Ru-Yi Meditation Center
Zhiyi · Tiantai · 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門

Dhyāna, Walked Step by Step to Its Own Perfection.

The Shi Chan Boluomi Cidi Famen is the Tiantai founder Zhiyi's major treatise on meditation as a pāramitā — not a single technique but a graduated path, walked in careful sequence from the right motivation for practice through preliminary conditions, method, cultivation, realization, and fruit. No complete English translation of this ten-fascicle work is known to exist. This page is the entrance for reading Ru-Yi's own translation, fascicle by fascicle, as it is made.

Browse 10 fascicles → Translation notes →

How to read this collection

Zhiyi delivered this treatise as oral lectures, recorded by his disciple Fashen and revised by his disciple Guanding — the same pairing behind his other great meditation works. It opens by naming ten framing topics for the whole treatise, from the right motivation for practice through to where the path ultimately leads, and then works through them one at a time, at real length.

This translation is now complete. All ten fascicles are rendered into English, from the treatise's opening ten-topic outline in fascicle 1 through the non-destructive path's own closing samādhis in fascicle 10 — the whole of Zhiyi's Shi Chan Boluomi Cidi Famen as it survives. The received text itself ends unfinished, part-way through its own announced ten topics; fascicle 10's closing status note explains where and why.

What each fascicle page includes

  • The Chinese source text beside our English translation.
  • Reading notes explaining Zhiyi's own ten-topic outline and key terms as they first appear.
  • A running glossary so terminology stays consistent from fascicle 1 to fascicle 10.
10 fascicles in the Chinese treatise
10 fascicles complete — translation finished

Read by Fascicle

All ten fascicles are complete. Use this as the table of contents for the whole treatise — every fascicle links to Ru-Yi's own translation.

Fascicle 1 · Complete, all 5 topics

Why, What It's Called, Its Gates, the Sequence, and the Mind That Practices

The treatise's ten-topic outline, the great intent behind cultivating dhyāna-pāramitā, its name, its three gates of practice, the whole sequence of attainments from the twelve contaminated dhyānas through the bodhisattva's nine unshared samādhis, and a Madhyamaka-style analysis of the mind that practices them.

Fascicle 2 · Complete, all 25 conditions

The Twenty-Five Preliminary Conditions, in Full

Topic 6 complete: pure moral discipline (precepts, upholding/violation, repentance), the five desires to reject, the five hindrances to abandon, the five things to harmonize — food, sleep, and a full posture-breath-mind meditation manual — and the five dharmas to practice: aspiration, diligence, mindfulness, skillful wisdom, one-pointedness.

Fascicle 1 Read Ru-Yi's translation Complete — all 5 topics covered by scroll 1 of the 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門. Fascicle 2 Read Ru-Yi's translation Complete — all 25 preliminary conditions covered by scroll 2 of the 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門. Fascicle 3 Read Ru-Yi's translation Complete — the gate of stopping and verifying wholesome capacity (layers 1–2 of 5 internal expedient means) covered by scroll 3 of the 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門. Fascicle 4 Read Ru-Yi's translation Complete — verifying unwholesome capacity, settling the mind, treating illness, and recognizing demonic affairs, finishing the internal expedient means, in scroll 4 of the 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門. Fascicle 5 Read Ru-Yi's translation Complete — the four dhyānas in full, naming and cultivation through the marks of realization for each, in scroll 5 of the 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門. Fascicle 6 Read Ru-Yi's translation Complete — the four immeasurable minds and the four formless concentrations, finishing mundane dhyāna, in scroll 6 of the 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門. Fascicle 7 Read Ru-Yi's translation Complete — the six wondrous gates and the sixteen special excellences, dhyāna both mundane and world-transcending, in scroll 7 of the 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門. Fascicle 8 Read Ru-Yi's translation Complete — the thorough-and-bright contemplation in full, closing dhyāna both mundane and world-transcending, in scroll 8 of the 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門. Fascicle 9 Read Ru-Yi's translation Complete — the destructive path in full: the nine contemplations, eight recollections, and ten perceptions, in scroll 9 of the 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門. Fascicle 10 Read Ru-Yi's translation Complete — the non-destructive path in full, closing the treatise as it survives, in scroll 10 of the 釋禪波羅蜜次第法門.

Translation Notes

Recurring terms, kept consistent as the fascicles grow. See also this site's note on translation method.

禪波羅蜜 — dhyāna-pāramitāThe perfection of meditative absorption — this treatise's central subject, treated as a graduated path rather than a single technique.
十意 — the ten topicsZhiyi's own framing outline for the whole treatise, stated at the very opening of fascicle 1.
發菩提心 — the bodhi-mindBodhicitta: the compassionate resolve, grounded in correct contemplation of the middle way, that distinguishes a bodhisattva's motivation for practice from every other kind.
四弘誓願 — the four universal vowsTo bring across all beings, sever all afflictions, master all dharma-gates, and accomplish the unsurpassed buddha-path — mapped in fascicle 1 onto the Four Noble Truths.
十波羅蜜 — the ten pāramitāsThe ten perfections. Fascicle 1's argument: cultivating dhyāna alone brings the other nine to completion.
二十五方便 — the twenty-five preliminary conditionsThe treatise's well-known preparatory framework for practice, complete as of fascicle 2: the five conditions, five desires to reject, five hindrances to abandon, five things to harmonize, and five dharmas to practice.
止門 — the gate of stoppingŚamatha, the first layer of the internal expedient means (fascicle 3): three kinds, discussed both in terms of practice (fixing on an object, restraining the mind, embodying truth) and in terms of principle.