釋氏稽古略 3.212

3.212

鳥窠禪師　諱道林。杭州富陽潘氏子。母朱氏誕時異香光明滿室。因名曰香光。九歲出家。二十一於荊州果願寺受戒。後詣長安西明寺復禮法師。學華嚴經起信論。禮示以真妄頌。俾修禪那。師問曰。初云何觀。云何用心。禮久而無言。師三禮而退。屬代宗詔徑山道欽禪師至闕。師就得以謁之。契悟心要。及南歸錢塘孤山永福寺。有辟支佛塔。時道俗共為法會。師振錫而入。有靈隱寺韜光禪師曰。此之法會何以作聲。師曰。無聲誰知是會。後見西湖之北秦望山有長松枝葉繁茂盤屈如蓋。遂棲止其上。故時人謂之鳥窠禪師。有鵲巢於側。人又曰鵲巢和尚。至是元和間。白侍郎居易由中書舍人出刺杭州。聞師之道。因見師棲止巢上。乃問曰。師住處甚險。師曰。大守危險尤甚。曰弟子位鎮山河何險之有。師曰。薪火相交識性不停得非險乎。曰佛法大意如何。師曰。諸惡莫作眾善奉行。曰三歲孩兒也解恁麼道。師曰。三歲孩兒雖道得。八十翁翁行不得。侍郎欽嘆。數從問道。乃起竹閣於湖上近師之居。以便朝夕之參益。竹閣者今曰廣化寺。侍郎遺像存焉。師於穆宗長慶四年二月十日告侍者曰。吾今報盡。言訖跏趺而化。勅諡圓修禪師。師嗣國一欽禪師。四祖旁派（傳燈）。

Chan Master Niaoke. His taboo name was Daolin. He was a son of the Pan family of Fuyang in Hangzhou. When his mother, of the Zhu clan, gave birth to him, an unusual fragrance and brilliant light filled the room, so he was named Xiangguang. At the age of nine he left home. At twenty-one he received the precepts at Guoyuan Monastery in Jingzhou. Later, he went to Dharma Master Fuli at Ximing Monastery in Chang'an and studied the Avataṃsaka Sūtra and the Awakening of Faith. Fuli showed him the "Verses on True and False" and bade him cultivate dhyāna. The master asked, "At first, how does one contemplate? How does one apply the mind?" Fuli was silent for a long time without speaking. The master made three prostrations and withdrew. When Emperor Daizong summoned Chan Master Daoqin of Mount Jingshan to the imperial palace, the master went and had an audience with him, attaining awakening to the essentials of mind. When he returned south to Yongfu Monastery on Gushan in Qiantang, there was a pratyekabuddha stūpa. At that time monastics and laity held a Dharma assembly together; the master shook his khakkhara and entered. Chan Master Taoguang of Lingyin Monastery said, "Why do you make noise at such a Dharma assembly?" The master said, "Without noise, who would know there is an assembly?" Later, seeing on Mount Qinwang north of the West Lake a tall pine whose luxuriant branches and leaves coiled and twisted like an umbrella, he then took up residence atop it. Thus the people of the time called him Chan Master Niaoke (Bird's Nest). A magpie built a nest beside him, so people also called him Magpie-Nest Reverend. By the Yuanhe era, Attendant Gentleman Bai Juyi, having left his post as Secretariat Drafter to serve as Prefect of Hangzhou, heard of the master's Way. Coming to see the master lodging in the nest, he asked, "The place where the master dwells is extremely perilous." The master said, "The Governor's danger is even far greater." [Bai] said, "This disciple holds an office that guards the mountains and rivers—what danger could there be?" The master said, "Firewood and flame interacting, the nature of consciousness never ceasing—how could that not be perilous?" He asked, "What is the great meaning of the Buddha Dharma?" The master said, "Do no evil, reverently practice all good." [Bai] said, "Even a three-year-old child understands how to say that!" The master said, "Although a three-year-old child can say it, an eighty-year-old man cannot practice it." The Attendant Gentleman admired him with sighing praise, and repeatedly approached him to inquire about the Way. He then built a bamboo pavilion on the lake near the master's dwelling to facilitate morning and evening visits for instruction. This bamboo pavilion is today called Guanghua Monastery; the Attendant Gentleman's surviving portrait is preserved there. On the tenth day of the second month in the fourth year of the Changqing era of Emperor Muzong, the master told his attendants, "My retribution is now exhausted." Having spoken these words, he sat cross-legged and transformed. By imperial order he was posthumously titled Chan Master Yuanxiu. The master was a Dharma heir of Chan Master Guoyi Qin, a collateral branch of the Fourth Patriarch (Transmission of the Lamp).