禪關策進 1.77

1.77

兄弟。開口便道。我是禪和。及問他如何是禪。便東覰西覰。口如扁擔相似。苦哉屈哉。喫著佛祖飯。不去理會本分事。爭持文言俗句。高聲大語。略無忌憚。全不識羞。有般底不去蒲團上。究明父母未生以前本來面目。冷地裏學客舂。指望求福。懺除業障。與道太遠在○凝心斂念。攝事歸空。念想纔生。即便遏捺。如此見解。即是落空亡的。外道魂不返的死人。又有妄認能嗔能喜能見能聞。認得明白了。便是一生參學事畢。我且問爾。無常到時。燒作一堆灰。這能嗔能喜能見能聞的。什麼處去也。恁麼參的是藥汞銀禪。此銀非真。一煆便流。因問爾。尋常參箇什麼。答道。有教參萬法歸一一歸何處。又教我只如此會。今日方知。不是。就和尚請箇話頭。我道古人公案。有什麼不是。汝眼本正。因師故邪。累請不已。向道去。參狗子無佛性話。忽然打破漆桶。却來山僧手裏。喫棒。

"Brothers, as soon as you open your mouths you say, 'I am a Chan monk.' But when asked what Chan is, you gaze east and look west, your mouths clamped shut like a carrying pole. How bitter, how pathetic! Eating the food of the Buddhas and patriarchs, you do not attend to your proper task, but dispute over literary phrases and worldly lines, talking loudly and shouting, with no wariness or fear whatsoever, completely without shame. There are those who do not go to the meditation cushion to investigate and clarify the original face before father and mother gave birth, but in a cold, secluded place emulate a visiting grain-pounder, hoping to seek merit and repent of karmic hindrances; they are too far from the Way. [Others] concentrate the mind and rein in thoughts, gathering affairs back to emptiness; as soon as a thought arises, they immediately suppress it. Such an understanding is that of one who falls into empty voidness, an outsider whose soul does not return—a dead person! There are also those who mistakenly identify the ability to feel anger, happiness, seeing, and hearing, and once they clearly recognize it, they take that to be the completion of a lifetime of investigative study. Let me ask you: when impermanence arrives and you are burned into a pile of ashes, where does this ability to feel anger, happiness, seeing, and hearing go? What you investigate in this manner is quicksilver Chan; this silver is not real, and melts into liquid as soon as it is smelted. When you are asked, 'What do you usually investigate?' you reply, 'Someone taught me to investigate: "The ten thousand dharmas return to the one; where does the one return?" and also taught me just to understand it like this. Only today do I know it is wrong; I ask the venerable master for a huatou.' I say: 'In the ancients' gongans, what is not right? Your eye was originally upright, but became deviated due to the teacher.' When you repeatedly ask without stopping, I tell you: 'Go investigate the phrase, "A dog has no Buddha-nature."' If you suddenly smash the lacquer bucket, come to this mountain monk's hands to take the staff!"