East Asian Ch'an Buddhism and Confucianism in 12th and 13th Century: Examines Targets and Background of Dōgen's Criticism of the Theory of the Consistency among the Three Major Chinese Religions

Title

East Asian Ch'an Buddhism and Confucianism in 12th and 13th Century: Examines Targets and Background of Dōgen's Criticism of the Theory of the Consistency among the Three Major Chinese Religions

Author

HE Yansheng

Page

135-163

DOI

10.6163/tjeas.2014.11(1)135

Abstract

This paper examines the targets and background of Dōgen's criticism of the theory of the consistency among the three major Chinese religions. This theory argues that Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism were fundamentally in agreement with one another. Dōgen felt that the Song (960-1279) theory in vogue at that time was also heterodoxy, and felt that the popularity of the theory of the consistency among the three major religions was an indicator of the decline of Buddhism, and urged his disciples not to listen to it so uncritically. According to what Dōgen said, those who advocated the theory of consistency belittled the doctrine of the Saddharma-pundarika-Sūtra (法華經) and esteemed the Surangamasamadhi (首楞嚴經) and Yuanjue (圓覺經) Sūtra. Because it was said that the Six Patriarch Huineng (惠能, 638-713) esteemed the Saddharmapundarlka, Mahaparnirvana (涅槃經) and Vajra (金剛經) Sūtra, Dōgen felt that it was inconsistent with Zen tradition to esteem the Surangamasamadhi and Yuanjue Sūtras, pointing out that from very early on there had been those who doubted the authenticity of the Surangamasamadhi and Yuanjue Sūtras, suggesting that they were not Buddhist. According to our research, Dōgen first started to criticize the theory of the consistency of the three religions in 1243. One cannot find any criticism from him before that date. In 1243 Shoichi (聖一, 1202-1280), a Japanese monk of the Linji (臨濟) Sect who had made a pilgrimage to China, arrived in Kyoto to be the abbot of Tofuku (東福) Temple. It was also precisely in this year that many disciples of the Daruma Sect came to Dōgen to be converted to his sect. All of these disciples esteemed the Surangamasamadhi and Yuanjue Sūtra, and advocated the consistency of the three religions. Their stream of teaching was completely of the Chinese Song Dynasty Linji Sect. Having verified these facts, we believe that the targets of Dōgen's criticism were in fact the Chinese Linji Sect and those who continued their stream of teaching in Japan, the Japanese followers of the Linji Sect, as well as the followers of the Daruma Sect. The reason for carrying out this criticism was because of the existence of the Daruma and Linji Sects in Japan. He wanted to criticize them from the viewpoint of sutras held by the Sixth Patriarch, and thus make crystal clear the orthodoxy of the Zen ideas he taught, and emphasize that what he adhered to was the orthodoxy that had been passed down from the Six Patriarch Huineng of the Tang Dynasty (618-907).

Keyword

East Asian Ch'an Buddhism, Criticism of the theory of the consistency among the three major Chinese religions, Dōgen's Zen Buddhism, Saddharma-pundarika Sūtra,Surangamasamadhi(Lengyan Jing), Yuanjue Sūtra, Six Patriarch Huineng

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