景德傳燈錄 18.3

18.3

Great Master Zongyi of Xuansha in Fuzhou, whose Dharma name was Shibei, was a native of Min County in Fuzhou. His surname was Xie. In his youth he was fond of angling, drifting in a small skiff on the Nantai River in company with the various fishermen. Early in the Xiantong reign period of the Tang, when he had just turned thirty, he suddenly longed to leave the dust [of the world], so he abandoned his fishing boat and went to Chan Master Lingxun of Mount Furong to have his head shaved. He went to Vinaya Master Daoxuan at Kaiyuan Monastery in Yuzhang to receive full ordination. In a hemp robe and straw sandals, his food only just kept him breathing, and he would often sit in tranquil meditation all day long, so that everyone was amazed by him. He and Xuefeng Yicun were originally brothers in the Dharma, yet they were as close as master and disciple. Xuefeng called him an ascetic (dhūta) on account of his austere practices. One day Xuefeng asked, "Which one is Ascetic Bei?" He replied, "To the end I would not dare deceive anyone." On another day Xuefeng called out, "Ascetic Bei, why do you not go on an extensive pilgrimage?" The Master said, "Bodhidharma did not come to the Eastern Land; the Second Patriarch did not go to the Western Heavens." Xuefeng approved of this. When [Xuefeng] ascended Mount Xianggu, [the Master] joined forces with him to establish [the monastery]. Students of the profound gathered like clouds. The Master entered [Xuefeng's] room to resolve doubts without interruption morning and night. Furthermore, upon reading the Śūraṅgama-sūtra, he clarified his mind-ground. From this, his responsiveness to situations was swift and keen, in silent accord with the sūtras. Whenever students of the profound from all quarters had unresolved questions, they invariably sought instruction from him. When it came to inquiring and challenging Upādhyāya Xuefeng, he also did not defer even to his teacher. Xuefeng said, "Ascetic Bei is a person who has returned [from a past life]."

One day Xuefeng ascended the hall and said, "If you want to understand this matter, it is like an ancient mirror on its stand: when a foreigner comes, a foreigner appears; when a Han person comes, a Han person appears." The Master said, "What happens when the clear mirror suddenly arrives?" Xuefeng said, "Both foreigner and Han person are concealed." The Master said, "The old upādhyāya's heels have not yet touched the ground."

The Master sat in the hall for a long time; the assembly all thought he would not preach the Dharma, and all at once each returned [to their quarters]. The Master then scolded them, saying: "Look! They are all of one kind—not a single one has wisdom. As soon as they see me open these two flaps of skin, they all crowd around seeking words and mental calculations. What is my reality, for their sake they never know at all. See how exceedingly difficult, how exceedingly difficult it is!"

The Master sometimes said: "Virtuous Chan monks, you all travel about on pilgrimage and claim, 'I practice Chan and study the Path.' Is it because there is some extraordinary place, or is it just wandering about asking here and there? If you have something, try to present it; I will verify right and wrong for you. I know all of it—do you still have anything? If not, you should know you are merely pursuing amusement. Since you have come here, I now ask you: do all of you have eyes? If you do, right now you ought to recognize [it]. Do you recognize it? If you do not recognize it, then when I call you people born blind and born deaf, is that so? Do you agree with this statement? Virtuous Chan monks, do not put yourselves down either! In your reality, when were you ever such people? The Buddhas of the ten directions place you upon the crowns of their heads, not daring to err by the slightest fraction. They only say, 'This matter only I can know.' Do you understand? Nowadays those who succeed one another all claim to inherit from Śākyamuni. I say Śākyamuni is a fellow practitioner with me. Who do you say he practiced with? Do you understand? It is not at all easy! Know that only with great awakening can one begin to understand and know it. If it is an awakening of defined limits, one cannot see it either. Do you recognize great awakening? It certainly cannot be that you recognize its reflection before a skull! It certainly cannot be your speaking of emptiness, speaking of nonexistence, speaking of this side or that side, of mundane dharmas, or of something that is not a mundane dharma! O monks, space itself is still phantom-born from delusion and error; if you now truly accept [the real], where would there be such designations? When there is not even any news of space, where are the three realms? The sequence of karma, the conditions of parents, birth, and setting you up before and after—to speak of nonexistence now is still deceptive speech, how much more so [to speak of] existence, you know? You monks who have been on pilgrimage for a long time claim that there is a matter of awakening. I now ask you: on the summit of a mountain or a sheer cliff, in a place completely cut off from human beings, is there still the Buddha Dharma? Can you still discern it? If you cannot discern it, you are not there yet. I usually say: directly before a deceased monk, that is right where bodhi meets the eye, the sign behind the crown shining with spiritual light for ten thousand leagues. If a person can see it, they can effortlessly emerge from the realm of the aggregates and cast off the mental concepts before their skull. In the end, it is merely your true person. Where else could there be another separate dharma capable of covering it? Do you know? Do you still have faith? Can you take charge of it? You must make great effort!"

The Master also said: "I now ask you people: for now, what matter have you undertaken? In what world have you settled your body and established your life? Can you discern it? If you cannot discern it, it is just like pressing the eyes and producing flowers—whatever you see is mistaken. Do you know? Right now, seeing before you the mountains, rivers, the great earth, form, emptiness, light, darkness, and all various things—these are all the marks of flowers of wild agitation, called inverted knowledge and views. Now, one who leaves the household life recognizes the mind and penetrates the root, therefore they are called a śramaṇa. Now that you have already shaved your head, donned the robes, and taken on the appearance of a śramaṇa, you ought to have a share in benefiting oneself and benefiting others. Look at you now: all pitch-black, resembling black ink! You cannot even save yourselves; how can you understand how to act for others? Worthy ones, the cause and conditions of the Buddha Dharma are a great matter. Do not take it lightly, gathering your heads together, talking wildly and chattering, wasting time in pursuit of amusement! Time is hard to regain; what a pity for great men! Why do you not examine yourselves and see what matter this is? Take the ancestral tradition from of old: it is the crown clan of all Buddhas. Since you cannot take charge of it, therefore I use skillful means to urge you: just continue through Kāśyapa's gate and transcend suddenly! This one gate transcends your ordinary and sacred, cause and effect; it transcends his ocean of the wondrously adorned worlds of Vairocana; it transcends his skillful means gate of Śākyamuni; directly, for eternal eons, it does not allow a single thing to become an object seen by your eyes. Why do you not urgently investigate it? You must not say, 'Let me wait for two or three lifetimes to accumulate pure karma for a long time.' Worthy ones, what matter is your ancestral vehicle? It cannot be attained by your physical and mental effort and adornment; the Dharma cannot be attained through knowledge of other minds or recollection of past lives. Do you understand? Take Śākyamuni's emergence [in the world]: he performed so many transformations and taught the twelve divisions of the canon, like pouring water into a vase, performing a great Buddha-work for your sake. In this gate, not a bit of it can be used; not a hair's breadth of artifice can be used. Do you know? It is like a dream event, also like talking in one's sleep. A śramaṇa should not have to show his head—it is precisely because he recognizes and knows it! Do you know? Recognizing it is the great release, the great showing of one's head. Therefore it is said: transcending the ordinary and surpassing the sacred, emerging from birth and departing from death, departing from cause and departing from effect, transcending Vairocana and surpassing Śākyamuni, not deceived by ordinary, sacred, cause, or effect; in all places no one recognizes you. Do you know? Do not merely harbor long-standing longing for the net of love of birth and death, dragged along by good and bad karma with no share of freedom! Even if you refine your body and mind to be equal to empty space, even if you reach the place where pristine clarity is settled and unmoving, you still do not emerge from his aggregate of consciousness. The ancients called it like rushing water: flowing so swiftly that one is unaware, mistakenly taking it to be clear and still. Such cultivation never emerges from his boundary of saṃsāra; as before, one is spun around by it. Therefore it is said: 'All conditioned things are impermanent.' Even the fruits of practice of the three vehicles are fearsome like this; if one lacks the eye of the Path, it is also not ultimate. How much better from this day, as an ordinary person tied to the ground, without using a fraction of effort, to simply transcend suddenly! Do you understand how to save mental energy? Do you still wish and delight in it? I urge you: right now I am standing here waiting for you to see it; it does not require you to add effort and practice austerities. If not right now, what other time are you waiting for? Do you agree? Do you agree?"

The Master sometimes ascended the hall and addressed the assembly, saying: "Your reality is just like this." At other times he also said: "Bodhidharma is present right now. Do you all see him?"

The Master said: "You people see dangers and evils, see tigers, knives, and swords, all sorts of things threatening your life, and immediately boundless fear arises. What is it like? It is just like a painter in the world who paints an image of hell, and paints tigers, knives, and swords; after finishing, he looks closely at it and then becomes afraid of it himself! You people right now are also like this: seeing all kinds of things as existent, they are phantoms you produced yourselves, and you generate fear yourselves. It is also not another person's fault. Do you now wish to awaken from this phantom delusion? Just recognize your diamond eye! If you recognize it, it has never allowed a speck of dust to be exposed. Where would there still be tigers, wolves, knives, and swords capable of terrifying you? Even with such artifices as Śākyamuni had, he also could not find a way to show his head. Therefore I say to you: the eye of a śramaṇa holds the world fast, enclosing heaven and earth, not leaking a single hair. Where is there still a single thing to be your knowledge and perception? Do you know? Such release! Such wonder! Why do you not investigate it?"

The Master said: "You people are like someone sitting in the great ocean, submerged over your head in water, yet still stretching out a hand to beg people for water to drink. Do you understand? Now, a bodhisattva who studies prajñā must be of great capacity and have great wisdom before they succeed. If you have wisdom, right now you can find release. If your capacity is sluggish, you must endure toil and hardship day and night, forgetting fatigue and neglecting food, just like mourning deceased parents. Being so earnest and urgent throughout a whole lifetime, and further having someone to carry and guide you, investigating the truth to the marrow of your bones, you may also come to see it. What is more, nowadays who is a person capable of undertaking study? Worthy ones, do not merely memorize phrases and words just like reciting dhāraṇīs, stepping forward with mouths chattering away, and when held fast and questioned by someone, having nowhere to turn, you become angry and say, 'The upādhyāya does not answer my questions!' Studying things like this is great suffering! Do you know? There is a sort of upādhyāya sitting on a rope chair, claimed to be a kalyāṇamitra; when questioned, he immediately moves his body and hands, winks his eyes, sticks out his tongue, and stares blankly. There is another sort who says, 'Luminous and spiritual, the intellect of the spiritual terrace can see and hear, acting as the master within the bodily field of the five aggregates.' To be a kalyāṇamitra like this greatly misleads people! Do you know? I now ask you: if you recognize what is luminous and spiritual to be your reality, why is it that when you are asleep, it does not become luminous and spiritual? If it is not so when you are asleep, why is there a time when it is luminous? Do you understand? This is called 'mistaking a thief for one's son'—it is the root of birth and death, the conditioned breath of deluded thoughts. Do you wish to know this source? I tell you: your luminosity and spirituality only arise from distinguishing previous sense data such as form, sound, and fragrance, and then you say, 'This is luminous and spiritual.' If there were no preceding sense data, this luminosity and spirituality of yours would be the same as the horns of a hare or the hairs of a tortoise. Worthy ones, where is reality? If you now wish to emerge from that master within the bodily field of the five aggregates, just recognize your secret diamond body! An ancient said to you: 'Perfected, correct, and pervasive, it pervades the sand-realms.' Now I shall explain a little for you wise people, so that you may understand through a metaphor. Do you see this sun of Jambudvīpa? The enterprises, nourishment of the body, livelihoods, and various mental activities and deeds performed by worldly people—are they not all established relying on its sunlight? But does the body of the sun itself have diverse kinds and mental activities? Is there any place it does not pervade? If you wish to know this diamond body, it is also like this. Right now, the mountains, rivers, the great earth, the lands of the ten directions, form, emptiness, light, darkness, and your body and mind—are they not all manifested relying on your perfected, awesome light? Even the karmic sequence of gods and humans, the various kinds of living beings receiving birth and retribution, both sentient and insentient—are they not all relying on your awesome light? Even the Buddhas realizing the Path and attaining the fruit, receiving beings and benefiting living creatures—are they not all relying on your awesome light? But does the diamond body have ordinary people and Buddhas? Does it have your mental activities? You cannot just say 'there is none' and have it suffice! Do you know? Since you have such wonder, why do you not realize and clarify the place where you show yourself in plain sight? Instead, you follow along within the bodily field of the five aggregates making a livelihood in the ghost realm, directly deceiving yourselves. Suddenly, when the killing realm of impermanence arrives, with eyes wide in terror, clinging to body and clinging to life, at such a time it will be exceedingly difficult to withstand, just like a turtle having its shell stripped off alive—great suffering! Worthy ones, do not just treat sleepy views as sufficient; they cannot cover even a hair's breadth! Do you know? The three realms have no peace, just like a burning house. Moreover, you are not people who have attained peace and happiness; you merely gather in great herds to meddle in the mundane world, like wild deer running here and there, only knowing how to seek clothing and food. If you are like this, how can you practice the royal way? Do you know? Kings and great ministers do not constrain you; parents allow you to leave the household; donors of the ten directions provide you with food and clothing; the earth spirits and dragon gods protect you. You must have a sense of shame and know gratitude before you are worthy! Do not disappoint people. Sprawled out on the long platform beds, letting time waste away, saying, 'This is peace and happiness'—not at all! It is all nourished by gruel and rice; you will rot away like rotten winter melons, buried away in the soil, your karmic consciousness boundless with no root to rely upon. For what reason have śramaṇas reached such a state? Take the wriggling creatures on the great earth: I call them dwelling in the eon of hell. If you do not resolve it now, tomorrow or the next day, see yourselves transformed into the womb of a donkey or the belly of a horse, pulling plows and rakes, holding the iron bit and bearing the saddle, pounded in mortars and ground in mills, burned and boiled in fire and water—going there is not at all easy! Suffering it requires great dread. It is your own burden, you know! If you resolve it, directly and for eternal eons you will never be allowed to have news of this. If you do not resolve the causes and conditions of these afflictions and evil karma, it will not cease after one eon or two eons—it will last as long as your diamond [nature]! Do you know?"

Elder Nanjie arrived at Xuefeng's place. Xuefeng instructed him to visit the Master. The Master asked, "An ancient said, 'This matter only I can know.' What do you say, Elder?" Nanjie said, "One must know there is one who does not seek to know." (Guizong Rou offered an alternative by clapping three times.) The Master said, "Why does the upādhyāya at the peak of the mountain undergo so much hardship?"

Xuefeng, while doing communal labor clearing fields, saw a snake. Raising it with his staff, he called to the assembly, "Look! Look!" and cut it into two pieces with a blade. The Master tossed his staff behind his back and did not even look back. The assembly was astonished. Xuefeng said, "How sharp!"

One day, while accompanying Xuefeng on a walk in the mountains, Xuefeng pointed to a patch of ground and said, "A seamless stūpa could be built here." The Master said, "How tall would it be?" Xuefeng looked up and down. The Master said, "As for the dependent retribution of humans and gods, it is not as good as the upādhyāya; but as for receiving the prophecy on Vulture Peak, you are still far from it."

Xuefeng said, "When the world is one foot wide, the ancient mirror is one foot wide; when the world is ten feet wide, the ancient mirror is ten feet wide." The Master pointed to the brazier and said, "How wide is the brazier?" Xuefeng said, "As wide as the ancient mirror." The Master said, "The old upādhyāya's heels have not touched the ground."

The Master first accepted an invitation to dwell at the Puying Cloister at the Meixi salt-tax office. Later, he moved to Mount Xuansha. From then on, the monastic assemblies of the forests throughout the world all looked up to his reputation and submitted to him. Wang, the Military Commissioner of Min, invited him to expound the unsurpassed vehicle and treated him with the etiquette due a master. His students numbered over eight hundred, and the doors of the rooms were never closed.

The Master ascended the hall. After remaining silent for a long time, he addressed the assembly, saying: "I have exhausted myself to the utmost for your sakes; do you still understand?"

A monk asked, "What is it like when all is quiet and without words?" The Master said, "Why talk in your sleep?" The monk said, "Please, Master, speak of the fundamental matter." The Master said, "Why doze off?" The monk said, "I am dozing off; what about the upādhyāya?" The Master said, "How can you be so oblivious to pain and itch?" He also said: "What a pity for such great master-monks, traveling on pilgrimage for thousands and tens of thousands of miles to come here, yet unable to withstand a bit of dozing and sleep-talk, and so they give in!"

[A monk] asked, "What is the student's self?" The Master said, "What use do you have for a self?"

A monk asked, "Regarding the matter of the ancestral school from of old, what are the Master's words here?" The Master said, "Few listen." The monk said, "Please speak directly, Upādhyāya." The Master said, "Why suffer from deafness?"

He also said: "Worthy ones, nowadays matters leave me no choice, making me hold down such awesome light, earnestly advising you with bitter mouth, using hundreds of thousands of skillful means to say this and that. When I share knowledge and hearing with you, it all turns into inverted knowledge and views. Using this throat, lips, and mouth only results in the wild-fox karma of deceiving you. Do you agree? Whether there is fault or no fault, only I myself know; how could you understand? If such a person steps forward, they willingly submit to rebuke. Being a teacher and model for people is not at all easy; one must be a kalyāṇamitra before one can know it. Now, when I help you with such skillful means, you still cannot see it; if I were to uphold the ancestral vehicle purely, where would you place yourselves? Do you understand? The forty-nine years were skillful means. Take the assembly at Vulture Peak: there were a million in the assembly, yet only Kāśyapa alone personally heard it; all the rest did not hear. What do you say Kāśyapa personally heard? You cannot say that the Tathāgata's teaching without words was what Kāśyapa heard without hearing, and have it suffice! It certainly cannot be the matter of your cultivating causes to achieve results, adorned with blessings and wisdom! Do you know? Take the statement, 'I have the correct Dharma eye, which I entrust to Mahākāśyapa'—I say it is like talking about the moon. Caoqi raising the whisk was like pointing to the moon. Therefore it is said: in the realm of the Great Tang, regarding the matter of the ancestral vehicle, I have never seen a single person proclaim it. If someone were to proclaim it, everyone in the whole world would lose their lives, just like an iron hammer without a hole, all losing their sharpness and their tongues tied at once. You people are fortunate to have met me, who, disregarding body and life, share inverted knowledge and views with you and follow your wild ideas, so that you only then have a place to bring questions. If I did not have such hearing in common with you, where would you be able to see me? Do you understand? It is exceedingly difficult! Strive on! Take care!"

He then delivered a verse, saying: