大慧普覺禪師語錄 28.15

28.15

示諭：「應緣日涉差別境界，未甞不在佛法中。又於日用動容之間，以狗子無佛性話，破除情塵。」若作如是工夫，恐卒未得悟入，請於脚跟下照顧，差別境界從甚麼處起？動容周旋之間，如何以狗子無佛性話破除情塵？能知破除情塵者，又是阿誰？佛不云乎：「眾生顛倒迷己逐物，物本無自性，迷己者自逐之耳。」境界本無差別，迷己者自差別耳。既日涉差別境界，又在佛法中，既在佛法中，則非差別境界，既在差別境界中，則非佛法矣。拈一放一，有甚了期？廣額屠兒在涅槃會上，放下屠刀立地便成佛，豈有許多忉忉怛怛來？日用應緣處，纔覺涉差別境界時，但只就差別處，舉狗子無佛性話，不用作破除想，不用作情塵想，不用作差別想，不用作佛法想，但只看狗子無佛性話，但只舉箇無字，亦不用存心等悟，若存心等悟，則境界也差別，佛法也差別，情塵也差別，狗子無佛性話也差別，間斷處也差別，無間斷處也差別，遭情塵惑亂身心不安樂處也差別，能知許多差別底亦差別。若要除此病，但只看箇無字，但只看，廣額屠兒放下屠刀云：「我是千佛一數。」是實是虛？若作虛實商量，又打入差別境界上去也。不如一刀兩段，不得念後思前，念後思前則又差別矣。玄沙云：「此事限約不得。心思路絕，不因莊嚴本來真靜，動用語笑隨處明了，更無欠少。」今時人不悟箇中道理，妄自涉事涉塵，處處染著、頭頭繫絆，縱悟則塵境紛紜，名相不實，便擬凝心歛念，攝事歸空，閉目藏睛，隨有念起，旋旋破除，細想纔生，即便遏捺。如此見解，即是落空亡底外道，魂不散底死人，溟溟漠漠無覺無知，塞耳偷鈴徒自欺誑。左右來書云云，盡是玄沙所訶底病，默照邪師埋人底坑子，不可不知也。舉話時都不用作許多伎倆，但行住坐臥處勿令間斷，喜怒哀樂處莫生分別，舉來舉去，看來看去，覺得沒理路沒滋味心頭熱悶時，便是當人放身命處也。記取記取，莫見如此境界便退心，如此境界正是成佛作祖底消息也。而今默照邪師輩，只以無言無說為極則，喚作威音那畔事，亦喚作空劫已前事，不信有悟門，以悟為誑，以悟為第二頭，以悟為方便語，以悟為接引之辭，如此之徒，謾人自謾，誤人自誤，亦不可不知。日用四威儀中，涉差別境界，覺得省力時，便是得力處也。得力處極省力，若用一毫毛氣力支撐，定是邪法，非佛法也。但辦取長遠心，與狗子無佛性話廝崖，崖來崖去，心無所之，忽然如睡夢覺、如蓮華開、如披雲見日，到恁麼時自然成一片矣。但日用七顛八倒處，只看箇無字，莫管悟不悟、徹不徹，三世諸佛只是箇無事人，諸代祖師亦只是箇無事人，古德云：「但於事上通無事，見色聞聲不用聾。」又古德云：「愚人除境不忘心，智者忘心不除境。」於一切處無心，則種種差別境界自無矣。而今士大夫，多是急性便要會禪，於經教上及祖師言句中摶量，要說得分曉。殊不知，分曉處，却是不分曉底事；若透得箇無字，分曉不分曉，不著問人矣。老漢教士大夫放教鈍，便是這箇道理也。作鈍牓狀元亦不惡，只怕拕白耳一笑。

Your letter instructs: 'In responding to conditions day by day, I tread upon differentiated realms, yet I am never not within the Buddhadharma. Moreover, in the midst of daily demeanor and movement, I use the huatou "a dog has no buddha-nature" to smash and eliminate emotional defilements.' If you practice like this, I fear you will never attain awakening and entry in the end. Please look beneath your own feet: from where do differentiated realms arise? In the midst of movement, demeanor, and social intercourse, how can you use the huatou 'a dog has no buddha-nature' to smash and eliminate emotional defilements? And who is the one able to know about smashing and eliminating emotional defilements? Did not the Buddha say: 'Sentient beings are inverted; they delude themselves and chase after objects. Objects originally have no intrinsic nature; those who delude themselves simply chase after them of their own accord.' Realms originally have no differentiation; those who delude themselves simply differentiate them on their own. Since you tread daily in differentiated realms, you are also within the Buddhadharma; since you are within the Buddhadharma, then there are no differentiated realms; since you are within differentiated realms, then it is not the Buddhadharma. Picking up one and letting go of another—when will there ever be an end? When the butcher Broad Forehead was at the Nirvāṇa assembly, he laid down his butcher's cleaver and immediately became a buddha on the spot. How could there have been so much chattering and vexation? In daily life, where you respond to conditions, the moment you feel that you are treading in differentiated realms, simply right at the point of differentiation, bring up the huatou 'a dog has no buddha-nature.' You do not need to form thoughts of smashing and eliminating, you do not need to form thoughts of emotional defilements, you do not need to form thoughts of differentiation, and you do not need to form thoughts of the Buddhadharma. Just look at the huatou 'a dog has no buddha-nature'; just bring up the single word 'No' (wu). Neither do you need to harbor a mind waiting for enlightenment. If you harbor a mind waiting for enlightenment, then the realms will also be differentiated, the Buddhadharma will also be differentiated, emotional defilements will also be differentiated, the huatou 'a dog has no buddha-nature' will also be differentiated, the places of interruption will also be differentiated, the places without interruption will also be differentiated, the places where you suffer delusion and agitation from emotional defilements and body and mind are ill at ease will also be differentiated, and that which is able to know these many differentiations will also be differentiated. If you want to eliminate this sickness, just look at the single word 'No.' Just look at the butcher Broad Forehead laying down his butcher's cleaver and saying: 'I am one among the thousand buddhas.' Is this real or empty? If you deliberate over real or empty, you fall back into differentiated realms again. It is better to cut it in two with a single blow of the sword; you must not think of after and deliberate on before. If you think of after and deliberate on before, then there is differentiation once again. Xuansha said: 'This matter cannot be circumscribed. When the path of thought is severed, without relying on adornment it is originally true and tranquil; in movement, functioning, speech, and laughter, it is luminous everywhere, lacking nothing at all.' People today do not awaken to the principle within this; they blindly tread in affairs and dust of their own accord, contaminated and attached everywhere, bound fast at every turn. Even if they awaken, the dusty realms are chaotic and names and forms are unreal, so they intend to congeal the mind and gather their thoughts, collect affairs and return to emptiness, close their eyes and conceal their vision; whenever a thought arises, they repeatedly smash and eliminate it, and as soon as a subtle thought is born, they promptly suppress it. Such a view is an outsider fallen into empty annihilation, a dead man whose soul has not dispersed, dim and murky without sensation or awareness, plugging one's ears to steal a bell—vainly deceiving oneself. What your letter says is entirely the sickness rebuked by Xuansha, the pit in which heterodox teachers of silent illumination bury people; you cannot fail to know this. When bringing up the huatou, you do not need to use so many tricks at all; just in walking, standing, sitting, and lying down, do not allow it to be interrupted. In joy, anger, grief, and pleasure, do not produce distinctions. Bringing it up again and again, looking at it again and again, when you feel there is no path of reason, no flavor, and your mind is hot and stifled—that is precisely the place for you to surrender your life. Remember this! Remember this! Do not regress upon seeing such a realm; such a realm is precisely the message of becoming a buddha and becoming a patriarch. Nowadays, the cohorts of heterodox teachers of silent illumination merely take wordlessness and speechlessness as the ultimate principle, calling it the matter beyond King of Wonderful Voice, or calling it the matter before the empty kalpa. They do not believe there is a gate of enlightenment; they take enlightenment to be deception, take enlightenment to be a second head, take enlightenment to be an expedient expression, take enlightenment to be words for guiding beginners. People of this sort deceive others and deceive themselves, mislead others and mislead themselves; this too you cannot fail to know. In the four deportments of daily life, when treading in differentiated realms, the moment you feel it is effortless is precisely the place where you gain strength. The place where you gain strength is extremely effortless; if you use a single hair's breadth of strength to prop it up, it is definitely a heterodox dharma, not the Buddhadharma. Just muster a lasting determination to grapple closely with the huatou 'a dog has no buddha-nature.' Grappling back and forth until the mind has nowhere to go, suddenly it will be like waking from a dream, like a lotus flower opening, like parting the clouds to see the sun. When you reach such a time, it will naturally become a single whole. Just in the topsy-turvy places of daily life, only look at the single word 'No'; do not care whether you awaken or do not awaken, whether you penetrate or do not penetrate. The buddhas of the three periods are simply people with nothing to do; the successive generations of patriarchs are also simply people with nothing to do. An ancient worthy said: 'Just penetrate non-affair amidst affairs; seeing forms and hearing sounds, there is no need to be deaf.' Another ancient worthy said: 'The fool eliminates objects but does not forget the mind; the wise person forgets the mind and does not eliminate objects.' Being without mind in all places, the various differentiated realms will naturally vanish of themselves. Nowadays, scholar-officials are mostly impatient and want to understand Chan right away; they make reckonings and deliberations upon the scriptural teachings and in the sayings of the patriarchs, wanting to explain them with distinct clarity. Little do they know that the place of distinct clarity is precisely the matter without distinct clarity. If you can penetrate the single word 'No,' whether it is distinctly clear or not distinctly clear, there is no need to ask others. This old fellow's teaching scholar-officials to let themselves be dull is precisely this principle. Being the top graduate on the list of dullards is not bad either; I only fear drawing a blank, ha-ha!