Clerics › Religious Figure
Zhong Shu
Northern Song poet-monk, secular name Zhang Hui, who lived in Suzhou and Hangzhou after taking vows, was a close friend of Su Shi, and wrote Jin Ming Chi, included in the Three Hundred Song Lyrics.
In a temple courtyard at dusk, a great bronze bell hangs at the right and incense smoke rises from a bronze urn; monks in orange robes and plainly dressed visitors walk toward a lamplit hall, lotus flowers bloom in a stone basin, and a gold prayer wheel stands at the left.
Also known as Zhang Hui (secular name) · Monk Hui · Courtesy name Shili
Zhong Shu, secular name Zhang Hui and courtesy name Shili, appears in song-lyric anthologies as Monk Hui; he was a Northern Song poet-monk whose dates are unknown. He took vows before the Yuanfeng era and afterwards lived around Suzhou and Hangzhou, close to Su Shi; in 1081 Su Shi, writing to Teng Dadao, already knew of his reputation for discipline, and in 1082 Zhong Shu wrote the lyric Jianzi Mulanhua on Li Gongling's Shanyin picture. His lyrics are limpid, and his Jin Ming Chi, opening 'tian kuo yun gao', is in the Three Hundred Song Lyrics under the name Monk Hui.
Life and times
Dates Dates unknown; already a monk and acquainted with Su Shi in the Yuanfeng years (1081–1082 CE attested)