緇門警訓 6.18

6.18

Now, an informal instruction is what is called "household training." What is meant by household training? For example, a family may have three or five sons; what the elder ones did today, what the younger ones did today, whether right or not, when they return in the evening, the parents judge each matter one by one. In the monasteries it is also like this: what was done at the monastery today, whether right or not, the abbot should judge each matter one by one. Looking at the present time, the monasteries are insipid and people's faculties are narrow and inferior, beyond description. There is a sort of bankrupt sthavira who send letters and messages, seeking a monastery to preside over here and seeking a monastery to preside over there. As soon as they obtain a monastery to preside over, they pick an auspicious day to enter the monastery, and furthermore say, 'I am a sthavira,' enjoying pleasures at ease within the abbot's quarters. This sort is called the dregs of hell. Nowadays in the monasteries, when it comes to Chan inquiry, such persons are indeed hard to find. I see this band of fellows here, inwardly indignant and mouths muttering, saying, 'I understand Chan, I understand the Way!' They enter the abbot's quarters, taking advantage of a quick tongue to prop up a couple of turning words, and then walk off. It is not this principle at all! There is another sort of fellow who, through vague impressions, recognizes a stubborn emptiness and immediately says, 'It is just this matter!' There is another sort who say they see light and shadows in empty space. There is another sort who say, 'There is nothing that is not it!' They are mistaken! Beyond salvation! This sort is fit only for the peace and happiness of the physical body. Let them not be struck down at once by illness in the Life-Prolonging Hall, flailing hands and feet like a crab fallen into boiling water, seeing gods and seeing ghosts, seeking a shaman here and a physician there, divining misfortune and divining good fortune, inquiring after good and inquiring after bad! Do you not see? Our Buddha, the Tathāgata, is the King of Physicians for the traidhātuka and the Compassionate Father of the four forms of birth, healing the mental illnesses of all sentient beings. It is only because you do not believe in your own mind and seek externally that demonic spirits and goblins enter your minds, producing so many views. Do you wish to recognize your own mind? It is like the sun at noon: all under heaven is bright; where else could there be darkness? If you reach this ground, there are no hexagram images of good or ill fortune, nor right and wrong, good and bad. Then you can sit atop right and wrong and lie atop right and wrong, and even brothels, taverns, tigers' dens, and demons' palaces are all places where one establishes one's life. It is solely because for measureless kalpas your karmic consciousness has been heavy and thick, with your minds jumping, wavering, agitated, and entangled, and your faith cannot reach it, that you are bound by worldly affections, thrown into utter confusion: people from Jiangnan protect people from Jiangnan; people from Guangnan protect people from Guangnan; people from Huainan protect people from Huainan; people from the north protect people from the north; people from Hunan protect people from Hunan; people from Fujian protect people from Fujian; monks from Sichuan protect monks from Sichuan; monks from Zhejiang protect monks from Zhejiang. Saying, 'A fellow countryman of mine is residing in a monastery, I will go assist him'—one day if something falls short, it is completely overturned into right and wrong spoken everywhere! How bitter, how bitter! Going on itinerant pilgrimage like this is completely disgraceful and humiliating! If one is a real fellow, severing it with a single stroke, how much freedom and ease! But if you cannot sever it, you will be bound by affection everywhere: loving form, you are bound by form; loving monasteries, you are bound by monasteries; loving fame, you are bound by fame; loving profit, you are bound by profit; loving the body, you are bound by the body. Why do you not take a step back and reflect: what good is there in this stinking bag of skin of yours? At that time, simply because you had a single thought of lustful affection, you entered your mother's womb and received your father's semen and mother's blood, intercourse forming a lump of pus. When the mother ate hot food, you endured the hell of boiling cauldrons; when the mother ate cold food, you endured the hell of freezing ice. And when you burst out from your mother's womb, you endured cold and endured heat, endured hunger and endured fullness, endured sickness and endured pain, tormented and oppressed right up to today. Solely because you cannot reflect inwardly, there arise so many rights and wrongs, births and deaths: 'I live, you die; you die, I live'; living, dying, dying, living, receiving retribution according to karma without cessation. Recently, there is another sort of slave-dog: hired for money, they buy an ordination certificate, shave their dog heads, and put on the Buddha's kāṣāya. Not distinguishing master from servant, unable to tell beans from wheat, they enter my Dharma to destroy my Dharma. Consistently decking out their whole bodies, swaying their waists and holding their hips, wildly waving and thrashing about, wanting to act like great men. Great men do not act like that! If you want to be a great man, you must step back and not, before others' faces and behind their backs, with servants' lips and maids' tongues, dislike good and speak evil, saying food and drink are lavish here, or the dormitories are comfortable there—none of this is needed! Eminent monks! A human body is hard to obtain, the Buddha's Dharma is hard to hear. If this body is not delivered in this life, in what life will you deliver this body? Do you all want to engage in Chan inquiry? You must put it down! Put down what? Put down the four great elements and the five aggregates; put down the multitude of karmic consciousnesses accumulated over measureless kalpas; investigate thoroughly right beneath your own feet to see: what principle is this? Pushing back and forth, suddenly the flower of the mind bursts into blossom, illuminating the lands of the ten directions. It can be said that what is grasped in the mind responds to the hand: then you can transform the great earth into yellow gold and churn the long river into sarpirmaṇḍa. Would this not be the great joy of a lifetime? Do not merely recite words from books, seeking Chan and seeking the Way! Chan and the Way are not in books. Even if you could recite the entire canon of teachings and the hundred schools of philosophy, they would still just be idle words; when dying, they are of no use at all. The ancients, having awakened, only then sought an enlightened master to discern and decide, removing the sand and gravel to leave pure authenticity, weighing catty and ounce—just like someone opening a general store with everything in stock: if someone comes to buy licorice, give him licorice; if someone comes to buy coptis, give him coptis—you must not give licorice when someone buys coptis! It is also like having a lump of gold: putting it into a blazing furnace to smelt it, smelting back and forth until it is thoroughly refined; only then do you apply tongs and hammer to beat it into vases, plates, hairpins, and bracelets. How many ounces the vase weighs, how many ounces the plate weighs, each is distinct and clear. Afterward, you melt these vases, plates, hairpins, and bracelets back into a single piece of gold—this is called the one-flavor equal Dharma-door. If it is not like this, it is entirely blurry Suchness and muddled Buddha-nature! Do you still understand? Do you still believe? Just now this mountain monk answered this monk with four turning words, saying: 'Within death there is life; within life there is death. Within death fear death; within life fear life.' Testing all the patch-robed monks under heaven with these four turning words—tell me: with what will the patch-robed monks under heaven test them?" After a long pause, he said, "Basically, one must grant that their bone and flesh are good; even without rouge, she is naturally charming." (Recorded Sayings)