928 william m. bodifordGhost Festival (632b); memorial services for patrons (635c); vegetarian
feasts (635c); and worship ceremonies performed periodically before
each deity enshrined within the monastery (635c, 644–645). It is also
chanted to cure illness (641b), for safe childbirth (642a), to empower
icons (636c), to bestow a posthumous ordination name (636c), to
install a memorial tablet in the ancestral hall (636c), to begin construc-
tion projects (643b), and so on. On these occasions it usually accom-
panies other dhāraṇī such as the one for invoking great compassion.
The more important the ceremony, the more dhāraṇī there are to
chant, and they will be repeated a greater number of times. In this way
dhāraṇī are woven into all aspects of Zen practice. The Sho ekō shingi
shiki reinforces the impression of the close connection between Zen
practice and dhāraṇī when it notes, regarding one type of funerary
ritual, that morning and evening rites are the same except that morn-
ing ones are “sitting Zen and dhāraṇī while evenings are dhāraṇī and
sitting Zen” (akatsuki zazen darani, yū darani zazen nari
; fascicle 4; T. 2578.81:664b). Table 1 lists the
number of times specific dhāraṇī are mentioned in a representative
sample of pure rules from China and Japan.
The dhāraṇī mentioned above represent the final stage of East Asian
esoteric Buddhism. Instead of the so-called mnemonic (giji )
kinds of dhāraṇī found throughout Mahāyāna scriptures, they belong
to the genre of fully developed esoteric scriptures, which are accompa-
nied by powerful deities, ritual gestures, hand signs (mudrā), circular
altars (mandala), and visualizations.^8 These spells are precisely those
that are widely deemed to be the most efficacious for invoking spiritual
resonance (kannō ; ganying) and attaining blessings. Regardless
of how one defines esoteric Buddhism, these kinds of dhāraṇī must
constitute one of its main currents. The use of these dhāraṇī within
Zen can result in contradictory social dynamics, in which Zen can be
seen either as included within Japan’s esoteric Buddhist tradition or
as an outside rival to it.
Zen initially succeeded as an independent school of Buddhism in
Japan largely because its leaders offered patrons a unique combination
of strict meditation, ritual expertise, and thaumaturgy. Stories describing
(^8) Here I am referring to the esoteric scriptures translated during the seventh and
eighth centuries by people such as Śubhākarasiṃha (Shanwuwei ; 637–735),
Yixing ( ; 683–727), Vajrabodhi (Jin’gangzhi ; 671–741), and Amoghavajra
(Bukong ; 705–774).