Chapter 2. Matching concepts and early interpretation¶

The previous chapter examined the first translation efforts. An Shigao and Lokakṣema brought many Buddhist texts into China, but how Chinese readers understood those texts is another question. The present section examines how early Chinese intellectuals approached and interpreted Buddhism through their existing Daoist and xuanxue frameworks, what this understanding made possible, and what it misread.

1. The meaning of matching concepts¶

What is geyi?

Geyi literally means "comparing meanings (yi) by standards or categories (ge)." It can also be understood as "matching concepts" or "drawing doctrinal analogies." In its technical sense, geyi was a narrow practice of matching Buddhist numbered lists with existing Chinese numbered lists, item by item, to explain unfamiliar terms through familiar ones. Using the vocabulary and ways of thinking found in Laozi, Zhuangzi, and xuanxue to explain Buddhist doctrine must be distinguished from this practice. It was extremely widespread at the time, but was not identical with geyi. Conflating them would enlarge a specific technical practice into the intellectual climate of an entire age.¹ Later in this essay, "matching concepts" is also used broadly for attempts to explain Buddhist doctrine through Confucian, Daoist, and xuanxue concepts. The technical sense applies specifically to item-by-item matching of numbered lists. These scopes must remain distinct: examples of the broader practice do not show that technical geyi was being used in every case.

The clearest historical record of this method is the dispute between Dao'an (312 to 385) and Sengguang (Sengxian) in the "Biography of Sengguang" in the Biographies of Eminent Monks. Dao'an held that "the old practice of matching concepts often departs from the principles" and advocated abandoning such analogies. Sengguang defended the old method out of respect for predecessors, treating it as a provisional means of introducing beginners to the teaching. This record shows that the term geyi and the practice it named were explicitly discussed and disputed at the time.¹

Matching concepts was not an idea invented by one person. It was the natural response of the early Chinese Buddhist intellectual world as a whole to newly arriving thought. Understanding the unknown through the known and describing unfamiliar concepts in familiar language occur in every cultural encounter. Geyi is simply the Chinese name for this universal phenomenon.

2. The rise of xuanxue: the soil of matching concepts¶

The Three Mysterious Classics and xuanxue

To understand why matching concepts took Daoist and xuanxue vocabulary as its frame of reference, we must first examine xuanxue, the dominant intellectual current of the late Han, Wei, and Jin periods, from the second to fourth centuries. Its name literally means the "study of the mysterious and profound." The word xuan comes from the Laozi's "mystery upon mystery, the gateway to all wonders" and denotes a fundamental principle that transcends particular things and resists naming. Xuanxue was the philosophical tradition of the Wei and Jin that explored such fundamental questions through its central texts, the Laozi, Zhuangzi, and Book of Changes.

The central texts of xuanxue were the "Three Mysterious Classics," the Laozi, Zhuangzi, and Zhouyi, or Book of Changes. Their interpretation was its defining undertaking. After Confucian authority declined in the late Han, xuanxue became the educated classes' mainstream philosophy.

Wang Bi and "valuing nonbeing"

The most important figure in xuanxue was Wang Bi (226 to 249). In his commentaries on the Laozi and the Book of Changes, he advanced the influential position that the universe is grounded in "nonbeing." Here the term refers to the unnameable ultimate ground on which the generation of all things depends, not a literal "nothing." "Being," meaning all particular existing things, arises from and depends on "nonbeing." The position later became known as "valuing nonbeing" or "taking nonbeing as the root."

Wang Bi's "nonbeing" roughly corresponds to the unnameable Dao of the Laozi's "The Dao that can be spoken is not the constant Dao." It is not a particular thing but that on which the generation of all things rests. The "being" of the ordinary world must find its ground in "nonbeing."

Guo Xiang and "independent transformation"

In his commentary on the Zhuangzi, Guo Xiang (252 to 312) advanced a different position. All things undergo "independent transformation," arising spontaneously on their own, without a single "nonbeing" as their source. Their existence consists simply in their being as they are, requiring no appeal to an external ground. The position, called "honoring being," opposed Wang Bi's "valuing nonbeing."

The encounter between xuanxue and Buddhism

To Wei and Jin intellectuals, Buddhist concepts such as "emptiness" (śūnyatā), "wisdom" (prajñā), and "nirvāṇa" bore striking superficial resemblances to xuanxue's "nonbeing," "Dao," and "nonaction." Both spoke of a fundamental condition beyond particular things, and both had an epistemological dimension of "not clinging to being."

The superficial resemblance made matching concepts possible and was also the source of all its misreadings.

3. How matching concepts worked: pairing concepts¶

In practice, matching concepts constructed a "correspondence table," pairing Buddhist concepts with xuanxue or Daoist concepts one by one and using the latter to explain the former.

The pairings do have points of resemblance, and the two traditions resonate in a broad spirit of "going beyond grasping." The real trouble is that the pairings conceal crucial differences, forcing the distinctive claims of a new philosophical framework into the outline of an existing one.

The example of "absence in the mind"

The "absence in the mind" (xinwu) approach to matching concepts offers a concrete and instructive example. It interpreted the Buddhist understanding of "nonbeing," or emptiness, as "the mind's not clinging to external things," avoiding the claim that "external things themselves are empty" or "things lack intrinsic nature." The interpretation was quite natural within a Daoist or xuanxue context, where the sage lives in the world without allowing external things to entangle the mind and responds through nonaction. Buddhist emptiness concerns both mental attitudes and the manner in which all dharmas exist, and the latter is crucial. Interpreting emptiness as "the mind's nonattachment" turns an ontological claim into a psychological one and loses the very core of Buddhist philosophy.

4. The six houses and seven schools of Prajñāpāramitā: diverse early interpretations¶

During the Wei and Jin period, various schools of interpretation formed in China around the central concept of prajñā, encompassing emptiness and wisdom. Later sources organized them into the "six houses and seven schools," a classification found in later commentaries on Sengzhao's Zhaolun and related texts. This classification is itself a retrospective arrangement and may not fully reflect how the schools described themselves, but it provides a framework for understanding the diversity of interpretations at the time.²

The school of original nonbeing

Dao'an and Zhu Fatai represented this school. Its central claim was that all dharmas are "originally nonbeing," meaning that all phenomena are, at their root, "nonbeing," without substantial existence. This "original nonbeing" expresses their emptiness. At the fundamental level, all dharmas lack substantial "being" and can only be designated "nonbeing."

The problem is that this "original nonbeing" was deeply influenced by Wang Bi's xuanxue. It resembles "nonbeing is ontologically prior to being" more than the Buddhist claim that "all dharmas lack intrinsic nature."

The alternative school of original nonbeing

Departing from the school of original nonbeing, this school held that "original nonbeing" was the essence of dharmas, but their phenomenal appearances were not themselves identical with it. It retained a distinction between "dharmas' original nonbeing" and "dharmas' appearances," offering a variant of the position of the school of original nonbeing.

The school of form as such

Represented by Zhi Daolin, who is discussed in the next section, this was the most philosophically creative of the six houses and seven schools. Its central claim was that "form itself is emptiness." Material phenomena (form, rūpa) are emptiness; emptiness is not outside or above form, for form itself is empty. Phenomena have no substantial essence independent of their appearing. Compared with the other schools, this position was closer to Nāgārjuna's Madhyamaka concept of emptiness.

The school of containment in consciousness

The school took "consciousness" as the repository of emptiness, whose realization occurred at the level of consciousness. Its thought contained the beginnings of an orientation toward consciousness-only, but in the Chinese cultural setting of the time it remained a distinctive interpretation of the Prajñāpāramitā sūtras.

The school of illusory transformation

Its central claim was that all phenomena are like illusions or magical transformations, without real substance. This metaphor is very common in Mahāyāna sūtras, especially the Vimalakīrti Sūtra. The school of illusory transformation built a system of interpretation around it.

The school of absence in the mind

Its central claim was that the practitioner's "mind" should be free of attachment to external things. "Absence in the mind" meant a mental state of nonattachment, not that external things themselves were empty. As noted above, interpreting the ontology of Buddhist emptiness as a practical claim about mental attitudes was one of the most typical misreadings produced by matching concepts.

5. Zhi Daolin: the most complex thinker of the age of matching concepts¶

Life and social circles

Zhi Daolin (314 to 366), whose courtesy name was Daolin, family name Guan, and monastic name Daolin, was the Buddhist monk most revered by the educated classes of the Wei and Jin period. His social circle included leading Eastern Jin literati, among them the calligrapher Wang Xizhi (303 to 361) and the statesman Xie An (320 to 385). He was both a monk and an important participant in the Eastern Jin's elite circles of pure conversation.

Reinterpreting "Free and Easy Wandering"

Zhi Daolin's most famous intervention was his reinterpretation of the Zhuangzi's "Free and Easy Wandering." In his commentary on the Zhuangzi, Guo Xiang held that the great Peng bird and the cicada shared the freedom of "each fitting its own nature." The Peng had its freedom, and the cicada its own. Freedom meant simply "matching one's own measure," each fulfilling its allotted capacity, with no hierarchy between them. Guo Xiang was applying his philosophy of independent transformation, in which all things are complete in themselves and need seek nothing beyond themselves.

Zhi Daolin criticized Guo Xiang's interpretation. "Free and easy wandering," he argued, pointed to the absolute freedom of the "perfected person," or sage, who transcends every limitation; it did not mean "matching one's own measure." Only breaking attachment to one's own limitations was true freedom. Guo Xiang's version instead reduced freedom to "adjustment within one's own limitations," which was not true liberation.

Here Zhi Daolin was rereading Zhuangzi through a Buddhist conception of liberation. True freedom did not lie in "each accepting its allotted place"; it lay in going beyond all discrimination and attachment. Such a sophisticated form of matching concepts did more than fit Buddhist concepts into Daoist vocabulary. It used Buddhist insights to correct or deepen Daoist understanding.¹

The philosophical content of the school of form as such

Zhi Daolin's claim that "form itself is emptiness" had an internal argumentative structure. The "form" of things (material phenomena) is empty not because it is "nonbeing" at some deeper level, but because form itself has no substantial essence existing independently of its appearance. The "nature of a flower," for example, is not another thing called "the nature of a flower" apart from its color, shape, and scent. The flower is the appearance of these particular features; there is no additional substance.

The argument is close in spirit to Madhyamaka's "conventional designation." A flower exists as something conventionally designated; no intrinsically real "flower" hides behind the phenomena. Within a xuanxue setting, Zhi Daolin's direct reading of Buddhist scriptures, especially the Prajñāpāramitā sūtras, brought him closer to their original meaning than other interpretations based on matching concepts.

Yet this proximity had limits. Zhi Daolin's understanding of emptiness remained chiefly concerned with whether the essences of kinds of things could exist independently of their appearances. He had not yet reached Nāgārjuna's Madhyamaka inference that things lack intrinsic nature because they arise dependently. The two point in similar directions, but their argumentative structures differ.

6. The fundamental problems of matching concepts¶

Dao'an's criticism of matching concepts, noted in the previous chapter, touched on a real philosophical problem. Explaining B through A always means filling B with A's associations, contexts, and meanings. When listeners understand "Buddhist prajñā," what they are actually understanding is "Daoist nonbeing with the label prajñā attached."

The central misreadings produced by matching concepts concern cosmology, psychology, and dependent origination.

First, cosmological nonbeing versus emptiness as the absence of intrinsic nature. Daoist and xuanxue "nonbeing" has a cosmological meaning, expressed in "The Dao generates one; one generates two; two generates three; three generates the myriad things." "Nonbeing" is the root and support of all things. Buddhist emptiness (śūnyatā) does not ask "what all things arise from"; it analyzes "how all things exist." All dharmas lack intrinsic nature and arise depending on conditions. Explaining the latter through the former makes Buddhism seem to say that "all things come from nothingness," while concealing its actual concern with "all things existing without intrinsic nature."

Second, mental attitudes versus ontological claims. The school of absence in the mind misread emptiness as "the mind's nonattachment." It turned an ontological claim about how all dharmas exist into a practical claim about the practitioner's mental state. In everyday practice the two seem to lead toward similar outcomes, releasing attachment and freeing the mind, but philosophically they concern entirely different levels.

Third, independent transformation and naturalness versus dependent origination. Guo Xiang's "independent transformation" means that all things arise spontaneously on their own, without depending on external causes. Superficially, it and Buddhist dependent origination both reject "an external ruler," but they move in opposite directions. Independent transformation says "each thing is complete and sufficient in itself"; dependent origination says "each thing arises and ceases depending on conditions and is not self-sufficient." Explaining the latter through the former produces the opposite understanding.

A historical assessment of matching concepts

Viewed critically, matching concepts was the principal intellectual obstacle during Chinese Buddhism's first few centuries. It led Chinese intellectuals to believe they understood the Dharma when they actually understood a Dharma filtered through Daoist concepts. After Kumārajīva arrived in 401, his new translations and oral explanations gave people in China their first relatively direct access to Nāgārjuna's Madhyamaka in its original meaning. This was the first systematic reckoning with the tradition of matching concepts, as the next chapter, 10.3, will discuss.

From another perspective, however, matching concepts cannot be dismissed as pure error. It was an inevitable initial adjustment in the encounter between two mature cultures, and the beginning of dialogue, not its end. The discussions of this period constituted the first large-scale philosophical dialogue across cultures in Chinese philosophical history. Their value lies not only in how much they ultimately understood correctly, but also in the real philosophical questions they raised.

7. The legacy of matching concepts¶

Matching concepts as an explicit method was criticized and gradually abandoned in the fourth and fifth centuries. Yet the habits of thought it shaped left enduring traces in Chinese Buddhism.

The discourse of "the unity of the three teachings" grew from xuanxue's sense of affinity with Buddhism and Buddhism's active borrowing of Daoist vocabulary. Together they laid the foundations for speaking of the integration of Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism. Chinese people thereafter tended to see the three teachings as spiritual traditions with a shared underlying character rather than mutually exclusive competing systems. The tendency has its historical roots in the age of matching concepts.

Chinese Buddhist doctrine retained its Daoist coloring even after matching concepts had clearly disappeared. Tiantai's "original awakening," Huayan's "nature-origination," and Chan's "no-thought, no-form, and nonabiding" all carry ways of thinking that resonate with Daoist nothingness and the way of naturalness. The connection directly reflects the historical accumulation of the age of matching concepts; it is no accident.

Monks' entry into literati society followed the model established by Zhi Daolin and others, in which monks participated in literati pure conversation. It became an important pattern of interaction between the educated classes and Buddhism in Chinese history. Eminent Buddhist monks still held very high social standing in literati and scholar-official circles during the Tang and Song, continuing a tradition traceable to the age of matching concepts.

The history of matching concepts is the first stage of Chinese Buddhism's understanding of itself. It was an almost unavoidable misreading and, at the same time, a real philosophical encounter.

References¶