淨土或問 1.7

1.7

When Elder Tianru was meditating in quiet repose in his Chamber of Resting Clouds, a guest pushed open the door and entered—it was a Chan elder. The Master therefore bade him sit. After they had sat for a long while, the setting sun was at the window and the incense smoke was nearly exhausted. The guest then adjusted his robes, stood up, and leisurely asked: "I have heard that the venerable Yongming Yanshou received the teaching of the single transmission from National Teacher Tiantai Deshao, being the Dharma-grandson of Fayan. He guided disciples at Jingci Monastery in Hangzhou, where several thousand were always seated beneath his seat; his responsive eloquence and talent were swift as thunder and flying as wind, and the Chan forests across the land praised him as a great master. Why is it that, apart from expounding Chan, he cultivated the practice of the Pure Land himself and moreover taught it to others, additionally writing such texts as Pointing to the West to circulate widely in the world, and composing the verses of the Fourfold Selection, which say in brief: 'With Chan but no Pure Land, nine out of ten will go astray. Without Chan but with the Pure Land, ten thousand who cultivate it, ten thousand go'? Seeing how he advocates the Pure Land with such words, standing steep as a myriad-fathom cliff without the slightest indulgence, did he not bend his own Chan and excessively praise the Pure Land? This doubt is no small matter; would the Master please resolve it for me?" The Master replied: "A great question indeed! You should know that Yongming did not praise it excessively, but rendered profound service to both the Chan lineage and the doctrinal teachings. It is only regrettable that Yongming merely raised the main outline without fully elucidating it, and therefore was unable to completely dispel the doubts of Chan practitioners. I am unworthy in studying Chan and not well-versed in the Pure Land, yet I have dipped into the various Pure Land scriptures and know a little of their general purport. It is originally a method easy to practice and easy to enter, yet it is also a Dharma difficult to explain and difficult to believe. Therefore, when our benevolent father Śākyamuni was present in the world, expounding the Amitābha-sūtra for his disciples, knowing beforehand that few sentient beings in the latter days of the Law would be able to believe and turn toward it, he cited the Buddhas of the six directions extending their broad and long tongues to utter words of truth, in order to arouse their faith and shatter their doubts. Reaching the end of the sūtra, following the praises of the Buddhas, he then personally said: 'You should know that for me to perform this difficult task in the evil age of the five defilements, and to expound this Dharma difficult to believe for the sake of the entire world, is extremely difficult.' These are all his earnest and painstaking admonitions urging people to believe and turn toward it. Furthermore, when the World-Honoured One of Great Compassion bent down to rescue those of the final kalpa, whenever his golden mouth proclaimed a single verse or a single line, there were none among humans, non-humans, and the rest who did not believe, receive, and uphold it. Only regarding the teaching of the Pure Land are there occasional doubters. Why is this? It is truly because the doctrinal gate of the Pure Land is most vast and most grand, and the method of Pure Land practice is most simple and most easy. Because it is vast and grand yet simple and easy, those who hear it cannot help but doubt. What is called 'vast and grand' is that it gathers and embraces all capacities completely: above, reaching even to bodhisattvas in the position of equal enlightenment who are bound to one last birth, they too are reborn in the Pure Land; below, reaching to foolish men and foolish women, and even to those ignorant fellows who commit the five heinous sins and ten evil deeds, if at the time of death they can only practice buddhānusmṛti, repent their faults, and turn their minds toward the Pure Land, they will all attain rebirth. What is called 'simple and easy' is that from the outset there are no difficult or laborious practices, nor are there conditions for confusion or differentiation: merely upholding the four-character name of Amitābha Buddha, through this one is able to leave Sahā and attain rebirth in Sukhāvatī, attaining the stage of avaivartika until attaining buddhahood and only then stopping. Since its vastness is like that and its simplicity is like this, even the wise cannot be without doubt. If you understand this, you will know that Yongming's praise had profound intent and was not excessive."