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Master Yüan

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Master Yüan is an iconoclastic teacher who appears in the Bodhidharma Anthology, which contains the earliest known records of Chan. Apart from appearing in this text, he is otherwise unknown. According to Jeffrey Broughton, despite being an obscure figure, and not appearing in Chan genealogical charts, Yüan may be the earliest "Zen master."

Teachings

According to Broughton, Yüan's teachings prefigure the hallmark doctrine of sudden awakening famously advocated by the later Southern School of Chan, thus making its hero, Huineng, a "descendant in rhetoric" of Yüan. Yanagida Seizan also considers Yüan's teaching to anticipate Shenhui's critique of the gradualistic meditation methods of the Northern School. Yanagida further understands Yüan to foretoken the radical and spontaneous approach of Linji Yixuan, as Yüan taught that one must have energy and liveliness so as to not be deceived by others and the Dharma. Broughton states that:

He is iconoclastic, consistently criticizing reliance on the Dharma, reliance on teachers, reliance on meditative practice, reliance on canonical texts. Faith in Buddhist teachings and teachers, praxis according to the traditional rules, and learning in scripture lead to nothing but self-deception and confusion. From this stance Master Yüan never budges. His relentless boldness prefigures much in the stance of the full-blown Ch'an tradition.

While Yüan criticizes such things as reliance on texts, teachers, and traditional practices, he speaks positively of bodily energy (t'i-ch'i) and spirit (ching-shen). Such terms can be found in Daoist works such as the Zhuangzi and Liezi; and in Chinese medical texts, ching-shen also refers to vim, vigor, and stamina. For Yüan, energy and spirit are necessary to overcome ingenious artifice (ch'iao-wei), another term appearing in the Zhuangzi. However, as Broughton points out, this does not make Yüan a Daoist, but rather a Buddhist in the Bodhidharma circle who cast his understanding in native Chinese terms. According to Master Yüan, to give rise to the thought of moving toward the path is to have "crafty artifice," a mind of devices in which "a hundred ingenious schemes arise." For Yüan, this is to fall into having mind. Yüan says:

If you desire to cut off crafty artifice, don't produce the thought of enlightenment and don't use knowledge of the sutras and treatises. If you can accomplish this, then for the first time you will have bodily energy. If you have spirit, do not esteem understanding, do not seek Dharma, and do not love knowledge, then you will find a little quietude. ... If you do not seek wonderful understanding, do not serve as a teacher for people, and also do not take Dharma as your teacher, you will walk alone spontaneously.

In the same vein as Vimalakīrti who chastised Śāriputra for his addiction to sitting in the cross-legged posture, Master Yüan saw attachment to sitting meditation as a form of "ingenious artifice." According to Broughton, this criticism was directed at members of the Bodhidharma circle who reified the practice of sitting meditation. Yüan says:

All the sutras and treatises are dharmas that produce mind. If you produce a mental focus on the path, then ingenious artifice will give rise to knowledge and a complement of events. If mind is not produced, what need is there for cross-legged sitting dhyana? If ingenious artifice does not arise, why toil over right mindfulness? If you do not raise the thought of enlightenment and do not seek insight and understanding, then you will exhaust both phenomena and principle.

According to Yanagida, Master Yüan may have been the inspiration for the Oxhead School text, the Jueguan lun (Treatise on Cutting Off Contemplation). Broughton too observes that the Jueguan lun contains a dialogue between two figures, Ju-li (Entrance-into-Principle) and Yüan-men (Gate-of-Conditioned). According to Broughton, the latter may be a literary representation of Master Yüan, whose name means "conditioned." Yanagida also believed that Master Yüan's dialogues were known to the author of the Zhengdao ge.

References

  1. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, page 5, University of California Press, 1999
  2. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, page 84, University of California Press, 1999
  3. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, page 118, University of California Press, 1999
  4. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, page 95, University of California Press, 1999
  5. ^ John R. McRae. Yanagida Seizan's Landmark Works on Chinese Ch'an, page 89, Cahiers d'Extrême-Asie, vol. 7, 1993. Numéro spécial sur le Chan/Zen : Special Issue on Chan/Zen. En l'honneur de Yanagida Seizan
  6. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, page 148, note 19, University of California Press, 1999
  7. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, page 85, University of California Press, 1999
  8. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, pages 85-86, University of California Press, 1999
  9. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, pages 40-41, University of California Press, 1999
  10. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, page 41, University of California Press, 1999
  11. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, pages 94-95, University of California Press, 1999
  12. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, page 51, University of California Press, 1999
  13. Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, pages 84-85, University of California Press, 1999
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