana precepts, although in actuality both sets of precepts were required in Zen in China and for the most part in Japan as well. 2. Charismatic Abbot: The abbot, or elder, as the living heir of the transmission process, is the “Honored One”—thus vitiating the need for a Buddha Hall with its icons, which was the centerpiece of other sects’ temples (although in actuality Zen temples invariably used a Buddha Hall for ceremonial occasions). The abbot lives in a Vimalakîrtî-like “ten-foot-square” room (C. fang-chang; J. hòjò), to which he invites monks for personal instruction. 218 • Appendix II 3. Dharma Hall: This becomes the most important site in the compound because it houses the abbot during convocations held twice daily. (In...