止觀輔行傳弘決 4.24

4.24

Regarding the second section on rebuking the five desires, there are five sections of text and five meanings, but the essential point is solely one. The five meanings also have two aspects: the phenomenal and the principle. The meaning of the subsequent text is the same as that for the five conditions, treating the phenomenal first and the principle next. "Bound" means fettered. Each of the five desires arises in relation to the two retributions of dependent [environment] and primary [body], and toward the sentient and the non-sentient. Regarding "craving visible forms": The treatise says: "It is like a person who, coveting good fruit, climbs a tree and is unwilling to come down. People then fell the tree; as the tree topples, he falls, shattering his body and head, and dies as a result." Therefore, one must rebuke it. "Pupil" (mou) refers to the eyeball. "Glancing" (lai) means looking sideways. It also says: mou is the pupil of the eye. Mencius says: "When the heart within is upright, the pupil of the eye is clear." "Emerald" (cui) refers to the kingfisher. The Yiwu zhi says: "It nests in high trees, sixty or seventy feet above the ground. The indigenous people bring it down to take its young." The Shuowen says: "A red sparrow as large as a swallow, with jade-green wing feathers." Here, eyebrow colour is named after the wing colour. "Gleaming" (hao) means white light, and also exceptionally white. Regarding "as Nanda kept the precepts out of desire": The Sutra on Entering the Womb says: "The World-Honoured One was in the city of Kapilavastu. Knowing that the time had come for Nanda to receive the precepts, the Buddha went to his gate and emitted light illuminating the house. Nanda said, 'It must be the World-Honoured One.' He sent a messenger to look, and it was indeed the World-Honoured One. Nanda wished to look for himself, but his wife said, 'If I allow you out to look, he will surely make you go forth from household life.' She then tugged at his robe. Nanda said, 'I will return shortly.' His wife said, 'You must return before the wetness on my forehead has dried.' He replied, 'As you require.' The Buddha had him take the bowl and fill it with food. Having filled it with food, he went out, but the Buddha had already left. He passed it to Ānanda. Ānanda asked, 'From whom did you receive the bowl?' He replied, 'I received the bowl from the Buddha.' Ānanda said, 'Take it back and give it to the Buddha.' Nanda then went to take the bowl back to the Buddha. The Buddha had his head shaved, telling the barber, 'Do not hold the razor over the head of a king of Jambudvīpa.' He also thought, 'I will comply with the World-Honoured One for now, and return home in the evening.' The Buddha, knowing his thought, magically created a great pit. If one's life had ended, how could one return? The Buddha told Ānanda, 'Have Nanda serve as the duty-distributor (karmadāna).' Ānanda conveyed the Buddha's words, and Nanda asked, 'What does a duty-distributor do?' Ānanda replied, 'He inspects and supervises within the monastery.' He asked, 'What is done?' He replied, 'When the monks go out begging for food, you should sweep the ground and sprinkle water, take fresh cow dung and clean soil [to plaster the ground]. Guard against loss, and close the doors and gates for the saṅgha. At dawn, you must open the gates, and sweep and sprinkle the latrines.' After the monks left, he wished to close the doors for them; closing the west, the east opened, and closing the east, the west opened. He thought, 'Even if there is loss, when I become king I will build hundreds of thousands more fine monasteries, doubling today's.' He then set off for home. Walking along the main road, he feared the Buddha might return, so he took a small lane. He still encountered the Buddha, so he hid behind tree branches; the wind blew, exposing his body. The Buddha asked, 'Why have you come?' He replied, 'I remembered my wife.' The Buddha then took him out of the city to the Park of Mṛgāra's Mother. The Buddha asked, 'Have you ever seen the Gandhamādana Mountain?' He replied, 'I have not.' The Buddha had him take hold of the corner of his robe and flew; in an instant they saw the mountain. On the mountain were fruit trees, beneath which was a female monkey, missing an eye and thoroughly burned. The Buddha asked, 'How does she compare to the devīs?' He replied, 'The devīs have no such desires, how could she compare to them?' He asked, 'Have you seen the devas?' He replied, 'I have not.' The Buddha had him take hold of the corner of his robe, and they immediately reached the Trāyastriṃśa Heaven. He had him tour and observe; arriving at the Joyful Grove, he saw celestial maidens, the Grove of Union, and the like, and heard various sounds. In one place, celestial maidens had no husband; when he asked the Buddha, the Buddha had him ask the devas. A deva replied, 'The Buddha's younger brother Nanda keeps the precepts to be born here, and will become our husband.' The Buddha asked Nanda, 'How do the celestial maidens compare to Sundarī?' He replied, 'Comparing the celestial maidens to Sundarī is like comparing Sundarī to a blind monkey.' The Buddha said, 'Cultivating the pure life has such benefits. If you now keep the precepts, you will be born in this heaven.' Then the Buddha returned with him to the Jetavana. At that time, Nanda yearned for the heavenly palace and cultivated the pure life. The Buddha told the assembly of monks, 'None of you are to share legal acts with Nanda; no monks are to dwell, sit, or rise together with him.' He thought to himself, 'Ānanda is my younger brother; he surely will not disdain me.' He immediately went to sit with him, but Ānanda got up and walked away. He asked, 'Brother, why do you abandon your elder brother?' Ānanda said, 'Indeed, our practices differ, which is why we diverge.' He asked, 'What do you mean?' Ānanda replied, 'You delight in birth in heaven, whereas I delight in quiescent extinction.' Hearing this, his distress doubled. The Buddha again asked, 'Have you seen Naraka?' He replied, 'I have not.' He had him take hold of the corner of his robe, and he then saw that all the hells had people being punished. In one place there was no one; he asked the Buddha, and the Buddha had him ask the hell wardens. The hell warden replied, 'The Buddha's younger brother Nanda practices in order to be born in heaven; after a brief time in heaven, he will return to this place to suffer torment.' Nanda, terrified, wept like rain; he addressed the Buddha and recounted the matter. The Buddha said, 'Cultivating the pure life for the sake of heavenly pleasure has such faults.' The Buddha returned with him to the Jetavana and explained the phases of the womb at length. Thereupon, Nanda for the first time aroused the aspiration [for awakening], kept the precepts for the sake of liberation, and later attained the fruit of an arhat." If he entered among an assembly, he would first look at women because of residual habits. Here, it is cited from the perspective of fault, without discussing his attainment of the fruit. Regarding "kings indulge excessively and without measure": A large one is called a country (guo), a small one a state (bang). Traversing the three with the one is called a king (wang). The three refer to the three powers—heaven, earth, and human—because worldly convention does not know of the devas of the three realms. This refers to King Bimbisāra who, out of desire for visible form, entered an enemy state in person and stayed in the room of the courtesan Varmā; and King Udayana who, out of desire for visible form, severed the hands and feet of five hundred ṛṣis, as found in the nineteenth fascicle of the Dazhidulun. "Indulge" (dan): The Erya says: "Prolonged enjoyment. If written with the radical for alcohol (酉), it is the character for poisoned liquor (zhan)." "Excessive" (huang) means indulging in pleasure without satiety. "Ancestral" (zong) means revered; "shrine" (miao) means appearance—that is, the dwelling place of revered appearances. "Altars of earth" (she) refers to Sovereign Earth; earth (tu) means to discharge (tu), for what the earth produces is like what the mouth discharges; it is the earth deity. The Guoyu says: "Having levelled the nine lands, they sacrificed to them as deities." Tian means upright. It also says: Bearing yellow heaven above and treading sovereign earth beneath, because the earth is vast and cannot be honoured in its entirety, altars were established as the she. Ji is the general name for the five grains, meaning the deity of the five grains. Thus, where the Son of Heaven resides, the ancestral shrine is on the left and the altars of earth and grain on the right, arranged according to the four seasons and the five phases. Therefore, the ruin of a state is called the loss of the altars of earth and grain. Having entered an enemy state and the room of a courtesan, the altars of earth and grain were ruined. Under "in this land", it next cites examples of excessive indulgence in this land. "Grand" (hehe) means flourishing. Even so grand a Zhou was destroyed by desire. Regarding "Baosi": In ancient times, as the Xia dynasty declined, two dragons stopped in the court of Xia, declaring, 'We are two former rulers of the Baosi.' The dragons disappeared, leaving their saliva, which was placed in a chest and stored away. When the Xia fell, this vessel was transmitted to the Yin; when the Yin fell, it was again transmitted to the Zhou; across the three dynasties none dared to open it. In the final years of King You, it was opened; the saliva flowed into the courtyard, and women were made to strip naked and clamour at it. It transformed into a black turtle and entered the king's inner palace. A young girl in the inner palace who had not yet shed her milk teeth encountered it; when she reached hairpin age, she became pregnant, and gave birth without a husband. Terrified, she abandoned the infant by the roadside. A husband and wife heard her crying at night, took pity on her and adopted her, and eventually fled to the state of Bao. The people of Bao, seeking to atone for a crime, requested to present the girl to King You. Because the girl came from the state of Bao, she was called Baosi. In the third year of King You, he saw her in the inner palace and loved her. She gave birth to a son, Bofu; he then deposed Queen Shen and the crown prince, establishing Baosi and Bofu. Baosi was not fond of laughing, but when she laughed, she possessed a hundred and twenty charms. King You, wishing to make her laugh, beat the alarm drums and lit the beacon fires; the feudal lords all arrived, but there were no bandits, and Si burst into great laughter. King You did this repeatedly, so the feudal lords eventually ceased to arrive. In the eleventh year, the Marquis of Shen joined with the Quanrong to attack King You; King You lit the beacon fires and beat the alarm drums, but summoning the troops none arrived. They then killed King You, captured Baosi, took all the Zhou treasures, and departed. The Marquis of Shen and the feudal lords then enthroned the crown prince. "Greedy wolf" refers to a mind of greed like that of a wolf. Regarding "desire for sound": Sound characteristics do not remain. Foolish people do not understand, accumulating attachments to them. Regarding "coquettish and seductive words": As it says in the Vibhāṣā, "Before the Buddha appeared in the world, Śakra would frequently visit the ṛṣi Dīpayana to listen to the Dharma. Śacī thought, 'Śakra has abandoned me and wishes to go to another woman.' Hiding her form, she boarded his chariot. Upon arriving at the ṛṣi's place, Śakra saw her and said, 'The ṛṣi does not wish to see women; you must return.' When she adamantly refused to leave, Śakra struck her with a lotus stalk, and Śacī then apologised to Śakra with gentle words. Hearing her voice, the ṛṣis aroused desire; their topknots fell to the ground and they lost their supernatural powers." Even all worldly defiled words arouse people's desire; therefore, they must be rebuked. Regarding "silk and bamboo strings and pipes": From antiquity, music has not exceeded the eight timbres: clay is called the xun, which children still blow today; gourd is called the sheng; hide is called the drum; bamboo is called the pipe; silk is called the strings; stone is called the chiming stone; metal is called the bell; wood is called the zhu. The reason for making music and harmonising the eight timbres was to transform people's perverse intentions, preserve their correct nature, and change customs and mores. Today's music consists entirely of the sounds of Zheng and Wei, which increase madness and licentiousness and ruin one's correct nature; therefore, it must be rebuked. As the treatise says: "Five hundred ṛṣis dwelt in the Snowy Mountains; a kinnarī was bathing in the Snowy Mountains and singing. Hearing her singing voice, they lost their dhyāna concentrations, their minds becoming intoxicated and maddened, unable to control themselves." Those on the fingers are rings; those on the arms are bracelets; bells, pendants, and the like are all used to adorn women's bodies; because they emit sounds, they are capable of arousing desire. Next, regarding desire for fragrance: "Dense" (yufu) describes abundant fragrance. "Pervasive" (fenyun) is an auspicious fragrance. "Sweet-smelling" (fenfang) refers to blended fragrant scents. "Fierce" (kulie) also describes intense fragrance. "Rich and delicate" (yuyu) is a soft, delightful fragrance. One should not attach to the fragrances of either the dependent or primary [retributions]. People think that attaching to fragrance has little fault, but this is not so: it opens the gate of defilements and blocks the correct path; a hundred years of keeping precepts can be destroyed in an instant. The Dazhidulun says: "Once an arhat entered a dragon palace to accept the dragon's invitation. Having eaten, he had a novice wash his leftover bowl; the novice repeatedly smelled the remnants in the bowl, which were extremely fragrant and delicious. He then devised an expedient: getting under the rope-bed, he grabbed the bed leg with his hand and entered the dragon palace together with him. The dragon said, 'Why have you brought someone who has not yet attained the Path?' The master said, 'I was unaware.' The novice received delicious food, saw that the dragon maiden was wonderfully fragrant and incomparably graceful, and aroused great defiled attachment, vowing in his heart: 'May I cultivate merits so as to usurp this dragon's place.' The dragon said, 'Do not bring this novice again.' The novice returned, single-mindedly cultivated giving and precepts, and prayed to quickly become a dragon. At that time, as he circumambulated the monastery, water issued from beneath his feet; knowing that his dragon karma was complete, he went to the edge of the large pond where his master had originally entered, covered his head with his kāṣāya, died, and transformed into a great dragon. Because his merits were vast, he immediately killed that dragon, and the entire pond turned red. Before he died, his master and fellow disciples rebuked him. He replied, 'My mind is already fixed.' The master led the monks to the pond to look at it, sighing, 'It was brought about because of attachment to fragrance.' Furthermore, a monk attached to the fragrance of lotus flowers in a pond and was rebuked by the pond deity. Later, someone else uprooted and destroyed them, but the pond deity did not reprimand him. The monk in turn reprimanded the pond deity. The deity said, 'A monk is like pure white cloth: any black is easily seen. The worldly person is like a black object, which people do not notice. What is there to wonder at?'" Regarding desire for taste: "Rare and precious" means exquisite flavors. Writing the character yao with the food radical is not the present sense. The Shizhuan says: "What is eaten that is not grain is called yao; yao means cooked meats." The Shuowen says with the meat radical it means to eat. "Fat and rich" (feiyu): The Shuowen says, "meat beneath the belly." "Juicy" (jin) means moist. "Greasy" (ni) and the like are of the nature of fat and lard. Because of attachment to tastes, one will have molten copper poured into one's mouth. Because of attachment to tastes, one falls into impurities. For example, a novice always loved curd. When donors made offerings to the saṅgha, the novice always obtained the leftovers, clinging to them without parting, and after death was reborn in the leftover curd. His master, having attained arhatship, said when the monks were dividing the curd: 'Gently, do not harm the curd-loving novice.' People asked him the reason, and he replied, 'This worm was formerly my novice; because of his attachment to curd, he was reborn in this curd.' For this reason, one must rebuke taste. Regarding desire for touch: It is the root that engenders defilements and the condition of fetters. Why is this? The other desires each attain their share in four faculties, but this desire for touch fills the entire bodily sensation. Because its sphere of arising is broad, it generates abundant defiled attachment, and this attachment is difficult to abandon. If one falls into hell, one will still experience countless torments through bodily touch; this touch is called the place of great darkness. The treatise says: "As the Sutra on the Ṛṣi Kalpa says, 'In the past there was a ṛṣi named Kalpa who possessed the five supernatural powers and was honoured by the king. He flew back and forth, and the king personally held the ṛṣi, spread his hair, and served him food, pouring and serving with his own hands over many years. The king had business requiring long travel; the king had a daughter who was incomparably beautiful. The king told the daughter, "I serve the ṛṣi and dare not displease him. I am now traveling far; you must attend to him as I have." When that ṛṣi flew there, the daughter raised him by hand to place him upon the seat; touching the daughter's softness, he immediately aroused lustful thoughts. With desire flaring, he lost his supernatural powers and walked out of the palace on foot, while crowds gathered to watch. The king heard of this and went to look; bowing his head, he spoke a verse rebuking the ṛṣi. The ṛṣi said, "It is truly as you say."'" Regarding "these five faults and harms": the five similes are as in the text. Furthermore, the Mahāyāna treatise says: "Pitiable are sentient beings, constantly troubled and confused by the five desires, yet still pursuing them unceasingly, like a dog gnawing a dry bone, or like stepping on a poisonous snake. These five desires are no different from those of beasts." "Age" (ling) means years of life.