廬山蓮宗寶鑑 1.12

1.12

Now, the nature of the true dharmadhātu is equal between sentient beings and buddhas, without difference and without sameness; the wondrously awakening, luminous mind blends defilement and purity, being neither one nor two. Thus, in every dust-mote is a pure land—other regions and this world are alike realms of Sukhāvatī; in every thought is Amitābha—all wriggling and fluttering sentient beings are buddhas of the dharmakāya. Yet because feelings arise, wisdom is obstructed; because thoughts alter, physical forms differ. The mind fluctuates along with arising, abiding, changing, and ceasing; environments vary in height with pits, gullies, mounds, and hills. Therefore pure lands and defiled realms differ in suffering and joy; sentient beings and all buddhas are distinguished as ordinary beings and sages. This causes the six destinies to be vast and boundless, crawling within the nine abodes, and the four modes of birth to surge forth, rising and sinking in the three realms: entering delusion from delusion, passing from suffering to suffering, stirred across dust-mote kalpas with no time of liberation. Therefore our Buddha opened the gate of expedients, teaching the buddhānusmṛti-samādhi and pointing to the existence of the Pure Land as a destination of return. As for what is called the buddhānusmṛti-samādhi: in Sanskrit, *buddha*, which is translated here as 'awakened one'—one who has awakened himself, awakens others, and whose awakened practices are fully complete; hence he is called Buddha. Like awakening from a dream, like a lotus flower blossoming, it is meant to cause sentient beings to reflect back their own light, maintaining pure thoughts in unbroken succession. When this has matured after a long time, delusions are exhausted and obstacles eliminated, not a single thought arises, past and future are cut off, and one awakens to this awakening nature: internally there is no mind capable of mindfulness, and externally there is no realm that is the object of mindfulness. Both subject and object are forgotten, sentient beings and Buddha are not two; hence it is called buddhānusmṛti. In Sanskrit, *samādhi*, which is translated here as 'correct concentration'—meaning that thought is focused, mentation is stilled, and spiritual wisdom is luminous and wondrous. A sūtra says: 'If there is someone who practices buddhānusmṛti, you should know that this person is a puṇḍarīka flower among men.' In the Eastern Jin, the ancestral master Yuan, upon hearing Master Mitian lecture on the *Prajñā-sūtra*, had a great and sudden awakening and entered into immeasurable, profound samādhi. Traveling to and residing at Mount Lu, he formed ties of practice with eminent monks and court literati, and so said: 'The samādhis of the various teachings have many names; for high efficacy and ease of advancement, buddhānusmṛti is foremost.' Thereupon he named his society 'White Lotus'. The master then composed the 'Preface to the Buddhānusmṛti-samādhi', which brought forth this principle. When Tiantai Zhizhe classified the teachings, he stated that the *Guan Wuliangshou jing* is the ultimate and real teaching of the Mahāyāna, using the three contemplations to clarify the mind, which reveals the essential import of buddhānusmṛti. When the Venerable Fazhao bowed to Mañjuśrī to seek guidance, it was this Dharma that was pointed out. When Chan Master Xingchang formed ties for pure conduct, and prime ministers and renowned officials took refuge and practiced together, it was this path [they pursued]. When Chan Master Ze of Changlu organized the wondrous Lotus Assembly, inspiring the two bodhisattvas Samantabhadra and Puhui to join the assembly, it was to bear witness to this path. The School Patriarch Cizhao manifested in the world by the power of his fundamental vow, gave rise to a mind of broad salvation, guided the expedient to approach the real, and transformed and led according to faculties, wishing to cause both the sharp and dull faculties to awaken together to this path. He compiled the *White Lotus Repentance*, laid out the diagram of the four lands, took faith, practice, and vows as provisions, and took precepts, concentration, and wisdom as the pivot, thereby establishing this orthodox school of buddhānusmṛti. When Song Gaozong wrote with his imperial brush the two characters 'Lotus Society' (Lianshe), it was to venerate this Dharma gate. Respectfully we contemplate that our Great Yuan has unified all under heaven; the various nations come to court, and the people's minds take joy in goodness. Chan Master Dongyan Yuanying Ri of Donglin Chan Monastery on Mount Lu respectfully received the imperial decree to serve as abbot of the bodhimaṇḍa, restoring the Buddhist monastery and compiling the biographies of the sages. He thus looked back to antiquity to rectify the school's guidelines and erect the great bridge of Dharma. Renowned as Zongyuan, he opened the ancestral path for eighteen years; beyond promoting the teachings of the Chan school, he constantly guided humans and devas with the buddhānusmṛti-samādhi. In the autumn of the *renchen* year of Zhiyuan [1292], he accepted an invitation from the Guangli Chan Monastery on Mount Ayuwang in Qingyuan Circuit, yielding his seat to Chan Master Yuetang Yin of Kaixian, who successively served as abbot. In the first month of the first year of Yuanzhen [1295], the Shuming Layman Yan Juedao, the ragged-robed monk, respectfully received the imperial decree granting the White Lotus School's Shanfa Hall to protect and uphold the teaching of the Dharma. In the first month of the second year of Yuanzhen [1296], an imperial decree was again respectfully received, granting the Master Tonghui the title of Patriarch of the White Lotus School along with a gold-embroidered kāṣāya. In the tenth month of the fifth year of Dade [1301], the imperial court respectfully bestowed imperial incense, and golden banners arrived at the temple. From the Jin to the present it has been nearly a thousand years; moved by this gracious glory, distant lands and foreign domains, the wise and the foolish alike, have all followed the transformation. All with one mind practice buddhānusmṛti, respectfully wishing the Emperor ten thousand pacities of sacred longevity, peace throughout the realm, and the perpetual turning of the Dharma wheel, joyous in the sun of Shun and the winds of Yao, this very world being the world of Sukhāvatī. I, Pudu, have improperly partaken of the lineage of Śākya without having benefited the gate of the teachings. I have often seen that those who profess the Lotus School do not understand the purport of buddhānusmṛti; abandoning the root to pursue the branches, they practice while clinging to marks, and the correct cause of pure karma has nearly sunk away. All of them are harboring treasures while wandering lost in foreign lands, turning their backs on the real and facing the false. Those who engage in its practices are as numerous as ox hairs, but those endowed with right view are as rare as a unicorn's horn, causing arrogant people to slight the path of our Buddha. Alas! The ancient times are far removed, and the Dharma has long fallen into decay; the correct path is obscured and weakened, while heterodox teachings blaze with increasing fervor, and many people misunderstand and stray onto aberrant paths. They do not consider that the single gate of the Pure Land is the shortcut out of saṃsāra, as straight as a bowstring and as bright as the sun, whose profound purport lies within the sūtras and repentance rituals. Without meeting an enlightened teacher to instruct them, they are just like a herd of blind men groping an elephant, each proclaiming divergent views, passing from darkness into darkness, forever entangled in heterodox views—how lamentable! How much more so now, when we respectfully meet the Son of Heaven of Buddha-mind who governs the world with the true Dharma: it is a time of celebration between sovereign and ministers, and an era when the Buddha Dharma circulates. How could we not use the ancestral master's buddhānusmṛti-samādhi to instruct humans and devas, making it an eye for the future, so that they may awaken and enter the Buddha's knowledge and vision together? I have thus set my mind on the Pure Land, probed deeply into the earlier school, and compiled essential words into a work titled *Precious Mirror*, illuminating the real and the false in ten treatises. The first is titled 'Correct Causes of Buddhānusmṛti', meaning that to enter a room one must go through the door. The second is titled 'Correct Teachings', which shows that the buddhānusmṛti Dharma gate encompasses the gradual, partial, sudden, and perfect, so that practitioners may return to the supreme path according to their capacities. The next is titled 'Orthodox School', which shows the principle of righting the mind through the buddhānusmṛti-samādhi, so that practitioners may understand its school and reach its origin. The next is titled 'Orthodox Lineage', which clarifies the origin and development of how the buddhas, ancestors, and school masters attained the path, wishing to let later students know that it has its source. The next are titled 'Correct Faith, Correct Practice, and Correct Vows', so that they may have faith in the true Dharma, cultivate correct practice, and make correct vows to seek birth in the West. The next is titled 'Correct Formulas for Rebirth', which shows the road to birth in the Pure Land at the end of life. The next is titled 'Correct Retribution', which clarifies the meritorious ornaments of the primary and dependent retributions of the Pure Land obtained through practice. The next is titled 'Correct Discourses', which cites the sincere words of the buddhas to crush various heterodoxies and divergent views, wishing to make people change from the unwholesome and follow the wholesome. It is not that I dare say this will aid the ancestral style; it is to benefit those who have not heard it, wishing to straighten what is crooked, rectify what is heterodox, resolve what is doubted, and awaken what is deluded, so that all people across the whole earth may in a single thought together attain the buddhānusmṛti-samādhi and collectively realize bodhi—would that not be magnificent! May cultivators of pure karma not begrudge their compassion: try opening this volume, rejoice in accord upon seeing and hearing it, and praise and assist its circulation. As for that single sentence from before the buddhas and ancestors appeared in the world, please cast your eye on it from high.