Jōkei's Monju kōshiki in Five Parts (c. 1196)

Abstract

(ProQuest: ... denotes non-US-ASCII text omitted.)Translators NoteThe most accessible source for Jokei's five-part Monju koshiki is found in the Jokei koshiki shu ... , which includes both Chinese (kanbun ...) and classical Japanese (yomikudashi ...) renderings (Taisho Daigaku 2000, 143-60). The translation here is based on the Chinese text in the Jokei koshiki shu. Jokei's koshiki itself is undated, but it is likely that it was composed around 1196.1 The Jokei koshiki shu edition is based on a 1917 copy held by Tokyo University's Shiryo Hensanjo ... , with reference to mid-Muromachi-period (1333-1568) copies held by Otani University and Koyasan University (the latter on behalf of Kongo zanmai'in on ...).2 The Shiryo Hensanjo version is part of a compilation of Jokei's writings whose original title appears to have been Gedatsu Shonin bunso A?SATAAT, but is often referred to as Shonin goso to .... The texts in this compilation are widely believed by specialists to be authentic writings of Jokei's. The Shonin goso to held by Shiryo Hensanjo is based on a manuscript held by Hanazono University (and formerly Kozanji Hobenchi'in ... ). Sugisaki Takahide has investigated the Hanazono manuscript and suggests based on the handwriting style that it was likely made in the Kamakura period not long after Jokei's death (Sugisaki 2001, 61).3Translation4MONJU KOSHIKI ... (MANJUSRI KOSHIKl)First, we perform the communal obeisance (...):Respectfully, we pay reverence to the heavenly beings and to the Honored Greatly Awakened One,whose blessings and knowledge are as vast as the grains of sand in the Ganges.Through the perfection of causes and the fulfillment of the fruits, [he] attained perfect awakening,long-dwelling and steadfast, without past or future.5Homage to the Mother of Awakening for the Three Times, the Great Sage Manjusri Bodhisattva (repeat three times).[Next,] we perform the essential dharma rites as usual.6 Next, the petition to the kami.7 Next, the pronouncement:8Pronouncement of Intentions (Hyobyaku)Respectfully, we address the collective body and the separate bodies of all the three jewels and declare:We should loathe birth-and-death. We should loathe it, but we do not yet. We should rejoice in bodhi. We should rejoice in it, but we do not yet. We are like the children playing in a burning house, unaware and thus unafraid.9 Again, we are like the blind approaching a mountain of treasures, unable to see it and thus not longing for it.10 The follies and delusions of sentient beings are like this again and again. While transmigrating and reincarnating through countless lives since the distant past, we fall into the three paths and the eight difficulties, suffering and anguishing without respite, unable to bear arousing [the aspiration for enlightenment].11 Or we come [to be born] among the heavenly beings, coveting and pursuing, incapable of liberation. The wicked conditions of our favorable and adverse [circumstances] persist before our eyes; the false conceptions of our attachments and aversions blaze in our dreams. The reversal of permanence, bliss, selfhood, and purity is endless; the cycle of birth, old age, sickness, and death is limitless. Affections and attachments are like shackles and chains; we are long bound in the prison of the three worlds. Fame and profit are like poison, always afflicting the body and mind in this and future lives. From darkness into darkness, we do not hear the Buddhas name for ages.12 Even chancing to approach the three jewels, those with faith and reverence are few.The unsurpassed enlightenment is vast and deep. Even the initial awakening of the aspiration for enlightenment will inevitably become the three wondrous contemplations (sanmy ...).13 The first is called the mind that loathes and separates from the conditioned (ui TfS), because one loathes the pervasive void of the conditioned. Second is the mind that deeply considers sentient beings, because one saves the exhaustive void of sentient beings. …