佛果圜悟禪師碧巖錄 4.23

4.23

Wuzhuo traveled to Mount Wutai. Reaching a desolate and remote place halfway along the road, Mañjuśrī manifested a temple to lodge him. [Mañjuśrī] then asked, 'Where have you recently departed from?' Wuzhuo said, 'The South.' Mañjuśrī said, 'How is the Buddha Dharma maintained in the South?' Wuzhuo said, 'Monks of the saddharma-vipralopa mostly observe the precepts and Vinaya but little.' Mañjuśrī said, 'How large are the assemblies?' Wuzhuo said, 'Sometimes three hundred, sometimes five hundred.' Wuzhuo then asked Mañjuśrī, 'How is it maintained here?' Mañjuśrī said, 'Ordinary and sacred dwell together; dragons and snakes are mixed.' Wuzhuo said, 'How large is the assembly?' Mañjuśrī said, 'The front three-three and the back three-three.' Then they drank tea. Mañjuśrī held up a glass cup and said, 'Does the South also have this?' Wuzhuo said, 'No.' Mañjuśrī said, 'What do they usually use to drink tea?' Wuzhuo had no words, and thereupon took his leave. Mañjuśrī ordered the youth Juntī to see him out the gate. Wuzhuo asked the youth, 'Just now he said "the front three-three and the back three-three"—how many is that?' The youth said, 'Great Worthy!' Wuzhuo responded, 'Yes?' The youth said, 'How many is it?' He also asked, 'What temple is this?' The youth pointed behind the vajra. Wuzhuo turned his head, and the manifested temple and youth all vanished from sight; there was only an empty valley. That place was later called the Vajra Cave. Later, a monk asked Fengxue, 'Who is the master within Mount Qingliang?' Fengxue said, 'In a single phrase, he gave no time for Wuzhuo to ask; / Down to the present he is still a monk wandering the wilds.' If you want to penetrate through plainly and solidly, stepping on solid ground, understand beneath Wuzhuo's words, and naturally, even dwelling in boiling caldrons or burning coals, you will not sense heat, and dwelling on cold ice, you will not sense cold. If you want to penetrate through so as to be solitary, precipitous, and steep, like the precious sword of the Vajra King, understand beneath Mañjuśrī's words, and naturally water cannot splash on you and wind cannot blow into you. Have you not seen? Dizang of Zhangzhou asked a monk, 'Where have you recently departed from?' The monk said, 'The South.' Dizang said, 'How is the Buddha Dharma there?' The monk said, 'Discussion is vast and billowing.' Dizang said, 'How could that compare to my tilling the fields here to earn rice to eat?' Tell me, compared with Mañjuśrī's answer, is this the same or different? Some say Wuzhuo's answer was wrong, while in Mañjuśrī's answer there were both dragons and snakes, both ordinary and sacred—what connection is there? Can you clearly discern 'the front three-three and the back three-three'? The first arrow was still light; the second arrow goes deep. Tell me, how many is it? If you can penetrate through here, a thousand phrases or ten thousand phrases are just a single phrase. If you can cut off and hold fast beneath this single phrase, in due course you will reach this realm.