弘明集 2.13

2.13

I reply: "The purport of my previous treatise has already made this clear: the compilations of worldly scholars focus exclusively on traces of governance; words that surpass the world were either scattered and lost from historical records, or destroyed and extinguished in the burning of books and burying of scholars. Now I shall once again lay out my thoughts. The books of the Three Sovereigns are called the Three Fen, which speak of the Great Dao. In that time, filial piety and kindness were naturally complete; how could they have instructed with humaneness and righteousness? Pure simplicity was not yet abandoned; what would there have been for those like Laozi and Zhuangzi to sway? If they did not illuminate the spirit as originating in the unarisen and making empty all natures to shine upon the ultimate, what else would be regarded as the Great Dao? These texts are lost; who in the world would recognize them? When Sima Qian described the Five Emperors, he said of all of them that they were 'born divine and efficacious,' or 'able to speak while infants,' or 'named themselves,' and were 'profound, penetrating, and their wisdom was like spirits.' They already resemble Mahāyāna bodhisattvas who manifest transformations and are born. Residing on the hill of Xuanyuan, ascending Mount Kongtong, climbing Mount Ji and Mount Tai, traveling to the Youling and Panmu trees—their free and unrestrained traces were transcendent. How do we know they did not follow the way of the Tathāgata? Given the long eras of the Five Emperors—Yao governed for a hundred years, and Shun for seventy—the mysterious influence of figures like Guangcheng, Dawei, Hongya, Chao Fu, Xu You, the father of Zizhou, the transformed men, and the four masters of Mount Gushe accumulated and overflowed at that time. Yet among the Five Dian, only two chapters on Tang and Yu remain, being extremely sparse and incomplete. Zichang's records also state that the sayings of the Hundred Schools concerning the Yellow Emperor 'are not elegant and proper in language, so the gentry find them hard to speak of.' He recorded only deeds of subjugation and traces of governance, yet not one in ten thousand was recorded. How could it be that because the flourishing of the ultimate Dao is not seen in incomplete chapters, it must all be false? Now, divine and enlightened rulers traveled in a vast world, leading the seven sages at Jici and visiting the divine man at Gushe; what need is there to speak further of the life of a single transformation? How do we know that what was refined in their subtle words did not plumb the spirit beyond billions of kalpas? The words of Guangcheng say, 'The essence of the ultimate Dao is deep and dark'—this is the Śūraṅgama Samādhi. 'Those who attain my Dao become sovereigns above and kings below'—this means ascending or descending in accordance with transformation to become flying emperors, wheel-turning sage kings, and the like. 'Those who lose my Dao see light above and become soil below'—this also refers to being born and dying within the realms of devas and humans. That [the Yellow Emperor], stimulated by Dawei's wind, addressed him as Heavenly Master and withdrew—this is also one of the ten titles [of a Buddha]. I suspect that the transformation of the unarisen was profoundly deep in those times, and its karma flowed among the mysteriously supreme; but deeds were lost in antiquity and the principle was obscured along with the texts. Therefore, what the Hundred Schools gathered was as if understood yet obscure; furthermore, the gentry scholars did not regard it as elegant and proper, thus causing those who sacrifice themselves for worldly matters without deepening themselves in the Dao to rely on historical records to suppress the ultimate principle, following immediate inclinations while neglecting distant transformations, and entangling their spirits across eternal kalpas—is this not lamentable? Boyi described the Classic of Mountains and Seas, saying that in the country of Tiandu, 'they lean on people and love people.' Guo Pu's commentary says that antiquity called Tiandu 'Tianzhu,' where Buddhism arose; the meaning of 'leaning on and loving' is also the Tathāgata's instruction of great compassion. It was indeed already heard in the era of the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors; that the state records did not transmit it is not sufficient cause for doubt. In general, from the Three Dynasties down to the era of Confucius and Laozi, how could anything outside the historical records be measured? When Confucius asked about ritual, Laozi explained it to him; when the Gatekeeper Yin requested it, he again clarified the Dao for him. Supposing those two chapters had lost their words and were preserved solely in the Book of Rites, how could later generations not regard the Old Man under the Pillar simply as an old Confucian who knew ritual—how could they know he embodied the mysterious wind? Today, books of a hundred generations have drifted away amidst preservation and loss, and principles cannot be fully present; how can one judge by what is seen and cut off the interaction of Confucius and Laozi? Dongfang Shuo's answer to Emperor Wu of Han regarding the kalpa fire, and Liu Xiang's Liexian zhuan recording seventy-four persons found in Buddhist scriptures—the scholars' glimpse through a bamboo tube in these matters did not begin with Emperor Ming of Han. However, those who gallop their spirits beyond the world are numerous and prominent, while those who bind their sincerity in the subtle and obscure are few and hidden; thus the reality of latent stimulation is not proclaimed among worldly matters. Master Dao'an's teacher Fotudeng was humane and sage. In the era of Shi Le and Shi Hu, he said to Hu, 'Within the city of Linzi there is the site of an ancient King Aśoka monastery, where there are still images and dew-receiving basins beneath deep forests and giant trees, twenty fathoms into the earth.' Hu sent messengers to dig and search according to the map, and all was found as he had said. Recently, Yao Lüe's uncle, serving as Prince of Jin, saw a bright light at Hedong's Puban where elders spoke of an ancient King Aśoka monastery; digging in search, he found a relic bone of the Buddha inside a stone case and silver box, shining with extraordinary brilliance. Following Lüe, he welcomed it to the capital, and it is now seen in the new monastery by the monks on the Ba Embankment. Viewed from this, that there were Buddhist events in the regions of Qi and Jin has been true for a long time. The reason they were not recounted in the Three Commentaries is just as in the histories of Gan Bao and Sun Sheng: without mentioning the word 'Buddha,' the wondrous transformation was nonetheless manifested, flourishing in Jiangzuo under the Jin dynasty."