宏智禪師廣錄 5.12

5.12

The Master then said: "Fundamentally there are not this many matters. Doing this and doing that, there come to be this many matters. Now, conversely, from within the many matters, subtract and subtract, seeking to reach the place where there are not this many matters. It is only your ordinary arising and ceasing that is birth and death. If arising and ceasing are exhausted, that is the fundamentally pure, with nothing to point to, nothing to compare to. Hanshan said: 'My mind is like the autumn moon, / Clear and bright in the emerald pool.' Even if it is sparkling bright like the autumn moon, I still fear that is not it. He also said: 'No thing can compare with it; / Tell me, how can I speak of it?' Since there is no thing, how can one speak of it? Therefore it is said: 'Impermissible is also impermissible; even this phrase is not accepted.' It is called utterly transcendent without resting place. It cannot rest in any place. This is the all-pervading mind; where could it be placed? Clean and naked, stripped bare and unburdened, not the slightest thread can stand. Just as the senior monk asked a moment ago, 'Profound and uniquely persisting, universally responding to the ten directions,' I told him, 'There are also no ten directions to respond to.' At that time, is there still the principle of responding? Murky and blended, it is called the Great Clod. If one is a clear-sighted fellow, he is completely lucid and luminous. If one is not a clear-sighted fellow, he is seen to be mediocre and bustling. One must be like a jewel emitting light, its light returning to illuminate itself. Yet although this is an affair of the second head, one must nevertheless discern it at the second head. If there is the slightest disturbance, at that moment one will revolve along with karma. The place where resting is exhausted, where there is nothing left to rest, is bodhi. The supreme, pure, luminous mind is not obtained from others. Great Master Yongjia said: 'It cannot be grasped, it cannot be rejected; / within the unobtainable, it is obtained just so.' Is this not opening wide like the character eight, entrusting it with both hands? Take care!"