弘明集 3.19

3.19

Previously I sent the "Discourse on Equalizing Goodness" and also inquired after your refined views. Your reply was thorough, and you also considered that the rise and fall of this principle ought to be clarified, and that one cannot merely dwell between the acceptable and the unacceptable. Although I cannot conform entirely to it, neither do I rigidly cling to biased views; I am merely searching for the night-shining pearl in the vast sea, but simply have not yet found it. I consider the Buddhist sūtras to be a distinct school among the good teachings of the Nine Schools, mingled with Daoism and Mohism. Their compassion and loving giving are not different from those of the central lands. The noble man and gentleman takes benevolence as his personal duty, his mind free from preconceptions and certainty. Moreover, using images and colorful decorations will harmonize with the ears and eyes of ordinary people; the waste and damage they cause are still slight, while the benefits they induce may be prominent. For this reason, I preserve them side by side. As for busybodies who consequently take them as surpassing Confucius and transcending Laozi, holding that only this is valuable—these are people who cannot seek the foundation of establishing teachings and are bewildered by secondary doctrines. Those who understand their words must await the person who forgets words. If one merely places trust in the retribution of heaven and hell and the verification of imperishable causes and conditions, repressing sentiments, eating meagerly, and exhaustively bowing and worshipping, hoping to be shaded by the canopy of the Jeweled Scales and ascend the seat of the Boundless Lamp, this is why Master Chunyuan made such grand mockery of it. Your discourse says: 'All the sages, Laozi, and Zhuangzi all said that there are spirits and deities; on what basis can one judge it to be untrue, as the Buddha spoke of it?' I reply: Ostensibly there are rites and music, and in the unseen realm there are ghosts and spirits; this is why the sage kings established their teachings, never obscuring their existence from the start. If there truly were retribution in future lives, would the Duke of Zhou and Confucius have remained silent without a single word? When an infant is about to fall into a pit, ordinary people feel alarmed and distressed for it; could sages still be unbenevolent? Furthermore, you say: 'Man's corporeal form is most coarse, but man's spirit is truly subtle. How could the corporeal form and the spirit come to an end together?' I reply: Corporeal form and spirit rely on each other; the ancients compared them to firewood and fire. When the firewood is damaged, the fire is faint; when the firewood is exhausted, the fire is extinguished. Though there is its subtlety, how could it be transmitted alone? Furthermore, you say: 'What the mind stimulates [causes] a city wall to collapse, frost to fall, a white rainbow to pierce the sun, Venus to enter the Pleiades, and physicians using breath restraint to answer cold and warmth immediately; through concentrated sincerity and subtle response, to receive a body and be reborn in a land of the seven treasures—why could this not be real?'