Articles by alphabetic order
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
 Ā Ī Ñ Ś Ū Ö Ō
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0


A (Presumably Chinese) tantric scripture and its Japanese exegesis: the Yuqi Jing 瑜祇經 and the practices of the Yogin

From Tibetan Buddhist Encyclopedia
Jump to navigation Jump to search




ABSTRACT


The Yuqi jing Sūtra of the Yogin] is often listed as one of the most important scriptures of Tantric Buddhism in East Asia, but its content and contribution to the esoteric system have so far been little understood. Traditionally regarded as a translation by Vajrabodhi, it was probably compiled in China in the late eighth century. The role that it played in Chinese Buddhism, however, remains unclear. In medieval Japan on the other hand, the

scripture appears to have been rediscovered and enjoyed great fortunes. Medieval interpreters intervened on the text by articulating novel conceptual associations, often expressed through curious imagery. At the same time, a new type of initiatory abhiṣeka informed by the sūtra

emerged, which engendered a distinctive discourse on the yogic identities pursued by a tantric practitioner. What spurred such sudden interest in the Yuqi jing in medieval Japan? What did Japanese exegetes read into the text? This article addresses these issues by exploring ‘canonical’ commentaries and unpublished initiatory documents that have recently come to light in temple archives.


KEYWORDS: Yuqi jing 瑜祇經 Esoteric Buddhism Tendai 天台 Shingon 真言 abhiṣekayugi kanjō 瑜祇灌頂


The Jin'gangfeng louge yiqie yujia yuqi jing/Jp. Kongōbu rōkaku issai yuga yugi kyō 金剛峯樓閣一切瑜伽瑜祇經 [[[Sūtra of the Yogin]] [Practicing] Total Union at the Adamantine Peak Pavilion; T no. 867, 18: 253–269], better known as Yuqi jing/Jp. Yugikyō 瑜祇經 (lit. Yogin Sūtra), is often listed as one of the most important scriptures of Tantric Buddhism in East Asia, arguably because it is one of the ‘five basic texts’ (gobu hikyō 五部祕經) of both major schools of the Japanese Tantric tradition, Tendai 天台 and Shingon 真言.

Footnote1 Yet its content and contribution to the Tantric system have so far been little understood. The role that it played in Chinese Buddhism remains unclear. Its doctrinal or ritual relevance for the initiators of Tantric Buddhism in Japan seems negligible. In medieval Japan, on the other hand, the

scripture appears to have been rediscovered and enjoyed great fortunes. From the twelfth century onwards, commentaries of varying size and format were compiled by scholar-monks of the major Esoteric lineages, while the circulation of ‘secret transmission documents’ (injin 印信) attests to the emergence of a new type of initiatory abhiṣeka informed by the sūtra (called yugi kanjō 瑜祇灌頂) and performed across lineages.


Thus, the significance attributed to the Yuqi jing appears to rely on medieval developments that occurred in Japan. What spurred such a sudden interest in the Yuqi jing among Japanese scholiasts? Which particular features of the scripture appealed to their concerns? What did Japanese exegetes read into this scripture and how did they translate it into performative terms? Attempting to address these questions, this article


recovers the history of the Yuqi jing reception in Japan and explores the characteristics of its exegesis, both textual and ritual. Despite the wealth of material related to the Yuqi jing which has been preserved in Japanese archives, the [[Yuqi

jing]] has been remarkably understudied in its whole. Several Japanese scholars have touched on specific aspects of the scripture in their analyses of sectarian positions and ritual imagery, but there is not a single monographic study of this scripture yet.Footnote2 In my own research I, too, first approached the Yuqi jing as a canonical source to explore different areas

of enquiry, namely, the medieval permutations of a deity called Aizen 愛染,Footnote3 which originates in this scripture, and Taimitsu hermeneutics, of which the Yuqi jing is a fundamental component.Footnote4 However, the closer analysis of recently discovered medieval


exegetical and ritual works brought to the fore a more expansive role that the scripture might have played in shaping new paradigms for conceptualising Tantric practice.Footnote5 A more comprehensive analysis of the scripture and its Japanese reception is thus necessary to shed light on the prominence of the Yuqi jing in the Japanese medieval landscape, as well as its place within Tantric Buddhism.


1. The Yuqi jing, a (probably) Chinese scripture

1.1. Transmission


Modern scholars consider the Yuqi jing an ‘apocryphalscripture, probably compiled in China in the second half of the eighth century, sometime after the death of Amoghavajra (Bukong 不空 [705–774]) and before the arrival of the Japanese monk Kūkai 空海 (774–835) in


804.Footnote6 Traditionally it was held to be a text translated by Vajrabodhi ((Jin’gangzhi 金剛智 [671–741] and as such it is included in the Taishō canon.Footnote7 However, no Sanskrit or Tibetan editions of the scripture exists. Further, doubts concerning the authorship of the Chinese text

were raised by medieval Japanese scholiasts, who discussed the possibility of two different translators, puzzled by the fact that Kūkai (the first source to mention the scripture in Japan) had given it as translated by Vajrabodhi in one of his writings and by Amoghavajra in another.Footnote8


Curiously the Yuqi jing does not appear in contemporary official Chinese catalogues, nor among the manuscripts from Dunhuang. Its title first surfaces in a Chinese-Tibetan inventory of the Yuan-period, where it is noted that there is no Tibetan edition.Footnote9 It would later be included in the Ming-period edition of the canon that the Ōbaku school reprinted in Japan.Footnote10 Nonetheless, the scripture must have existed in Tang China and widely


circulated in esoteric circles, because it is listed in the inventories of sacred texts acquired in China by three of the Japanese monks who travelled there

in the ninth century, Kūkai, Eun 惠運 (798–869) and Shūei 宗叡 (809–884).Footnote11 In addition, Chapter Nine of the Yuqi jing appears to have been transmitted independently, for it is recorded as a separate scripture in the catalogues of Ennin 圓仁 (794–864), Engyō 圓行 (799–852) and Shūei. Footnote 12

Kūkai listed the Yuqi jing among the works that his disciples were required to study.Footnote13 It is also said that the name that Kūkai gave to the main temple complex he established on Kōyasan, Kongōbuji 金剛峰寺 (Temple of the Adamantine Peak) was inspired by the title of the Yuqi jing, which starts with the three characters kongōbu 金剛峰 in its long version. The Yuqi jing may therefore have had a symbolical role in the institutional development of Esoteric Buddhism in Japan, but as we shall see its impact on doctrinal or ritual exegesis cannot be discerned in Kūkai’s writings.


1.2. Structure


The Yuqi jing is a composite scripture, constituted of twelve chapters loosely connected, suggesting that the scripture might be a collation of passages from different Indian works that were translated into Chinese and brought together in the text we have now. (See Table 1).


The scripture is not centred on a single deity, but presents a number of deities which would become significant in Japanese Buddhism as objects of individual worship (besson 別尊). Two of these seem to have been of interest only to Japanese interpreters, as they do not appear in the pantheon of Chinese or Tibetan Tantric Buddhism: the above-mentioned Aizen, to whom two chapters of the Yuqi jing are dedicated, Chapter Two, ‘Zen’aibon’ and Chapter Five, ‘Aizenbon,’ and a deity called Daishōkongō 大勝金剛, presented in Chapter Eight.Footnote14 The scripture also provides information on the ritual identity of deities that appear in Chapter Nine, Buddhalocanā (Jp. Butsugen 佛眼) and the Five Ākāśagarbhas (Jp. Go Kokūzō 五虛空藏). Further, Chapter Eleven describes a distinct visualisation practice centred on a set of fifteen deities. As the title of the chapter recites, this represents the ‘Accomplishment of Vajrasattva’s Awakening Mind through an Initiation performed by Inner Actions’ (Kongōsatta bodaishin naisagō kanjō shicchi 金剛薩埵菩提心内作業灌頂悉地).


1.3. A ‘combinatory’ scripture?


The Yuqi jing belongs to the textual lineage of the Jin'gangding jing 金剛頂經, one of the two major scriptures of East Asian Tantric Buddhism and the canonical basis of the Adamantine world (Jp. kongōkai 金剛界) maṇḍala.Footnote15 This can be inferred from the full title of the Yuqi jing and from the system that underlines its narrative: the text continuously refers to the five families and the 37 deities of the maṇḍala of the Adamantine world.Footnote16


Yet modern Japanese scholarship has held the Yuqi jing as an example of Tantric texts that combines the two maṇḍalic realities crystallised in the Womb world (taizōkai 胎蔵界) and Adamantine world. This contention draws on the fact that at various points the Yuqi jing uses mudrās and mantras originated in either the Womb or the Adamantine systems. Combinatory constructions have also been read in the pairing of deities portrayed in the scripture, Aizen and Vajrasattva (Jp. Kongōsatta 金剛薩埵) in Chapter Five and


Buddhalocanā and Ekākṣarauṣṇīṣacakra (Jp. Ichiji kinrin 一字金輪) in Chapter Nine, perceived as sexual opposites. For instance, Misaki Ryōshū 三崎良周 (1921-2010) pointed out that Ekākṣarauṣṇīṣacakra is generated by the mantra of Buddhalocanā, mother of all the buddhas (issai butsumo butsugen 一切仏母仏眼) and that the instructions for the corresponding maṇḍala allocate the male deity, Ekākṣarauṣṇīṣacakra, to a seat directly in front of his female partner, proving that Buddhalocanā was understood as


Ekākṣarauṣṇīṣacakra’ śakti.Footnote17 Following the hint of Ōmura Seigai 大村西崖 (1868–1927) at the beginning of the twentieth century, scholars have suggested that the combinatory practice of the Womb and Adamantine systems (taikon gōgyō 胎金合行 or myōgō 冥合), which today is regarded as the fundamental pattern of Tantric Buddhism in Japan, had already occurred in China in the second half of the Tang period.Footnote18 These scholars see the pattern reflected in a number of

scriptures and ritual manuals compiled at that time, which incorporate elements of both systems – another example often given is that of Fahua guanzhi yigui 法華観智儀軌, the canonical source for the esoteric rituals of the Lotus Sūtra, also attributed to Amoghavajra.Footnote19 However, the extent to

which this association can be traced back to China remains controversial. Undoubtedly, to present it as a Chinese formulation served to legitimise the Japanese version of Tantric Buddhism and, within it, the sectarian theorization of the non-duality of the two maṇḍalic realities (ryōbu funi 兩部不二). Yet evidence for such development in China at the time of Amoghavajra is scant.Footnote20 This issue cannot be


addressed in any length in the context of this article, but it is crucial to take it into account and interrogate the available material as to when the Yuqi jing started being interpreted in combinatory terms.


To my knowledge there are no extant Chinese commentaries or ritual manuals on the Yuqi jing that can help reconstruct the formative stages of the scripture. A close analysis of early Japanese works that cite the Yuqi jing does not provide evidence of combinatory reading. Kūkai employed the text in some of his major works, such as Benkenmitsu


nikyōron 辯顯密二教論 and Jūjūshinron 十住心論, as expression of the Adamantine system. His position was clear to medieval commentators. Yūgi 佑宜 (1536–1612), for instance, would acknowledge that Kūkai used the Yuqi jing ‘to explain the tenets of the Jin'gangding jing, because he saw this sūtra as belonging to the Adamantine Textual


lineage.’Footnote21 Kūkai did not write any commentary on the scripture. To him is attributed only a short explanatory work on Chapter Eight of the Yuqi jing, which consists of the procedures for a liturgy to Daishōkongō.Footnote22 Another writing of Shingon lineage, compiled by the imperial prince Shinjaku 眞寂法親王 (886−927), third son of Uda tennō 宇多天皇 (866–931), similarly gives only instructions on the mudrās and mantras to use for each chapter of the scripture.Footnote23 Thus, the early interest in the scripture among Shingon scholar-monks does not support the suggestion that the scripture was imported and read as a combinatory scripture.


2. Annen’s commentary: repositioning the Yuqi jing A significant change in the interpretation of the Yuqi jing was triggered by Annen 安然 (841–889?), the Tendai monk known as the great systematiser of Japanese Esoteric Buddhism.


Annen compiled the first substantial commentary on the scripture, known as Yugikyō shugyōbō 瑜祇經修行法, or Yugikyōsho 瑜祇經疏.Footnote24 This very influential work would become a reference manual for scholar-monks of all Tantric lineages in Japan interested in the hermeneutical and ritual practices of the Yuqi jing. Given that Annen never travelled to China, his interpretation may appear born out of distinctly Japanese concerns. It cannot be excluded, however, that it was precipitated by instructions he received from his masters, the Tendai monks who went to China after Kūkai.Footnote25


Annen’s exegesis contributed to a new assessment of the Yuqi jing both at the hermeneutical and the performative level and thus deserves dedicated attention.


2.1. Scholastic reframing


Annen elaborated a complex hermeneutics of the Yuqi jing whereby the scripture became a crucial term in the threefold system of Esoteric Buddhism created by Tendai scholiasts. Without entering in the technical details of the system, it is worth taking it into account for the consequences it will have on the medieval interpretation of the Yuqi jing. The starting point is once again the relation between the Womb and Adamantine worlds. Annen’s predecessors had posited the two textual lineages as distinct


because they were transmitted separately, but had devised an ‘accomplishment class’ (soshitsuji 蘇悉地) that functioned as their unifying element. This third element of the system is usually identified with the Suxidi jieluo jing 蘇悉地羯羅經, a text belonging to the Womb scriptural lineage – indeed so it appears in the writings of Ennin and Enchin. Annen, however, while maintaining the two Womb and Adamantine realities separate, unified them according to two distinct modes, one informed by the Suxidi jieluo jing


and another by the Yuqi jing. The Yuqi jing became ‘the accomplishment method (soshitsujihō 蘇悉地法) according to the Adamantine reality.’Footnote26 In this way, Annen created an alternative system to Kūkai’s interpretation of the two maṇḍalas as two and yet nondual (nijifuni 二而不二). Eventually he posited the practices of the Yuqi jing as


a more complete ‘accomplishment practice’ than those of the Suxidi jieluo jing and ‘the essence of the practices of the two maṇḍalas’ (ryōbu daihō no kanjin 兩部大法之肝心).Footnote27 This reading sealed the status of the scripture in Tendai and, at the same time, reinforced the significance of the Adamantine textual lineage for Taimitsu scholiasts.


2.2. Ritual transformation


Annen may also be seen to lay the foundations for ritual practices informed by the Yuqi jing. The beginning of Yugikyō shugyōbō may resemble a ritual manual more than a textual commentary, for there Annen presented fourteen types of practice that can be detected in the chapters of the scripture.Footnote28 I shall here draw attention to two.


As mentioned above, the Yuqi jing includes mudrās and mantras associated to the Womb maṇḍala and the Adamantine maṇḍala. Annen focused on a crucial set called the ‘eight syllable mantra [that engenders] the sudden enlightenment of the great compassion womb’ (daihi taizō tonshō hachiji shingon 大悲胎蔵頓証八字真言). This mantra appears in Chapter Nine of the Yuqi jing. Its title points to a Womb lineage provenance, great compassion (daihi) being a function embodied by the Womb maṇḍala.Footnote29 Of the eight


syllables of this mantra, a vi ra hūṃ khaṃ hūṃ hrīḥ aḥ, the first five are the seed-syllables of the five elements, earth, water, fire, wind and ether. Their visualization is a fundamental practice advocated in several passages of the Dari jing and further articulated in its Commentary.Footnote30 The remaining three syllables embody three of the five buddhas of the Adamantine maṇḍala. By uttering this mantra, making the corresponding mudrās, and visualizing the eight syllables on his body, the practitioner is said to


realize the unification of the two maṇḍalic realities.Footnote31 Annen thus was the first scholiast who put forward a ritual exegesis of the Yuqi jing in combinatory terms. Annen instructed the practitioner to distribute the eight syllables on eight parts of the body as explained in the Dari jing, but argued that with the method expounded in the


Dari jing alone it was not possible to achieve the fulfilment of this practice. For that it was necessary to use the Yuqi jing, which subsumed the gist of the Adamantine lineage and helped demonstrate the indispensable combination of the two worlds ritually. Annen called this practice ‘secret abhiṣeka’ (himitsu kanjō 祕密灌頂), borrowing a term from the Dari jing.


In addition, Annen supplied a wealth of details on the meaning of another practice of syllable installation, described in Chapter Eleventh of the Yuqi jing. Annen’s interpretation will be reused by all medieval ritualists for the performance of the initiatory abhiṣeka created according to that chapter, which would be known as yogin consecration (see below). Indeed later sectarian sources, such as Keikō’s 敬光 (1740–95) Sange gakusoku 山家学則, attribute to Annen the origin of this initiation, which would eventually become the climax of the ritual training programme of Tendai tantric practitioners.Footnote32


3. Medieval commentaries


3.1. Sources


Let me now turn to the medieval commentaries. I have mapped out the medieval exegetical production on the Yuqi jing across major lineages on the basis of extant works. (See also Table 2, arranged in chronological order).


A number of these commentaries have been included in the sectarian collections of the Shingon and Tendai schools or in standard editions of the Buddhist canon, such as the Nihon daizōkyō. Thus, we can assume that these writings were considered representative of scholastic positions, either because their authors were erudite and prolific scholar-monks, or because the texts exerted considerable influence on the tradition. Others commentaries have been printed in the publications of specific temple archives,


such as Kanazawa bunko, for their historical value. Others still remain unpublished. I shall review the most prominent works according to their sectarian affiliation, not because I find the sectarian division of Buddhist exegeses particularly useful to investigate the Yuqi jing reception, but because this helps underscore the presence of the scripture in canonical corpora.


Shingon commentaries on the Yuqi jing are included in Volume Five of Shingonshū zensho 眞言宗全書 and Volume Seven of Zoku Shingonshū zensho 續眞言宗全書. Based on intertextual citations and the number of extant later copies, three works appear to have been particularly influential. The first, Yugisotoran hiketsu 祕決, in two kan, is attributed to the Daigoji 醍醐寺 monk Jitsuun 實運 (1105–1160) and consists of short comments on important passages of each chapter of the scripture.Footnote33 The other two are writings by


Dōhan 道範 (1178–1252), eminent scholar-monk of Kōyasan: Yugisotoran kuden 口傳, in two kan, dated 1224;Footnote34 and Yugisotoran kuketsu 口決, in five kan, based on the oral transmission that Dōhan is said to have received from Jitsugen 實賢 (1176–1249), abbot of Daigoji, in 1241.Footnote35 These texts refer extensively to Annen’s commentary, attesting to the continuing significance of the Tendai scholiast in the medieval period.Footnote36 Noteworthy is also the later Yugikyō hidenshō 瑜祇經祕傳抄, an extensive exegesis in six kan by Yūgi 瑜祇 (1536–1612), erudite monk with a broad intersectarian training who would become the second patriarch of Chishakuin 智積院.Footnote37


Outside sectarian collections, we find a Yugikyō shūkoshō 瑜祇經拾古鈔 by Raiyu’s 頼瑜 (1226–1304), eminent Shingon scholar-monk trained on Mount Kōya as well as Daigoji and Ninnaji 仁和寺. Dated 1284, it is said to record the transmission of Jōhen 靜遍 (1165–1223).Footnote38 Connected to the spread of Esoteric Buddhism in Eastern Japan is the Yugi kaishinshō 瑜祇開心抄, a lengthy, systematic commentary to the Yuqi jing in the archives of Shōmyōji 稱名寺 (Kanazawa bunko), which borrows heavily from Annen’s work as well as Jitsuun’s transmission. Of an unknown author but probably dating from the Kamakura period, it was one of the several works on the Yuqi jing owned and used by Kenna 剱阿 (1261–1338), the second abbot of Shōmyōji 称名寺.Footnote39 Also owned by Kenna and with inscription by him is a Yugikyō jūnibon daiyō 瑜祇經十二品大要, a small-format


commentary on the twelve chapters of the scripture.Footnote40 Finally, not yet published are three commentaries by Monkan Kōshin 文觀弘眞 (1278–1357), head administrator (chōja 長者) of Tōji 東寺, head (zasu 座主) of Daigoji and counsellor of emperor Go-Daigo 後醍醐 (1288–1339). Among them, the Yuga yugi hikanshō 秘

肝鈔 is a beautifully illustrated manuscript that has recently come to light in the archives of Ninnaji.Footnote41 It was probably compiled before 1344 in Yoshino 吉野, where Monkan is also said to have bestowed a yogin abhiṣeka to emperor Godaigo and the empress dowager.Footnote42 Monkan inherited the Sanbōin 三寶院 lineage (one of the Daigoji lineages).


Fewer of the medieval Taimitsu commentaries have been made available in print. The volumes of the Zoku Tendaishū zensho dedicated to Tantric texts includes three writings, which attest to the concern with the Yuqi jing in in the main Taimitsu lineage, Sanmon 山門, as well as in the influential Yōjō 葉上 lineage initiated by Yōsai 榮西 (1141–1215). The first, Yugikyō kenmon 瑜祇經見聞, is the record of a series of lectures given by Enni Ben’en 圓爾辨圓 (i.e., Shōichi Kokushi 聖一国師 [1202–80]) at Tōfukuji 東福寺 in


1274, compiled by his disciple Chikotsu Daie 癡兀大慧 (1229–1312).Footnote43 It is a short work which explains salient passages of the sūtra in a question and answer format, with a long digression on tropes from the Putixin lun at the end, followed by an embryological chart (on the latter, see below). Enni is better known

as a Zen monk, but at Tōfukuji he also continued the Tantric lineage of Yōsai, having received Tantric teachings and initiations from two of his disciples, Tōyō Eichō 東陽榮朝 (1428–1504) and Anin

阿忍.Footnote44 Interestingly, two other manuscripts recording instruction that Enni gave on the Yuqi jing in 1273 and 1274 have recently come to light in the Ōsu 大須 archives at Shinpukuji, Nagoya and have been printed in a multi-volume collection of medieval Zen works. One, titled Hikyōketsu 秘経決, by and large corresponds to the text included in Zoku Tendaishū zensho.Footnote45 (Figure 1a & b) The second manuscript, titled Yugikyō kenmon (daiichi) 瑜祇經見聞 (第一), is a more extended discussion of the meaning of the sūtra, starting from its title, and the particularities of each chapter.Footnote46


The other two texts published in the Zoku Tendai zensho were produced in the Sanmon Anō 穴太 branch: Yugikyō kuketsu nukigaki 瑜祇經口決抜書, by Kōshū 光宗 (1276–1350), the compiler of the monumental Keiran shūyōshū 溪嵐拾葉集, is a chapter by chapter explanation of the meaning of the sūtra, composed according to the colophon in 1

312, when Kōshū received transmission from his master, Chōgō 澄豪 (1259–1350)Footnote47; Yugikyō chōmonshō 瑜祇經聴聞抄 is a lengthy and complex work that Chōgō compiled before 1334. Although

this work centres on interpretations of the Anō lineage, it also includes readings upheld by other branches of Tantric Buddhism, Tendai (for instance from the Onjōji 園城寺 line) as well as Shingon (Tōji 東寺 line). It may be considered a Taimitsu summa of exegeses and oral instructions on the [[Yuqi

jing]], of the same standing as Dōhan’s Kuketsu introduced above.Footnote48 To these writings we should add commentaries that do not bear the scriptural connection in the title. One eminent case is Taimitsu keigushō 台密契


愚抄, a long commentary attributed to Enni’s disciple Dōshō 道照 (Tōfukuji lineage) according to one manuscript, and to Son’en shinnō 尊円親王 (1298–1365), abbot of Shōrein (Sanmai 三昧流 lineage as transmitted by Jien 慈円 [1155–1225]), according to other extant editions.Footnote49 Speaking of

Jien’s lineage, it may be worth mentioning that two unpublished manuscripts that may well represent the oldest dated medieval sources on the scripture are in the Shōrein 青蓮院 collection (Kissui 吉水 Archives) and are expected to be included in a forthcoming volume dedicated to Sōjitsu.


This basic inventory of exegetical works on the Yuqi jing gives sufficient evidence to assert that between the twelfth and the fourteenth centuries knowledge of the scripture spread throughout different Tantric lineages. Although it may be convenient to arrange these works along sectarian lines,

in fact individual interpretations circulated across sectarian boundaries. This fluidity partly ensued from the multifarious training that monks received, in the medieval period as well as before. For instance, the ninth

century Yugi sōgyō shiki by Shinjaku (mentioned above) referred to Kūkai’s (textual) transmission as well as to the oral transmission received from Sōō 相應 (831–918) of Mudōji 無動寺 (Ennin’s lineage), attesting that Shinjaku was trained both at Ninnaji and on Mount Hiei.Footnote50 In-text references offer ampler evidence of exchanges: one finds citations of commentaries compiled within competing lineages as well as details of ritual instructions given by masters belonging to different lineages. Daie, for


instance, in a passage of the Kenmon refers to a ‘Kanjō shiki’ 灌頂私記 (Personal notes on the abhiṣeka) which, he glosses, was the ‘personal record of another lineage’ (tamon no shiki 他門ノ私記).Footnote51 Further, in the version known as Yugikyō kenmon (daiichi) Daie states to have presented ‘the fundamentals of the

transmissions of Tōji, Tendai and Onjōji lineages.’Footnote52 Kuketsu nukigaki is explicit about the intersectarian use of the Yuqi jing and suggests that the Tōji and Tendai lineages share the same

interpretations of the yugi rituals. From the end of the medieval period onwards major commentaries also appear to have been copied irrespective of the lineage where they were originally produced. Dōhan’s Yugisotoran kuketsu, for instance, was copied by Tendai monks, as a perusal of copies preserved at Eizan

bunko archives reveal. A point in case is a Yugikyō kikigaki 瑜祇經聞書, copied in 1561 together with the Yuqi jing by the Tendai monk Shunkei 舜慶 (1522–1604). Despite the different title, this document turns out to be a copy of Dōhan’s work, transmitted to Shunkei as part of his training.Footnote53


3.2. Format and content


As it is evident from their titles, several medieval commentaries presented themselves as ‘secret transmissions’ (hidenshō), ‘oral decisions’ (kuketsu), ‘oral transmission’ (kudensho), betraying their connection with (and perhaps origin within) an initiatory ritual context. Also titles such as kenmon (lit. ‘what was seen and heard’) or chōmonshō (lit. ‘notes of things heard’), which may be taken to indicate the public delivery of a lecture or a seminar (dangi 談義), identify a more intimate genre of medieval


exegetical texts meant to convey the inner understanding of a teacher in experiential terms (‘seeing and hearing’), as it occurs in a ritual setting.Footnote54 In terms of subject matter, the commentaries also encompassed performative issues, intersecting more doctrinal points with specific ritual matters. This may be a consequence of the very


nature of the Yuqi jing, which includes a wealth of ritual elements, mantras, mudrās and visualisations, as well as indication for ritual programmes. Chōgō’s Yugikyō chōmonshō, for instance, in the exegesis of Chapter Eleven spends several pages to explain the steps and symbolic meaning of the yogin abhiṣeka, as well the relation this bears to other types of initiations. The style of the commentaries, too, is at times more fragmentary than discursive, as one may expect from ritual instruction manuals.


Despite their titles, many of the works surveyed above are long writings that follow the traditional formats of Sinitic sūtra commentaries, either a line-by-line exegesis (mongu 文句) or one focused on the meaning (gengi 玄義). Accordingly, they provide an analysis of the title of the scripture, its main deities and a

chapter by chapter elucidation of its content, with some chapters drawing more attention than others. Let us take a closer look at Dōhan’s Yugisotoran kuden, which unfolds along this basic


pattern. It opens with a long section on the title of the Yuqi jing (daimoku no koto 題目事), divided in five entries: ‘the place where the scripture was expounded’ (sessho no koto 説處事), which compares the narrative of the Yuqi jing with the place and sequence of preaching in other scriptures of the


Jinganding lineage (Kongōchō tō sessō sessho shidai no koto 金剛頂等説相説處次第事); the time of preaching (setsuji no koto 説時事); the buddha who preaches the scripture (kyōshū 教主); its abode (shojū 所住) and its retinue (kenzoku 眷屬). The Introductory Chapter addresses significant points of the preface (jobun daiji no koto 序文大事事) and highlights the Adamantine affiliation of the


scripture by listing the seed syllables of the 37 venerable ones in the central assembly of the Adamantine world maṇḍala as well as a strophe on the 16 great bodhisattvas (a group within the 37 deities). Within these sections, Dōhan carries out a line-by-line exegesis of text. Similarly, Chapter

Two (‘Zen’aiō’) discusses the chapter title and major tropes in the chapter: the so-called ‘samādhi of the hidden organ of the horse’; the ‘hidden and profound’ matter of all Tathāgatas; the lion’s roaring; the identity of


the cakravartin buddhas; the relation between Zen’ai and Aizen. Of the remaining chapters, some are elucidated in more abridged form than others, by selecting a single line or an expression that identifies a concept or deity expounded in the chapter. The exegesis is carried out through

equivalences to other elements of the maṇḍalic worlds, references to established meanings within the Esoteric tradition and quotations from previous masters, forming a complex scholastic framework around the scripture.

Interestingly, Dōhan also draws connections between different chapters. For instance, he links the Introductory Chapter and the Chapter on Aizen arguing that both illustrate the notion of duality, the first by interpreting the title of the sūtra, the latter by interpreting the names of Aizen and Zen’ai (these two names

are composed of the same two characters in inverted position).Footnote55 Eventually Dōhan claims that each of the twelve chapters of the Yuqi jing embody the meaning of non-duality, and this makes


the scripture into a consistent whole. Dōhan also connects chapters in order to clarify the rituals they outline. For instance, he links Chapter Ten and Chapter Eleven in liturgical terms, explaining how the consecration ritual presented in Chapter Eleven is contingent on the practice of inner fire ritual (nai goma 内護摩) prescribed in Chapter Ten.Footnote56

In short, extended commentaries, such as Dōhan’s exegesis, dissect the scripture in multiple segments in order to recompose it according to the specific meaning a scholiast claims it embodies.


3.3. Reading duality into the Yuqi jing: the title of the sūtra At the beginning of his exegesis Dōhan argued that there is an implicit hermeneutical strategy embedded in the Yuqi jing, reflected also in its title. It consists in first positing the dualism of principle and cognition instantiated by the two maṇḍalas and then resolving it by using non-dualistic terms (funi no gon 不二之言), which Dōhan

describes as the ‘melodic sound of union’ (sōō no bon’on 相應梵音).Footnote57 This approach may be deemed to be the fundamental characteristic of medieval commentaries. Taken together, despite differences in structure and details of interpretation, all commentaries show that their compilers read elaborated expressions of duality and its overcoming in the Yuqi jing, and in so doing unequivocally transformed the scripture into a ‘combinatory’ scripture.

The exegesis of the title of the Yuqi jing is perhaps the most incisive example of this tendency. In directing their attention to the meaning of the title of the Yuqi jing medieval scholiasts followed an established Sino-Japanese exegetical tradition that saw in the title of a scripture its

essence. One may recall, for instance, the well-known exegeses of the title of the Lotus sūtra in Tiantai treatises or the esoteric elucidations of the title (kaidai 解題) of non-esoteric scriptures, including the Lotus Sūtra,


compiled by Kūkai in Japan.Footnote58 The interpretation of the title of the Yuqi jing plays on the conventional dualistic motif of the two maṇḍalas. For this, too, parallels and antecedents may be found in the Japanese exegetical tradition of the Lotus Sūtra. For instance, Kōen Hokkegi 講演法華義, a work purporting to explain the esoteric meaning of the Lotus Sūtra, attributed to Enchin but probably compiled later, matches the characters of the Lotus Sūtra title, Myōhō renge 妙法蓮華 (‘Lotus of the Wonderful Law’) to


the two esoteric maṇḍalas: the two characters for myō-hō are said to embody the Womb maṇḍala and the two characters for ren-ge the Adamantine maṇḍala; eventually the title in its entirety is conceived as an embodiment of the non-dual nature of these maṇḍalas.Footnote59 While this remains the essential interpretive pattern, the medieval


commentaries on the Yuqi jing introduce new elements. To understand how this exegesis unfolded, one needs to focus on the full title of the sūtra, Jin'gangfeng louge yiqie yujia yuqi jing, Jpn. Kongōbu rōkaku issai yuga yugikyō. This title is unpacked by glossing each term with one or more Tantric concepts. For instance, Dōhan’s Yugisotoran kuden starts as follows:


The Adamantine peak (Kongōbu 金剛峯) is the Adamantine world (kongōkai 金剛界). Peak (bu 峯) means top (chō 頂). Pavilion (rōkaku 樓閣) indicates the Womb world (taizōkai 胎蔵界). All (issai 一切) refers to all physical and mental elements (shikishin shohō 色心諸法) –matter (shiki )

is the principle (ri ), that is, Womb (tai ); mind (shin 心)is cognition (chi ), that is, vajra (kon[[[gō]]] [剛]). Yoga (yuga 瑜伽) is the male voice; yogi (yugi 瑜祇) is the female voice. Yuga yugi 瑜伽瑜祇, taken together, signify perfect union (sōō 相應).Footnote60


Thus, not only did Dōhan subsume the combination of the Adamantine and the Womb world in the title of the Yuqi jing. He also posited a male-female opposition by imaginatively reading the compound yuga yugi in gendered terms. According to medieval exegetes, the terms yuga and yugi, which in

Sanskrit identify a practice (yoga) and its practitioner (yogin), would both mean yoga, yuga being the masculine form and yugi the feminine. By combining the two terms, perfect union (yoga, Jp. sōō 相應) is shown to be actualised.

It is not clear where Japanese scholiasts appropriated such etymology from, for yogi is not a feminine noun in Sanskrit.Footnote61 Yet this turned out to be an effective hermeneutical strategy to convey the combinatory meaning of the scripture. Dōhan reiterates it across his commentary applying it also to specific deities from the scripture: Aizen and Zen’ai, for instance, are made to embody that sexual opposition.


This reading of the title of the Yuqi jing appears to have been shared across lineages, for one finds it in the same or slightly different format in different sources. Enni/Daie’s Yugikyō kenmon dissects the title accordingly (Figure 1b):


kongōbu 金剛峯 = five peaks 五峯 = Adamantine 金剛

rōkaku 樓閣 = eight pillars 八柱 = Womb 胎蔵

issai yuga 一切瑜伽 = male voice 男聲 = gate of discernment 慧門

yugi 瑜祇 = female voice 女聲 = gate of meditation 定門.Footnote62


Here the characters of the title are also matched to the architectural details of a stūpa called ‘yogin stūpa’ (yugitō 瑜祇塔), which would become a symbol of the scripture: ‘five peaks’ refer to the five spears with five rings each, which are depicted on the stūpa’s roof; ‘eight columns’ are the pillars inside the stūpa which support


it.Footnote63 (Figure 2) This numeric pairing provides the opportunity to reinforce the correlation with the two maṇḍalas, which can be identified by another set of five and eight, namely, the five Buddhas of the Adamantine system and the eight petals of the central section of the Womb maṇḍala. The analogy thus articulates the combination of the Adamantine and Womb systems that takes place in the Yuqi jing in yet another mode.


4. Ritual exegesis: initiatory documents as commentaries


If the interpretation of the title sets the stage for a sustained reading of the sūtra along dualistic patterns, this reading does not remain confined to exegetical works. It becomes part of the knowledge transmitted in the ritual context and it is therefore reiterated in the documents that certify such

transmission. A compelling example is a manuscript titled ‘The inner, unfathomable meaning of one’s body attaining Buddhahood’ (Jishin jōbutsu ō fukatoku gi 自身成仏奥不可得義).Footnote64 (Figure 3) The manuscript


comes from a private archive, the Fujii Eikan bunko, held at the Art Research Centre of Ritsumeikan University and comprising material originally in the Kongōzō 金剛蔵 depository of Kanchiin 観智院 at Tōji. The folio is dated Kenmu 建武 1 (1334) 7/12. It consists of the title of the sūtra, a drawing of a human

figure and several passages explaining the function of the syllable VAṂ. The siddhāṃ letters for ‘Yugi’ are written on the upper corner, identifying the document as related to the Yuqi jing. The title of the scripture is glossed in colour-coded terms that point out biological duality and the generative potential that duality incorporates:


kongōbu 金剛峯 = white fluid (byakutai 白渧)/cognition (chi )

rōkaku 楼閣 = red fluid (shakutai 赤渧)/principle (ri )

issai 一切 [no gloss]


yuga yugi 瑜伽・瑜祇 (yuyu 瑜瑜/gagi 伽祇) = merging of the two fluids in which the seed of consciousness is entrusted/This is called ‘the human body is the buddha’s body’ (nitai wagō shiki no shushi kono naka ni tasu 二渧和合識種子詫其中/是云人躰即仏身也) = non-duality of principle and cognition (richi funi 理智不二)Footnote65

kyō [no gloss]


It is noteworthy that the compiler (or the copyist) of this manuscript intervened further to disclose his understanding: the last four characters of the title are linked with red lines that pair them in sets of two and conveys in powerful visual terms the interaction between opposite sexes that starts a creative process. (Figure 3)


The Fujii Eikan injin brings to the fore the exegetical value of ritual material. Similar transmission documents may be found in important medieval temple archives. I had previously identified a similar version within the holdings of Kanazawa bunko 金澤文庫. Dated 1297, this, too, consisted of a single folio and therefore its exegetical backdrop was more difficult to identify.Footnote66 Another version has recently come to light in the archives of Zentsūji 善通寺, Kagawa prefecture, within a set of


transmission documents of the Yuqi jing called Kongōōinryū hiketsu 金剛王院流秘決. (Figure 4a) It is not dated, but according to a colophon the set was transmitted by Shōkaku 勝覚 (1057–1129), founder of the Sanbōin lineage, to Shōken 聖賢 (1083–1149), initiator of the Kongōōin lineage, which places the origins of this interpretation at the beginning of the twelfth century.Footnote67 The set of transmission documents consists of several folios, each purporting to transmit the secret meaning of one chapter of the


Yuqi jing (although not all chapters are covered). Kongōōinryū hiketsu thus reiterates the format of the commentaries hitherto examined, providing compelling evidence that injin functioned as scriptural exegeses, albeit in more elliptic, and often visual, terms. Comparative analysis enables us to situate the curious one-folio injin within a more systematic interpretation of the Yuqi jing. The outer title of the matching folio in the Kongōōin set explicitly indicates that the content illustrates the Introductory


Chapter of the Yuqi jing. (Figure 4b) Accordingly, as established in the commentarial tradition, the document starts with an explanation of the title of the scripture. The central image of the document, a human figure standing in a yogic position that reproduces the form of syllable VAṂ (Figure 5) can also be read as a legitimate interpretation of the chapter. The meaning of the syllable VAṂ is in fact addressed in this chapter, which describes it as ‘the one-syllable heart-mantra of the bodhisattva Fugen’ (ichiji


shin myō 普賢菩薩一字心明), corresponding to a ‘three-dimension mudrā’ (katsuma-in 羯磨印).Footnote68 The discussion of this syllable also occupies a relevant place in the commentaries. Yugikyō kenmon, for instance, explains at length that the two gates of meditation and wisdom, the 16 bodhisattvas and the five Buddhas of the five directions (that is, the constituents of the adamantine world) are all subsumed in this one-syllable mantra and the 37 deities [of the maṇḍala] are perfectly realised therein:


Figure 4b. ‘Yugi, From the Introductory Chapter.’ Outer title of the folio. Kongōōinryū hiketsu, Zentsūji Archives, dozō 23–249-28. Reproduced with permission.


The master says: ‘The syllable (VAṂ) of the Introductory Chapter of this scripture is the most fundamental spell (shin chū shinju 心中心呪 [lit. ‘the heart of the heart’]). The entire body and all marks (tsūtai sōsō 通体惣相) of the thirty-seven venerable ones [of the maṇḍala] are [comprised in] just this one character (VAṂ). (…) Accordingly, in this syllable the seeds, marks and forms of the dharma world are like a ‘circular stūpa’ (entō 円塔). This is called the essence of the dharma-body (hosshintai 法身體), the non-duality of principle and cognition.Footnote69


The commentary reiterates over and again that the syllable embodies the ‘cognition-body’ (chishin 智身) of the Buddha, that is, Mahāvairocana of the Adamantine world.Footnote70 In the injin the mudrā that the figure of a yogin ties in fact is the ‘cognition-mudrā’ (chiken-in 智拳印), signifier of the Adamantine aspect of the Buddha. In other words, the initiatory document shows in diagrammatic mode how the practitioner can actualise a Buddha-body

by reproducing the sonic and bodily form of the ‘All-encompassing Tathāgata,’ namely, Mahāvairocana. It does so on the basis of the knowledge and acceptance of a conceptual system of correspondences, which is explicated in lengthy details in the commentaries and crystallised in the images and short pronouncements of the transmission documents.


The attention to ritual matters exhibited in the medieval commentaries to the Yuqi jing transforms these into a form of ritual exegesis and precipitates the need, I argue, to read them together with ritual documents concerning initiatory practices, such as protocols (shidai 次第), transmission certificates and even maps of the ritual space (danzu 壇圖), in order to fully understand specific points of the exegesis. At the same time,

ritual material such as the Kongōōinryū hiketsu amply demonstrates that initiatory documents carried exegetical meaning. Evidence from both types of sources suggests a blurred demarcation between textual genres and demands a new categorization of the commentarial tradition, one that includes ritual material next to more traditional discursive treatises.



5. New rituals and the Tantric paradigms of the Yuqi jing


5.1. The yogin consecration


The injin examined above point to a ritual, rather than scholastic, occasion for the transmission of the meaning of the Yuqi jing, but are not explicit about the configuration of such ritual. A closer inspection of the material related to the Yuqi jing suggests that it is in the context of an initiation that much knowledge of the Yuqi jing was communicated. Known as ‘yogin consecration’ (yugi kanjō 瑜祇 灌頂), this was an advanced initiatory practice

seemingly created by Japanese ritualists in the medieval period on the basis of Chapter Eleven of the scripture. As we have seen, medieval commentaries as well as ritual documents of the Yuqi jing devoted particular attention to this chapter, which contained instructions for a visualisation


practice aimed at attainingVajrasattva’s mind.’ The ritual shaped by it enjoyed immediate and enduring success, judging from the volume of sources preserved in temple archives of different lineages. I have reconstructed it elsewhere, but it is useful to summarise relevant points here to grasp the extent of the impact of the Yuqi jing in Japan.Footnote71


Chapter Eleven of the sūtra instructs the practitioner ‘to visualise [his] body in the shape of the Buddha’ 觀身如佛 and gives a list of deities to locate on specific parts of the practitioner’s body:


根本命金剛 Vajra[[[sattva]]] of original life釋論以爲虚 makes of Indra’s wheel its seat,

多羅爲二目 Tārā is the two eyes,

毘倶胝爲耳 Bhṛkuṭī is the ears,

吉祥爲口舌 Śri/Lakṣmī is the tongue,

喜戲爲鼻端 Ratī is the top of the nose,

金剛觀自在 Vajra [[[karma]]?] and Avalokiteśvara,

以成定慧臂 Become the arms of meditation and wisdom,

三世不動尊 Trailokyavijaya and Acala,

以爲兩膝脚 Are the knees and legs,

心爲遍照尊 The Venerable One who Shines Everywhere [[[Mahāvairocana]]] is the heart,

臍成虚空眼 Buddhalocanā is the navel,

虚空寶爲冠 Ākāśamālā is the crown,

相好金剛日 Vajratejas is the marks [of the Buddha].Footnote72


These deities are a curious group not documented in any other textual source. Taken together, the scripture states, ‘these fifteen deities become a single Buddha-body’ – an expression that would become ubiquitous in the medieval exegetical and ritual material related to the Yuqi jing.

In transforming the instructions of the scripture into a full-fledged ritual, Japanese ritualists tried to build an ‘inner maṇḍala,’ as opposed to the painted maṇḍala used in the consecration rituals of the two major maṇḍalas. As its title indicates, Chapter Eleven focuses on ‘inner actions’ (nai sagō 内作業). Medieval exegetes applied this notion

to the very name of the consecration, which sources describe as a ‘consecration through inner actions’ (nai sagō kanjō 内作業灌頂), as well as to its performance. The initiation entails a set of visualizations of the 15 deities aimed at recreating the practitioner’s body as the body of Mahāvairocana. Most of the 15 deities are allocated to the sensorial organs (eyes, ears, nose, tongue) and the limbs (arms and legs), which may be understood as marking the points of exposure of the practitioner’s body to the

external world in order to protect them.Footnote73 However, if one considers the vertical sequence of the central points on which four of the deities are visualised, one finds that it links the heart, the head, the tongue and the navel, i.e., the four cakras that are central in the

conception of a subtle body, the ‘invisiblebody made of vital points and channels through which energy flows.Footnote74 Some Japanese medieval commentaries illustrate the installation of the 15 deities with drawings that


translated the scriptural instructions graphically and make this reading more explicit. One such example is included in the above-cited Yugikyō hiketsu attributed to Jichiun.Footnote75 (Figure 6) Further, drawing on Annen’s interpretation of the Yuqi jing as the fulfilment of the Adamantine and Womb maṇḍalas, medieval ritualists established a system of correspondences between each of the fifteen deities and the sections of the two maṇḍalas, thus engendering the transformation of the practitioner’s


body into the double maṇḍalic being of Mahāvairocana.Footnote76 We could understand these visualisations as sophisticated instantiations of the idea of ‘becoming a Buddha with one’s own body’ (sokushin jōbutsu 即身成佛), whereby the practitioner unites with the principal deity. This was a fundamental notion in East Asian Tantric Buddhism. The yogin consecration, however, transposes such a dynamic in the interior of the body. Commentaries reiterate that for this consecration it is not necessary to construct a


ritual platform, for the place of performance is a himitsudan 祕密壇, the secret altar in the mind of the practitioner, where the practitioner visualises and attains his own maṇḍalic body. The practitioner is instructed ‘to make offerings to himself according to procedure.’ He visualizes each

of these objects in a specific order and mentally present them to himself. At the end of this oblation the practitioner can be proclaimed a ‘new Buddha.’ The act of self-veneration thus reflects the attainment of the status of a Buddha.


The paradigm of this hermeneutics of transformation goes beyond the application of the standard model of duality based on the interaction of the Adamantine and Womb maṇḍalas. In fact, the central elements highlighted in the ritual exegesis of the Yuqi jing are more easily understood in the context of the practices of interiorization that characterise the Higher Yoga Tantras in Indian sources.Footnote77

5.2. The ritual performance of gestation


Another ritual element that characterised the medieval exegeses of the Yuqi jing is the insertion of visual maps of gestation in both the commentarial and liturgical material. These maps, which I have called ‘embryological charts,’ articulate the process of formation of a new being in a basic pattern of five stages (tainai goi 胎内五位).Footnote78 (Figure 7) Different correlations are added to the pattern in order to subsume different aspects of Tantric teachings or practice, so the charts are not all

identical. They are also included at different places in the commentaries. In some cases, they are placed at the end of the treatise, as in Yugikyō kenmon, or appear as a supplement to the commentary, as in Taimitsu keigushō.Footnote79 In other cases, such as in Yugikyō hiketsu and Yugikyō hidenshō, the charts are inserted within

Chapter Two, focused on Zen’ai (Aizen’s alter ego).Footnote80 Further, these charts were also transmitted as independent documents, usually in a set with other initiatory documents – this

is the case with Kongōōinryū hiketsu discussed above. It is possible to relate the mapping of foetal growth to the content of the chapter which include them, and I have attempted to do so elsewhere.Footnote81 Yet, considering their circulation, it may be more appropriate to consider these charts as diagrammatic expressions of the meaning attributed to the Yuqi jing in its whole.


The embryological charts illustrate the condition in which birth takes place, with semen and menstrual blood mixing in the mother’s womb and the implanting of consciousness in the womb. The gradual formation of a physical (rūpa) body culminates in the image of the five-element stūpa (gorintō 五輪塔) that appears in the fourth stage of gestation.

The five elements are the five material constituents of reality (earth, water, fire, wind, and space) and a correlative term for the five viscera that regulate the human body. Thus, the five elements denote the cosmic composition of the human body, indispensable to transform the human body in

the cosmic body of the Buddha. The stūpa stage of gestation reveals a body endowed with the five organs and the sense fields. Last stage in the charts conveys the transformation of such body in that of the tathāgata. In some


commentaries the five stages of gestation are also presented as performed through a sequence of five hand gestures, which compose the so-called ‘five-pronged mudrā’ – also known as ‘mudrā of the human form’ (ningyō-in 人形印). The first stage corresponds to the fists tied together; then the two middle fingers up and the two fingers next to them progressively make the form of a human being, until the hands open up to indicate the birth of the foetus. Yugikyō chōmonshō, for instance, explains that the half-mudrā made


with the left hand reproduces the shape of a woman (nyogyō 女形); the half-mudrā made with the right hand signifies the male shape (nangyō 男形). By joining left and right hands the practitioner produces a five-pronged vajra mudrā, thereby ‘uniting principle and cognition into the body of a non-dual

single reality’ (funi ichijitsu no tai 不二一實ノ體).Footnote82 The embryogenetic model presented in these works seems to resolve the reflection on duality that the sūtra exuded in the production of a new body.


There is sufficient evidence to demonstrates that such embryological conceptualisation is linked to the performance of the yogin abhiṣeka. Dōhan hints to it through analogies when, in his exegesis of Chapter Eleven (the canonical basis of the yogin abhiṣeka), divides the title of the chapter in three parts, Kongōsatta bodaishin 金剛薩埵菩提心, naisa[[[gō]]] kanjō 内作[[[業]]]灌頂 and shitsuji 悉地, and make the first and the third parts correspond, respectively, to father (nyofu 如父) and mother (nyobo 如母), while the


middle section is the ‘child’ (nyoshi 如子).Footnote83 The Yugisotoran hiketsu attributed to Jitsuun is more explicit in linking the abhiṣeka to gestation. It explains that the ‘water of the vase of knowledge’ used for the consecration ritual is the mixture of red and white fluids; the 15 deities are subsumed in it. The sprinkling of the water

that occurs at the moment of the anointment of the practitioner embodies the emplacement of the twin fluids in the practitioner’s body. When the practitioner visualises the 15 deities on his body, he is instructed to form the mudrā of inner five prongs: the five prongs indicate five parts of the practitioner’s body, which grow from the


interaction of the two fluids.Footnote84 This type of exegesis, too, resonates with continental practices of transformation that focus on the symbolic use of sexual fluids.Footnote85


6. Concluding considerations: towards a transnational understanding of the Yuqi jing Probing the reception and interpretation of the Yuqi jing in Japan has uncovered a distinct commentarial and ritual tradition

established in the medieval period. The defining features that this analysis has identified carry significant consequences for reassessing the place that the scripture occupies within the history of East Asian Buddhism. A few, preliminary conclusions may be drawn here.


The historical circumstances in which the Yuqi jing was composed remain to be clarified. Focusing on its content, the absence of deities that are central in the scripture, such as Aizen or Daishō Kongō, from the Indian or Tibetan tantric pantheon, supports the theory of a Chinese origin of the scripture. Other chapters of the scripture,

however, in particular those that expound the principles of the yogin consecration, link the scripture more closely to Higher Yoga tantras. These links should perhaps be self-evident if one considers the textual family to which the Yuqi jing belongs, the Adamantine scriptures. Its representative text, Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgraha, which

emerged during the second half of the seventh century, is indeed considered one of the most important Yoga tantra.Footnote86 Yet the Chinese version of this tantra (Jin'gangding jing) was not put to the same use in Japan. On the contrary, the exegetical and ritual practices of the Yuqi jing developed in the medieval period flesh out the connections with continental yogic literature in a conspicuous manner.


Japanese interpreters operated a consistent reading of duality in the Yuqi jing and eventually associate it to practices of bodily transformation. While drawing on Annen’s interpretation, medieval commentaries proffer an accretion to the standard dualistic pattern crystallised into the two maṇḍalas, making biological opposites meaningful in

symbolic and practical terms: the ‘red drop-white drop’ model introduces a new rationale in the analysis of the scripture and engenders new patterns of ritual performance. The resolution of duality in the production of a new being, in particular, deserves consideration, for it invokes the generative function of dualisms that practitioners experience in their worldly life.


These developments elicit further questions as to whether the medieval practices of the Yuqi jing reveal distinct shifts in the Japanese understanding of Tantric Buddhism or should be linked to interpretative trends in continental Tantric Buddhism. The evidence gathered in this article attests that commentarial production reached its peak between

the thirteenth and the fifteenth centuries. Why did it flourish at this moment in the history of Japanese Buddhism? To answer this puzzling question, further analysis is necessary than it has been possible in the limited space of this article. In particular, it is indispensable to reframe the interpretations of medieval Japanese scholiasts in

a broader, transnational history that considers how the ideas and practices inferred from the Yuqi jing were construed across the Tantric Buddhist tradition (and not only in Chinese Buddhism) at the time of the compilation of the scripture as well as in the span of time corresponding to the climax it enjoyed in medieval Japan.



Acknowledgments


Research for this article was facilitated by a Senior Research Fellowship from the British Academy/Leverhulme, for whose support I am grateful. I am indebted to Ōkubo Ryōshun 大久保良峻 of Waseda University for the opportunity to present my initial findings at Waseda University, where I benefitted from a learned audience’s comments. I am grateful to Shinpukuji 真福寺, Zentsūji 善通寺 and Ritsumeikan University 立命館大學 for graciously allowing me to publish photos of the material in their holdings.


Disclosure statement


No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).


Additional information


Funding


This work was supported by British Academy/Leverhulme [SRF 2015].


Notes


1. I shall use the term Tantric Buddhism as synonymous of Esoteric Buddhism (Jp. mikkyō 密教). Which of the two terms is more appropriate to designate the Buddhist system that developed from the sixth century onward across Asia has been object of long debates among scholars. (For a summary of

different positions see Orzech, Payne, Sørensen, ‘Introduction’.) While I am aware of their terminological differences, I use the adjectives ‘Tantric’ and ‘Esoteric’ interchangeably, but privilege ‘Tantric’ for the wider connections this term affords to similar interpretations and material from other areas of the Buddhist world.


2. Interestingly, the Yuqi jing spurred some interest in Europe in the 1990s: a full, annotated translation of the sūtra in Dutch was the core of the Ph. D dissertation of the late Pol vanden Broucke (vanden Broucke, Yugikyō), who later published three articles in English on specific aspects of the scripture (see below). The art historian Roger Goepper included an English translation of Chapter Five of the Yuqi jing in his iconological study of Aizen and presented a range of ritual material from Shingon works related to the Yuqi jing (Goepper, Aizen-myōō).


3. For convenience’s sake the names of deities with no counterpart in Sanskrit are given in Japanese pronunciation.

4. Dolce, ‘Nigenteki genri no gireika’; Dolce and Mano, ‘Annen.’

5. Dolce, ‘The Embryonic Generation of the Perfect Body.’

6. Misaki, Taimitsu no kenkyū, 137–140; Osabe, Tōdai mikkyōshi zakkō, 240–241.

7. T no. 867, 18: 253c: 唐南天竺國三藏沙門金剛智譯.

8. See, for instance, Yugi kaishinshō, 134, entry ‘On the translator.’ The hypotheses articulated in this work can be found in other works by Shingon scholar-monks. Cf. vanden Broucke, ‘On the Title and Translator of the Yuqi jing.’ On the Yugi kaishinshō, see below, n. 37.

9. Kamata et al (ed.), Taishō shinshū daizōkyō hōbō sōmokuroku 2: 212; Hōbōgirin, p.1035; vanden Broucke, ‘The Twelve-armed Deity Daishō kongō and His Scriptural Sources,’ 150 and 272n28.


10. Yasuhara (‘Yugikyō no kenkyū’ 1: 61) notes that in the Ming canon the sūtra appears in two juan 巻. However, medieval Japanese sources always give it as one juan. See, for instance, Yugikyō kenmon, ZTZ mikkyō 2: 207 ‘this sūtra in one fascicle (kan 巻) and twelve chapters.’


11. Kūkai, Shōrai mokuroku, T no. 2161, 55: 1062b29 (金剛峯樓閣一切瑜伽瑜祇經一卷), 1066a18; Eun, Eun risshi shomokuroku, T no 2168, 55: 1090a27; Shūei, Zenrinji Shūei sōmokuroku, T no. 2174b, 55: 1112c.25. The title also appears in several medieval catalogues, such as the Daigoji Rokugekyōtō mokuroku 錄外經等目錄 [Catalogue of Scriptures and Other Writings not Recorded], T no. 2175, 55: 1112c24.


12. Jin'gang jixiang da chengjiu pin jing 金剛吉祥大成就品經 [[[Scripture]] of the Chapter of the Great Accomplishments of Vajraśrī], one juan. See entries in Ennin’s catalogue, Nittō shingū shōgyō mokuroku, T no. 2167, 55:1080c28; Engyō’s catalogue, Reiganji wajō shōrai hōmon dōgu tō mokuroku, T no. 2164, 55:1072b6; and Shūei’s catalogue, Shinshosha shōrai hōmon tō mokuroku, T no. 2174, 55: 1108b2. Engyō notes that an alternative name of this text is ‘Sūtra of Five Eyes’ (Gogenkyō 五眼經) and that it comes from the ‘Scripture of the Adamantine Crown Peak’ (referred to as Kongōchōbu kyō 金剛頂峰經). Annen’s Hakke hiroku also reports that it is a chapter from the scripture (referred to as Yugikyō) and that it was brought to Japan by En(nin) and (En)gyō (T no. 2176, 55:1119b20).


13. See Shingonshū shogaku kyōritsuron mokuroku 眞言宗所學經律論目録, KDZ 1, p. 106.

14. This chapter has been translated in vanden Broucke, ‘The Twelve-armed Deity Daishō kongō,’ 150–155.


15. Jin'gangding jing (often given with the reconstructed Sanskrit title of Vajraṣekhara-sūtra) is the title of Amoghavajra’s translation of the first five chapters of the Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgraha, T no. 867, vol. 18. See Kano, ‘Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgraha.’


16. Harriet Hunter (A Transmission and Its Transformation, 113) however notes that the system is not always consistent.


17. Misaki, Taimitsu no kenyū, p. 138. Cf. T 18: 260a6-12. On the basis of these images Misaki has suggested that Chapter Nine of the Yuqi jing was influenced by Higher Yoga Tantras. On the relation between Butsugen and Ichiji kinrin in the maṇḍala, see Hunter, A Transmission and Its Transformation, 110–114. Misaki sees a sexual relationship also in the relation between Aizen and Vajrasattva presented in Chapter Five of the Yuqi jing, where Aizen is described as ‘the wife of Vajrasattva and the mother of all the Buddhas’ (T 18: 257b2-3). On this association and the changing gender of Aizen, see Dolce, ‘Nigenteki genri no gireika.’


18. Ōmura, Mikkyō hattatsushi, 520; Ōsabe, Tōdai mikkyōshi zakkō, 240–242; Misaki, Taimitsu no kenkyū, 508 passim; and vanden Broucke, ‘On the Title and Translator,’ which summarises Japanese scholarship.


19. Fahua guanzhi yigui / Jp. Kanchigiki 法華観智儀軌 (full title: Chengjiu Miaofa lianhua jing wang yujia guanzhi yigui 成就妙法蓮華経王瑜伽観智儀軌), T no. 1000, 19: 594–602. On this ritual, see Dolce, ‘Reconsidering the Taxonomy of the “Esoteric.”’


20. Harriet Hunter presents an excellent discussion of this point. See Hunter, A Transmission and Its Transformation, in particular Chapter Three and Chapter Four.

21. Yugikyō hidenshō 瑜祇経秘伝抄, a long commentary on the scripture by Yūgi (see below, n. 37). Yūgi, on the contrary, considers the sūtra to embody the meaning of the non-duality of the two realms.


22. The text is listed as Yugikyō gyōbōki 瑜祇經行法記 in Nihon daizōkyō, and I have used this as its main title, but the internal title is Issai nyorai Daishōkongōchō saishō shinjitsu samayabon shidai kannen 一切如来大勝金剛頂最勝眞實三昧耶品次第觀念 (see NDZ 36: 235). The text follows the recitative passages of the sūtra and offers instructions on diverse practices: an internalised fire ritual (naikahō 内火法), the installation of 12 syllables on the practitioner’s body (junijikan 十二字観) and a five colour visualization (goshikikan 五色観). See NDZ 1: 527-530 for an analysis of the content.


23. The text is given as Yugi sōgyō shiki 瑜祇總行私記 in the Taishō canon and as Yugikyō sōgyōki 瑜祇經總行記 in Nihon daizōkyō. Further, on the title page of the latter Gikyō kuden 祇經口傳 appears as its main title and two other alternative titles, Yugikyō shuin 瑜祇經手印 and Yugikyōhōshō 瑜祇經法抄 are given. The text is considered to be the oral transmission from one of Shinjaku’s masters, either Shūei or Jinnichi 神日 (860–916). On the latter, see MDJ 5: 2209.


24. Full title of the Taishō version: Kongōbu rōkaku issai yugi kyō shugyōbō 金剛峰樓閣一切瑜祇經修行法, T no. 2228, 61: 485a–504b. This is a text in three kan, but medieval sources state that there were three different versions, an extended text in six kan, a middle one in three kan and an abbreviated text in one kan. See NDZ (kaidai) 1: 521–527. Also known as Gyōbō shidai. For an introduction to Annen in English, see Dolce and Mano, ‘Annen,’ 768–775.

25. Iyanaga Nobumi 彌永信美 has suggested to me that Annen might have received oral instruction from Ennin which engendered his understanding, in particular of the ritual dimension of the Yuqi jing. The assumption is that Ennin, in turn, would have learned these interpretations in China. However, in the current status of research on early Japanese Esoteric Buddhism it is difficult to find evidence for such an hypothesis.


26. Yugikyō shūgyōbō, T no. 2228, 61: 485a7.

27. See, for instance, Shingonshū kyōjigi, T 75: 441a. See also Kagiwada, ‘Tōmitsu ni okeru Yugikyō kaishaku no hensen.’

28. T no. 2228, 61: 485.

29. Yuqi jing, T 18: 263b4–5.


30. The practice is known as ‘visualisation of five syllables on the practitioner’s body’ (goji gonshin kan 五字厳身観) or ‘visualisation of the five cakras’ (gorinkan 五輪観). See, e.g., Dari jing, T n. 848, 18: 31a, 38b–c, 52b-c; Dari jing shu, T no. 1796, 39: 727c8–728a9. For a translation and extensive discussion of these passages in English, see Chen, Legend and Legitimation, 203–218.


31. Yugikyō gyōbōki, T no. 2228, 61: 494c–495a.

32. Nihon daizōkyō kaidai 1: 524. Sange gakusoku suggests that the yogin consecration was transmitted only within Taimitsu lineages, but my research has shown that it was adopted by several Tantric lineages regardless of their institutional affiliation. See Dolce, ‘The Abhiṣeka of the Yogin.’

33. SZ 5: 11–26.


34. ZSZ 7: 91–134. According to the colophon this work was copied in 1276 by Kakuman 覚満 and this copy in turn transcribed in 1297 by Jitsuō 實応 at Negoroji 根来寺. This manuscript, now in Kōyasan University library, is the one printed in ZSZ. See ZSZ 14 (index of titles and authors): 40-41.


35. SZ 5: 27-137. According to the colophon (shikigo 識語), Dōhan received the transmission of the Yuqi jing at Hosshōji 法性寺, the temple of the Fujiwara house in the capital, at the same time as an individual given as ‘Zenjō tenka’ 禅定展下. The explanatory notes of Shingonshū zensho (SZ kaidai, 11) associate this title to Dōjo nyūdō shinnō 道助入道親王 (1196-1249), a Ninnaji monk and son of emperor Gotoba. However, in the medieval period the title was used by members of the Regent family when they took tonsure. Here it must refer to Kujō Michie 九条道家 (1193-1252), who is known to have nurtured an interest in the Yuqi jing. See Matsumoto, Chūsei ōken to sokui kanjō, 356-357 and 362. The colophon also informs us that the instruction lasted 30 days.

36. On the influence of Annen on early Tōmitsu exegesis of the Yuqi jing, see Kagiwada, ‘Tōmitsu ni okeru Yugikyō kaishaku no hensen.’

37. ZSZ 7: 137–154. According to the information included at the beginning of each juan, it records the transmission Yūgi received by a Kōyasan monk called Keiga 景巌 in 1576. Yūgi received instructions at Daigoji, Onjōji 園城寺 and Enryakuji 延曆寺, as well as Nara temples. See ZSZ 14: 255–256 and MDJ 5: 2191 b–c.


38. In NDZ 36 (kyōzōbu mikkyōbu ge 2): 1–89. According to Ono (ed.), Bussho kaisetsu daijiten (11: 84), Jōhen also authored a commentary on the Yuqi jing, Yugikyōshō 瑜祇経抄, not yet identified. This is said to be quoted by Raiyu in his own commentary.

39. Kanazawa bunko shiryō zensho 6. On the dating, see Manabe, ‘Kaishaku.’ The list of texts on esoteric Buddhism held at Kanazawa bunko give more than twenty titles on the Yuqi jing, of which six are books owned (shutakuhon 手沢本) by Kenna. The latter include a copy of Jitsuun’s Yugikyō hiketsu and a manual for the practice of the yugi kanjō. Manabe, ‘Kanazawa bunko ni okeru shingon mikkyō tenseki,’ p. 276.


40. Printed in Kanazawa bunko shiryō zensho 6. Of the twelve chapters, Chapter Two and Chapter Three are not commented upon. The manuscript is written on the back of a letter in cursive. Although restored, it is not in excellent conditions and several lines are missing at different points. The preface includes the name of Kenna in Siddhāṃ. See also Manabe, ‘Kaishaku,’ in Kanazawa bunko shiryō zensho 6: 289–290.


41. Unpublished manuscript. Not dated. Copied by Hōren 宝蓮 in 1344. Colophon in Abe, Chūsei nihon no shūkyō tekusuto taikei: 262. I am grateful to Abe Yasurō 阿部泰郎 of Nagoya University 名古屋大學 for introducing me to this text and providing me with photographs of the manuscript. The conditions of the manuscript render its reading arduous in places. The other two commentaries, titled Yugikyōhō and Yugi sotaran, compiled respectively in 1339 (Ryakuō 2, Engen 3) 6/6 and 6/7, are part of Onokō hishō. See Uchida, Monkanbō Kōshin to bijutsu, 343-344 and, for the colophons, Abe, Chūsei Nihon no shukyō tekusuto taikei: 259–260.


42. See Yuga dentōshō 瑜伽伝灯鈔, the biography of Monkan, in Uchida, Monkanbō Kōshin to bijutsu 146–147. The famous portrait of Godaigo in the holdings of Shōjōkōji 清浄光寺, in Fujisawa, where the ruler is portrayed holding the same accessories of Vajrasattva, a vajra and a vajra bell, is said to reproduce the semblance of Godaigo when he received the yugi initiation. See Nara kokuritsu hakubutsukan, Shinbutsu shūgō, 196 (no. 177) and Dolce, ‘The Abhiṣeka of the Yogin.’

43. See ZTZ, mikkyō 2, 205–216. From a manuscript in the holdings of Kyoto University Library. Daie succeeded Enni to the abbotship of Tōfukuji 東福寺. He also received transmissions from Sanbōin lineage of Daigoji.


44. On Yōsai’s Tantric thought and lineage see Mano, ‘Yōsai and the transformation of Buddhist precepts in pre‐modern Japan’ and Mizukami, ‘Yōsai no mikkyō shisō.’ On Enni’s interest in the Yuqi jin see Mizukami, ‘Enni Ben’en no mikkyōsetsu to taimitsu.’


45. Chūsei zenseki sōkan vol. 4, 457–486 (5–78 facsimile). I am grateful to Shinpukuji for giving permission to publish two photos of this manuscript, and to Abe Yasurō for facilitating the request.


46. Chūsei zenseki sōkan, vol. 12, 545–584. Comparative analysis of the two manuscripts, in particular the calligraphy and the style of annotations, shows that these were copied by the same person, Nōnin 能信 (1291–1355), founder of Shinpukuji. A gloss on the title page of Hikyōketsu indicating that this is one of two juan suggests that the two manuscripts might have originally been transmitted as a set and later divided. See Abe, ‘Yugikyō kenmon (daiichi) kaishaku.’


47. ZTZ mikkyō 2, 217–256.


48. ZTZ mikkyō 2, 257–355. Several manuscripts are preserved at Eizan bunko 叡山文庫 and other Tendai temples on Mount Hiei 比叡山, which bear different internal titles: Yugikyōshō 瑜祇經抄, Yugikyō kuketsu 瑜祇經口決, Kanokyō kikigakishō 彼経聞書抄. See the supplement to ZTZ mikkyō 2, ‘Kaidai.’


49. A printed and edited version of this text has been published in Mizukami, Taimitsu shisō keisei no kenkyū, 595–670.

50. See n. 21 and Tomabechi, ‘Yugi sōgyō shiki.’

51. ZTZ mikkyō 2, 212a.


52. Chūsei zenseki sōkan 12, 558. I am grateful to Kigensan Licha for drawing my attention to this passage.

53. See Shibuya, Tendai shoseki sōgō mokuroku, 1223; and Sonehara, ‘Shunkei no kenkyū.’ I am grateful to Sonehara Satoshi 曽根原理 for bringing this work to my attention.


54. Ogawa Toyoo 小川豊生 notes that the term kenmon first appeared in Tendai ritual texts from the early eleventh century, with the number of occurrences increasing in the fourteenth century. Ogawa suggests that titles such as kenmon and kikigaki 聞書 indicate a specific category of Japanese texts that combine scriptural passages and teacher’s notes to convey the insights attained through religious experience. Ogawa, Chūsei Nihon no shinwa, moji, shintai, 591–598.


55. Yugisotoran kuden, ZSZ 7: 106.

56. Yugisotoran kuden, ZSZ 7: 128.

57. Yugisotoran kuden, ZSZ 7: 93.

58. Dolce, ‘Esoteric Patterns in Nichiren’s Interpretation of the Lotus Sūtra,’ 310–313.

59. Kōen hokkegi, Chishō Daishi zenshū 3: pp. 920-1. For a discussion of this work, see Dolce, ‘Esoteric Patterns in Nichiren’s Interpretation of the Lotus Sūtra,’ 273–278.


60. Yugisotoran kuden, ZSZ 7: 93. No gloss is given for kyō (sūtra).


61. This was already noted by vanden Broucke, ‘On the Title and Translator.’

62. ZTZ mikkyō 2: 205; Chūsei zenseki sōkan, 459–460.


63. Several drawings of this stūpa exist, either within commentarial writings, as in Jitsuun’s Yugisotoran hiketsu (SZ 5: 13), or as independent folios. The manuscript in Figure 2, from the Fuji Eikan bunko 藤井永観文庫 at Art Research Center, Ritsumeikan University, is a beautiful example of the latter. Now framed as a hanging scroll, according to the inscription it is called Sōōkyō injin 相応経印信 and it was transmitted on the 5th day of

the seventh lunar month of Kenmu 建武 1 (1334) by a certain ajari Keishin 堅信. On the yogin stūpa, see vanden Broucke, ‘The Yugitō’ and Matsumoto, Chūsei ōken to sokui kanjō, 340–348. I am grateful to the Art Research Center for allowing me to reproduce this image and providing high resolution photos of the document.


64. Fuji Eikan bunko, Art Research Center, Ritsumeikan University, eik2-0-20, recorded as Yugi kiribumi 瑜祇切文. Currently framed as a hanging scroll. Copied by a certain Shunkei 春賢, it was originally included in a set of 11 folios under the title of Yugi injin setsumon hiden 印信説文秘伝. I am grateful to the Art Research Center for allowing me to reproduce this image and providing high resolution photos of the document. I have discussed this document in Dolce, ‘Nigenteki genri no gireika,’ 193–195.


65. The sentence ‘merging of the two fluids in which the seed of consciousness is entrusted’ comes from the Mohe zhiguan 摩訶止観, Zhiyi’s treatise on meditation (T 47: 93c11–12), which in turns draws on the Da zhidu lun 大智度論 (T 25: 199a 2–8).While in these classic Chinese sources the sentence served to explain the impurity of the physical body produced by other bodies, in the Japanese injin this negative meaning is turned around and the sentence becomes an expression of the identity of Buddha and practitioner.


66. Dolce, ‘Nigenteki genri no gireika,’ 194.

67. Kongōōinryū hiketsu. Unpublished, Zentsūji Archives, dozō 土蔵 23-249-28. I am grateful to Unno Keisuke 海野圭介 of the National Institute of Japanese Literature for sharing the photographs of this document with me and to the Treasure Hall of Zentsūji for graciously allowing me to publish the image.


68. T no. 867, 18: 255b6-20. The syllable VAṂ is described as the fundamental syllable of the Yuqi jing.

69. ZTZ mikkyō 2: 206–207. See also Hikyōketsu, Chūsei zenseki sōkan 4, 463.


70. For instance, ZTZ mikkyō 2: 207; Chūsei zenseki sōkan 4, 463.

71. For a detailed analysis of the yugi kanjō, see Dolce, ‘The Abhiṣeka of the Yogin.’

72. Yuqi jing, T 18: 267a2-10.

73. For an interpretation of similar material in Tibetan Buddhism, which focuses on body boundaries, see Dachille, ‘Piercing to the Pith of the Body.’

74. This is a core element in Indian and Tibetan tantras. See, for instance, Bentor, ‘Interpreting the Body Maṇḍala.’ Channels are however not discussed in Yuqi jing exegeses.


75. SZ, p. 24. Similar diagrams are included in the above-mentioned initiatory documents Kongōōinryū hiketsu.


76. See Monkan’s Yuga yugi hikanshō and Dolce, ‘The Abhiṣeka of the Yogin.’

77. See, for instance, Sugiki, ‘Oblation, Non-conception and Body’ and Dalton, ‘The Development of Perfection.’ Dalton (‘The Development of Perfection,’ 2) argues that by the end of the ninth century these texts presented the tantric subject as the site for the entire ritual performance: ‘the body’s interior provided the devotee, the altar, the oblations, and the buddha to be worshipped.’


78. For a detailed analysis of the charts see Dolce, ‘The Embryonic Generation of the Perfect Body, 297.’


79. Yugikyō kenmon, ZTZ mikkyō 2: 214–215 and Hikyōketsu, 485. According to Mizukami this is the first text where such a chart appears. See ‘Enni Ben’en no mikkyō setsu to taimitsu,’ 85. Taimitsu keigushō, in Mizukami, Taimitsu shisō, 666–667. In other manuscripts of Taimitsu keigushō the chart is not included. See Mizukami, ‘Taimitsu shisō,’ 454–455.


80. SZ 5: 14–15 and SZ 7:173.

81. Dolce, ‘The Embryonic Generation of the Perfect Body, 297.’

82. Yugikyō chomonshō, ZTZ mikkyō 2: 302. See Dolce, ‘The Embryonic Generation of the Perfect Body,’ 295. This commentary does not include the chart. A similar passage is in Yugikyō hidenshō, SZ 7: 173–174, which does illustrate these notions with both a gestation chart and a drawing of the five mudras.

83. Yugisotoran kuden, ZSZ 7: 127.

84. SZ 5: 23–24.

85. Cf. Dalton, ‘The Development of Perfection.’


86. See, for instance, Kano, ‘Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgraha.’

Previous article View issue table of contents


References


Abbreviations


DNBZ Dai Nihon Bukkyō zensho 大曰本佛教全書[Complete Collection of Japanese Buddhist Texts]. 151 vols. Edited by Bussho kankōkai 佛書刊行会. Tokyo: Bussho Kankōkai 佛書刊行会, 1912–1922. [Google Scholar]


KDZ Kōbō daishi zenshū 弘法大師全集 [The Complete Writings of Kōbō daishi]. 15 vols. Edited by Sofū senyōkai 祖風宣揚会. Tokyo: Yoshikawa kōbunkan,1909–1910. [Google Scholar]

MDJ Mikkyō daijiten 密教大辞典 [[[Wikipedia:Dictionary|Dictionary]] of Esoteric Buddhism]. Edited by Mikkyō jiten hensankai 密教辞典編纂会. Kyoto: Hōzōkan 法藏館, 1969–70. [Google Scholar]

NDZ Nihon daizōkyō 日本大蔵經 [The Japanese Buddhist Canon]. 51 vols. Edited by Nakano Tetsue 中野達慧 et al. Tokyo: Nihon daizōkyō hensankai 日本大藏經編纂會, 1914-21. [Google Scholar]


SZ Shingonshū zensho 眞言宗全書 [The Complete Writings of the Shingon School]. 44 vols. Edited by Shingonshū zensho kankōkai 眞言宗全書刊行會. Kōyasan: Shingonshū zensho kankōkai 眞言宗全書刊行會, 1933–39. [Google Scholar]


T Taishō shinshū daizōkyō 大正新脩大藏經 [The Taishō-era Revised Canon], 100 vols. Edited by Takakusu Junjirō 高楠順次郎 et al. Tokyo: Taishō Issaikyō kankōkai 大正一切經刊行會, 1924–35. [Google Scholar]


ZSZ Zoku Shingonshū zensho 續眞言宗全書 [The Complete Writings of Shingon School, Continued], 42 vols. Edited by Zoku Shingonshū zensho kankōkai 續眞言宗全書刊行會. Kōyasan: Zoku Shingonshū zensho kankōkai 續眞言宗全書刊行會, 1988. [Google Scholar]


ZTZ Zoku Tendaishū zenshō 續天台宗全書 [The Complete Writings of the Tendai School, Continued], 15 vols. Edited by Tendai shūtenhensanjo 天台宗典編纂所. Tokyo: Shunjūsha 春秋社, 1987–2000. [Google Scholar]


Primary sources


Dari jing 大日經 [full title: Dapiluzhena chengfo shenbian jiachi jing 大毘盧遮那成仏神変加持經; Skt. Mahavairocana sūtra]. 7 juan. Ttranslated by Śubhākarasiṃha (Shanwuwei 善無畏 [637–735]) and Yixing 一行 (673–727). T no. 848, 18: 1–55. [Google Scholar]


Dari jingshu 大日經疏 [full title: Dapiluzhena chengfo jingshu 大毘盧遮那成仏經疏; A Commentary on the Mahavairocana sūtra]. 20 juan. By Śubhākarasiṃha (Shanwuwei 善無畏 [637–735]) and Yixing 一行 (673–727). T no. 1796, 39: 579–789. [Google Scholar]


Eun risshi shomokuroku 惠運律師書目録 [Catalogue of the texts brought back by Vinaya Master Eun]. 1 kan. By Eun 惠運 (798–869). T no 2168, vol. 55. [Google Scholar]

Goshōrai mokuroku 御請來目録 [Catalogue of Texts Brought back by Kūkai].1 kan. By Kūkai 空海 (774-835). T no. 2161, vol. 55. [Google Scholar] Hakke hiroku 八家秘録 [Full title: Sho ajari shingon mikkyō burui sōroku 諸阿闍梨眞言密教部類總録; Secret Records of the Eight Houses]. 2 kan. By Annen 安然 (841–915?). T no. 2176, vol. 55. [Google Scholar]


Jin’gangfeng louge yiqie yujia yuqi jing/Jp. Kongōbu rōkaku issai yuga yugi kyō 金剛峯楼閣一切瑜伽瑜祇經 [[[Sūtra]] of the Yogin [Practicing] Total Union at the Adamantine Peak Pavilion]. 2 juan. Allegedly translated by Vajrabodhi (Jin’gangzhi 金剛智 [671-741]). T no. 867, vol. 18. [Google Scholar]


Kōen hokkegi 講演法華義 [Full title: Nyū shingonmon junyojitsuken kōen hokke ryakugi 入真言門住如実見講演法華略義; Simplified Purports of the Expounded Lotus Sūtra], attributed to Enchin 圓珍 [814-891]. Included in Chishō Daishi zenshū 智証大師全集, Bussho Kankōkai (comp.), Dai Nihon Bukkyō zensho (vols. 25-28), 3: 911-40. [Google Scholar]

Kongōōinryū hiketsu 金剛王院流秘決 [Secrets of the Tradition of the Kongōōin]. Unpublished manuscript, Zentsūji archives, Dozō 土蔵 23–249–13. [Google Scholar] Nittō shingū shōgyō mokuroku 入唐新求聖教目録 [Catalogue of Newly Discovered Sacred Teachings in the Tang]. 1 kan. By Ennin 圓仁 (794-864). T no. 2167, vol. 55. [Google Scholar]


Reiganji wajō shōrai hōmon dōgu tō mokuroku 靈嚴寺和尚請來法門道具等目録 [Catalogue of Buddhist Texts and Utensils Imported by the Abbot of Reigan Temple]. By Engyō 圓行 (799-852). T no. 2164, vol. 55. [Google Scholar]


Rokugekyōtō mokuroku 錄外經等目錄 [Catalogue of Scriptures and Other Writings not Recorded]. 1 kan. Anonymous. T no. 2175, vol. 55. [Google Scholar] Shingonshū kyōjigi 眞言宗教時義 [Meaning of Teachings and Times in Shingon]. By Annen 安然 (841–889?). 4 kan. T no. 2396, vol. 75. [Google Scholar] Shingonshū kyōjigi and Shinshosha shōrai hōmon tō mokuroku: Shingonshū shogaku kyōritsuron mokuroku 眞言宗所學經律論目錄 [Catalogue of Scriptures, Precepts and Treatises for Those Who Study the Shingon Doctrine] (also known as Sangaku roku 三學錄 [Catalogue for Three Kinds of Learning]). 1 kan. By Kukai 空海 (774-835). KDZ 1. [Google Scholar]

Shinshosha shōrai hōmon tō mokuroku 新書寫請來法門等目録 [Catalogue of Teaching Newly Copied and Imported by Shūei]. 1 kan. By Shūei 宗叡 [809-884]. T no. 2174, vol. 55. [Google Scholar]


Taimitsu keigushō 胎密契愚鈔 [A Fool’s Account of the Taizōkai Secret Seals]. 3 kan. Attributed to Dōshō 道照 or Son’en shinnō 尊円親王 (1298-1365). In Mizukami, Taimitsu shisō keisei no kenkyū, 595–670. [Google Scholar]


Yuga yugi hikanshō (瑜伽瑜祇)秘肝鈔 [Treatise on the Secret Core of the Yuqi jing]. 4 kan (one missing). By Monkan 文觀 (1278-1357). Unpublished manuscript, Ninnaji archives. [Google Scholar]


Yugi hiyōketsu 瑜祇秘要決 [[[Essential]] Secrets on the Yuqi jing]. 12 kan. By Shōshin 性心 (1287–1357). SZ 5: 137–434. [Google Scholar] Yugi kaishinshō 瑜祇開心抄 [Revealing the Essence of the Yuqi jing]. 5 kan. Author unknown, Kamakura period. Kanagawa kenritsu Kanazawa bunko (ed.), Kanazawa bunko shiryō zensho, Butten 仏典 6 (Shingon): 131–216. [Google Scholar]


Yugi sōgyō shiki 瑜祇總行私記 [Private Notes on the Practices of the Yuqi jing]. 1 kan. By Shinjaku 真寂法親王 (886−927). T no. 2229, vol. 61: 504–512; NDZ 36 (kyōzōbu, mikkyō ge 2): 243-257. [Google Scholar]


Yugikyō chōmonshō 瑜祇經聴聞抄 [Lecture Notes of the Yuqi jing]. 3 kan. By Chōgō 澄豪 (1259-1350). ZTZ mikkyō 2 (kyōten chūshaku rui 1): 257–355. [Google Scholar] Yugikyō gijutsu 瑜祇經義述 [Commentary on the Yuqi Jing]. 7 kan. By Yūhan (or Yūban) 宥範 (1843-1920). NDZ 36: 349–460. [Google Scholar


Yugikyō gyōbō 瑜祇經行法 [full title: Kongōbu rōkaku issai yugi kyō shugyō hō 金剛峯楼閣一切瑜祇經修行法; Method for Practicing the Yuqi jing]). 3 kan. By Annen 安然 (841–889?). T no. 2228, 61: 485–504 (a.k.a. Yugikyōsho祇經疏, NDZ 36: 185-234). [Google Scholar]


Yugikyō gyōbōki 瑜祇經行法記 [Notes on the Method for Practicing the Yuqi jing]. 1 kan. Attributed to Kūkai 空海 (774-835). NDZ 36 (kyōzōbu, mikkyōbu ge 2): 235–241. [Google Scholar]


Yugikyō hidenshō 瑜祇經秘伝抄 [Secret Transmission on the Yuqi jing]. 6 kan. By Yugi 祐宣 (1536–1612). ZSZ 7, 137–54. [Google Scholar]


Yugikyō jūnibon daikō 瑜祇經十二品大綱 [Outline of the Twelve Chapters of the Yuqi jing]. Kanagawa kenritsu Kanazawa bunko (ed.), Kanazawa bunko shiryō zensho 6, Butten 仏典 6 (Shingon): 115–129. [Google Scholar]


Yugikyō kenmon 瑜祇經見聞 [Lecture Notes on the Yuqi jing]. 1 kan. By Enni Ben’en 圓爾辨圓 (1202-80)/Chikotsu Daie 痴兀大慧 (1229–1312). ZTZ mikkyō 2: 205–217. [Google Scholar


Yugikyō kenmon (daiichi) 瑜祇経見聞 (第一) [Lecture Notes on the Yuqi jing (Part One)]. By Enni Ben’en 圓爾辨圓 (1202-80)/Chikotsu Daie 痴兀大慧 (1229–1312). Abe et al. (eds.), Chūsei zenseki sōkan 12, Kikō zensekishū –zoku, 545–584. [Google Scholar]


Yugikyō kuketsu nukigaki 瑜祇經口決抜き書き [Excerpts on the Oral Secrets of the Yuqi jing]. 8 kan (ending part missing). Lecture by Chōgō 澄豪 (1259-1350) and notes taken by Kōshū 光宗 (1276-1350). ZTZ mikkyō 2: 217-56. [Google Scholar]


Yugikyō shūkoshō 瑜祇經拾古鈔 [Excerpts of Old Commentaries on the Yuqi jing]. 3 kan. By Raiyu 頼瑜 (1226–1304). NDZ 36 (kyōzōbu, mikkyōbu ge 2): 259–347. [Google Scholar

Yugisotoran hiketsu 瑜祇經祕決 [Secrets on the Yuqi jing]. 2 kan. Attributed to Jitsuun 實運 (1105–1160). SZ 5, 11–26. [Google Scholar

Yugisotoran kuden 口伝 Oral Transmissions on the Yuqi jing. 2 kan. By Dōhan 道範 (1178–1252), SZ 7: 93–134. [Google Scholar

Yugisotoran kuketsu 口訣 [Oral Decisions on the Yuqi jing. 5 kan. By Dōhan 道範 (1178–1252), SZ 5: 27–136. [Google Scholar]

Yuqi jing (Jp. Yugikyō) 瑜祇經. See Jin’gangfeng louge yiqie yujia yuqi jing. [Google Scholar]


Zenrinji Shūei sōmokuroku 禅林寺宗叡総目録 [General Catalogue [of the Texts Brought Back] by Shūei of the Zenrinji. 1 kan. By Shūei 宗叡 (809-884). T no. 2174b, vol. 55. [Google Scholar]


Secondary sources


Abe Yasurō 阿部泰郎. Chūsei Nihon no shūkyō tekusuto taikei 中世日本の宗教 テクスト 体系 [The Structure of Religious Texts in Medieval Japan]. Nagoya: Nagoya daigaku shuppan 名古屋大學出版, 2013. [Google Scholar

_______. ‘Yugikyō kenmon (daiichi) kaishaku’ 瑜祇経見聞 (第一) 解釈 [Explanation on the Yugikyō kenmon (Part One)], Chūsei zenseki sōkan 中世禅籍叢刊 [Series on Medieval Zen Texts] 12, Kikō zensekishū: zoku 稀覯禅籍集 続 [Collection of Rare Zen Texts, Continued], edited by Abe Yasurō et al., 711–715. Kyoto: Rinsen shoten 臨川書店, 2018. [Google Scholar


Bentor, Yael. ‘Interpreting the Body Maṇḍala: Tsongkhapa versus Later Gelug Scholars’. Revue d’ Études Tibétaines [Journal of Tibetan Studies] 31 (2015): 63–74. [Google Scholar

Chen, Jinhua. Legend and Legitimation: The Formation of Tendai Esoteric Buddhism in Japan. Mélanges Chinois et Bouddhiques vol. 30. Bruxelles: Institut Belge des Hautes Études Chinoises, 2009. [Google Scholar

Dachille, Rae Erin. ‘Piercing to the Pith of the Body: The Evolution of Body Maṇḍala and Tantric Corporeality in Tibet’. Religions 189 (2017): 1–16. [Google Scholar


Dalton, Jacob. ‘The Development of Perfection: The Interiorization of Buddhist Ritual in the Eighth and Ninth Centuries’. Journal of Indian Philosophy 32 (2004): 1–30. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®], [Google Scholar


Dolce, Lucia. Esoteric Patterns in Nichiren’s Interpretation of the Lotus Sūtra. PhD Dissertation, Leiden University, 2002. [Google Scholar] _______. ‘Reconsidering the Taxonomy of the “Esoteric”: Taimitsu Hermeneutical and Ritual Practices’. In The Culture of Secrecy in Japanese Religion, edited by Teeuwen and Scheid, pp. 130–171. London; New York: Routledge, 2006. [Google Scholar


_______. ‘The Embryonic Generation of the Perfect Body: Ritual Embryology from Japanese Tantric Sources’. In Transforming the Void: Embryological Discourse and Reproductive Imagery in East Asian Religions, edited by Anna Andreeva and Dominic Steavu, 253–310. Leiden: Brill (Sir Henry Wellcome Asian Series), 2016. [Google Scholar


_______. ‘Nigenteki genri no gireika: Fudō, Aizen to chikara no hizō’ 二元的原理の儀礼化—不動・愛染と力の秘像 [Ritualizing Duality: Fudō, Aizen and the Secret Iconography of Empowerment]. In Girei no chikara: Chūsei shūkyō no jissen sekai 儀礼の力 —中世宗教の実践世界 [The Power of Ritual: The World of Religious Practice in Medieval Japan], edited by Lucia Dolce and Matsumoto Ikuyo 松本郁代, 159–206. Kyoto: Hōzōkan 法藏館, 2010. [Google Scholar


_______. ‘The Abhiṣeka of the Yogin: Bodily Practices and the Interiorization of Ritual in Medieval Japan’. In Rituals of Initiation and Consecration in Premodern Japan: Power and Legitimacy in Kingship, Religion and the Arts, edited by Fabio Rambelli and Or Porath, 253–310. Berlin: DeGruyter, 2022. [Google Scholar

Dolce, Lucia, and Shinya Mano. ‘Annen’. In Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia, edited by Charles D. Orzech et al, 768–775. Leiden: Brill, 2011. [Google Scholar

Goepper, Roger. Aizen-myōō. The Esoteric King of Lust: An Iconological Study. Zürich Museum Rietberg: Artibus Asiae, 1993. [Google Scholar


Hunter, Harriet. A Transmission and Its Transformation: The Liqujing Shibahui Mantuluo in Daigoji. Ph. D dissertation, Leiden University, 2018. [Google Scholar]

Kagiwada Seiko 鍵和田聖子. ‘Tōmitsu ni okeru Yugikyō kaishaku no hensen’ 東密における『瑜祇經』解釈の変遷 [Changes in Tōmitsu Interpretations of the Yuqi jing]. Ryūkoku daigaku daigakuin bungaku kenkyūka kiyō 龍谷大学大学院文学研究科紀要 [The Bulletin of the Graduate School of Letters of Ryūkoku University] 35 (2013): 28–39. [Google Scholar

Kamata Shigeo 鎌田茂雄 et al (ed.). Daizōkyō zenkaisetsu daijiten 大藏經全解説大辭典 [Comprehensive Bibliographic Dictionary of the Taishō-era Buddhist Canon]. Tokyo: Yuzankaku shuppan 雄山閣出版, 1998. [Google Scholar]


Kanagawa kenritsu Kanazawa bunko 神奈川県立金沢文庫 (ed.). Kanazawa Bunko shiryō zensho 金沢文庫資料全書 [Collected Resource Material in the Kanazawa Archives]. 10 vols. Kyoto: Rinsen shoten 臨川書店, 2017 (1974–1991). [Google Scholar


Kano Kazuo. ‘Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgraha’. In Brill’s Encyclopedia of Buddhism, edited by Jonathan Silk et al, vol. 1: 373–381. Leiden: Brill, 2017. [Google Scholar

Mano, Shinya. Yōsai and the transformation of Buddhist Precepts in Pre-modern Japan. Ph. D dissertation, SOAS, University of London, 2014. [Google Scholar

Manabe Shunshō 真鍋俊照. ‘Kaishaku’ 解釈 [Explanation]. In Kanagawa kenritsu Kanazawa bunko (ed.), Kanazawa bunko shiryō zensho 6 (Shingon hen 真言編 [[[Shingon]] section] 1): 291–292. [Google Scholar


_______. ‘Kanazawa bunko ni okeru Shingon mikkyō tenseki (kyōsō)’ 金沢文庫における真言密教典籍(教相) [[[Books]] on Shingon Esoteric Buddhism in Kanazawa Archives (Doctrine)]. In Kanagawa kenritsu Kanazawa bunko (ed.), Kanazawa bunko shiryō zensho 6 (Shingon hen 真言編 [[[Shingon]] section] 1): 275–285 . [Google Scholar] Matsumoto Ikuyo 松本郁代. Chūsei ōken to sokui kanjō: Shogyō no naka no rekishi jōjutsu 中世王権と即位灌頂 —聖教の中の歴史叙述 [[[Wikipedia:Royal|Royal]] Authority in Medieval Japan and the Enthronement Initiation Ritual: Historical Evidence from Buddhist Scriptures]. Tokyo: Shinwasha 森話社, 2005. [Google Scholar

Misaki Ryōshū 三崎良周. Taimitsu no kenkyū 台密の研究 [A Study of Taimitsu]. Tokyo: Sōbunsha 創文社, 1988. [Google Scholar] Mizukami Fumiyoshi 水上文義. Taimitsu shisō keisei no kenkyū 台密思想形成の研究 [Studies on the Formation of Taimitsu Thought]. Tokyo: Shunjūsha 春秋社, 2008. [Google Scholar

_______. ‘Yōsai no mikkyō shisō’ 榮西の密教思想 [The Tantric Thought of Yōsai]. Tōyō shisō to shūkyō 東洋思想と宗教 [[[Thought]] and Religion of Asia] 27 (2010): 21–35. [Google Scholar


_______. ‘Enni Ben’en no mikkyō setsu to taimitsu’ 圓爾辨圓の密教説と台密 [[[Enni]] Ben’en’s Esoteric Interpretations and Taimitsu]. In his Nihon Tendai kyōgakuron: Taimitsu, jingi, kokatsuji 日本天台教学論 — 台密, 神祗, 古活字 [Essays on Japanese Tendai Doctrine: Taimitsu, Kami, Pre-modern Printing], 79–87. Tokyo: Shunjūsha 春秋社, 2017. [Google Scholar


Nara kokuritsu hakubutsukan 奈良國立博物館. Shinbutsu shūgō: Kami to hotoke ga orinasu shinkō to bi 神仏習合 — 神と仏が織りなす信仰と美 [The Combination of Kami and Buddhas: Belief and Beauty of Entwining Gods and Buddhas], special exhibition catalogue. Nara: Nara kokuritsu hakubutsukan 奈良國立博物館, 2007. [Google Scholar

Ogawa Toyoo 小川豊生. Chūsei Nihon no shinwa, moji, shintai 中世日本の神話 · 文字 · 身体 [[[Myth]], Letters and Body in Medieval Japan]. Tokyo: Shinwasha 森話社, 2014. [Google Scholar


Ōmura Seigai 大村西崖. Mikkyō hattatsushi 密教發達志 [The Development of Tantric Buddhism]. Tokyo: Bukkyō Kankōkai Zuzōbu 佛書刊行會圖像部, 1918 (reprinted 1972). [Google Scholar

Ono Genmyō 小野玄妙 (ed.). Bussho kaisetsu daijiten 佛書解說大辞典 [Comprehensive Dictionary of Buddhist Works with Explanations]. Tōkyō: Daitō shuppansha 大東出版社, 1965-1978. [Google Scholar]


Orzech, Charles D., Richard K. Payne, Henrick H. Sørensen. ‘Introduction: Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia: Some Methodological Considerations’. In Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia, edited by Charles D Orzech et al, 3–18. Leiden: Brill, 2011. [Crossref], [Google Scholar

Osabe Kazuo 長部和雄. Tōdai Mikkyōshi zakkō 唐代密教史雑考 [Considerations on the History of Tantric Buddhism in the Tang period]. Kobe: Kōbe Shōka Daigaku Gakujutsu Kenkyūkai 神戶商科大学学術研究会, 1971. [Google Scholar


Shibuya Ryōtai 渋谷亮泰. Shōwa genson Tendai shoseki sōgō mokuroku 昭和現存天台書籍綜合目録 [A Showa-period Comprehensive Catalogue of Extant Tendai Books]. 2 vols. Tokyo: Meibunsha 明文社, 1940 & 1943. Google Scholar


Sonehara Satoshi 曽根原理. ‘Shunkei no kenkyū’ 舜慶の研究 [A Study of Shunkei]. Tōhoku daigaku fuzoku toshokan kenkyū nenpō 東北大学附属図書館研究年報 [Tōhoku University Library Annual Research Report] 27 (1994):1–34. [Google Scholar


Sugiki Tsuhehiko. ‘Oblation, Non-conception and Body: Systems of Psychosomatic Fire Oblation in Esoteric Buddhism in Medieval South Asia’. In Homa Variations: The Study of Ritual Change across the Longue Durée, edited by Richard K. Payne and Michael Witzel, 167–213. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016. [Crossref], [Google Scholar

Tomabechi Seichi 苫米地誠一. ‘Yugi sōgyō shiki瑜祇總行私記 On the Yugi sōgyō shiki. In Kamata et al (eds.), Daizōkyō zenkaisetsu daijiten, 659. Tokyo: Yuzankaku shuppan 雄山閣出版, 1998. [Google Scholar


Uchida Keiichi 内田啓一. Monkanbō Kōshin to bijutsu 文観房弘真と美術 [Monkan and Art]. Tokyo: Hōzōkan, 2006. [Google Scholar


vanden Broucke, Pol Kamiel. Yugikyō. De schriftuur van alle Yoga’s en Yogī ’s van het paviljoen met vajra-top (T. XVIII no. 867, 253-69) [Yugikyō: The Scripture of all Yogas and Yogis of the Vajra-topped Pavilion (T. XVIII no. 867, 253-69)]. Ph.D. Dissertation, Rijksuniversitei Gent, 1989-90. [Google Scholar

_______. ‘On the Title and Translator of the Yugikyō (T.XVIII no. 867)’. Kōyasan daigaku mikkyō bunka kenkyujo kiyō 高野山大学密教文化研究所紀要 [Bulletin of the Research Institute of Esoteric Buddhist Culture] 7 (1994): 212-184 (reverse numbering). [Google Scholar


_______. ‘The “Yugitō”.’ Oriens Extremus [The Extreme East] 42 (2002): 105–167. [Google Scholar


_______. ‘The Twelve-armed Deity Daishō kongō and His Scriptural Sources’. In Tantric Buddhism in East Asia, edited by Richard Payne, 147–160. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2006 (1999). [Google Scholar

Yasuhara Kendō 安原賢道. ‘Yugikyō no kenkyū (ichi)’ 瑜祇經の研究 (一) [Studies on the Yuqi jing 1]. Mikkyō kenkyū 密教研究 [Studies on Esoteric Buddhism] 45 (1932): 59–81. [Google Scholar


Source