佛果圜悟禪師碧巖錄 4.20

4.20

'Leaving the grass, entering the grass, who knows how to seek and investigate?' Xuedou nevertheless knows where he lands. Arriving here, one hand lifts up and one hand presses down. 'White clouds layer upon layer, the red sun shining brightly' is very much like grass sprouting luxuriantly and mist veiling over. Arriving here, not a single hair belongs to the ordinary, not a single hair belongs to the sacred. Throughout the whole realm it has never been hidden; not one thing can cover it. This is what is called the realm of no-mind: in cold one does not sense cold, in heat one does not sense heat; altogether it is a great gate of liberation. 'Looking to the left, there is no flaw; glancing to the right, one has already grown old.' Master Lanzan lived in seclusion in a stone chamber on Mount Heng. Tang Dezong heard of his fame and sent an envoy to summon him. The envoy arrived at his chamber and proclaimed, 'The Son of Heaven has issued an edict. The Venerable should rise and give thanks for the imperial grace.' Lanzan was just then poking the cow-dung fire, looking for roasted taro to eat. Cold snot hung down to his chin, and he had not answered. The envoy smiled and said, 'May I advise the Venerable to wipe your snot?' Lanzan said, 'How could I have leisure to wipe my snot for a worldly person?' He did not rise at all. The envoy returned and reported this, and Dezong greatly admired and sighed over him. Such utter clarity and plain purity does not accept anyone's disposal; he truly holds fast, as if cast from raw iron. Take, for instance, Master Shandao: after suffering the purge, he never became a monk again, and people called him the Stone Chamber Postulant. Whenever he treaded the pestle, he forgot to move his feet. A monk asked Linji, 'What was the meaning of the Stone Chamber Postulant forgetting to move his feet?' Linji said, 'Drowned in a deep pit.' Fayan's verse on 'The Perfect and Complete Nature of Reality' says: 'When principle reaches its ultimate, affective notions are forgotten; / How could there be an analogy to match it? / In the end, under the frosty night moon, / It falls into the front creek according to conditions. / As the fruit ripens, the monkeys grow heavy; / The mountains are long, as if the path were lost. / Raising one's head, the lingering glow remains; / Originally it lies west of one's dwelling.' Xuedou says, 'Have you not seen Hanshanzi traveling too early? For ten years unable to return, forgetting the road by which he came.' Hanshanzi's poem says: 'If you wish to find a place to settle your body, / Cold Mountain can be preserved for long. / A subtle breeze blows through the secluded pines; / Listening close, the sound is even better. / Below sits a gray-haired man, / Murmuring as he reads Huang-Lao. / For ten years unable to return, / Forgetting the road by which he came.' Yongjia also says: 'The mind is the root, phenomena are the dust; / The two kinds are like marks on a mirror. / When marks and grime are exhausted, the light first appears; / When mind and phenomena are both forgotten, the nature is then true.' Arriving here, like an idiot or a stump, one only then sees this gong'an. If you do not reach this stage, merely running about within words, when will there ever be an end?