十不二門指要鈔 1.3

1.3

The prosperity or decline of the great teaching depends upon the person. Once the patriarchs had passed on, the abstruse transformation nearly ceased. A time cannot long fall into decay; an extraordinary figure must emerge across generations. Venerable Master Li, the teacher transmitting the teachings at Siming, is truly a great man of the doctrinal school! Even as a boy receiving the scriptures, he could reflect upon their meanings; his natural faculties were uniquely aroused—would one not call him of a superior nature, possessing innate knowledge? When he received full ordination and studied under Master Tong of Baoyun, at his very first attendance at the Dharma seat, his father dreamed that he knelt before the master, and the master took a vase of water and poured it into his mouth. Its delivery was like a spring, and his reception was like a valley. Thereupon, as for the purport of the Tiantai great teaching's perfect and sudden [nature], upon receiving it once he thoroughly understood it, without needing to hear it again. The master said to him, "There is nothing in my words that you do not penetrate; you are not [merely] helping me." When the master first passed away, the venerable master dreamed again that he strung the master's head upon his left arm and walked. Ah! Did not the former [dream] symbolize receiving the transmission—like Ānanda pouring water from vessel to vessel without any difference? Did not the latter [dream] symbolize carrying on the propagation—holding the head of his master's sarvākārajñatā to walk and convert others? At the beginning of Chunhua (990 CE), the Qianfu Temple of the prefecture invited him to open a lecture seat. The assembly of students joyfully followed him like numerous streams converging upon the sea. Consequently, the halls were narrow and humble, and the disciples steadily multiplied; before long, he relocated to the Bao'en Cloister. The various texts—the Lotus Sūtra, the Zhiguan, the Golden Light [Sūtra]—were lectured on continuously in succession, without an idle day throughout the year. He once exhorted his disciples, saying: "Whether I go out or stay put, whether I am silent or speak, never do I not take the purport of the teaching and contemplation, expedient and real, as my food and drink, as my staff and armrest. Do not be indolent!" How great! As for wearing the robe of patient endurance and dwelling in the chamber of great compassion, gently and skillfully guiding others, it cannot be fully praised! The Ten Gates of Nonduality in the Shiqian has been considered a difficult text by lecturers past and present. Many annotations have been made, each presenting divergent views; who did not claim to hold the jewel of the spiritual serpent or wield a brush covering the entire sky? Yet how could they reflect upon the teaching and contemplation of our single school, utterly failing to understand where its inspiration lies! When the master examined them, he sighed repeatedly: not only were the explanations of the text inadequate, but alas, the overarching framework was thrown into chaos! That the mountain should collapse and the horns break off was truly cause for deep sorrow; if one wished to rectify it, who was there but himself? Thereupon, he correctly analyzed this text and broadly adduced clear evidence, with more than enough skill to spare, while simultaneously restoring the grand path. The doctrinal school's expedient and real, obscure to all in present times, is hereby determined—the distinct principle according with conditions is of this category. That upon which the path of contemplation relies, misunderstood through successive generations, is hereby made apparent—this is the reason the pointing to essentials was established. As for the structural passages of the Lotus Sūtra and the Zhiguan, they are synthesized and interwoven with virtually nothing left out. Later scholars will be able to see the distant by looking at the near, and to know the flavor by dipping a finger. Does not the Book of Changes say: "It penetrates the aspirations of all under heaven, establishes the undertakings of all under heaven, and resolves the doubts of all under heaven"? Truly, these ten or twenty thousand words have attained this. I, Zunshi, am unworthily his fellow student; let viewers not say that I am merely being partisan! Grasp what is superior in its principle; do not grasp what is superior in personal feeling. The text and principle are clear—who could obscure them?