續傳燈錄 9.6

9.6

Chan Master Wenyue of Yunfeng on Mount Nanyue was a son of the Xu family of Nanchang. At first he went to Dayu. Hearing him instruct the assembly, saying: 'Everyone gathers together to eat a stalk of pickled vegetable; if you call it a single stalk of pickled vegetable, you enter hell like a shot arrow,' he then stepped down from his seat. The Master was greatly frightened, and that night he went to the Abbot's quarters. Dayu asked: 'What have you come seeking?' The Master said: 'I seek the mind Dharma.' Dayu said: 'Before the Dharma wheel turns, the food wheel turns first. While you are young and your physical strength is robust, why do you not beg for food on behalf of the assembly? I have no leisure even to endure hunger—what leisure do I have to expound Chan for you?' The Master did not dare disobey. Not long after, Dayu moved to Cuiyan. Having completed his fund-raising task, the Master again crossed over to Cuiyan to seek instruction. Cuiyan said: 'The Buddha Dharma has not yet rotted away. In the snowy cold, you should beg for charcoal on behalf of the assembly.' The Master also accepted the charge and performed his duties well. He again went to the Abbot's quarters. Cuiyan said: 'The hall superintendent's office lacks a person; now I trouble you with it.' The Master received it without joy, resenting Cuiyan for not penetrating his mind-ground. While sitting behind the privy racks, a bucket hoop suddenly broke and fell from the rack. The Master suddenly attained awakening and instantly saw Cuiyan's function. He ran, throwing on his saṅghāṭī robe, and went up to the sleeping hall. Cuiyan smiled to welcome him, saying: 'Karmadāna, I am pleased indeed that the great matter is finished!' The Master bowed twice, and before he could utter a single word, he departed. He attended on him for eight years. Later, he appeared in the world at Cuiyan. At that time, the head monk led the assembly out to welcome him and asked: 'The ancestral vehicle of Deshan is not what I ask about; what is the great function of Linji?' The Master said: 'Where have you come from?' As the head monk hesitated, the Master struck him with his palm. As the head monk prepared to reply, the Master shouted and said: 'Lead the assembly back!' From then on, the entire assembly stood in awe of him. A monk asked: 'What is the Way?' The Master said: 'No picking up lost articles on the road.' The monk said: 'What is the person on the Way?' The Master said: 'The grass-bandit is utterly defeated.' The monk bowed. The Master sighed with a hiss. A monk asked: 'The ten thousand dharmas return to the one; where does the one return?' The Master said: 'The Yellow River has nine bends.' The monk asked: 'What is the first phrase?' The Master said: 'Hands hanging past the knees.' The monk asked: 'What is the second phrase?' The Master said: 'Ten thousand miles to Yaizhou.' The monk asked: 'What is the third phrase?' The Master said: 'A dung basket and a broom.' A monk asked: 'What is the Buddha Dharma in the deep mountains and precipitous cliffs?' The Master said: 'A monkey climbing a tree upside down.' A monk asked: 'What is the matter beneath the patch-robe?' The Master said: 'Bones inside the skin.' A monk asked: 'Without involving trivialities, please, Master, speak quickly.' The Master said: 'Mount Sumeru.' A monk asked: 'What is the pure Dharma body?' The Master said: 'Firewood grounds and reed grass.' He ascended the hall and said: 'If words do not leave the rut, how can one escape coverings and entanglements? A patch of cloud lying across the valley entrance—how many people are confused as to the source? Therefore it is said: "Words do not display the matter; speech does not accord with the capacity. Those who accept words are lost; those who stagnate in phrases are confused." When you people arrive here, upon what do you base your understanding?' After a long pause, he said: 'If you wish not to incur the retribution of uninterrupted hell, do not slander the Tathāgata's true wheel of the Dharma.' He ascended the hall and said: 'The past buddhas have already perished; the future buddhas are not yet born. Right at this very day, the Buddha Dharma is entrusted fully to Cuiyan. Letting go, it accords with capacities and benefits beings; holding fast, it crumbles like tiles and dissolves like ice. Tell me, is holding fast good, or is letting go good?' After a long pause, he said: 'Bah! You wild fox spirits!' He struck the Chan bed and stepped down from the seat. He ascended the hall and said: 'You people coming up like this is much like thrusting your heads into a tub of glue. Going down like this is also stumbling on level ground. Even if you neither come nor go, morning brings three thousand strikes and evening brings eight hundred.' He ascended the hall and said: 'Is the Way far off? Touch anything and it is true. Is the sage far off? Embody him and you are spiritual. Therefore, the Sahā world uses sound to perform the Buddha's work; the Gandhavyūha world uses fragrant food to perform the Buddha's work. Here at Cuiyan, solely within inhalation and exhalation, one makes offerings to and serves all the buddhas of past, present, and future, as numerous as dust and sand, without a single one being neglected. All the buddhas of past, present, and future, as numerous as dust and sand, are Cuiyan's attendants—not a single one fails to arrive. If a single one fails to arrive, thirty blows of the staff! Do you head monks understand? Offering this profound mind to the dust-mote realms is called repaying the Buddha's kindness.' He ascended the hall and said: 'The root of sentient beings relies on the ocean of wisdom as its source. The flow of conscious beings takes the entire Dharma body as its substance. It is only because sentiments arise that wisdom is blocked, and thoughts change so that substance seems different. When one reaches the origin, sentiments are forgotten, and the mind is known to unite with substance. Do you Chan worthies understand? The ancient Buddha crosses paths with an exposed pillar; the Buddha hall butts heads with a lantern. If you do not understand, double layers snap in two.' He ascended the hall and said: 'Carrying a bamboo pole along, one acts out the play wherever an occasion arises. Even so, one hand alone does not clap. In the assembly, is there a master Chan guest, a patch-robed monk of fundamental capacity, who will step forward to sing in harmony together? Is there?' At that time a monk came forward and bowed. The Master said: 'Barely resembling a tune, it was just worthy to hear, / When blown by the wind again into another melody.' He then stepped down from his seat. He ascended the hall and said: 'Dawn breaks and daylight appears; the ten thousand matters are all accomplished. Uttarakuru grows non-glutinous rice.' He stepped down from his seat. He ascended the hall and said: 'Where there is a Buddha, do not stay; where there is no Buddha, run quickly past. With staffs slung across your shoulders, where are you people going on itinerant pilgrimage?' After a long pause, he said: 'Holding the alms-bowl in Pūrvavideha; eating rice in Aparagodānīya.' He ascended the hall and said: 'Even if the mind penetrates measureless time, across kalpas how has it ever differed from today? Tell me, what about today's matter?' After a long pause, he said: 'A black turtle bores through a wall.' He ascended the hall and said: 'Seeing, hearing, sensing, and knowing are free of obstruction; sights, sounds, scents, and touches are constantly in samādhi. A patch-robed monk says: "I understand! Mountains are mountains, waters are waters; when hungry, I eat rice, when tired, I sleep." Suddenly Mount Sumeru jumps up into your nostril, and a makara fish pierces through your eyes—how do you deliberate this?' After a long pause, he said: 'Go to the hall and practice!' He ascended the hall and said: 'Severing with a single sword cut does not yet deserve to be called an ancestral master; leveling the high to suit the low is certainly not the work of a master craftsman. When Cuiyan reaches here, his mouth is like a carrying pole. How do you people deliberate this?' After a long pause, he said: 'If you wish not to incur the retribution of uninterrupted hell, do not slander the Tathāgata's true wheel of the Dharma.' He ascended the hall and said: 'If you see that all marks are not marks, then the mountains, rivers, and great earth are completely free of fault. You head monks wear robes and eat rice all day long, yet you have never bitten into a single grain of rice, nor have you ever had a single thread hanging on you. Then you can turn the great earth into gold and churn the long river into ghee. Even though it is like this, wearing robes and eating rice are not absent, yet you have not even dreamed of the foul stench under a patch-robed monk's gate.' He ascended the hall and said: 'Samantabhadra's practice, Mañjuśrī's wisdom: on Potalaka cliff a pure breeze arises. A blind donkey follows the herd across Silla; the magpie's tongue is three thousand miles long.' He ascended the hall, held up his staff, and said: 'Holding an alms-bowl toward the Gandhavyūha world, why is there no way to step out? Carrying the sun and moon on the tip of the staff, why do those with eyes act as if blind? Even if the wind moves and the grass bends, echoes conform and sounds harmonize, with not the slightest speck remaining, it is still the dharma of contention. What is the dharma of non-contention?' He struck with his staff and stepped down from the seat. He ascended the hall and said: 'Linji's vanguard was let off by one move; Deshan's later command is put aside for now. How do you speak the single phrase that stands uniquely revealed without partiality?' After a long pause, he said: 'Lamentable indeed was Zhongli Mei under Chu!' He struck the Chan bed with his fly-whisk and stepped down from the seat. He ascended the hall and said: 'The teaching says: "All kinds of grasping and rejecting are saṃsāra. If one attempts to discern complete enlightenment without having escaped saṃsāra, that nature of complete enlightenment joins in the transmigration; if one hopes to escape saṃsāra, there is no such possibility." When you people arrive here, how will you discern complete enlightenment?' After a long pause, he said: 'Lotus leaves are round, round like mirrors; water caltrops are pointed, pointed like awls.' He struck the Chan bed with his fly-whisk. He ascended the hall and said: 'An ancient said: "Mountains, rivers, and stone walls do not obstruct the eye's vision."' The Master said: 'What is the eye?' He picked up his staff, struck the Chan bed once, and said: 'Mount Sumeru shattered into a hundred fragments is not what I ask about; tell me, how old is the Dragon King Sāgara?' A lay scholar asked: 'What is the Buddha?' The Master said: 'Wearing robes and eating rice according to the family's means.' The scholar said: 'If so, then I shall take three steps back, cross my hands in front of my chest, and leave.' The Master said: 'Adding a cup after being drunk is not as good as having none.' At an evening informal gathering, he cited Baizhang instructing the assembly on New Year's Eve: 'You crowd of youngsters certainly do not understand the sūtras, vinaya, and treatises, and having entered the assembly to practice Chan, you do not understand Chan either. On the thirtieth day of the twelfth month, how will you settle the account?' The Master said: 'Truly, Chan worthies! We are far removed in time from the sages, and people's minds are indifferent. Look at today's monasteries—there is simply no proper place anywhere. Either they gather three to five hundred disciples in a tumultuous crowd, considering abundant food and comfortable quarters alone to be a flourishing transformation, while among them there is not a single person diligently striving for the Way. Even if there are five or ten scurrying up and down, half-green and half-yellow, as soon as they understand something, they all say: "I understand!" Each considers himself to hold the jewel of the spiritual serpent, and who is willing to acknowledge error? When it comes to prodding and whipping them forward, there is truly not one in ten thousand. How bitter! How bitter! As the saying goes: "The grove of prajñā withers year by year; the wild grass of ignorance grows year by year." Especially among today's youngsters, as soon as they enter the assembly, they immediately hold their hands upright in their sleeves and receive offerings from others. Everywhere, they do not pick a single stalk of greens, nor do they carry a single bundle of firewood; their ten fingers do not touch water, and a hundred matters do not concern their minds. Although they enjoy pleasure for a time, how can they avoid burdening themselves in the three miserable destinies? Do you not see what is said in the teaching: "Better to wrap hot iron around one's body than to receive the robes of a person of faith; better to pour molten copper into one's mouth than to receive the food of a person of faith." If you head monks have truly realized it, even if the great earth is turned into gold and the long river is churned into ghee to make offerings to you, it would not be beyond your due. If you have not yet realized it, then even down to a drop of water or an inch of thread, you must put on fur and horns, pull the plow and drag the harrow, to repay them before you are done! Do you not see what the Patriarch said: "If one enters the Way without penetrating the principle, one will repay the offerings of faith in physical form." This is a definite matter, never in vain. Head monks! Time is to be cherished; time waits for no man. Do not wait until one day the light of your eyes falls to the ground, with not a single basket of work in the field of the black robes, sinking into the pains of a hundred punishments in the Iron Enclosure! Do not say I did not tell you. Take care!'