景德傳燈錄 4.43

4.43

National Preceptor Huian of Mount Song (Tripiṭaka Master Yaśas's record says: "Nine women transcend human society; eight women sever marriage. Six legs are added to the rotten bed; the mind ancestor is revered among the assembly") was a native of Zhijiang in Jingzhou. His surname was Wei. In the seventeenth year of the Kaihuang era of Emperor Wen of the Sui, the empire-wide investigation of privately ordained monks and nuns examined the Master; he stated, "Wood has no name," and thereupon retreated into the mountains and valleys. In the Daye era, corvée laborers were mobilized on a large scale to dig the Tongji Canal. The starved corpses lay pillowed upon one another; the Master begged food to relieve them, and those who were saved were very numerous. Emperor Yang summoned the Master, but he did not go; he secretly entered Mount Taihe. When the Emperor traveled to Jiangdu and the realm fell into turmoil, [the Master], carrying his tin staff, ascended the Hengyue Temple and practiced the ascetic disciplines. During the Zhenguan era of the Tang, he arrived at Huangmei, where he visited the Patriarch Ren and obtained the essentials of mind. In the first year of the Linde era, he traveled to the stone cliffs of Mount Zhongnan and stayed there. Gaozong once summoned the Master, but he did not comply with the edict. Traveling through all the renowned sites, he arrived at Songshao and said, "This is the place of my end." From then on, Chan practitioners gathered like spokes at a hub. Tanran and Huairang came to visit him and asked, "What is the meaning of the Patriarch's coming from the West?" The Master said, "Why not ask about the meaning of oneself?" [They] said, "What is the meaning of oneself?" The Master said, "You should observe the secret functioning." [They] said, "What is the secret functioning?" The Master demonstrated it to them by opening and closing his eyes. At these words, [Tan]ran knew where to return and went nowhere else. [Huai]rang's encounter did not mesh; he took his leave and went to Caoxi. Empress Wu summoned [the Master] to the imperial capital, treating him with the etiquette of a master and revering him equally with Chan Master Shenxiu. The Empress once asked the Master his age in cyclical years. He replied, "I do not remember." The Empress said, "Why do you not remember?" The Master said, "The body of birth and death is like a ring: a ring has neither beginning nor end, so what use is remembering? Moreover, this mind flows on continuously without any gap; seeing bubbles arise and cease is mere delusion. From the first consciousness to the phase of movement, and at the time of cessation, it is just like this. What year or month could be remembered?" Hearing this, the Empress bowed her head, believed, and accepted it. Soon after, in the second year of the Shenlong era, Zhongzong bestowed upon him a purple kāṣāya and ordained fourteen disciples [for him], furthermore inviting him into the forbidden palace to receive offerings for three years; he was also granted a set of monk's robes. The Master took his leave and returned to Mount Song. On the third day of the third month of that year, he instructed his disciples, saying, "After I die, carry my corpse into the forest and wait for a wild fire to cremate it." Soon, Master Wanhui came to see the Master, shaking his hand and conversing wildly; the attendants on both sides inclined their ears, but none of them understood. On the eighth day, he closed his doors, lay down, and passed into silence, aged one hundred and twenty-eight (He was born in the renyin year, the second year of the Kaihuang era of the Sui, and passed away in the jiyou year, the third year of the Jinglong era of the Tang; at that time he was called National Preceptor Laoan). The disciples obeyed his instructions and carried [his body] into the woods. Indeed, a wild fire naturally cremated him, yielding eighty grains of śarīra, among which five grains were reddish-purple in color; these were retained in the palace. In the second year of the Xiantian era, his disciples erected a stūpa.