佛祖歷代通載 9.37

9.37

In the tenth month of the first year of Datong, the Master was about to manifest nirvāṇa. Daofu, the nun Zongchi, Daoyu, Huike, and others were attending at his side. He said, 'The time is approaching. Why do you not each state what you have attained?' Then Daofu said, 'According to my view, neither grasping at words nor departing from words, one acts for the functioning of the Way.' The Master said, 'You have attained my flesh.' The nun Zongchi said, 'What I see now is like Ānanda seeing the land of Akṣobhya Buddha: once seen, it is never seen again.' The Master said, 'You have attained my skin.' Chan master Daoyu said, 'The four elements are fundamentally empty, and the five skandhas do not exist; from where I see, there is not a single dharma to be attained.' The Master said, 'You have attained my bones.' The Great Master Huike then made three prostrations and returned to his place, standing [silently]. The Master said, 'You have attained my marrow.' Then, looking at Huike, he said, 'The Bhagavān entrusted the treasury of the eye of the correct Dharma to Mahākāśyapa, and it was transmitted successively down to me. I now entrust it to you; you must protect and uphold it. I also confer upon you the kāṣāya to serve as a token of faith in the Dharma.' Huike knelt and received the robe, wishing to hear instructions. The Master said, 'Inwardly I transmit the Dharma-seal to tally with the true mind; outwardly I bestow the Dharma robe to determine the ancestral tenet. In later generations, morals will decline and doubts and suspicions will arise competitively, saying, "I came from the Western Land, and you are from this region; on what basis did you attain the Dharma, and what serves as proof?" Should you encounter adverse conditions, simply bring forth this robe to manifest trust, and your teaching will be unhindered. Over two hundred years after my passing, the robe will cease to be transmitted, and the Dharma will spread throughout worlds as numerous as sand grains; those who silently accord and secretly tally with it will number more than tens of thousands. You must expound and transform, never looking down upon the unawakened. With a single thought turning back the capacity [of the mind], one is identical with what was originally possessed. Listen to my gāthā: / "I originally came to this land / To transmit the Dharma and save deluded beings. / A single flower opens into five petals, / And the bearing of fruit naturally matures."' He also said, 'I have the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra in four fascicles, which I also bestow upon you; it is the essential gateway to the mind-ground of the Tathāgatas. Since leaving Southern India to come to this eastern land, I saw that the Red County of the Divine Continent had the atmosphere of the Mahāyāna, and so I crossed oceans and deserts to seek people for the sake of the Dharma. When conditions were not yet harmonious, I was like someone foolish or inarticulate. Now that I have attained you to transmit it to, my intention is complete.' He then went with his disciples to Qiansheng Monastery at Yumen. Yang Xuanzhi, governor of Qicheng, asked, 'In the Five Indies of the Western Heaven, masters are succeeded as patriarchs. What is their Way like?' The Master said, 'One who clarifies the Buddha-mind school, whose practice and understanding correspond, is called a patriarch.' Xuanzhi said, 'Your disciple has long revered the Three Jewels, but my wisdom is dim and obscure. I pray the Master will compassionately disclose the essential tenet.' The Master answered him with a gāthā: / 'Not seeing evil and giving rise to aversion, / Not observing good and striving to establish it; / Not abandoning wisdom to draw near to folly, / Not throwing away delusion to approach awakening; / Comprehending the Great Way beyond all measure, / Clarifying the Buddha-mind beyond limitation; / Not tangled with the ordinary or the sacred, transcendent— / This is called a patriarch.' Hearing the gāthā, Xuanzhi bowed with his head to the ground and said, 'I pray the Master will, in his compassion and forbearance, dwell long in the world.' The Master said, 'My affinity for transforming is finished, and the transmission of the Dharma has found its person. I shall soon pass away.' On that day, sitting upright, he entered nirvāṇa. His disciples enshrined his whole body and buried it at Dinglin Monastery on Mount Xiong'er. The next year, the Wei envoy Song Yun returned from the Western Regions and met the Master at the Congling Mountains, carrying a single shoe in his hand, striding along alone with an airy grace. Yun asked, 'Where is the Master going now?' He replied, 'Going to the Western Heaven.' When Yun returned to court and recounted the affair in full, the disciples opened the crypt, and there were only the empty coffin and a single shoe remaining. Emperor Wu of Liang heard about the full circumstances of the Master’s manifestations and personally composed an inscription, carving it into stone on Mount Zhong.