Introduction
In this essay, I will present a preliminary argument for a working hypothesis: that Xuánzàng 玄奘 (602–664) was not a devotee of Gunayin, but that this feature of his biography was added after his death to help legitimise the Heart Sutra. Given the historically dominant narrative, this proposition should be counter-intuitive and even cause cognitive dissonance. Xuanzang's devotion to Guanyin is literally the stuff of legends. A number of scholars have recently suggested, based on revisiting the traditional sources, that we need to rethink the standard biographies of Xuanzang: I think especially of Max Deeg, Jeffrey Kotyk, and Liu Shufen.
For example, Liu Shufen (2022) has drawn attention to the situation of Xuanzang in Gaozong's court: he was subject to virtual house arrest, unable to translate for long periods, and a board of censors was appointed to oversee his translation work with authority to change the translations as they saw fit. (see my summary Attwood 2023a). All of this runs counter to the historically dominant narrative.
My goal here is to persuade readers to take this proposition seriously. It would suit my purposes better if readers sought to refute my conjecture (and if they would tell me about it). As I state it, the proposition should be easy to refute and I will continue to look for evidence of Xuanzang's devotion to Guanyin. For now, I will present the evidence that raised questions in my mind and hope that it also raises questions for the reader.
The incident in which Xuanzang chants the Heart Sutra when he is lost in the Gobi Desert and facing demonic forces has long been a central element of what I now call "the Myth of the Heart Sutra." (aka the historically dominant narrative). The story occurs in at least two sources: the Yancong Biography (T 2053; 50.224b.9-10) and the preface composed in the eighth century by Amoghavajra for a manuscript copy of the Táng fàn fān duì zìyīn bānrě bōluómìduō Xīn jīng «唐梵飜對字音般若波羅蜜多心經» (T 256; hereafter Táng fàn Xīn jīng). English translations can be found in Li (1995: 26) and Hurvitz (1977: 108-110).
The story usually goes something like this: Xuanzang was lost in the desert and facing demonic forces, so he prayed to Guanyin. This doesn't work so he chants the Heart Sutra and all is well.
The story draws on a common theme in Chinese Buddhist mythology. Guanyin was believed to intercede in such situations if asked. A whole genre of Chinese literature exists in which people in peril pray to Guanyin who magically rescues them. The archetype for these stories is Chapter 25 of the Lotus Sutra (i.e. the Guânshìyīn Púsà pǔmén pǐn 觀世音菩薩普門品). Robert Campany (1991) has referred to this literature as "miracle tales".
Note, however, that in the Yancong version of the story, this prayer to Guanyin fails.
Despite chanting the name of Guanyin, he could not make them go away. However, when he recited this scripture [i.e. the Heart Sutra], the spirits dispersed upon hearing his voice, thus saving him from danger and providing real protection.
雖念觀音不能令去，及誦此經，發聲皆散，在危獲濟，實所憑焉。(T 2053; 50.224b11).
That Guanyin fails to perform a miracle is a strange twist for a miracle tale. And has long intrigued me. The miracle tale genre is a record of episodes in which Guanyin saves pious people in peril. Such religious stories circulated widely and provided Chinese Buddhists with "proof" of the value of faith and hope for earthly deliverance. However, this failure does not seem to lessen Xuanzang's faith because in the very next paragraph: "Then he reined in his horse and proceeded towards the northwest, whilst repeating the name of Guanyin Pusa" (Li 1995: 26-27).
Another key element of the Yancong version of the story is a narrative flashback to explain how Xuanzang came to have the Heart Sutra before he left China. Since an elaborate explanation is provided, we can deduce that Yancong felt an explanation was warranted. This suggests that despite the appearance of at least four inscriptions of the Heart Sutra existing by this time (dated 661, 669, 673, and 685), Yancong perceived that his readers would not be familiar with the Heart Sutra. Or that they would wonder how Xuanzang had the text before he went to India. Whatever his motivations, this is what Yancong takes the time to explain. And given that this seems to be the only narrative flashback in a relentlessly linear narrative, we might also suppose that Yancong imposed narrative on an already existing text that lacked it (contra Kotyk 2020 who doubts Huili's role in the creation of the Biography).
In the Táng fàn Xīn jīng version of this story, Guanyin's failure is omitted. Indeed, Guanyin plays a radically different role in this version of the story. Now it was Guanyin himself who gave Xuanzang the Heart Sutra, in the guise of a sick monk, before mysteriously disappearing. Guanyin then reappeared to Xuanzang in India, announced his role in the story, and then promptly "vanished into space". The latter miracle being the seal of authenticity for the Heart Sutra. This seems like pretty strange behaviour for an Indian bodhisatva. It is all rather oblique. But it was plausible enough for Tanahashi Kazuaki (2014: 82-84) to treat it as the answer to the problem of the provenance of the Heart Sutra:
The possibility that Xuanzang "received" the Hridaya in India cannot be entirely ruled out... [because] Xuanzang may have had contact with Avalokiteśvara in India. (84)
It was quite striking, therefore, to come across an episode in the biography of Xuanzang by his former colleague, Daoxuan. In this biography, faced with deadly peril Xuanzang prays not to Guanyin, but to Maitreya. This led me to look more closely at who Xuanzang "prays to" and at the words "prays to" and related terminology.
Sources
The Dà Táng dà Cí’ēnsì sānzàng fǎshī chuán xù «大唐大慈恩寺三藏法師傳序» "A Biography of the Tripiṭaka Master of the Great Ci’en Monastery of the Great Tang Dynasty" (T 2053) was compiled in 688 CE and is attributed to both Huìlì 慧立 (615- c. 677) and Yàncóng 彥悰 (fl. 688). T 2053 recounts an earlier compilation by Huili and subsequent editing and expansion by Yancong. However, note that Kotyk (2020) has cast doubt on this attribution. This biography has been translated into English several times but the older translations are not as reliable as the more recent translation by Li Rongxi (1995).
Some biographical details can also be found in Xuanzang's Travelogue: Dà Táng Xīyù jì «大唐西域記» The Great Tang Dynasty Record of the Western Regions. (T 2087). This was completed ca 646 CE, with editorial assistance from a monk named Biànjī 辯機. This text has been extensively studied and written about by Max Deeg, but for this essay, the article by Kotyk (2020) is more apposite.
These sources tend to be used uncritically to tell the story of Xuanzang. In fact, more caution is warranted and the usual caveats apply. For example, any facts stated within should not be considered reliable unless they are independently corroborated. Any fact that only occurs in one source cannot be considered reliable.
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| Daoxuan |
Daoxuan 道宣 (596–667) also composed a biography of Xuanzang for his Xù gāosēng zhuàn «續高僧傳» "Further Biographies of Eminent Monks" (T 2060; 50.446c1- 459c10). The date of composition is a matter of some conjecture. As Zou (2018: 234) notes:
[Daoxuan] himself asserts that he completed the text in 645 CE (Zhong Tang Zhenguan shi you jiu nian 終 唐貞觀十有九年). However, he includes details of several events that took place in later years, five of which are discussed by Chi Limei 池麗梅. The last of Chi’s examples occurred in the twenty-third year of the Zhenguan era (649 CE), but we know that some of the events that Daoxuan describes in Xu gaoseng zhuan took place even later.
These two texts generally meet the requirements of a primary historical source, i.e. they are first-hand accounts of the events written at or near the time they describe. Both Yancong and Daoxuan worked with Xuanzang. On the relationship between Xuanzang and Daoxuan see Zou (2018: 144-150). Kotyk (2020) makes the case that Daoxuan's Biography is a more reliable source for the history of Xuanzang, than Yancong's. It is still subject to the distortions of a hagiography, but Daoxuan was writing just four years after Xuanzang's death.
Some of Daoxuan's other works are relevant here:
- Dàtáng nèidiǎn lù «大唐內典錄» "Catalogue of the Inner Canon of the Great Tang" (T 2149), which includes a brief biographical sketch of Xuanzang and an early record of the Heart Sutra.
- Jí shénzhōu sānbǎo gǎntōng lù «集神州三寶感通錄» "Collected Record of Miracles Relating to the Three Jewels in China" (see Landry 2022).
The Frequency and Distribution of Terms
In the Yancong Biography (T 2053) we see some intriguing, but unfortunately not always decisive, distribution of terminology. The term qǐ qǐng 啟請 occurs just three times. At 222c12 and 276c3 the term means "make a request" in a conventional sense, but at 223b3 Xuanzang makes a request that Maitreya will send him a man to guide him on the route out of China. It is this term that is translated as "prays to".
Xuanzang is twice portrayed as reciting the name of Guanyin, i.e. niàn Guānyīn Púsà 念觀音菩薩 (223c7, 224b7). On four occasions, Xuanzang also "recites [a] scripture" 誦經 (e.g. 223c6-7, 273c7).
The distribution of names is particularly interesting. As we know, the name of the bodhisatva changed in Sanskrit from Avalokitasvara (avalokita-svara) to Avalokiteśvara (avalokita-īśvara) and in the Yancong Biography this is reflected in two distinct spellings: the older name Guānyīn 觀音, which translates Avalokitasvara, is used only in scroll 1. The newer name, Guānzìzài 觀自在, which translates Avalokiteśvara, occurs in scrolls 2,3 and 4. This seems to suggest (though does not confirm) that two different authors were at work. In scroll 2, the name is also transcribed: Ā fó lù zhǐ duō yī shī fá luó 阿縛盧枳多伊濕伐羅, [ Middle Chinese after Pulleyblank: ʔa bwaH lɔ kiə̆X ta ʔi ɕip̚ buat̚ la; i.e. A va lo ki te ś va ra] (230c08). This is followed by a note:
In Tang Chinese, this is known as Guānzìzài 觀自在. The combined pronunciation of the Sanskrit is as above. If divided into individual parts, Ā fó lù zhǐ duō 阿縛盧枳多 translates to guān 觀 and yī shī fá luó 伊濕伐羅 translates to zìzài 自在. The old translations such as Guāngshìyīn 光世音, Guānshìyīn 觀世音, or Guānshìyīn Zìzài 觀世音自在 are all incorrect. (230c8-10)
It's likely that this passage was copied from the Travelogue (T 2087; 51.883b; Li 1996: 75). If the author was Yancong on his own, and Yancong believed Guānyīn 觀音 to be an incorrect spelling, then why does he use it at all? Contra Kotyk (2020), this seems to suggest (at least) two authors at work.
The name Maitreya occurs more often and is more widely distributed. The text uses three ways of writing it. The partial transcription Mílè 彌勒 occurs 12 times (scrolls 1,2,3,6,10), while the translation Císhì 慈氏 "the Benevolent one" occurs 19 times (scrolls 2,3,4,6,10). However, scroll 3 includes a note: "In Tang speech called Císhì, which was previously erroneously called Mílè" 唐言慈氏，舊曰彌勒，訛也 (235c11). Even though Mílè is "erroneous", it is still used 12 times. Again, to me, this suggests two authors at work. Also in scroll 3, we encounter the name transliterated as Méidálì 梅怛麗 (235c11; juan 3). The Digital Dictionary of Buddhism notes that there are numerous different transcriptions.
While it is well known that the Travelogue (T 2087) does not mention the Heart Sutra, my research shows that this should not surprise us. The story that Xuanzang had it before he went to India is clearly apocryphal and the earliest it could have been composed is ca 654 CE, when Atikūṭa completed his translation of the Tuóluóní jí jīng «陀羅尼集經» (T 901). This was the source of the gate gate dhāraṇī so the Heart Sutra had to be composed sometime after this date. But the first reliably dated mention of the Heart Sutra occurs in the Biography and is from 656 CE.
With respect to Guanyin and Maitreya, the Travelogue shows a similar pattern. For example, Xuanzang records seeing not less than fourteen images of Guanyin in India. One of these (T 2087; 51.935b; Li 1996: 296) "answers prayers". But there is no narrative to go with most of these. It's just "At such and such a place, there is a statue of Guanyin". He also records a generic miracle tale involving Guanyin and a story in which the famous Indian monk Bhāvaviveka prays to Avalokiteśvara in order to live long enough to meet Maitreya. There is no suggestion in the Travelogue that Xuanzang himself was a devotee of Guanyin.
The mentions of Maitreya in the Travelogue are more varied. There are just seven mentions of Maitreya statues, though most of them seem to be associated with miracles. We also see mention of two Asoka-built stupas: one where Maitreya will appear on earth and one where he received his prediction of Buddhahood. The latter is accompanied by a story about that event (905c). More striking is a whole series of Maitreya-based backstories for Buddhists that profoundly influenced Xuanzang. So we see Vasumitra (887a), Guṇaprabha (891c), Asaṅga (896b-897a), [the arhat] Kāśyapa (919c), Nāgārjuna (930a), Dignāga (930c), and Bhavaviveka (930c-931b) all expressing devotion to Maitreya or interacting with him in some way.
In the Travelogue, Guanyin is largely a background figure that Xuanzang does not engage actively with. There is no sense that Xuanzang felt any particular devotion to Guanyin. By contrast, the mythology of Maitreya mythology is worked into the narrative whenever his name comes up. There is considerable emphasis on the role of Maitreya in initiating the Yogācāra lineage that Xuanzang was part of.
Daoxuan's catalogue, the Nèidiǎn lù (T 2149), lists the Heart Sutra (T 2149, 55.282c06), mentioning only a single text, but the biographical note on Xuanang that follows does not mention Guanyin or Maitreya. The fact that Daoxuan doesn't mention the Dàmíngzhòu jīng «大明呪經» (T 250) is an important part of the rejection of the attribution of it to Kumārajīva. If the Dàmíngzhòu jīng had existed in 665 CE, then it would have existed in Daoxuan's milieu, because his milieu substantially overlapped with Xuanzang's.
Dàoxuān's Biography includes a single reference to Guanyin. Regarding the region of Mòluójùzhà 秣羅矩吒 (Sanskrit: Malakūṭa; a southern coastal region of India), Daoxuan notes: "In the middle is the heavenly palace where Bodhisattva Guānzìzài 觀自在 always resides. This is the correct name for Guānshìyīn 觀世音." (452c2-3). Daoxuan does not use the common abbreviation, Guānyīn 觀音. There is no sense that Guanyin is important to Xuanzang.
By contrast, Dàoxuān's Biography contains nine references to Maitreya including four mentions of being reborn in Maitreya's Pure Land, e.g. "Xuanzang always wished to be reborn with Maitreya" 奘生常以來願生彌勒。(T 2060, 55.458a7). Notably, Daoxuan depicts Xuanzang, on his deathbed, silently repeating the name Maitreya (便默念彌勒 458a25-28) and encouraging those around him to chant a homage to Maitreya. This detail of his deathbed practice is particularly salient since it tells us what Daoxuan understood to be fundamentally important to Xuanzang.
Thus in Daoxuan's Biography, Xuanzang is unequivocally a devotee of Maitreya; and seemingly not a devotee of Guanyin at all.
A side note is that both Daoxuan and Yancong promote the idea that Xuanzang's translation Guānzìzài 觀自在 should be preferred. And yet, in modern-day China, the bodhisatva is universally known as Guānyīn 觀音. Xuanzang's innovation never caught on. This is probably because of the enduring popularity of Kumārajīva's translation of the Saddharmapuṇḍarikā.
Conclusion
On the whole, in the main biographical sources, Xuanzang is portrayed as a devotee of Maitreya. He is also portrayed as an avid consumer and translator of Buddhist literature attributed to Maitreya. And that Xuanzang saw himself as part of the Yogācāra lineage that traditionally goes back to Maitreya. For example, the Yogācārabhūmi śāstra «瑜伽師地論» (T 1579), a massive Yogācāra commentary attributed to Maitreya, was one of the first texts Xuanzang translated on returning from India (ca 646–648). We see references to his devotion to Maitreya distributed throughout the early biographical literature. The Travelogue contains major elements of Maitreya mythology, but Avalokiteśvara is merely a figure he saw depicted in statues and a figure of other people's devotion.
This leaves us in want of an explanation for why Xuanzang is depicted as a Guanyin devotee at all. Since we already know that the myth of the Heart Sutra was a fabrication, it is interesting to see that when Guanyin appears in the sources it is usually in connection with the Heart Sutra.
Daoxuan was aware of the Heart Sutra, which in his catalogue (665 CE) is a single text, without all the many versions we now know. He was also a collector of miracle stories. Per Kotyk (2020), we have reason to believe that Daoxuan's Biography is the more reliable witness. So the fact that Daoxuan does not mention Xuanzang's devotion to Guanyin is significant in its own right.
Arguments from absence are usually weak, unless, as in this case, there is a strong and reasonable expectation of presence. The presumption here is that, had Xuanzang been a devotee of Guanyin it would have been obvious in his own work. However, in the work he authored Guanyin is not a significant presence whereas Maitreya is. Similarly, if Xuanzang's devotion to Guanyin was significant in Daoxuan's eyes, it is exactly the kind of thing that he would have felt compelled to mention. Instead, Daoxuan depicts Xuanzang's religious life as centred on Maitreya. Again the deathbed scene in Daoxuan's biography carries extra weight since imminent death is known to cause people to focus on what is important to them.
Therefore, I now suspect that all the references to Xuanzang's devotion to Guanyin in Yancong's Biography are adventitious and that Xuanzang was not a devotee of Guanyin.
In our many discussions about Xuanzang, Kotyk and I think that Xuanzang included a reference to Guanyin when he composed the Heart Sutra ca 656 CE because the intended recipient was Wu Zhao, then Empress Consort to Gaozong. This was part of an elaborate religious response to Wu Zhou's difficult pregnancy with Lǐ xiǎn 李顯 (later Emperor Zhōngzōng 中宗) that included ordaining the month-old infant as a Buddhist monk. Wu Zhou was a Buddhist.
I have previously noted (Attwood 2024) that there is no indication in the Heart Sutra that Guanyin speaks. Rather all the conventional ways of indicating that a person is speaking—e.g. "..., he said"—are absent. Moreover, when the "core passage" is traced back to its source in the Large Prajñāpāramitā, the lines attributed to Guanyin come from a longer passage in which the Buddha is speaking. Nevertheless, most people (since the seventh century) have assumed that the lines are spoken by Guanyin because they read the Heart Sutra in isolation and are influenced by the historically dominant narrative.
My sense is that Xuanzang was re-envisaged as a devotee of Guanyin to help explain the apparent anomaly of Guanyin preaching in a Prajñāpāramitā text. His supposed role there is very different indeed from his role in the Lotus Sutra or his negligible role in Prajñāpāramitā (where he is only mentioned in passing). But that role was misinterpreted since he is not preaching.
It's also likely that the Heart Sutra presented to the court in 656 CE was intended to show how a new translation would preserve what was good about Kumārajīva's translation (T 223) and improve upon it by choosing better translations (I believe Kotyk first suggested this to me).
It seems to be only the Yancong Biography that supports the historically dominant narrative of Xuanzang as a devotee of Guanyin. Indeed, the Yancong Biography seems to be the principal (perhaps only?) source for this aspect of the narrative. Daoxuan by contrast saw Xuanzang as a devotee of Maitreya: he prays to Maitreya, he wishes to be reborn in Maitreya's pure land, he recites Maitreya's name on his deathbed. Moreover, even in Yancong's biography, Maitreya plays a much greater and more consistent role in Xuanzang's religious life.
This conclusion is provisional. I'm putting out feelers amongst relevant scholars and will be looking at other biographical materials to see what light they shed. Of course, as a standalone conjecture, it seems implausible. But in the context of numerous other observations about the history of Xuanzang and the history of the Heart Sutra, the conjecture that Xuanzang was not personally a Guayin devotee seems eminently plausible.
Buddhist Studies scholars in the twentieth century were far too willing to take Buddhist mythology as Buddhist history. While this attitude persists to some extent, more of us are trying to revisit the issue with greater attention to the best practice of historical methods. And this means that traditional "histories" are beginning to seem like religious narratives with religious purposes.
I have only mentioned Max Deeg in passing in this essay, but his extensive writing about the Xiyu ji (Xuanzang's Travelogue; T 2087) is an eye-opener: his works are online and well worth reading. His forthcoming multivolume commentary on the Xiyu ji will no doubt have a huge impact on Xuanzang studies.
~~o0o~~
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