Chapter 4. The formation of Pure Land: Buddhism for the people

Essay 9, Chapter 3 counted the three things people most needed in troubled times: consolation, rites for the dead, and a life to come. This chapter examines how these needs finally received a complete method. Essay 4, Chapter 2 traced its origin. The chapter on easy practice in the Commentary on the Ten Stages insults the "weak, timid, and inferior," then gives them a method all the same. China turned that page into a complete institutional system in three steps. Tanluan distinguished self-power from other-power and promoted the easy path from an expedient to the main entrance. Volume 2 has already recorded the troubled years through which he lived. Daochuo, who experienced the Northern Zhou suppression of Buddhism, added a judgment about the age. This was the age of Dharma decline, the evil world of the five impurities. "Only the gate of Pure Land offers a path of entry." He assigned the gate of the sages' path to those of high capacity and the Pure Land gate to the age itself. Shandao completed the work. Ordinary beings enter the reward land; name-recitation is the practice that assures birth; all nine grades are ordinary beings. The last restriction reserved for elites was removed.1 The genealogy of patriarchs of the Pure Land "school" was constructed retrospectively, as Volume 1's criticism of the historical sources has established. In this respect, the two great Chinese inventions are alike. Both Chan and Pure Land compiled family genealogies for themselves after the fact.2

The editorial record of that genealogy survives intact and deserves to be opened, for it is a different kind of document from Chan's pedigree. The designation of patriarchs began in the Southern Song, and the editors were Tiantai scholars. Zongxiao's Collected Texts on the Land of Bliss established six patriarchs of the Lotus Society: Huiyuan as founder, followed by Shandao, Fazhao, Shaokang, Shengchang, and Zongze. Zhipan's Comprehensive Chronicle of the Buddhas and Patriarchs revised the list to seven, removing Zongze and adding Chengyuan and Yanshou. Zhuhong and Shengan were added successively in the Ming and Qing. During the Guangxu reign, others added Zhixu and Chewu. In his lifetime, Yinguang added Xingce and revised the list to twelve patriarchs, moving Shengan all the way from ninth to eleventh. After his death, a proposal won general acceptance and placed Yinguang thirteenth. The list was settled only within living memory.3

Place three facts side by side. The editors were not members of the school whose genealogy they compiled. Pure Land's pedigree was the work of Tiantai historians. The patriarchs were not linked by master-disciple succession. Zhipan explicitly chose them for their contribution to spreading the teaching. Huiyuan and Shandao lived two hundred years apart and never met. The list was editable. Removal, addition, and retrospective recognition all took their turn. A chain cannot be revised after the fact; a hall of fame can add and remove names. A list without transmission could win general acceptance because it carried no authority to confer the Dharma. Pure Land's guarantor was Amitābha, not a teacher. There was no approval to grant and no initiation to monopolize. Patriarchal status was an honor, not a qualification to transmit the Dharma. Chan's lineage was a property deed; Pure Land's succession of patriarchs was a hall of fame. Property requires lawsuits; a hall of fame needs only a vote.

One piece of corroboration is revealing. Tanluan and Daochuo, the school's actual founders, are absent from the Chinese list. Japan's Shin school includes them among its Seven Eminent Masters. Two traditions compile two lists from the same history. Genealogy is the editor's classification of the teachings. Nor does a hall of fame require agreement among its members. Huiyuan, who heads the list, practiced pratyutpanna visualization and formed a society bound by common vows, with a strong emphasis on self-power. Doctrinally, he does not belong at all to the Shandao tradition that defines the school. The first patriarch and the school's founder practiced different methods, yet the list remained valid. This is the best proof that it was not a chain.

A property deed and a hall of fame

The English image changes three teacher–disciple tablets followed by an ellipsis into five seals, and the Chinese hall’s first seven patriarchs followed by an ellipsis into twelve blank plaques. These are schematic counts of symbols, not five generations of Chan patriarchs or a final Pure Land list of only twelve. The text records Zongxiao’s six, Zhipan’s seven after removing Zongze and adding Chengyuan and Yanshou, and Yinguang’s revised twelve during his lifetime; after his death in 1940, Yinguang himself was recognized as the thirteenth. The full thirteen-person table and the note’s distinctions between versions and dates govern the historical sequence.

The paired terms retain their separate referents: the teacher guarantees Chan authorization, while Amitābha guarantees Pure Land salvation; the former concerns Dharma authority, the latter an honorary patriarchal place. “A chain cannot be revised” describes the claim to exclusive direct transmission, not a finding that the historical Chan genealogy was never edited: Chapter 3 expressly discusses its retrospective construction. Property deeds, lawsuits, and voting are the author’s institutional analogies. The picture does not document a particular lawsuit or a formal ballot. The Pure Land list recognizes contributions to propagation without claiming an unbroken teacher–disciple succession.

Putting the thirteen figures back into their own times calls for another table. Its purpose is explained below it.4

Patriarch Dates Predicament of the times Personal experience Form of practice
Huiyuan 334–416 War in the north under the Sixteen Kingdoms; Huan Xuan's usurpation and Lu Xun's uprising at the end of the Eastern Jin At twenty-one he wished to go south, but disorder in the central plains blocked the road; when Fu Pi attacked Xiangyang, he went south as Dao'an's followers dispersed; when Huan Xuan purged the monks, Mount Lu alone was exempted; after Lu Xun seized Jiangzhou, Lu came to the mountain to see him Pratyutpanna visualization, a society bound by common vows, strong emphasis on self-power
Shandao 613–681 Great disorder at the end of the Sui; the Sui–Tang transition Not recorded in his biography Name-recitation as the practice that assures birth; ordinary beings enter the reward land; thoroughgoing other-power
Chengyuan 712–802 The An Lushan Rebellion Lived as an ascetic beneath a cliff on Mount Heng: "he ate when people left him food; when they did not, he ate earth and mud" Pratyutpanna asceticism; taught others exclusive Buddha-recollection
Fazhao Unknown (already at Hengzhou by 767) Regional military rule after the An Lushan Rebellion Not recorded in his biography Five-tempo Buddha-recollection, gathering followers through sound
Shaokang ?–805 Regional military rule in the middle Tang Not recorded in his biography Name-recitation in the streets and markets, using coins to entice children and establish the custom
Yanshou 904–975 The fall of the Tang; the division of the Five Dynasties; Wuyue's regional rule As a tax officer under Wuyue, he diverted official funds to buy fish and shrimp for release; sentenced to death, he remained composed at the execution ground and was released All good practices converge on one destination; joint practice of Chan and Pure Land
Shengchang 959–1020 Peace in the early Song (an exception) Not recorded in his biography Founded a Society of Pure Conduct in imitation of Mount Lu
Zhuhong 1535–1615 Japanese pirate raids under Jiajing; political disorder in the late Ming Lost his father at twenty-seven, then his young son; lost his wife at twenty-nine and his mother at thirty-one, and then left home Brought Chan into Pure Land; distinguished one-mindedness in principle and in practice
Zhixu 1599–1655 The Ming–Qing transition Fell gravely ill during a retreat at Wujiang and only then resolved single-mindedly on rebirth in the Pure Land Faith, vows, and name-recitation within a Tiantai framework
Xingce 1628–1682 The Ming–Qing change of dynasty After he grew up, his parents died one after the other, and he resolved to leave the world Instituted intensive seven-day Buddha-recollection retreats
Shengan Shixian 1686–1734 Peace under Kangxi and Yongzheng (a second exception) Not recorded in his biography Formed societies and urged the aspiration to awakening, speaking of Dharma decline with painful urgency
Chewu Jixing 1741–1810 The Qianlong–Jiaqing transition; the White Lotus rising in Sichuan and Hubei early in the Jiaqing reign Widely versed in the classics and histories; an illness taught him that worldly learning could not be relied on Abandoned Chan for Pure Land
Yinguang 1861–1940 The great Dingwu famine, 1900, the 1911 Revolution, warlord warfare, the War of Resistance against Japan An eye disease at six months left him nearly blind; as a youth he attacked Buddhism, then was ill for several years; in the winter of 1937, forced by the war, he moved to Mount Lingyan near Suzhou, where he died Sincere Buddha-recollection, karmic causation and fulfillment of human obligations, rejection of abstruse speculation

Two readings follow. First, the judgment that this is an evil world of five impurities had an experiential source, but the two columns must be read separately. In the column for the times, apart from the peaceful years of Shengchang and Shengan, everyone lived through years of war, dynastic change, or religious uprising: Shandao was born amid the great disorder at the end of the Sui, Chengyuan lived through the An Lushan Rebellion, Fazhao and Shaokang lived in the years of regional military rule that followed, and Zhixu and Xingce met the Ming–Qing transition. In the personal column, the biographies mostly record suffering of another kind: Yanshou stood at the execution ground; within four years Zhuhong lost his father, his son, his wife, and his mother; Zhixu fell ill to the point of death; Yinguang nearly lost his sight at six months old and in old age was driven by the war to move to Lingyan. The biographies of Shandao, Fazhao, and Shaokang record only their teachings and auspicious signs, and this column stays empty for them. Volume 2 assessed the doctrinal function of the Dharma-decline narrative; this volume adds its experiential source. The theory of Dharma decline was credible at first because it described what lay outside the window, and sometimes what lay inside the house. Second, an honest qualification is needed. Shengchang and Shengan lived in peaceful times, and their personal columns are empty too, yet their language of Dharma decline did not diminish. Once a judgment enters the daily liturgy, it is recited in peacetime too. The weak form described in Essay 9, Chapter 3 and the ratchet described in Essay 4, Chapter 1 are each confirmed once by this table.5

The method itself deserves a close look. Ten recollections through name-recitation were the first method of liberation in Buddhist history to take "cannot read, has no time" as its design premise. Doctrinal scholarship requires literacy, Chan requires leisure and aptitude, and calming and insight require withdrawal from ordinary work. A single Buddha-name requires nothing at all. The gradual lowering of requirements for practice recorded in Essay 4, Chapter 2 reaches its endpoint here. From the rhetoric that even those who heap sand into a stūpa have all attained the Buddha-way to the concrete practice of birth through ten recollections, the final step of the thousand-year process "from elites to the masses" was taken in China. The theory of Dharma decline gives this design its legitimacy. Volume 2 has recorded the full internal defense, comprising two paths, two gates, and Dharma decline. We have not lowered the standard; the age has lowered people's capacities. Memories of persecution made the theory of Dharma decline most believable. Daochuo wrote his classification of the teachings after the Northern Zhou burned the scriptures; its credibility came from persecution he had lived through.6

The problem of verification reaches its final form here. Volume 2's verdict is "a check from which no one returns alive." Whether birth in the Pure Land occurs is known only after death; no one can return to be questioned. China supplied this structure with an accompanying genre, biographies of those born in the Pure Land. Auspicious signs at death, unusual fragrances, celestial music, and emanated Buddhas arriving to welcome the dying were witnessed by those present and gathered into biographies. The compilations continued from the Tang and Song through the Ming and Qing. Set this within the volume's sequence. The Interlude gave us silence about the fruits of attainment; Essay 7 gave the signs of realization to the teacher; Chan had no third party to a master's approval; Pure Land verified birth at the deathbed. The last of four forms in which criteria ceased to be publicly testable is now in place, and this one is the most ingenious. Verification has not disappeared. It has moved to a place no witness can follow, after which those who remain write up eyewitness records. Essay 11's account of the institutionalization of funerary and memorial rites will explore the genre's sense of immediacy and its function further.7

As required, I explicitly mark what follows as this volume's conjecture and set out two readings together. Pure Land's victory can be read as soteriology's surrender to demographics. The baseline principles of self-power, realization in this life, and confronting defilements where they occur are almost entirely ceded here. Volume 2's entire critique stands; this chapter subtracts not a word. The victory can also be read as the first time Buddhism took "the majority" seriously as a fact. For a thousand years, this tradition's principal methods had been addressed to an elite of practitioners freed from ordinary work. Most people figured only as donors. Pure Land was the first method designed for the majority.

This volume favors the second reading, for reasons contained in its own material. All the evidence from the Interlude through Essay 7 shows that no one can verify how many ever completed the difficult path, while the density of those claiming attainment steadily declines. In a world where no one can prove where the difficult path leads, building a walkable road for the majority is better called an honest acknowledgment of the majority than surrender. The two assessments remain side by side. Volume 2 has completed the soteriological assessment. The assessment of transformation is that Pure Land kept most of this religion's believers in China. Which matters more remains the reader's own classification of the teachings.

The four chapters close, and China's reconstruction is complete. Doctrinal classification supplied the framework, Tiantai and Huayan the systems; Chan held the mountains and forests, and Pure Land drew in the people. All four shared one doctrinal source, the true and eternal, and one premise, that all was spoken by the Buddha. This whole now faced a test imposed by the state: Huichang. The next essay examines the form in which Chinese Buddhism survived.

References

References

  1. Tanluan's distinction between two powers appears in the upper and lower fascicles of his Commentary on the Treatise on Birth (T40, no. 1819, pp. 826a28–b9, 843c22–844a27). Daochuo's statement that "only the gate of Pure Land offers a path of entry" appears in the upper fascicle of the Collection on the Land of Peace and Bliss (T47, no. 1958, pp. 13c4–22). Shandao's ordinary beings entering the reward land and name-recitation as the practice that assures birth appear in fascicles 1 and 4 of the Four-Part Commentary on the Contemplation Sūtra (T37, no. 1753, pp. 247c16–250b27, 272a28–b12). For the troubled times and persecutions experienced by all three, see Volume 2, Essay 6. ↩

  2. For Pure Land's textual foundations, the White Lotus Society, the later construction of the patriarchal chronology, Daochuo's and Shandao's foundational work, and Yanshou's convergence of Chan and Pure Land, see Volume 1, Part I, Essay 10, Chapter 9, "The Pure Land school," Sections 1–4 and 6. This chapter draws directly on that account. ↩

  3. Zongxiao's designation of six patriarchs appears in the Collected Texts on the Land of Bliss. Zhipan's revision to seven, explicitly chosen for their contribution to spreading the teaching rather than master-disciple succession, appears in fascicle 26 of the Comprehensive Chronicle of the Buddhas and Patriarchs, "Record of the Establishment of Pure Land Teaching." The sources give two accounts of the inclusion of Zhixu, Chewu, and Xingce. The editor's note in Chen Hailiang's Collection in Perpetual Remembrance of Master Yinguang states: "By the Ming, Yunqi was generally acclaimed as the eighth patriarch. In the middle Qing, Master Wukai proposed Fantian as the ninth. During the Guangxu reign, Master Enxi added the two masters Lingfeng and Hongluo, making Lingfeng ninth and moving Fantian to tenth. Master Yinguang held that Master Jieliu Xingce's promotion of Pure Land was so earnest as to have few equals and that he deserved patriarchal status. He proposed him as the tenth patriarch, moved Fantian again to eleventh, and made Hongluo twelfth." On this account, Zhixu, or Lingfeng, and Chewu, or Hongluo, were added during the Guangxu reign. Chen Chienhuang's "近代确立莲宗十三位祖师的过程及其释疑" (English translation: Chen Chienhuang, "The Process of Establishing and Justifying the Thirteen Patriarchs of the Lotus School," trans. Charles B. Jones, Pacific World, 3rd ser., 20 (2018): 1–19) examines only when Yinguang himself adopted the list. On the evidence of Yinguang's letter to Ding Fubao, "at least before the seventeenth year of the Republic (1928), Ouyi and Chewu had not yet been regarded as patriarchs of the Lotus School." At the end of the twenty-first year of the Republic (1932), Yinguang still called Shengan the ninth patriarch. "Yinguang's establishment of the twelve patriarchs should be dated to between 1938 and 1939" (pp. 9–10, 12 within the English translation). A note in the same article, however, records that the Brief Biographies of the Nine Patriarchs of the Lotus School, printed by the scripture-printing office of Fazang Monastery in Jiangbei in the sixteenth year of the Republic (1927), had already added Chewu as the tenth after Wukai's nine patriarchs (p. 4, n. 11 within the English translation). The claim that they had not been regarded as patriarchs before 1928 therefore applies only to Yinguang's side. For Yinguang's revised sequence of twelve, see his "Eulogies of the Twelve Patriarchs of the Lotus School" in the lower fascicle of the continuation of Master Yinguang's Collected Writings: the Qing tenth patriarch Puren Xingce, eleventh Fantian Shixian, and twelfth Hongluo Jixing. His letter to Zhang Jueming likewise says: "After the eighth patriarch, Master Lianchi, add Ouyi as ninth and Jieliu as tenth, move the ninth patriarch Siqi Shixian to eleventh, and then add Chan Master Chewu as twelfth" (as recorded in the Collection in Perpetual Remembrance). After Yinguang's death, Yang Shisun of Fujian proposed him as thirteenth patriarch, and "the proposal won the agreement of the great majority" (Chen Chienhuang, p. 16 within the English translation). Yang's "Proposal to Honor the Master of Lingyan as the Thirteenth Patriarch of the Lotus School" also appears in the Collection in Perpetual Remembrance. Chen states that "by the twenty-ninth year of the Republic (1940), thirteen patriarchs had been established in all." The Seven Eminent Masters of Japan's Shin school, Nāgārjuna, Vasubandhu, Tanluan, Daochuo, Shandao, Genshin, and Genkū, derive from the tradition of Shinran's Hymn of True Faith and Buddha-Recollection. ↩

  4. The table has two columns for each life. The column for the predicament of the times records only events generally known to have occurred within each person's lifetime; it does not imply that the person experienced them, and this book gives no separate notes for it. The personal column records only what the biographies state; where a biography records nothing, the table says so rather than filling the gap from the times. Dates: those of Huiyuan, Chengyuan, Shaokang, Shengchang, Xingce, and Shixian are inferred from the year of death and the age at death given in their biographies. For the dates of Shandao, Zhixu, Yinguang, and Fazhao, see the dates of the thirteen patriarchs listed in the preface to Chen Chienhuang's article cited in the note on the patriarchal lists (as reprinted on a Pure Land website); Fazhao's dates are given as unknown, since both biographies begin their account with his residence at Yunfeng Monastery in Hengzhou in Dali 2 (767). Yanshou died in the second month of Kaibao 8 (975): his biography in fascicle 28 of the Song Biographies of Eminent Monks says that he “died at his monastery in the eighth year of Kaibao, a yihai year, at the age of seventy-two” (T50, no. 2061, the passage beginning at p. 887b01), and fascicle 26 of the Comprehensive Chronicle of the Buddhas and Patriarchs gives the twenty-sixth day of the second month of Kaibao 8. Zhuhong was born in the yiwei year of Jiajing (1535) and lived to eighty-one, according to Deqing's “Stūpa Inscription for Great Master Lianchi of Yunqi in Old Hangzhou” (fascicle 25 of the Yunqi fahui (selections), J33, no. B277, the passage beginning at p. 194b12); Chen gives 1532–1612, which is not followed here. Xingce's birth year is inferred from his age of fifty-five at death; the same biography dates his father's dream of Hanshan entering the room, which preceded his birth, to Tianqi 6 (1626), and Chen gives 1626. Chewu's dates follow Bernard Faure, The Rhetoric of Immediacy: A Cultural Critique of Chan/Zen Buddhism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), p. 220 (Chen gives 1740). Sources for each patriarch: For Huiyuan, see his biography in fascicle 6 of the Biographies of Eminent Monks (T50, no. 2059, p. 357c23 ff.): at twenty-one he wished to cross the Yangzi to study with Fan Xuanzi, but “Shi Hu had just died, the central plains were in disorder, the southern road was blocked, and he could not carry out his wish”; he traveled south with Dao'an to the Fan and Mian region, and when Fu Pi attacked Xiangyang, Dao'an “divided his followers, each going where he would” (the passage beginning at p. 358a16); when Huan Xuan purged the monks, “only Mount Lu, as the dwelling of the virtuous, was excluded from the inspection” (the passage beginning at p. 360b07); and “when Lu Xun first came down and occupied the city of Jiangzhou, he entered the mountain to visit Huiyuan” (the passage beginning at p. 359b07). For Shandao, see fascicle 2 of the Records of Pure Land Sages and Worthies (X78, no. 1549, p. 237c17 ff.); the biography says that “his origins are unknown” and records nothing of his background; for the sources of his teaching, see the note on Tanluan, Daochuo, and Shandao in this chapter. Chengyuan's “he ate when people left him food; when they did not, he ate earth and mud” comes from Liu Zongyuan's “Stele Inscription for the Amitābha Monk of the Southern Sacred Mountain,” reproduced in fascicle 3 of the Records of Pure Land Sages and Worthies (p. 241b01 ff.); fascicle 26 of the Comprehensive Chronicle has the same. For Fazhao, see his biography in fascicle 21 of the Song Biographies of Eminent Monks (T50, no. 2061, p. 843c22 ff.) and fascicle 3 of the Records of Pure Land Sages and Worthies (p. 241b15 ff.). For Shaokang's use of coins to entice children to recite the Buddha's name, see his biography in fascicle 25 of the Song Biographies of Eminent Monks: he “encouraged small children, giving them one coin each time they could recite the name of Amitābha Buddha once … After a year of this, whenever men and women saw Shaokang, they would say ‘Amitābha Buddha’” (the passage beginning at p. 867b12); fascicle 3 of the Records of Pure Land Sages and Worthies agrees (p. 242a17 ff.). For Yanshou, see his biography in fascicle 28 of the Song Biographies of Eminent Monks (p. 887a11 ff.), fascicle 26 of the Comprehensive Chronicle (T49, no. 2035, p. 264b28 ff.), and fascicle 3 of the Records of Pure Land Sages and Worthies (p. 244a08 ff.); on which sources record the diversion of official funds for releasing animals, see the note on the patriarchs' lives in this chapter. For Shengchang, see fascicle 26 of the Comprehensive Chronicle (p. 265a08 ff.) and fascicle 3 of the Records of Pure Land Sages and Worthies (p. 245c04 ff.). For Zhuhong, see fascicle 5 of the Records of Pure Land Sages and Worthies (p. 267a12 ff.), which records nothing of his family; his bereavements follow his own “Testament”: “When I was twenty-seven, my late father passed away. Not long after, my son Zuzhi died young. At twenty-nine I lost my wife and later married Lady Tang. At thirty-one my late mother passed away as well, and I resolved to leave home” (fascicle 24 of the Yunqi fahui (selections), J33, no. B277, the passage beginning at p. 190b12); Deqing's stūpa inscription agrees (see above). For Zhixu, see fascicle 6 of the Records of Pure Land Sages and Worthies (p. 273b18 ff.): “Later, while in retreat at Wujiang, he fell ill almost to the point of death, and only then did he resolve single-mindedly on rebirth in the Pure Land.” For Xingce, see the same fascicle (p. 277a01 ff.): “After he grew up, his father and mother died one after the other, and he resolved to leave the world.” For Shixian, see the same fascicle (p. 278c09 ff.), which records only that “from youth he did not eat meat or pungent foods.” Chewu Jixing is not included in the Records of Pure Land Sages and Worthies, whose preface by Peng Jiqing is dated Qianlong 48, before Chewu's death; for his life, see Yinguang's “Eulogies of the Twelve Patriarchs of the Lotus School”: “Widely versed in the classics and histories, he hoped to guide the world. Only an illness showed him that this could not be relied on, and he studied the depths of every school. Finding all of them hard to realize, he devoted himself solely to the Pure Land teaching” (lower fascicle of the continuation of Master Yinguang's Collected Writings). For Yinguang, see the “Account of the Conduct of Master Yinguang, Restorer of the Pure Land School” by Zhenda and others, in Chen Hailiang's Collection in Perpetual Remembrance of Master Yinguang: “As a youth he followed his elder brother in reading Confucian books, took the learning of the sages as his own charge, and echoed Han Yu's and Ouyang Xiu's arguments against Buddhism; later, after several years of illness, he first realized his earlier error”; “six months after birth the Master fell ill in the eyes and nearly lost his sight; though he later recovered, his vision remained impaired”; and “in the winter of the twenty-sixth year [of the Republic] (when he was seventy-seven), forced by the state of affairs and unable to remain in Suzhou, he reluctantly accepted the request of Miaozhen and others and moved to Lingyan” (following the online version of the Bodhi Academy). ↩

  5. The sources for all the events mentioned after the table are given in the note to the table of patriarchs in this chapter. Yanshou's diversion of official funds to release animals and his pardon after remaining composed at the point of execution appear in fascicle 26 of the Comprehensive Chronicle of the Buddhas and Patriarchs and fascicle 3 of the Records of Pure Land Sages and Worthies. His biography in fascicle 28 of the Song Biographies of Eminent Monks records only that “when the two Zhe regions constituted a kingdom, he served as an official supervising the collection of military supplies” (the passage beginning at p. 887b01); it does not record this episode. ↩

  6. For the structure of the internal defense, comprising two paths, two gates, and Dharma decline, see Volume 2, Essay 6, Part I, Chapter 2, "The internal defense: two paths, two gates, and Dharma decline." The soteriological verdicts on other-power's guarantee, a check from which no one returns alive, and craving for salvation appear in Part II, Chapters 2–4 respectively. ↩

  7. This volume treats the genre of biographies of those born in the Pure Land, transmitted from the Tang and Song onward through such works as Jiezhu's Biographies of Birth in the Pure Land and Wang Rixiu's Longshu Writings on Pure Land, as the accompanying literary form of "verification moved to the deathbed." For its institutional setting, see Essay 11. ↩