Apocryphal Chinese books in the Buddhist canon at Matsuo Shintō shrine

Abstract

ABSTRACTEast Asian Buddhist apocryphal books have received significant attention in recent decades, especially since the publication of Chinese Buddhist Apocrypha (Hawai’i University Press, 1990). It is by now well known that many apocryphal books were found in the so-called Library Cave (no. 17) of the Mogao Grottoes, near Dunhuang. What is much less well known – at least outside Japan – is that complete manuscript sets of the Buddhist canon have been preserved in Japan from the twelfth century, and these manuscripts are frequently copies of eighth-century editions. In this paper I provide a brief introduction to the fact that one of the most prominent Shintō shrines in Kyoto – Matsuo shrine – had its own Buddhist canon on site for 700 years before it was consigned to a Hokkeshū temple, Myōrenji, in 1857. Then I provide a brief overview of the contents of roughly 3500 surviving rolls, many of which preserve apocryphal Buddhist texts that seem to have circulated quite widely in late Tang-era (618–907) China and Japan. Finally, I try to evaluate why a Buddhist canon copied for Hata-clan kami, mostly from Tendaishū temple manuscripts in nearby Shiga prefecture, contains so many Chinese apocryphal books.