The Buddhist Texts and the Lost Document Cited in the Daijō gishō-shō

Abstract

This paper studies the documents and surviving fragments quoted in the 13 chapters of the Daijō gishō-shō 大乗義章抄 (a commentary on the Dasheng yizhang 大乗義章), owned by the Minobu Bunko 身延文庫. The commentary is a written record created by Kanjin 寛信 (1084–1153), who belonged to the lineage of not only Shingon Esoteric Buddhism, but also of the Sanron School. A thorough examination of the commentary reveals that the writings of Jizang 吉蔵—as well as of Huiyuan 慧遠—were actively utilized, and that many surviving fragments were discovered from Sengkan’s 僧侃 Da zhidu lun shu 大智度論疏, which has not been preserved.