大慧普覺禪師宗門武庫 1.70

1.70

When Venerable Yanyang met Zhaozhou, a monk asked: 'What is the Buddha?' He said: 'A clod of earth.' 'What is the Dharma?' He said: 'The earth shakes.' 'What is the Saṅgha?' 'Eating gruel and eating rice.' He also asked: 'What is the newly emerging water?' He said: 'In the river out front.' The Master remarked: 'Dharma methods like this are just like child's play; only when one can enter such dharma methods can one bring peace and joy to others. For example, when the Reverend Zhenjing brought up the ancients and moderns, he was not inferior to Xuedou. Yet the later followers who transmitted his teachings turned into foul-mouthed petty types, who merely ask: "How did the ancients put it? What turning word did Zhenru give, and what turning word did Yangqi give?" You concern yourselves with so many trivial matters! Curing an illness does not require donkey-loads of medicine. If you give medicine in response to the illness, even a single blade of grass picked at the foot of a hedge can cure the disease; why speak of cinnabar, aconite, ginseng, or atractylodes?'