四分律刪繁補闕行事鈔 1.77

1.77

Finally, clarifying the original intention behind compiling this manual: A manual is truly intended to extract the essentials of the canonical texts and encompass their various meanings! My wisdom is merely like the glow of a firefly, and my capacity is truly crude and mediocre; how could I dare lightly disrespect the exemplary teachings, lightly turning them into frivolous discourse? Nevertheless, study requires an inheritance, and inheritance must recognize its root; whenever I cite something, I first verify and cross-examine it. Under a single matter, there are many ideas of rejection and establishment, and what the various masters have preserved involves voluminous views and sentiments. Now I have pruned and abbreviated them all, preserving only the textual proofs. Furthermore, where the teaching extends into other treatises, the principles and marks are difficult to fathom; unless one possesses comprehensive understanding, how could one exhaust them? They are fully displayed in the compiled *Yichao* (Meaning Manual). However, the cited textual proofs in this manual are mostly not detailed, selecting only those whose textual meaning is fit to be integrated into the main tradition. As for the inexhaustive texts outside this, if one insists on searching through them to know their beginning and end, that is not the intention of a manual compiler. Therefore, a text states: When the bhikṣus wished not to recite all the words and phrases fully, the Buddha said, 'I permit it.' The *Vinayamātṛkā* states: 'The Buddha commanded that one cite essential words and subtle phrasing to reveal the meaning directly.' The aim is to make it useful when encountering circumstances, without needing to consult others; acting immediately upon the matter at hand, how could one still doubt over sin and merit? Still, I fear that later generations may add non-urgent matters and augment its contents, causing the true tradition to become overgrown with weeds and practitioners to fall into delusion; the parable of the bird and the rat would then exist once again today!