大慧普覺禪師語錄 22.3

22.3

Layman Kuairan, Luo Zongyue, came expressly in the late spring of the dingchou year of the Shaoxing era [1157] to Mount Mao to see Miaoxi [Dahui], wishing to thoroughly investigate this great matter of the cause and condition. Repeatedly accompanying the assembly into my room, he displayed his tricks and flaunted his understandings, all of which I cast down. One day, suddenly seeing joy on his brow, I knew that he was 'peeking at a leopard through a tube,' turning his body and moving his brain, and already had a verse in his sleeve, though he had not brought it out. Miaoxi immediately turned the mechanism for him; although he was not yet able to leap stark-naked out of the tangle of vines, he nevertheless came to know that rice is made from grain and flour is in the wheat. Right at the moment when he should have applied effort, he abruptly came to bid farewell, saying, 'I must urgently return to marry off my daughter.' Coming with this scroll, he begged for the principles of undertaking the practice. In the past, Layman Pang said: 'I have a boy who does not marry, / I have a girl who does not wed. / The whole family gathered in a circle, / Together we speak the discourse of the unproduced.' Later, during the Yuanfeng era, there was a scholar called Layman Wuwei, surnamed Yang, named Jie, and styled Cigong, who had practiced under the elders and genuinely obtained power within the Chan school; he once matched Layman Pang's verse, saying: 'When a boy is grown he must marry; / When a girl is of age she must wed. / Why waste leisure effort / To speak yet more of the unproduced?' These two secular fellows took that piece of field of the permanent property of the ten directions, and without going to the authorities to have it stamped with an official deed, each marked out territories and drew boundaries, saying 'I know it exists,' and constantly proclaimed themselves venerable in places where there is no Buddha. At that time there was also a monk who was ill at ease with this, called Chan Master Haiyin Xin, who was residing at Dinghui in Suzhou at the time. Seeing this verse by Wuwei, he too composed a verse: 'I have no boy to marry, / Nor do I have a girl to wed. / When weary, I just lie down to sleep; / Who cares about the discourse of the unproduced?' With these three old fellows uttering these three verses, Layman Kuairan makes contact when he opens his eyes, makes contact when he closes his eyes, and makes contact when he neither opens nor closes them. Miaoxi can only watch from the cold sidelines. While I do watch, in the end does Layman Kuairan make contact at the place where the eyes are opened? Does he make contact at the place where the eyes are closed? Or does he make contact at the place where they are neither opened nor closed? If he makes contact at the place where the eyes are opened, he falls into Layman Pang's trap; if he makes contact at the place where the eyes are closed, he falls into Yang Wuwei's trap; if he makes contact at the place where they are neither opened nor closed, he falls into Chan Master Haiyin's trap. Seeing me speak like this, Kuairan will surely say, 'It is completely not like that.' If it is completely not like that, he falls once again into Miaoxi's trap. It is easy to get out of the three elders' traps, but hard to get out of Miaoxi's trap. In the end, how can Kuairan get out? Wait until you return to Yanping and have married off your daughter, then come back leisurely, and I will explain it thoroughly for you. Because I recall a verse by an ancient worthy, I also write it after this, hoping that Kuairan will not take root halfway—this too is solely out of the earnestness of a grandmotherly mind. The verse says: 'Studying the Way is like drilling for fire: / When you meet smoke, do not stop; / Only when the golden sparks appear / And you return home have you reached the end.' There is yet another questioning prompt: where, after all, is the home to which Kuairan returns? If you penetrate this one question, marrying off sons and daughters is all contained within it; if you have not yet recognized home, your karmic consciousness will be vast and boundless, running completely outside, and you will not be able to blame Miaoxi.