萬善同歸集 2.14

2.14

答：「得理則萬行方成；知宗乃千途不滯。不可去彼取此，執是排非；須履無閡之門，善入遍行之道。是以過去諸佛、本師釋迦，從無量劫來，捨無數身命，或為求法，則出髓而剜身；或為行慈，則施鷹而飼虎。《般若論》云：『如來無量劫來捨身命財，為攝持正法。正法無有邊際，即無窮之因，得無窮之果；果即三身也。』乃至西天此土，菩薩高僧，自古及今，遺身不少，皆遵釋迦之正典，盡效藥王之遺風。《高僧傳》藹法師入南山，自剜身肉布於石上，引腸掛樹，捧心而卒。書偈以石云：『願捨此身已，早令身自在。法身自在已，在在諸趣中；隨有利益處，護法救眾生。又復業應盡，有為法皆然；三界皆無常，時來不自在。他殺及自死，終歸如是處；智者所不樂，業盡於今日。』又僧崖菩薩燒身云：『代一切眾生苦，先燒其手。』眾人問曰：『菩薩自燒，眾生罪熟，各自受苦，何由可代？』答曰：『猶如燒手，一念善根，即能滅惡，豈非代耶？』又告眾曰：『我滅度後，好供養病人。並難可測其本，多是諸佛聖人，乘權應化；自非大心平等，何能恭敬？此是實行也。』天台宗滿禪師，一生講誦《蓮經》，感神人現身，正定經呪文字；後焚身供養《法華經》。又智者門人淨辯禪師，於懺堂前焚身，供養普賢菩薩。雙林傅大士，欲焚身救眾生苦；門人等前後四十八人，代師焚身，請師住世，教化有情。傳記廣明，不能備引。若云：『諸聖境界，示現施為。』則聖有誑夫之愆，凡無即聖之分；教網虛設，方便則空。本為接後逗前，令凡實證；設是示現權施，亦令後人倣傚。不可將邪倒之法，賺人施行，大聖真慈，終不虛誑。是以八萬法門，無非解脫；一念微善，皆趣真如。自有初心、後心，生忍、法忍，未必將高斥下，以下凌高。善須知時，自量根力；不可評他美惡，強立是非；言是禍胎，自招來業。且如得忍菩薩，雖證生、法二空，為利他故，破慳貪垢，尚乃燒臂焚身，如藥王菩薩、僧崖之類。若未具忍者，雖知以智慧火焚煩惱薪，了達二空不生身見；其或現行障重，未得相應；起勇猛心、運真實行，酬恩供佛、代苦行慈，欲成助道之門，不起希求之想；若不欺誑，事不唐捐。脫或智眼未明，猶生我執，但求因果，志不堅牢，擬傚先蹤，不在此限。夫眾生根機不同，所尚各異。故經云：『佛言：「若眾生以虛妄而得度者，我亦妄語。」』是知事出千巧，理歸一源。皆是大慈，善權方便。或因捨身命而頓入法忍；或一心禪定而豁悟無生；或了本清淨，而證實相門；或作不淨觀，而登遠離道；或住七寶房舍，而階聖果；或處塚間樹下，而趣涅槃。是以塵沙度門，入皆解脫；無邊教網，了即歸真。大聖垂言，終不虛設，譬如涉遠，以到為期；不取途中，強論難易。故知醫不專散，天不長晴；應須丸散調停，陰陽兼濟；遂得眾疾同愈，萬物齊榮。皆是權施，實無定法；隨其樂欲，逗其便宜。惟取證道為心，不揀入門麁細。若於圓教四門生著，猶為藏教初門所治。故菩薩所行檀度之門，如囚因廁孔而得出，似病服不淨而獲痊。非觀，無以拔三毒之病根；非行，無以超三界之有獄。《書》云：『獲鳥者，羅之一目；不可以一目為羅。治國者，功在一人；不可以一人為國。』是以眾行俱備，萬善齊修；一行歸源，千門自正。經明：十二因緣是一法，以四等觀者，得四種菩提。若惟取上上根人，則中下絕分。故弘半教，有成滿之功；至寶所，因化城之力。豈可捨此取彼、執實謗權，頓棄機緣，滅佛方便。故云：從實分權，權是實權；開權顯實，實是權實。如迷權實二門，則智不自在。《大論》云：『眾生種種因緣，得度不同。有禪定得度者；有持戒說法得度者；有光明觸身得度者。譬如城有多門，入處各別，至處不異。』所言般若功深者，然般若孕聖弘賢，含靈蘊妙。標之則為宗、為首、為導、為依；融之則觸境該空，無非般若。故經云：『色無邊故，般若無邊。』《肇論》云：『三毒、四倒，皆悉清淨，何獨尊淨於般若？』今何取捨，而欲逃空避影乎？且諸佛密意，詮旨難裁；空拳誑小兒，誘度於一切；無有決定法，故號大菩提。不知般若有破著之功，教中偏讚；却乃隨語生見，是以依方故迷。故般若能導萬行；若無萬行，般若何施？偏噉醬而飲醎，失味致患；專抱空而執斷，喪智成愆。《智論》云：『帝釋意念：「若般若是究竟法者，行人但行般若，何用餘法？」佛答：「菩薩六波羅蜜，以般若波羅蜜，用無所得法和合故，此即是般若波羅蜜；若但行般若，不行餘法，則功德不具足，不美不妙。譬如愚人，不識飯食種具，聞醬是眾味主，便純飲醬，失味致患。行者亦如是，欲除著心故，但行般若，反墜邪見，不能增進善法。若與五波羅蜜和合，則功德具足，義味調適。」』《楞伽山頂經》云：『菩薩速疾道有二：一、方便道者，能為因緣。二、般若道者，能至寂滅。』是以般若無方便，溺無為之坑；方便無般若，陷幻化之網。二輪不滯，一道無虧；權實雙行，正宗方顯。住無所住，佛事所以兼修；得無所得，智心所以恒寂。」

Answer: "When principle is attained, the myriad practices are accomplished; when the essential tenet is known, the thousand paths are unobstructed. One must not reject that and grasp this, clinging to the right while dismissing the wrong; one must tread the gate of non-obstruction and skillfully enter the path of universal practice. For this reason, the past Buddhas and our fundamental teacher Śākyamuni, throughout measureless kalpas, relinquished countless bodies and lives: either to seek the Dharma by extracting marrow and gouging their flesh, or to practice compassion by offering [their body] to a hawk and feeding a tiger. The Prajñā-śāstra states: 'For measureless kalpas the Tathāgata relinquished body, life, and wealth in order to uphold the saddharma. The saddharma is without limit; thus from an inexhaustible cause one attains an inexhaustible fruit, and that fruit is the three bodies.' Furthermore, from antiquity to the present in both India and this land, not a few bodhisattvas and eminent monks have relinquished their bodies, all abiding by Śākyamuni's authentic scriptures and fully emulating the bequeathed model of Bhaiṣajyarāja. The Biographies of Eminent Monks records that Master Ai entered Mount Zhongnan, carved off his own flesh and spread it upon the rocks, pulled out his intestines and hung them upon the trees, and passed away holding his own heart. Writing a verse upon a stone, he said: 'May I, having renounced this body, soon cause my body to attain sovereignty. / Having attained sovereignty in the dharmakāya, may I appear everywhere across all destinies; / Wherever there is benefit to be brought, may I protect the Dharma and rescue sentient beings. / Moreover, karmic retribution must come to an end; all conditioned dharmas are like this. / The traidhātuka is entirely impermanent; when the time arrives, there is no sovereignty. / Slain by others or dying of oneself, one ultimately returns to such a place; / This is what the wise find no joy in; my karma comes to an end today.' Also, the Bodhisattva Sengya, burning his body, said: 'To substitute for the suffering of all sentient beings, I first burn my hand.' The assembly asked: 'The bodhisattva burns himself, while sentient beings' sins are ripe and each must undergo their own suffering; how can you substitute for them?' He answered: 'Just as in burning a hand, a single thought of good roots can extinguish evil, is this not a substitution?' He further addressed the assembly: 'After my passing, take good care in making offerings to the sick. It is difficult to fathom their origin: most are Buddhas and sages who have manifested through provisional means. Unless one has a great and impartial mind, how could one show them reverence? This is true practice.' In the Tiantai lineage, Chan Master Man spent his life reciting the Lotus Sūtra; this moved a divine being to manifest in bodily form to correct and determine the characters of the sūtras and dhāraṇīs. Later, he burned his body as an offering to the Saddharmapuṇḍarīka Sūtra. Furthermore, the disciple of Zhizhe, Chan Master Jingbian, burned his body in front of the repentance hall as an offering to the Bodhisattva Samantabhadra. Great Master Fu of Shuanglin wished to burn his body to relieve the suffering of sentient beings; forty-eight of his disciples in succession burned their own bodies in place of their master, requesting him to remain in the world to teach and transform sentient beings. Biographies expound upon this at length; they cannot all be cited. If one were to say, 'These are realms of the sages, actions performed as provisional manifestations,' then the sages would bear the fault of deceiving people, and ordinary persons would have no share in reaching sagehood; the net of the teachings would be laid out in vain, and upāya would be empty. The original intent was to guide those who come after and adapt to those in the present so that ordinary people may truly realize [the fruit]; even if they are provisional manifestations, they are also meant to be emulated by later generations. One must not deceive people into practicing perverse and inverted dharmas; the true compassion of the Great Sage is ultimately never false or deceptive. For this reason, the eighty-four thousand Dharma gates are all nothing other than liberation; a single thought of slight goodness all tends toward tathatā. There are inherently the initial stage and the subsequent stage, the tolerance of beings and the tolerance of dharmas; one should not simply use the superior to disparage the inferior, nor the inferior to overstep the superior. One must properly know the right time and assess one's own faculties and strength; one must not evaluate others as good or bad and forcibly establish right and wrong. Words are the seed of calamity, bringing future karma upon oneself. Moreover, bodhisattvas who have attained tolerance, although realizing the dual emptiness of beings and dharmas, still burn their arms and immolate their bodies—like Bodhisattva Bhaiṣajyarāja and Sengya—for the sake of benefiting others and destroying the defilement of stinginess. As for those who have not yet perfected tolerance, though knowing how to use the fire of wisdom to burn the fuel of affliction and clearly understanding the dual emptiness without producing a view of the self, if their active obstructions are heavy and they have not yet attained accord, yet they give rise to a courageous mind and put into motion genuine practice—repaying kindness, making offerings to the Buddha, taking on suffering, and practicing compassion—wishing to accomplish an auxiliary gate to the path without producing grasping desires, then provided they are not deceiving themselves, their deeds will not be in vain. If, perchance, their eye of wisdom is not yet clear and self-grasping still arises, such that they merely seek cause and effect and their resolution is not steadfast, then attempting to emulate the precedents of past sages does not fall under this case. Sentient beings' capacities differ, and what they value is diverse. Thus the sūtra states: 'The Buddha said: "If sentient beings could be liberated through falsehood, I would also speak falsehood."' Therefore we know that while phenomena arise from a thousand contrivances, principle returns to a single source. They are all the Great Compassion and skillful upāya. Some, by abandoning body and life, suddenly enter the tolerance of dharmas; some, through single-minded dhyāna-concentration, suddenly awaken to non-arising; some realize their original purity and verify the gate of dharmatā; some practice the contemplation of impurity and ascend the path of detachment; some dwell in seven-jeweled mansions and advance to the sage's fruit; some abide in charnel grounds and beneath trees, heading toward nirvāṇa. Thus the gates of liberation, numerous as dust and sand, all lead to deliverance when entered; the boundless net of teachings, when understood, returns to truth. The words bequeathed by the Great Sage are never set forth in vain. It is like traveling to a distant place: arrival is the only goal; one does not stop midway to dispute about what is difficult and easy. Therefore we know that a physician does not rely solely on powders, and the sky is not perpetually clear; one must harmonize pills and powders, and balance both yin and yang; then all illnesses are cured together, and the myriad things flourish in unison. All these are provisional applications; in reality there is no fixed dharma. Adapting to their inclinations, he meets what is suitable. One takes only the realization of the Way as one's aim, without discriminating whether the entry gate is coarse or subtle. If one forms attachments to the four gates of the perfect teaching, they are still something to be cured by the initial gate of the tripiṭaka teaching. Therefore, the gate of the perfection of giving practiced by bodhisattvas is like a prisoner escaping through a latrine hole, or a sick person recovering by consuming foul medicine. Without contemplation, there is no way to pull out the root of the illness of the three poisons; without practice, there is no way to transcend the prison of existence in the traidhātuka. The Classic of History says: 'What captures a bird is a single mesh of the net, but one cannot make a net out of a single mesh. The governing of a state depends on the merit of one person, but one person cannot constitute the state.' Thus, when all practices are fully provided and the myriad good practices are cultivated together, a single practice returns to the source and the thousand gates naturally become upright. The sūtras explain: the twelve links of dependent origination are one dharma; when contemplated with the four equanimous minds, one attains four kinds of bodhi. If one were only to accept people of the highest capacities, those of medium and lower faculties would be completely excluded. Therefore, propagating the partial teaching possesses the merit of bringing things to completion; reaching the treasure abode depends on the power of the conjured city. How could one abandon this and grasp that, cling to the real and slander the provisional, suddenly discard beings' karmic capacities, and extinguish the Buddha's upāya? Thus it is said: 'Dividing the provisional from the real, the provisional is the real's provisional; opening the provisional to reveal the real, the real is the provisional's real.' If one is confused about the two gates of the provisional and the real, one's wisdom will lack sovereignty. The Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra states: 'Sentient beings are liberated through various causes and conditions in differing ways: some are liberated through dhyāna-concentration; some are liberated through keeping precepts and expounding the Dharma; some are liberated through light touching their bodies. It is like a city having many gates: the places of entry are distinct, but the place arrived at is the same.' As for the statement that the power of prajñā is profound: indeed, prajñā conceives the sages and nurtures the worthy, containing spirituality and holding subtlety. When highlighted, it is the tenet, the head, the guide, and the reliance; when fused, it contacts every realm to encompass emptiness, and there is nothing that is not prajñā. Thus the sūtra states: 'Because form is boundless, prajñā is boundless.' The Treatise of Sengzhao says: 'The three poisons and the four inversions are all pure; why should purity be honored in prajñā alone?' Why now make choices of grasping and rejecting, seeking to flee from emptiness and avoid shadows? Furthermore, the esoteric intention of all Buddhas and the purports of their teachings are difficult to delimit; like deceiving young children with an empty fist, they entice and deliver all beings; having no fixed dharma, it is named Great Bodhi. Failing to understand that prajñā has the function of breaking through attachments and is therefore praised especially in the teachings, you instead generate views based on words, and thus become confused because of the directions. Therefore, prajñā can guide the myriad practices; if there were no myriad practices, how could prajñā be applied? Exclusively eating sauce and drinking salt water spoils the flavor and causes harm; exclusively clinging to emptiness and seizing upon annihilation destroys wisdom and produces transgression. The Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra states: 'Śakra had the thought: "If prajñā is the ultimate dharma, practitioners should just practice prajñā; what use is there for other dharmas?" The Buddha answered: "The six pāramitās of a bodhisattva, because the prajñāpāramitā harmonizes them through the dharma of non-attainment, are themselves the prajñāpāramitā. If one only practices prajñā and does not practice the other dharmas, then one's merits will not be complete, neither fine nor wondrous. It is like a foolish person who does not understand the various ingredients of food, and hearing that sauce is the master of all flavors, simply drinks plain sauce, losing the flavor and causing harm. The practitioner is also like this: wishing to eliminate attachments of mind, he only practices prajñā, and consequently falls into wrong views, unable to advance in good dharmas. If it is harmonized with the five pāramitās, then merits will be complete and the flavor of the meaning will be balanced and suitable."' The Laṅkāvatāra-sūtra states: 'The swift paths of a bodhisattva are two: first, the path of upāya, which can serve as causes and conditions; second, the path of prajñā, which can reach quietude.' Therefore, prajñā without upāya drowns in the pit of the unconditioned; upāya without prajñā sinks into the net of illusions. When both wheels are unobstructed, the Single Path is without flaw; when the provisional and real are practiced together, the correct tenet is revealed. Abiding in non-abiding, the Buddha's works are thereby cultivated together; attaining non-attainment, the mind of wisdom is thereby eternally quiescent."