佛祖統紀 8.20

8.20

The sixteenth patriarch, the Venerable Baoyun, Yitong, courtesy name Weiyuan, was from the kingdom of Goryeo and belonged to the Yun clan (born in the dinghai year, the second year of the Tiancheng era under Mingzong of the Later Tang). His physical marks were extraordinary: he had a fleshy protuberance on the crown of his head, and his fine white eyebrow-hair curled elegantly, stretching five to six inches in length. In his youth, he took Shizong of Guishan cloister as his master. After receiving the full precepts, he studied the Avataṃsaka and the Awakening of Faith, becoming revered throughout his country. During the Tianfu era of the Jin, he travelled to China (at the end of Tianfu, the Master was only sixteen or seventeen, right at the time of receiving the full precepts and studying the Avataṃsaka; his coming to China must have been after twenty. Reckoned by chronology, it should have been between the Han and Zhou dynasties; the statement here of Tianfu is probably an error). Reaching Yunju on Mount Tiantai (the dwelling of the State Preceptor Shao), he suddenly had an awakening. When he called upon Luoxi and heard the doctrine of the threefold contemplation in a single mind, he sighed, saying: 'The learning of the perfect and sudden ends upon this path!' He thereupon remained to receive instruction. After a long while, the reputation of his full embodiment [of the teachings] spread far and wide. One day he bade farewell to his fellow disciples, saying: 'I wish to guide with this Path those who have not yet heard it, and I must begin from the land of my parents.' He then packed his bags, went down east, and passed through Siming, about to board a sea-vessel. The prefect, Grand Preceptor Qian Weizhi (son of King Zhongyi, Qian Chu), hearing of the Master's arrival, invited him with heightened courtesies to inquire into the essentials of the mind, and further requested him to be his Bodhisattva-precept Master, personally carrying out the ritual of transmission and reception. Monastics and laypeople flocked in reverence, all looking up to him as a model. Master Qian firmly detained him, saying: 'Whether something is checked or set in motion (The Mencius: "A man’s progress is [at times] set in motion; his stop is [at times] checked") is not within the power of a disciple. If it is a matter of benefiting living beings, why must it be Jilin (an alternative name for Goryeo)?' The Master said: 'Since conditions have united with you, my refusal will not turn you away.' Thereupon he stopped his departure. In the first year of Kaibao (under Taizu of the present dynasty), the Transport Commissioner Gu Chenghui, who had repeatedly received the Master’s instructions, first gave up his residence to make the Chuanjiao Cloister, inviting the Master to dwell there. In the fourth year of Taiping Xingguo, Fazhi first began to study under the Master (the Master was fifty-three; Fazhi was twenty). In the twelfth month of the sixth year, his disciple Yande went to the capital to petition for a temple plaque. In the fourth month of the seventh year, the plaque 'Baoyun' was bestowed. In the first year of Yongxi, Ciyun first began to study under the Master (the Master was fifty-eight; Ciyun was twenty-two). The Master expounded the teachings and contemplation for nearly twenty years; those who ascended the hall and received his transmission were beyond counting. He would always address people as 'fellow countrymen.' When someone asked why, he said: 'I take the Pure Land as my native land; all of you are bound to be reborn there, so all of you are people of my native land.' On the twenty-first day of the tenth month in the first year of Duanhong, he passed away lying on his right side. On the day of his cremation (jhāpita), relics (śarīra) filled his bones. His disciples reverently buried him at the northwest corner of the King Aśoka Monastery (before King Aśoka Monastery was turned into a Chan institution, its monks had invited Baoyun and other masters to establish lecture assemblies repeatedly; after Baoyun passed away, his bones were therefore buried in this ground). He lived sixty-two years. In the first year of Zhiping (under Yingzong), his Dharma-grandson Zongzheng, abbot of Nanhu, built a square tomb and stone stūpa, composing a record to commemorate it (seventy-seven years later). In the seventh year of Xuanhe (under Huizong), Changyuetang, abbot of King Aśoka Monastery, finding the ground overgrown and the stūpa dilapidated, moved the bones to Mount Wushi together with Master Wei of Baoyun. The bones were luminous and sparkling, clinking crisply when struck; five-coloured relics multiplied upon the bones, and there were those who obtained handfuls of them. Later, the abbot Zhiqian recarved the stone stūpa inscription at the Wushi Hermitage (see the stone stūpa record in the Zhenzu ji).