明覺禪師語錄 1.71

1.71

When the Master arrived at Xiuzhou, the practitioner Baiwan prepared a tea banquet and invited him to ascend the hall. A monk asked, "Going to answer the summons to Xuedou, you have first arrived in Jiahe; please, Master, bring forth and proclaim the higher ancestral vehicle." The Master said, "Everywhere birds cry, they are all alike." The monk continued, "If so, then I have gained hearing of what was never heard." The Master said, "Unless one is a painstaking person, one does not know it." The monk tried to speak further; the Master shouted at once. The monk bowed, and the Master said, "Let the one who asked the question earlier come forward." A monk asked, "What is the phrase of the separate transmission outside the teachings?" The Master said, "Three lifetimes and sixty kalpas." The monk continued, "The student does not understand." The Master said, "The blue-eyed foreign monk smiles and nods." The Master then said, "This mountain monk on this occasion has received the order of the prefect of the Yin River to take up the abbacy at Xuedou; coming again to Jiahe, I am all the more delighted and fortunate. Furthermore, receiving the kind and attentive hospitality bestowed by the practitioner Baiwan, my feeling of gratitude can never be forgotten. In addition, you have troubled yourselves to widely invite great virtues and urge me to proclaim the ancestral vehicle today. Moreover, when realized persons meet, it does not rely on direct eye-contact; to say that there is resonance within words or presentation of dynamic function within phrases is still accommodating those of middling and lower capacity, and remains far, far away from patch-robed monks of the fundamental lot. Just now a monk asked about the phrase of the separate transmission outside the teachings, and I replied, 'Three lifetimes and sixty kalpas'—do you people know where it falls? Furthermore, in the Heron Pool, the Vulture Peak, the coastal fields, and the mango grove—among the three hundred Dharma assemblies, where is there such news as this? Therefore it is said: 'The Buddhas of the three periods cannot proclaim it themselves; the teachings of an entire generation cannot reach it in their explanations and commentaries.' Unless one knows that it exists, no one can know it. You have stood for a long time, compassionate assembly; I respectfully hope you take care."