宏智禪師廣錄 5.27

5.27

At an informal gathering, a monk asked: "I remember: Venerable Dongshan instructed the assembly, saying: 'If discussing this matter, it is like a family having raised three sons: one must be in the prefecture, one must be in the county, and one must be in the village.' Who is the person in the prefecture?"
The Master said: "Honoured and noble, he does not contrive; who knows his name?"
The monk said: "Who is the person in the county?"
The Master said: "Stepping right in the doorway, as soon as someone asks the way, vaguely distinguishing, wind immediately passes through."
The monk said: "Who is the person in the village?"
The Master said: "Earth-faced and ash-headed, coming like this; piled up everywhere, not at all extraneous."
The Master then said: "When a patch-robed monk acts completely, what worry is there that it cannot be spoken? What worry is there that it cannot be practiced? If you have not truly arrived, not reached one hundred percent, not been secure and intimate to one hundred percent, then in moving through there will be deficits. If one is a fellow without deficits, what the buddhas spoke is just this; what the patriarchs practiced is also just this. In each person's share it is fully complete and perfect. If midway there is taking it on, shouldering it, awakening to it, or understanding it clearly, and at that moment an interruption suddenly arises so that one cannot flow vastly into a single whole, this is called a person who treads along. If it is the doing of a great man, one evacuation and it is finished, one vomit and it is exhausted; inside not a thread is kept, between them not a hair is admitted. Past mind cannot be found, future mind cannot be found, present mind cannot be found. Spanning the ten directions is this one mind; exhausting the three periods of time is this one phenomenon. Why not directly let the bottom of the pail drop out? It is only because on your mind-ground there is chaotic thinking and agitated fabricating. Amidst deluded thoughts, gummed and woven together, arranged and settled, stuck and stitched—when will you be free and easy? If right here you drop it with detachment, not seeing a single body, not seeing a single body, at that time filling empty space and pervading the Dharma realm, there is only your single self. The appearance of all buddhas of the three periods of time in the world is also their appearance in your body; the confusion of all living beings is also their confusion in your body; even the three realms and the nine levels, large and small, square and round, are all images manifested within your own body. Therefore Venerable Dongshan said: 'If discussing this matter, it is like a family having raised three sons: one must be in the prefecture, one must be in the county, and one must be in the village.' You tell me: which one is the person in the prefecture? Which one is the person in the county? Which one is the person in the village? If one thought is purely exhausted, completely open without reliance, the buddhas of the three periods of time looking at your crown cannot reach it—that is one place of practice. Distinct and bright, numinous and knowing, shining and radiant, clearly aware and fully lucid—that is also a place of practice. Following high and following low, illuminating green and illuminating yellow, across every land and dust-mote, every mind and every phenomenon—that is also a place of practice. If you clearly thread them into one strand, is this not the time when a patch-robed monk reaches the bottom in all directions? Then you will know: the profound within the profound transcends Vairocana and surpasses Śākya; the profound within substance naturally pervades all places; the profound within speech babbles and mumbles, putting forth the broad and long tongue. Is this not the time when a patch-robed monk enjoys full functioning? It is your place of practice, my place of practice, and the place of practice of all buddhas and patriarchs. What more monk or lay, male or female is there? If you are not turned by birth and death, not deluded by states of mind: birth is up to me, death is up to me; shedding the husk is like visiting a courier inn, like changing clothes. If one acts carelessly and fails to reach it, identifying the body as oneself and analyzing things as other, having lost the original road, one loses the correct cause. Going and coming, self and other are cut off. If you realize the wondrous and exhaust illumination, what worry is there that it will not be clear? Right at such a time, how is it? Distinguishing clearly, becoming accomplished in this way—do you not see the Sixth Patriarch say: 'The mind-ground contains all seeds; under universal rain they all sprout. Having suddenly awakened to the feeling of flowers, the fruit of bodhi ripens of itself'?"