佛果圜悟禪師碧巖錄 3.18

3.18

Liu Tiemo (a nun) was like sparks struck from flint, like a flash of lightning. If you deliberate, you lose body and life. When the Way of Chan reaches the crucial point, what place is there for so many things? When adept masters meet, it is like seeing horns over a wall and immediately knowing an ox is there, or seeing smoke across a mountain and immediately knowing fire is there. Push them and they move; press them and they turn. Guishan said: “A hundred years after my death, I will become a water buffalo at the foot of the mountain at the house of a donor. On my left flank will be written five characters: ‘Guishan monk so-and-so.’ At just such a time, if you call it a monk of Guishan, it is one; if you call it a water buffalo, it is one.” Nowadays, if people are asked about this, they will certainly be unable to explain it. Liu Tiemo had practiced for a long time, and her dynamic sharpness was steep and sheer; people called her “Liu the Iron Grinder.” Ten leagues from Guishan she had erected a hermitage. One day she went to visit Guishan. Seeing her coming, Shan immediately said: “Old cow, you have come!” The Grinder said: “Tomorrow there is a great feast at Taishan. Is the Venerable going?” Guishan let his body fall and lay down. The Grinder thereupon walked out. Look at them: it is just like ordinary conversation, yet it is neither Chan nor the Way. Could you understand it by calling it “nothing the matter”? From Guishan to Taishan is separated by several thousand leagues. Why did Liu Tiemo instead tell Guishan to go to the feast? Tell me, what was the intention? This old woman understood his, Guishan's, words: silk coming and thread going, one letting go and one reeling in, chanting back and forth to each other, like two mirrors reflecting one another without any image to be seen. Dynamic functions matched one another; phrases accorded with each other. Nowadays, people are tapped three times and still do not turn their heads, but not a bit could be concealed from this old woman. This is not worldly emotional views. It is like a clear mirror on its stand, a bright pearl in the palm: when a foreigner comes, a foreigner appears; when a Han comes, a Han appears. It was because she knew there is the transcendent matter that she was like this. Nowadays, people simply interpret it as “nothing the matter.” Master Sizuling Yan said: “Do not take having affairs as having no affairs; often affairs arise from having no affairs.” If you penetrate through, you see that their doing so is just like ordinary people talking; because most are obstructed and hindered by words, they do not understand. Only an intimate knower could understand them. Take Qianfeng addressing the assembly: “Lifting up one, you must not lift up two; letting go of the first move, you fall into the second.” Yunmen stepped out of the assembly and said: “Yesterday a monk came from Tiantai and went toward Nanyue.” Qianfeng said: “Today the head cook will not have communal work.” Look at the two of them: when letting go, both let go; when reeling in, both reel in. Under the Guiyang school this is called a “scenic atmosphere”: when the wind and dust stir the grass, every trace is thoroughly investigated. It is also called an “isolated-body phrase”: the meaning communicates, but the words are separated. When arriving here, you must turn left and pivot right before you are an adept master.