佛果圜悟禪師碧巖錄 6.3

6.3

Generally speaking, to uphold and establish the ancestral school, one must distinguish the right moment, understand advancing and retreating, right and wrong, and be clear about killing and giving life, seizing and releasing. If one's eyes are dim and confused, asking whenever meeting someone who asks, answering whenever meeting someone who answers, one fails utterly to realize that one's nostrils are in the hands of others. Consider Xuefeng and Yantou: both studied under Deshan. When this monk went to Xuefeng, his understanding went only this far; when he met Yantou, he still accomplished nothing at all. He vainly troubled those two venerable elders in asking and answering, seizing and releasing, right down to the present day, causing people everywhere to fall into complications and confusion without being able to clarify them. Tell me, where does this complication lie? Although Xuefeng had traveled everywhere, only later at Mount Ao Inn, when Yantou provoked him, was he able to achieve complete, thorough enlightenment. Later, during the persecution of Buddhism, Yantou became a ferryman on a lake. On each bank he hung a wooden board; when someone wanted to cross, they struck the board once. Yantou would say, 'Do you want to cross to that side?' and come rowing out from the reeds, dancing his oar. Xuefeng returned south of the mountains to live in a hermitage. This monk was also a veteran practitioner. When Xuefeng saw him coming, he leaned on the hermitage door with his hands, pushed himself forward, and said, 'What is this?' Nowadays there are those who, when questioned like this, immediately go chew on his words. This monk too was peculiar: he merely said to him, 'What is this?' Xuefeng lowered his head and returned to his hermitage. People often understand this as his being speechless; thus this monk had nowhere to grasp him. Some say that Xuefeng, challenged by this monk's single question, was rendered speechless and went back to his hermitage. They utterly fail to realize that Xuefeng's intent held a lethal poison. Although Xuefeng gained the upper hand, what can be done about hiding the body while exposing the shadow? Later, taking leave of Xuefeng, this monk brought this gong'an to Yantou for judgment. Arriving there, Yantou asked, 'Where have you come from?' The monk said, 'From south of the mountains.' Yantou said, 'Have you been to Xuefeng?' If one wishes to see Xuefeng, one had better look closely at this single question. The monk said, 'I have.' Yantou said, 'What words were there?' These words were not spoken in vain either. The monk did not understand; he just followed the flow of his words and turned. Yantou said, 'What did he say?' The monk said, 'He lowered his head, said nothing, and returned to his hermitage.' This monk completely failed to realize that Yantou, wearing straw sandals, had already walked around inside his belly several times. Yantou said, 'Alas! I regret that in the beginning I did not tell him the last word. If I had told him, no one in the world could have done anything about old Xue.' Yantou also supported the strong and did not support the weak. The monk remained in pitch darkness as before, not distinguishing black from white, harboring a bellyful of doubt, truly thinking that Xuefeng did not understand. Toward the end of the summer, he brought up the former words again to ask Yantou for instruction. Yantou said, 'Why didn't you ask earlier?' This old fellow was hatching a scheme! The monk said, 'I did not dare take it lightly.' Yantou said, 'Although Xuefeng was born on the same branch as me, he will not die on the same branch as me. If you wish to know the last word, it is just this.' Yantou was extremely sparing of his eyebrows. In the end, how do all of you understand this? When Xuefeng was serving as the head cook under Deshan, one day the noon meal was late. Deshan, carrying his bowl, came down to the Dharma hall. Xuefeng said, 'The bell has not yet rung, the drum has not yet sounded; where is this old fellow going with his bowl?' Deshan lowered his head in silence and returned to the abbot's quarters. Xuefeng related this to Yantou. Yantou said, 'Great Master Deshan does not understand the last word.' When Deshan heard of this, he had an attendant summon Yantou to the abbot's quarters and asked, 'Do you not approve of this old monk?' Yantou secretly whispered his meaning. The next day, when Deshan took the high seat, it was unlike usual. In front of the Monks' Hall, Yantou clapped his hands and laughed loudly, saying, 'How wonderful that the old fellow understands the last word! From now on, no one in the world can do anything about him. Even so, it will last only three years.' In this gong'an, when Xuefeng saw Deshan speechless, he thought he had gained the upper hand, not knowing he had been robbed. Because Deshan had once been robbed, later he also knew how to be a robber. Therefore the ancients said, 'Only when you reach the last word do you arrive at the secure barrier.' Some say Yantou surpassed Xuefeng, but that is a mistaken understanding. Yantou often used this dynamic function to instruct the assembly, saying, 'A person with clear eyes has no fixed patterns; rejecting objects is superior, pursuing objects is inferior.' Even if one had personally seen the ancestral master, one still could not grasp this last word. The meal was late, and old Deshan carried his bowl down to the Dharma hall himself. Yantou said, 'Great Master Deshan does not yet understand the last word.' Xuedou brought this up and said, 'I once heard talk of a one-eyed dragon, but turns out he only possesses one eye.' He utterly failed to realize that Deshan was a toothless tiger; had Yantou not seen through him, how could one know that yesterday was different from today? Do all of you wish to understand the last word? It is permitted only for the old barbarian to know, not for the old barbarian to understand. From antiquity to the present, gong'ans have had thousands of distinctions and myriad differences, resembling a forest of brambles. If you can penetrate through them, no one in the world can do anything to you, and the Buddhas of the three periods of time will stand downwind. If you cannot penetrate through, Yantou said, 'Although Xuefeng was born on the same branch as me, he will not die on the same branch as me.' In this single phrase there is naturally a way of escape. Xuedou's verse eulogy says: