景德傳燈錄 27.13

27.13

Chan Master Zhizhe, Zhiyi of Xiuchan Monastery on Mount Tiantai, was a native of Huarong in Jingzhou. His secular surname was Chen. His mother was of the Xu clan. When she first became pregnant, she dreamt of fragrant five-colored smoke wafting and coiling around her bosom. On the night of his birth, an auspicious light shone throughout the neighborhood. From childhood he had remarkable features, and his skin seemed never to take on dirt. At the age of seven, he entered Guoyuan Monastery; hearing a monk recite the "Universal Gate" chapter of the Lotus Sūtra, he chanted along with him. Suddenly he spontaneously remembered the text of all seven scrolls as though from past familiarity. At fifteen, he made vows before a Buddha image, resolving to leave home. In a trance-like state, as in a dream, he saw a great mountain bordering the sea, atop whose peak a monk was beckoning with his hand, and then led him into a monastery, saying: "You shall dwell here, and you shall finish your days here." At eighteen, having lost both parents, he went to Guoyuan Monastery and left home under the monk Faxu. At twenty, he took the full precepts. In the first year of Tianjia of the Chen dynasty, he went to Mount Dasu in Guangzhou to visit Chan Master Huisi. As soon as Huisi saw him, he said: "Formerly on Vulture Peak we listened together to the Lotus Sūtra; now you have come again." He then revealed to him the bodhimaṇḍa of Samantabhadra and explained the four comfortable practices. The Master entered contemplation for three weeks; his body and mind were completely opened, and concentration and wisdom blended together. Past supernormal knowledges secretly dawned within him, known clearly to himself alone. When he reported his awakening to Huisi, Huisi said: "Were it not for you, none would have realized it; were it not for me, none would have recognized it. This is the preliminary skillful means of the Lotus Samādhi, the initial revolving dhāraṇī. Even tens of thousands of scholars of written texts could never exhaust your eloquence. You may transmit the lamp; do not become one of the last people who extinguish the seed of Buddhahood." Having received this seal of confirmation, in the first year of Taijian he took his leave with bows and went to stay in Jinling to propagate the teachings. Whenever he preached the Dharma, he did not establish words and letters, and due to his eloquence, he never tired day or night. In the seventh year, the yimao year, he dismissed his disciples and went into seclusion at the Folong Peak of Mount Tiantai. Chan Master Dingguang had already been living on this peak; he said to his disciples: "Before long, a kalyāṇamitra leading disciples will arrive here." Shortly thereafter, the Master arrived. Dingguang said: "Do you still remember that time in the past when I raised my hand to beckon you?" The Master immediately realized the sign given when he had bowed before the image, and was filled with mingled joy and sorrow. They then clasped hands and went together to the hermitage. That night, they heard the sounds of bells and chimes in the empty air. The Master asked: "What auspicious omen is this?" Dingguang said: "This is the sign of the gaṇḍī gathering the monks to take up residence. This place of golden ground, I have already occupied; you should reside on the silver ground of the northern peak and open a mountain monastery." Later, Emperor Xuan built Xiuchan Monastery and allotted the tax revenue of Shifeng county to cover the community's expenses. When Emperor Yang of the Sui invited the Master to confer the Bodhisattva Precepts upon him, the Master gave the Emperor the Dharma name Zongchi ("Dharani"), and the Emperor in turn honored the Master with the title Zhizhe ("Wise One"). The Master often said: "The Lotus Sūtra is the wonderful scripture of the One Vehicle. It sweeps away attachment to the teachings of the phantom city, releases stagnant feelings regarding the straw hut, opens the provisional gate of skillful means, reveals the marvelous principle of reality, integrates the minor practices of diverse good deeds, and returns them to the vast and great One Vehicle." Thereupon he produced the Profound Meaning, setting forth the fivefold mysteries: explaining the title, discerning the essence, clarifying the central theme, discussing the function, and classifying the teachings. In terms of the title, it raises both Dharma and metaphor together: the wonderful Dharma of the One Vehicle is the fundamental nature of sentient beings, which is not defiled even when amidst ignorance and afflictions, just as a lotus flower dwells in muddy mire yet its nature is ever pure; hence it is taken as the title. This sūtra opens the provisional to reveal the real, abolishes the provisional to establish the real, and integrates the provisional to return to the real, just as the flower of the lotus contains, opens, and drops away, while the fruit of the lotus conceals, appears, and is fully formed. It also means manifesting traces from the origin and revealing the origin through the traces. Now, the titles of sūtras do not go beyond Dharma, metaphor, and person; whether single, compound, or complete, there are seven types in all (three single, three compound, and one complete), which subsume all titles. "Wonderful Dharma Lotus Flower" is one of the compounds (Dharma and metaphor combined as a compound). The title serves to evoke the essence. The essence is the true aspect of reality, for all characteristics have no substance apart from the true aspect. The central theme is the cause and effect of the One Vehicle, which is worthy of veneration because it opens, reveals, awakens to, and enters into the insight and vision of the Buddhas. The function is its powerful operation, for it possesses the power to open, abolish, and integrate. Then, as for classifying the teachings: the teachings of the Tathāgata throughout his lifetime are comprehensively classified into five periods and eight teachings. The five periods are: first, the period when the Buddha, newly awakened to the Way, taught the Avataṃsaka for bodhisattvas of superior faculties; second, the period of teaching the Āgamas for those of lesser capacity; third, the period of teaching the Vaipulya sūtras to reprimand partiality and suppress the lesser, while praising the great and extolling the complete; fourth, the period of teaching the Prajñāpāramitā sūtras to sweep away characteristics and dispel attachments; fifth, the period of integrating the provisional to return to the real, conferring predictions of Buddhahood upon practitioners of the three vehicles and all sentient beings, by preaching the Lotus Sūtra and the Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra. The eight teachings comprise the four teachings of ritual method—namely sudden, gradual, secret, and indeterminate—and the four teachings of doctrinal content—namely the Tripiṭaka teaching (the four noble truths of arising and ceasing), the Shared teaching (the non-arising four noble truths), the Distinct teaching (the immeasurable four noble truths), and the Complete teaching (the non-contrived four noble truths; only the complete principle of the Lotus Sūtra, extending even to making a livelihood, business enterprises, a single color or scent—none of which is not the true aspect of reality). These encompass all that the Tathāgatas of the three periods of time have expounded, exhausting their import (the four direct teachings and three connecting teachings are detailed in the original doctrinal works); anything departing from this is the teaching of Māra. The doctrinal principles having been clarified, without contemplative practice there is no way to return to one's nature. Thus, relying on the principle of the three truths in one mind (the true, the conventional, and the middle), he demonstrated the three cessations and three contemplations: in each contemplation of the mind, thought after thought cannot be grasped. Moving first through emptiness, next through conventionality, and later through the middle, leaving behind the two extremes to contemplate the single mind like the moon beyond the clouds—this is the active characteristic of the Distinct teaching. He once said: "For shattering all delusions, nothing surpasses emptiness; for establishing all phenomena, nothing surpasses conventionality; for plumbing all natures to their depths, nothing is greater than the middle." Therefore, when one is the middle, all are the middle; there is no conventionality and no emptiness that is not the middle. Emptiness and conventionality are likewise so: this is the active characteristic of the Complete teaching, like the three eyes of Maheśvara, neither vertical, horizontal, parallel, nor separate. (The verse of the fourteenth patriarch, the Bodhisattva Nāgārjuna, says: "Phenomena arisen through causes and conditions, I declare to be emptiness; they are also called conventional designations; they are also the meaning of the Middle Way." This accords with the three contemplations of śamatha, samāpatti, and dhyāna taught in the Śūraṅgama and Sūtra of Perfect Enlightenment; although the names are different, their purport is one. Master Bodhidharma transmitted mind with mind without stagnating in names and numbers, directly serving those of the highest supreme faculties and wisdom so that they might forget the trap and forget the concept; therefore, it is the same as this teaching yet not the same. Chan Master Zhizhe exhaustively investigated principles and fully developed natures, providing a complete gate; therefore, it differs from the Chan school yet is not different.) When the three contemplations are completely accomplished, the Dharma-body is not bare, and one avoids being like the poor son. Fearing that students might still be confused about cultivation and nature or fall into one-sided attachments, he further created the meaning of the "six stages of identity" to cut off this calamity. First is the identity in principle: the sentient beings of the ten Dharma realms, down to the tiniest midges, all share the wondrous nature; from the origin, it is ever-abiding, pure, and complete in its enlightened essence, uniformly equal in a single principle. (Those attached to names and characteristics do not believe that the mind itself is the Buddha; seeing this, they generate faith.) Second is the identity in words and names: although the principle nature is level and equal, those who follow the worldly flow use it daily without knowing it, and must rely on words and verbal teachings for external perfuming to hear the name and generate faith and understanding. (The Awakening of Faith says: "Because there is a deluded mind, one is able to know names and meanings." From this point onward, those of blind realization are excluded.) Third is the identity in contemplative practice: having heard the name and developed understanding, one must rely on the aforementioned three contemplations to return to the source. (This is the stage of external ordinary beings in the Complete teaching. Contemplating the five aggregates comprehensively as an inconceivable realm is the stage of the five grades. The Great Master manifested dwelling in this stage. The ten stages of faith in the Distinct teaching, as well as the Tripiṭaka and Shared teachings, are all called the stage of provisionary equipment.) Fourth is the identity in resemblance: as the merit of contemplative practice deepens, resembling functions are brought forth. (This is the stage of internal ordinary beings. Universally subduing ignorance, one enters the stage of the iron wheel of the ten faiths. Without severing delusions of view and thought, from the seventh faith onward, delusions of view and thought naturally collapse, and one attains purity of the six faculties. As the sūtra says: "The eyes born of father and mother see all three thousand realms," and so forth. Chan Master Huisi manifested dwelling in this stage. In the Distinct teaching, this corresponds to the thirty mental states before the grounds; in the Tripiṭaka and Shared teachings, both are called the stage of intensified effort. In the Śūraṅgama Sūtra and the Vijñaptimātratāsiddhi-śāstra, after the thirty minds, four intensified efforts are separately established; although the names and stages are the same, their purports are vastly different. Only those of thorough awakening skillfully synthesize them.) Fifth is the partial identity in reality: as the three minds open and develop, one attains the function of true suchness, and with each stage grows ever more superior. (Awakening the initial abode of the Complete teaching is the stage of the bronze wheel. Like the dragon girl attaining Buddhahood in a single thought and manifesting bodies in a hundred realms, from here onward one advances through to the stage of virtual enlightenment. All forty-one mental states are designated as true causes; though the stages differ, the complete principle is without distinction. In the Distinct teaching, this is called the ten grounds; in the Tripiṭaka and Shared teachings, both are called the stage of seeing the Way.) Sixth is the ultimate identity: ignorance is extinguished forever, the enlightened mind reaches its ultimate perfection, and one realizes that which is beyond realization. (This is wondrous enlightenment. The Awakening of Faith says: "The non-duality of the initial and fundamental enlightenment is called ultimate enlightenment." The Benevolent King Sūtra calls it the supreme forbearance of quiescent extinction. It subsumes the provisional Buddhas of the Distinct teaching, corresponding only to the second stage of the Complete practice. The Buddhas of the Tripiṭaka and Shared teachings may be understood from this.) As the above six stages are all identical with Buddha (neither degrading nor blurring them), they generally possess the three bodies—Dharma, enjoyment, and transformation—as their primary fruit (the three treasures and three virtues correspond and interweave; extending even to ten groups of three dharmas, completely subsumed without remainder. A verse says: "The Way, consciousness, nature, and prajñā; bodhi, the Great Vehicle, and the body; nirvāṇa and the virtues of the three treasures—each and every one consists of three dharmas"), and accordingly dwell in four lands as their dependent fruit. The four lands are: first, the Land of Eternally Quiescent Light (the land of Dharma-nature; the Dharma-body dwells in it, body and land corresponding); second, the Land of Real Reward and Unobstructedness (encompassing both forms of enjoyment: the land of self-enjoyment is dwelt in by the reward Buddha himself, while the land of other-enjoyment is dwelt in by bodhisattvas who have mounted the grounds); third, the Land of Expedient Means with Remainder; fourth, the Land of the Common Abode of the Pure and Defiled (both of these are lands of response and transformation, dwelt in by bodhisattvas prior to the grounds, practitioners of the two vehicles, and ordinary beings). In reality, it is neither body nor land, without superior or inferior; for the sake of responding to capacities, body and land are provisionally spoken of, and superior and inferior are distinguished. The Master attained the mutual interpenetration of body and land and the non-obstruction of the provisional and real; hence for more than thirty years, day and night he expounded them, producing four kinds of benefit and equipping the four siddhāntas. (Siddha means universal, and dāna translates as giving; the Chan Master's Dharma was universally bestowed upon sentient beings, who gained benefit according to their capacities, as it is said: the worldly siddhānta produces the benefit of joy, and so forth.) His disciple Guanding recorded tens of thousands of words daily and compiled them, comprehensively designating them the Tiantai Teaching, and dividing them into various categories (such as the Profound Meaning and Textual Phrases of the Lotus Sūtra, Great and Small Calming and Contemplation, treatises on contemplations for the Golden Light, Benevolent King, Vimalakīrti, and Nirvāṇa sūtras, the Sixteen Contemplations Sūtra, etc., and the Four Teachings and Gates of Chan, totaling over a hundred fascicles). The transmission through successive generations flourished in Jiangsu and Zhejiang. On the seventeenth day of the eleventh month in the seventeenth year of Kaihuang of the Sui dynasty, the Emperor sent an envoy to summon the Master. As he was about to set out, he said to his disciples: "I go now and shall not return. You must complete the Southern Monastery on Folong in strict accordance with my plans." An attendant said: "If not by the Master's own power, how could it be accomplished?" The Master said: "It will be accomplished by the royal house; you will see it, but I shall not." (Earlier, when the Master wished to build a monastery at the Stone Bridge, while in meditative quiescence he saw three spirits wearing black caps and crimson robes escorting an old monk, who said to the Master: "If you wish to build a monastery, now is not the time. When the three kingdoms become one, there will surely be a great donor who will build a monastery for you. When the monastery is completed, the realm will become pure; it should be named Guoqing ('Country Purified')." Having spoken, they disappeared. In the eighteenth year of Kaihuang, the Emperor dispatched the Sima Wang Hong to enter the mountain and build the monastery according to the plan, fulfilling the previous prediction.) On the twenty-first day, the Master arrived before the hundred-foot stone statue at Shicheng Monastery east of Shan and advanced no further. On the twenty-fourth day, he looked at his attendant and said: "Avalokiteśvara has come to welcome me; before long I should depart." At that time, his disciple Zhilang inquired: "I do not know what stage you have attained or where you will be born?" The Master said: "Because I did not refrain from leading the assembly, I have only attained the purification of the six faculties by abandoning myself to benefit others, being counted among the five grades." (The disciples of the five grades are at the stage of the preliminary skillful means of the Lotus Samādhi, secretly tallying with what Chan Master Huisi had said in the past.) He asked for a brush and composed a verse on contemplating the mind, and after chanting the essential guidelines of the various Dharma-gates, he sat cross-legged and passed away. He was sixty years old and had spent forty years as a monk. His disciples escorted him back to the Folong Cliff. In the ninth month of the first year of Daye, Emperor Yang was touring Huaihai; he sent an envoy to escort the disciple Zhizao and an inscription for the monastery's plaque into the mountain to attend the memorial feast on the anniversary of the Master's death. On the day they arrived, they gathered the monks and opened the stone chamber, only to see an empty couch. At that time, a thousand monks had gathered, but suddenly there was one extra person; all said that the Master's transformation body had come to receive the state offering. From the time the Master first received Chan teachings until his final passing away, he always wore a single tattered robe, never taking it off in winter or summer. He came and went, living on Mount Tiantai for twenty-two years, and constructed twelve great bodhimaṇḍas, of which Guoqing was the very last, and together with Yuquan Monastery in Jingzhou and others, there were thirty-six in all. He ordained fifteen thousand monks, copied fifteen complete sets of the Buddhist canon, and made eight hundred thousand gold, bronze, sculpted, and painted images. His deeds were extremely extensive, as recorded in his full biography.