四明尊者教行錄 6.158

6.158

The rise of categorised compilations was originally intended to equip students so that they might grasp the essentials in their reading. At first, the Senior Monastic Ren, hearing the lectures of Fazhi and listening to his numerous citations, recorded his texts to form five categories. Next, Venerable Yue of Shechuan, dwelling beneath Fazhi's chariot wheel, learned and of powerful memory, augmented them to seven. Later, the notes of Master Cong of Xiandu were obtained, bringing them to ten. Furthermore, Venerable Cai of Fohui renovated and expanded them, and Venerable Ji once again arranged them in order. For the *Xuanju* and *Zhiguan*, he compared them with the commentaries on the three major works, and with the commentaries on the *Vimalakīrti-nirdeśa* and *Suvarṇaprabhāsa*, supplementing them with subcommentaries and notes, pruning what was redundant and supplementing what was omitted. Only after five masters, from beginning to end, edited and polished them did they become an excellent edition. In the past, Master Guangzhi once instructed the assembly, saying: "The circulation of categorised compilations has an equal measure of gain and loss. The gain lies in students' seeking and knowing the essential meaning; the loss lies in forgetting the beginning and end of the original text's drift of meaning. Beyond the text, one must further infer; one must not simply say it is merely this. How much more so nowadays, when teaching halls everywhere mostly esteem the punctuated reading of this text—does this not miss the original root and only seek the branches and leaves? Yet where doctrinal scriptures are absent, if one happens to obtain this, it may allow one day and night to review the old and learn the new, so that one's learning is not in vain. If by this one indeed comes to recognize the grand carriage, one certainly ought not to esteem the wainwright's rough wheel as the ultimate." (This text is the preface to the ancient block print of the categorised compilations; it is appended here so that students may know its origins.)