Community hub
Recent from talks
Knowledge base stats:
Talk channels stats:
Members stats:
Jingying Huiyuan
Jingying Huiyuan (Chinese: 淨影寺, "Huiyuan of Jingying Temple", Japanese: Jōyō Eon; c. 523–592) was an eminent Chinese Buddhist scholar-monk of the Dilun branch of Chinese Yogācāra. He was a prolific commentator who wrote various commentaries on key Mahayana Sutras. He was the first Chinese author to write commentaries on the Pure Land Sutras (which still survive) and his commentary on the Contemplation Sutra influenced later Pure Land Buddhist figures like Daochuo and Shandao. Like later Pure Land figures, Huiyuan taught that even ordinary people could attain birth in the Pure Land through recitation of the Buddha Amitabha's name (nianfo).
Huiyuan's philosophy is a synthesis of Yogācāra and buddha-nature thought. He also advanced the doctrines of essence-function and the "dependent origination of the tathāgatagarbha" (Ch: 如來藏緣起, pinyin: rulaizang yuanqi), which holds that buddha-nature is the essence of both nirvāṇa and saṃsāra, both of which were seen as its "functions" (yong). Huiyuan synthesized this teaching with the Yogacara mind-only philosophy, identifying buddha-nature with the fundamental consciousness (ālāyavijñāna). Huiyuan's metaphysics was influential on later Huayan authors, like Fazang.
Huiyuan was born in Dunhuang (in modern-day Gansu) and became a monk in Guxiangusi monastery (Shanxi province) at an early age. At age twenty he received full ordination from the Dilun (Dasabhumikasutra school) master Fashang (495–580) and studied Vinaya under vinaya master Dayin (d.u.). Fashang in turn had been a student of the patriarch of the Southern Dilun sect, Huiguang (慧光). Huiyuan studied under Fashang for over seven years. Huiyuan's works mainly follow the thought of the previous Dilun masters, who syncretized the Yogacara philosophy of Vasubandhu and the buddha-nature thought of the Nirvana sutra. Huiyuan also later studied with a scholar of the Shelun tradition, Tanqian (曇遷, 542–607).
Huiyuan later resided at Qinghuasi monastery. During the reign of the Northern Zhou Emperor Wu (r. 560–578), there was a persecution of Buddhism in which many temples were seized and many monks forced into lay life or military service.
The emperor also ordered Buddhist elders to gather so he could inform them of his reasons for the persecution: Buddhist images violated the formlessless of the Buddha, the temples were wasteful and Buddhist monasticism was counter to filial piety. Huiyuan is said to have stood up and debated the emperor on these issues and a transcript of this debate has survived. Huiyuan then lived in seclusion for some three years during the rest of the persecution, focusing on reciting sutras and meditation.
After the rise of the Sui Dynasty (581–618), Huiyuan became the overseer of the saṃgha (shamendu) in Henan and worked to restore the Buddhist community. At the request of Emperor Wen (r. 581–604), Huiyuan eventually moved to the capital of Daxing where he resided at Daxingshansi monastery and later at Jingyingsi monastery, built by the emperor specifically for Huiyuan.
Jingying Huiyuan was prolific, writing numerous commentaries on key Mahayana texts, including commentaries on the Avataṃsakasūtra, Mahāparinirvānasūtra, Vimalakīrtinirdeśa, Sukhāvatīvyūhasūtra, Śrīmālādevīsiṃhanādasūtra, and on Vasubandhu's Daśabhūmika Commentary (Shidi jing lun). He also wrote the Compendium of the Purport of Mahāyāna (Dasheng yi zhang), an influential encyclopedia of Mahāyāna Buddhism.
Huiyuan's central philosophy was a combination of Yogacara mind-only thought, which holds that all phenomena arise from mind, and the buddha-nature teaching, which holds that all beings have Buddhahood within. Huiyuan owes much of this basic metaphysics to his teacher Fashang as well as to earlier Mahayana texts like the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra and the Awakening of Faith (which according to Huiyuan, was written based on the Laṅkāvatāra). For Huiyuan, all reality (samsara and nirvana) dependently arises from a pure consciousness or "true mind", the buddha-nature, a doctrine he referred to as "tathāgatagarbha dependent arising" (rulaizang yuanqi), a term he coined. Huiyuan equates the buddha-nature with the Yogacara basis consciousness (ālāyavijñāna). In drawing this equivalence, he cites the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra which outright states "tathāgatagarbha is called the ālāyavijñāna."
Hub AI
Jingying Huiyuan AI simulator
(@Jingying Huiyuan_simulator)
Jingying Huiyuan
Jingying Huiyuan (Chinese: 淨影寺, "Huiyuan of Jingying Temple", Japanese: Jōyō Eon; c. 523–592) was an eminent Chinese Buddhist scholar-monk of the Dilun branch of Chinese Yogācāra. He was a prolific commentator who wrote various commentaries on key Mahayana Sutras. He was the first Chinese author to write commentaries on the Pure Land Sutras (which still survive) and his commentary on the Contemplation Sutra influenced later Pure Land Buddhist figures like Daochuo and Shandao. Like later Pure Land figures, Huiyuan taught that even ordinary people could attain birth in the Pure Land through recitation of the Buddha Amitabha's name (nianfo).
Huiyuan's philosophy is a synthesis of Yogācāra and buddha-nature thought. He also advanced the doctrines of essence-function and the "dependent origination of the tathāgatagarbha" (Ch: 如來藏緣起, pinyin: rulaizang yuanqi), which holds that buddha-nature is the essence of both nirvāṇa and saṃsāra, both of which were seen as its "functions" (yong). Huiyuan synthesized this teaching with the Yogacara mind-only philosophy, identifying buddha-nature with the fundamental consciousness (ālāyavijñāna). Huiyuan's metaphysics was influential on later Huayan authors, like Fazang.
Huiyuan was born in Dunhuang (in modern-day Gansu) and became a monk in Guxiangusi monastery (Shanxi province) at an early age. At age twenty he received full ordination from the Dilun (Dasabhumikasutra school) master Fashang (495–580) and studied Vinaya under vinaya master Dayin (d.u.). Fashang in turn had been a student of the patriarch of the Southern Dilun sect, Huiguang (慧光). Huiyuan studied under Fashang for over seven years. Huiyuan's works mainly follow the thought of the previous Dilun masters, who syncretized the Yogacara philosophy of Vasubandhu and the buddha-nature thought of the Nirvana sutra. Huiyuan also later studied with a scholar of the Shelun tradition, Tanqian (曇遷, 542–607).
Huiyuan later resided at Qinghuasi monastery. During the reign of the Northern Zhou Emperor Wu (r. 560–578), there was a persecution of Buddhism in which many temples were seized and many monks forced into lay life or military service.
The emperor also ordered Buddhist elders to gather so he could inform them of his reasons for the persecution: Buddhist images violated the formlessless of the Buddha, the temples were wasteful and Buddhist monasticism was counter to filial piety. Huiyuan is said to have stood up and debated the emperor on these issues and a transcript of this debate has survived. Huiyuan then lived in seclusion for some three years during the rest of the persecution, focusing on reciting sutras and meditation.
After the rise of the Sui Dynasty (581–618), Huiyuan became the overseer of the saṃgha (shamendu) in Henan and worked to restore the Buddhist community. At the request of Emperor Wen (r. 581–604), Huiyuan eventually moved to the capital of Daxing where he resided at Daxingshansi monastery and later at Jingyingsi monastery, built by the emperor specifically for Huiyuan.
Jingying Huiyuan was prolific, writing numerous commentaries on key Mahayana texts, including commentaries on the Avataṃsakasūtra, Mahāparinirvānasūtra, Vimalakīrtinirdeśa, Sukhāvatīvyūhasūtra, Śrīmālādevīsiṃhanādasūtra, and on Vasubandhu's Daśabhūmika Commentary (Shidi jing lun). He also wrote the Compendium of the Purport of Mahāyāna (Dasheng yi zhang), an influential encyclopedia of Mahāyāna Buddhism.
Huiyuan's central philosophy was a combination of Yogacara mind-only thought, which holds that all phenomena arise from mind, and the buddha-nature teaching, which holds that all beings have Buddhahood within. Huiyuan owes much of this basic metaphysics to his teacher Fashang as well as to earlier Mahayana texts like the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra and the Awakening of Faith (which according to Huiyuan, was written based on the Laṅkāvatāra). For Huiyuan, all reality (samsara and nirvana) dependently arises from a pure consciousness or "true mind", the buddha-nature, a doctrine he referred to as "tathāgatagarbha dependent arising" (rulaizang yuanqi), a term he coined. Huiyuan equates the buddha-nature with the Yogacara basis consciousness (ālāyavijñāna). In drawing this equivalence, he cites the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra which outright states "tathāgatagarbha is called the ālāyavijñāna."