景德傳燈錄 3.17

3.17

Zen Master Sengna had the surname Ma. In his youth, he had extraordinary talent and thoroughly mastered the ancient classics. At the age of twenty-one, he lectured on the Book of Rites and the Book of Changes in Donghai, and his listeners were as crowded as a marketplace. When he went south to Xiangbu, the assembly of students followed him there. Encountering the Second Patriarch preaching the Dharma, he and ten like-minded companions joined the Patriarch and went forth from home. From then on, his hand never held a brush, and he forever abandoned worldly texts. With only one robe, one bowl, one sitting, and one meal, he practiced the dhūta austerities. After having attended on the Patriarch for a long time, he later said to his disciple Huiman, "The mind-seal of the ancestral masters does not consist solely in austerities; they only aid the Way. If you accord with the original mind and bring forth the function of the true light that accords with wish, then austerities are like grasping earth and turning it into gold. If you only attend to austerities without understanding the original mind, bound by hatred and love, then austerities are like treading a perilous path on a dark moonless night. If you wish to understand the original mind, you must scrutinize and examine carefully: when encountering forms and encountering sounds, before sensation and reflection arise, where does the mind go? Is it non-existent, or is it existent? Once it does not fall into existence or non-existence, or into a location, then the mind-jewel alone shines brightly, constantly illuminating the world, without the separation of even a single speck of dust, never having the characteristics of interruption and continuation for even a single kṣaṇa. Therefore, our First Patriarch also transmitted the four fascicles of the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra, saying to my teacher, the Second Patriarch: 'I observe that in the land of Cīnasthāna, only this sūtra can seal the mind. If you, benevolent one, practice according to it, you will naturally cross over the world.' Furthermore, whenever the Second Patriarch finished preaching the Dharma, he would say: 'Four generations after this sūtra, it will turn into names and characteristics; how deeply lamentable! I now transmit it to you; you should guard and uphold it well. Be cautious not to transmit it to an unfit person.' Having given his entrustment, the Master then wandered from place to place, and no one knew his end.