Dayang Jingxuan (; ) was a

Zen Zen ( zh, t=禪, p=Chán; ja, text= 禅, translit=zen; ko, text=선, translit=Seon; vi, text=Thiền) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism that originated in China during the Tang dynasty, known as the Chan School (''Chánzong'' 禪宗), and ...

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

monk during the early

Song Dynasty The Song dynasty (; ; 960–1279) was an imperial dynasty of China that began in 960 and lasted until 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song following his usurpation of the throne of the Later Zhou. The Song conquered the rest ...

. During his life, he was apparently the only living teacher representing

Caodong Caodong school () is a Chinese Chan Buddhist sect and one of the Five Houses of Chán. Etymology The key figure in the Caodong school was founder Dongshan Liangjie (807-869, 洞山良价 or Jpn. Tozan Ryokai). Some attribute the name "Cáodòng" ...

Sōtō Sōtō Zen or is the largest of the three traditional sects of Zen in Japanese Buddhism (the others being Rinzai and Ōbaku). It is the Japanese line of the Chinese Cáodòng school, which was founded during the Tang dynasty by Dòngshān L ...

school, and he was the last monk of that tradition to be mentioned in the influential ''

Transmission of the Lamp ''The Jingde Record of the Transmission of the Lamp'' (), often referred to as ''The Transmission of the Lamp'', is a 30 volume work consisting of putative biographies of the Chan Buddhist and Zen Buddhist patriarchs and other prominent Buddhist ...

'', compiled in 1004. However, as that work was compiled during his lifetime, it lacked biographical information. A biography did not appear until the ''Xudeng lu'' of 1101. He left his birth city to become a monk at Chongxiao Temple in

Jinling Nanjing (; , Mandarin pronunciation: ), alternately romanized as Nanking, is the capital of Jiangsu province of the People's Republic of China. It is a sub-provincial city, a megacity, and the second largest city in the East China region. T ...

. His teacher there was named Zhitong, but Dayang soon left when he was 19. He studied with Yuanjiao Liaoyi for a time, but eventually moved on, finally settling on Liangshan Yuanguan as his teacher. Dayang Jingxuan is an important figure in the

Zen lineage because he was apparently the only remaining representative of the

tradition during his lifetime. Furthermore, he is significant because the lineage effectively died out with him, but through highly unusual means, the lineage was passed on to someone he had never met. Juefan Huihong's biographical compilation of 1119, the ''Chanlin sengbao zhuan'' (Chronicle of the Sangha Treasure in the Groves of Chan), suggests that

Touzi Yiqing Touzi Yiqing (; ), sometimes also Touzi Qing Huayan, was a Zen Buddhist monk during the early Song Dynasty. Biography Touzi Yiqing was born in a city known at the time as Qingshe, which is near the present-day city of Yanshi in Henan Province. An ...

was the "true son", or student, of Dayang. The ''Xudeng lu'' of 1101 lists Touzi and nine others as disciples of Dayang. However, it explains that Touzi did not actually receive

dharma transmission In Chan Buddhism, Chan and Zen Buddhism, dharma transmission is a custom in which a person is established as a "successor in an unbroken Lineage (Buddhism), lineage of teachers and disciples, a spiritual 'bloodline' (''kechimyaku'') theoretica ...

from Dayang, but from Fushan Fayuan. Fushan had been a student of Dayang, but he himself had not received dharma transmission from Dayang either. The scholar Morten Schlütter notes that this form of lineage transfer "has no real parallel in early Chan literature". This refers to the fact that Touzi was able to be considered the immediate heir to Dayang's lineage without having met him, and that Fayuan was able to hold Dayang's lineage "in trust" without actually being a bona fide heir. Schlütter further interprets Huihong's likely embellished account as an attempt to strengthen the rather weak link between Touzi and the last Caodong monk recorded in the ''

'' in order to solidify the legitimacy of the lineage.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dayang, Jingxuan Chan Buddhist monks 943 births 1027 deaths Song dynasty Buddhist monks