Female Holder of the Lineage: Linji Chan Master Zhiyuan Xinggang (1597-1654)

Abstract

Female Holder of the Lineage: Linji Chan Master Zhiyuan Xinggang (1597–1654) Beata Grant (bio) The late Ming and early Qing witnessed a brief but vital revival of the Linji Chan Buddhist lineage. 1 It came at a time when the notion of lineage and sectarian distinctions seemed to have little to recommend it: not one of the four Great Buddhist Masters of Ming—Yunqi Zhuhong (1535–1615), Daguan Zhenke (1543–1603), Hanshan Deqing (1546–1623) and Ouyi Zhixu (1599–1655)—felt it necessary or perhaps even advisable to associate themselves with a formal Chan lineage and all are listed in the “lineage unknown” section of the official biographies of Chan monks. Nevertheless, there were a few Buddhist masters who were very much interested in restoring the fading glory of the line that traced itself back to the iconoclastic and brilliant Tang master, Linji Yixuan (d. 866). Of these, the most well-known was Miyun Yuanwu (1565–1641, hereafter referred to as Yuanwu). Yuanwu was of peasant stock, and spent much of his early years engaged not in study but rather in hard physical labor. He managed to educate himself, however, and when he was thirty years old, he left his wife and family and went to Mt. Longchi (Zhejiang) where he became a disciple of Linji Chan Master Huanyou Zhengzhuan (1549–1614). He rose quickly in the ranks and soon became a highly influential teacher, who travelled widely and took on a great number of disciples both monastic and lay from all parts of the country, particularly from the Jiangnan area. The Chinese religious historian Guo Peng argues that Yuanwu was a manipulative and ambitious man with little spiritual or religious substance. Guo cites various anecdotes which, in his opinion, reflect someone who was fond of “putting on a performance,” arbitrarily hitting, shouting, and rattling off koans to his students as if he were the Tang master Linji Yixuan himself. 2 An indication of his political astuteness can be seen in the fact that he declined an imperial invitation from the faltering Ming court, and instead directed all of his energies to writing, [End Page 51] preaching, traveling, restoring temples and monasteries, and training students who would continue the Linji line. Yuanwu presided over the tonsure of over three hundred persons, and his twelve official dharma heirs did much to shape early Qing dynasty Chan Buddhism, many of them developing close connections with the early Qing court. What is most significant for our purposes is that an unusual number of female disciples studied with and received dharma transmission from Yuanwu and his dharma heirs. Some of these women became eminent teachers in their own right and left behind collections of yulu or discourse records compiled by their disciples, which contain sermons, poems, letters and other writings as well as biographical accounts of their lives. Although some mention is made in Tang and Song texts of the yulu of Buddhist women teachers, these earlier texts appear to be no longer extant. 3 There are many more references to such collections of religious women’s writing during the Ming and Qing periods, although, again, only a very small percentage of these titles are available to us today. In a 1658 preface to one of these yulu, Gao Yiyong (jinshi 1613) from Jiaxing (Zhejiang) attempts to explain to his readers why there were so few records of the lives of religious women among the voluminous accounts of Buddhist monks and laymen through the ages. Those who abandoned worldly glory and went in search of tranquility, seeking to transcend this dusty world and refusing to be entrapped by it, were for the most part all virile, and heroic knights with wills of iron. Thus they were able to embark on this path and penetrate to the origin and become the famous religious figures of the ages. When it comes to the denizens of perfumed inner chambers and embroidered fans, they are as a rule gentle and submissive, weak and passive. If one looks in the various books of the Records of the Lamp for accounts of women who have taken refuge, one will find very few. 4 [End Page 52] Gao Yiyong asks...