萬松老人評唱天童覺和尚頌古從容庵錄 3.128

3.128

The Master said: This case is given in abbreviated form. If raised in full, it should run: One day [Huangbo] went up to the hall and said, 'All of you people, what are you seeking?' He then drove them off with his staff. As the assembly did not disperse, the Master then said, 'All of you people are nothing but swillers of dregs!' In the Tang dynasty they liked to scold people as 'swillers of dregs.' Duke Huan of Qi was reading a book up in the hall, while Wheelwright Bian was carving a wheel down below the hall. Putting aside hammer and chisel, he went up and asked, 'May I venture to ask, my lord, what words are you reading?' The Duke said, 'The canons of the sages.' He asked, 'Are the sages alive?' The Duke said, 'They are already dead.' He said, 'If so, then what my lord reads is nothing but the dregs of the ancients!' The Duke said, 'When I read a book, how can a wheelwright comment on it? If you have an explanation, it is well; if you have no explanation, you die.' Bian said, 'Your servant looks at it from the perspective of his own craft: when I carve a wheel, if I am too slow, it is sweet and loose, not firm; if I am too swift, it is bitter and tight, not fitting in. Neither too slow nor too swift, it is grasped by the hand and responds in the mind; my mouth cannot put it into words, yet there is a knack in it. I cannot teach it to my son, nor can my son receive it from me. That is why at the age of seventy I am still carving wheels in my old age. The ancients and what they could not transmit have died together with them. If so, then what my lord reads is indeed the dregs of the ancients!' [Huangbo] also said, 'Traveling like this only brings ridicule from others. Wherever you see eight hundred or a thousand people gathered, you just head there; you should not merely seek bustling excitement! When this mountain monk went on pilgrimage, if under the root of the grass I encountered a fellow, I would thrust an awl right into his crown to see him. If he knew pain and itch, I could fill a cloth bag with rice to make offerings to him. If it were all as easy as it is with you lot, how could the matter of today even exist? Since you claim to be on pilgrimage, you must put forth some spirit! Do you still know that in the great country of Tang there are no Chan masters?' Ever since Huangbo, Yantou and Luoshan loved to enforce this decree. In recent times, Fori, and from the north Elder Yi of Qingshou, went to their deaths without finding anyone to their liking; they would rather let their lineage end with no successor. The descendants of the grand-uncle of Venerable Jun of Xiangshan also enforced this decree. Those who do not understand call it patting oneself on the chest. If only an indignant fellow would come out to step forward and take it on! Sure enough, a monk came out and said, 'Everywhere, the venerable elders gather crowds and convert them; why do you say there are no Chan masters?' Huangbo said, 'I do not say there is no Chan, only that there are no masters.' Guishan asked Yangshan, 'What about this?' Yangshan said, 'The goose-king extracts milk; it is definitely not of the duck's kind.' Guishan said, 'This is indeed hard to distinguish.' Wuzu Jie brought out the monk's words: 'I thank the Venerable for putting the principle so well.' Wansong says: Raw words and cooked phrases, cold lips and bland tongue. Shimen Cong said, 'Huangbo's instruction was quite extraordinary indeed, but as soon as he was jostled by the patched-robe monk, he lost one eye.' Wansong says: He replaced that monk's two eyes. Chengtian Zong said, 'Wuzu Jie's eyes shine over the four continents.' Wansong says: It is still only one eye. 'If you want to see Huangbo, that is still not possible.' Wansong says: Truly so. 'If one wants to uphold the treasury of the eye of the true Dharma, it must be the master Huangbo.' Wansong says: Adding brocade on top of flowers. Cuiyan Zhen said, 'Everywhere, discussions immediately claim that Huangbo put this monk down.' Wansong says: They do not realize he helped this monk up. 'They also say that Huangbo, faced with this monk's coming forward, was simply unable to resolve it.' Wansong says: Black and white become all the more distinct. 'Why is this so? Cuiyan arbitrarily generated conjecture: The misty leopard glosses its fur without yet taking food; the courtyard fowl nourishes its courage, ultimately waiting to stun people.' Wansong says: Wait and see after five days. Huangbo also said, 'Ācārya, have you not seen that under Great Master Ma there were over eighty persons who sat in sanctuaries, every one of them rolling freely like a wheel, but those who attained the Great Master's true eye were only two or three? Only Guizong was slightly better.' Indeed, one who has left home must know the matters handed down from of old. Take, for instance, under the Fourth Patriarch, Great Master Niutou Rong spoke horizontally and spoke vertically, yet he still did not know the turning peg of the upward path. Only with this kind of eye and brain can one distinguish the correct from the deviant within the lineage. I have briefly raised it up to this point. If you want to see the beginning and end of this case, there are still over a hundred words after this. This was his earliest instruction to people upon coming into the world, so it has been widely circulated everywhere. Xuedou's verse and Foguo's commentary are the most detailed, yet they still lack the primary intent of his going up to the hall in the original record. Tiantong's verse brings it out, attaining the utmost in goodness and beauty. The verse says: