T'ien-tai's Three Major Works on the
Lotus Sutra

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Words and Phrases of the Lotus Sutra, Profound Meaning of the Lotus Sutra, and Great Concentration and Insight are the Great Teacher T’ien-t’ai’s three major analytical works on the Lotus Sutra.

The Profound Meaning of the Lotus Sutra, a writing in ten volumes, is a doctrinal analysis of Myoho-Renge-Kyo, the title of the Lotus Sutra, on the basis of five criteria – name, entity, quality, function and teaching.

The Words and Phrases of the Lotus Sutra, also in ten volumes, analyzes words and phrases from the twenty-eight chapters of the Lotus Sutra from four different perspectives, those of causal relation, comparable teaching, Essential and Theoretical Teaching, and observance of the mind.

The Great Concentration and Insight, likewise filling ten volumes, explains the doctrines of the threefold contemplation in a single mind and ichinen sanzen as a means of actually manifesting the Lotus Sutra in one’s life.

With Chang-an’s passing and the dawn of the Tang Empire, the T’ien-t’ai sect passed successively into the care of Chih-wei, Hui-wei and Hsuan-lang, but gradually lost favor due to the growing popularity of the Chan (Zen), Chen-yen (Shingon), Hua-yen (Kegon), Fa-hsiang (Hosso) and other sects.

But halfway through the Tang dynasty, Hsuan-lang’s disciple, Miao-lo (711-782), also called the Great Teacher Ching-hsi, became the sixth patriarch of the T’ien-t’ai sect. Miao-lo clarified and re-established the supremacy of the T’ien-t’ai doctrine of ichinen sanzen, rebuked all of the sects that had gained recent popularity, and returned religious authority to the T’ien-t’ai sect. He is therefore considered one of the T’ien-t’ai sect’s major patriarchs.

Miao-lo translated a number of sutras and authored many other works, including three commentaries on T’ien-t’ai’s three major works, called Annotations on the Profound Meaning of the Lotus Sutra (Hokke gengi shakusen), Annotations on the Words and Phrases of the Lotus Sutra (Hokke mongu ki) and Annotations on the Great Concentration and Insight (Maka shikan bugyoden guketsu).

Two disciples, Tao-sui and Hsing-man, carried on after Miao-lo’s passing, and became teachers to a Japanese priest who later became the Great Teacher Dengyo. It is said that Dengyo learned T’ien-t’ai’s perfected meditation from Tao-sui in particular. Spread of Buddhism - Part Three -- Buddhism in Japan

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