萬松老人評唱天童覺和尚頌古從容庵錄 4.49

4.49

The Master said: "Chan Master Qianfeng of Yuezhou was asked by a monk: 'Bhagavāns of the ten directions have one road to the gate of nirvāṇa. I wonder: where is the head of the road?' This question originally comes from fascicle five of the Śūraṅgama-sūtra: 'This Abhidharma of the Bhagavāns of the ten directions is the one road to the gate of nirvāṇa.' I wonder: where is the head of the road and its doorway? If one explains this meaning according to the sūtra, the Tathāgata spoke it himself as the premise for complete penetration; only in the sixth fascicle does Mañjuśrī select complete penetration. As for the matter of patch-robed monks, Tiantong once said: 'In the ten directions there are no walls; from the very beginning there was originally no obstruction. On four sides there are also no gates; right here is the place of entry.' Therefore Qianfeng drew a line and said, 'Here.' Those who do not know often call this Qianfeng pointing out the road for this monk; or else they say he drew a boundary line for this monk so that he would wander elsewhere no more. It is definitely not this principle. Have you not seen? Yunmen commented on it, sifting eight parts of rice to nine parts of chaff. Huanglong Nan said, 'Qianfeng pointing out the road for a time was an accommodation for beginners. Yunmen then adapted to the change, thereby keeping later people from tiring.' Wansong says: 'If the waves of Caoxi were alike, countless innocent people would drown on dry land.' Yunmen had long stayed with Qianfeng, Caoshan, and Shushan; this monk thought he would surely know Qianfeng's function, so he sought further instruction. If he had instead used Qianfeng's needle and thread, that would have been a tethering peg for a donkey. Suddenly he brought out Muzhou's axle-drill from Qin times, causing only the cup to hit the ground and the plate to shatter into seven pieces. This monk did not understand Qianfeng's meaning, so Yunmen gave another living path, very much like pouring oil to put out a fire, or fanning to melt ice. Zhu'an already exposed it earlier in a verse, saying: 'Qianfeng need not point it out; / Yunmen should stop the mishmash. / Naturally, the carp of the Eastern Sea / pokes Śakra's nostril.' Zhu'an was even more excessively compassionate than Yunmen, and people found it all the harder to understand. It is better that Tiantong, catching one off guard with a cold eye, is rather somewhat better. The verse says:"