廣弘明集 15.42

15.42

Those stuck in familiar ways do not comprehend rare tidings; keeping to the ordinary day after day, they seldom harbor feelings that transcend worldly affairs. This causes dust-like thoughts to constrain their profound minds, and the celestial net to ensnare their spiritual contemplation. If one uses this to exhaust one's lifespan, how could this life be surpassed? If one uses this to hope for understanding, there will be no time of breakthrough. Thereupon, aroused to indignation, one forgets sleep, one's sighs multiplied a hundredfold. In quiet contemplation during the peaceful night, principle accords with one's mind. One then contemplates being moistened by the benevolence of the nine marshes, and recites threefold the compassion that is unconditioned. One subtly traces the response of the dharmakāya, regarding as divine its wordless transformation. The transformation does not depend on what stimulated it; the compassion does not depend on what conditioned it. Harboring peace and finding self-contentment, it is like the sun and moon shining upon heaven, their light and shadow ever more luminous. The various kinds [of beings] flourish in joy, and all sentient beings follow alike. All rejoice that the hanging reflection is upon themselves, yet none realize where the subtle completion is lodged. Discourses on subtle things exhaust their merit here. Intending to simulate that obscure ultimate, so as to speak of its Way, it seems to exist vaguely, yet cannot be discussed. How is this to be clarified? When the dharmakāya moves things, it does not treat things as things to presage its beginnings, nor does it plan endings to achieve its completions. Principle is profound beyond the myriad transformations; numbers are cut off from the nameless. If one speaks of its lodging in the trap, then the Way is nowhere absent. Therefore, the Tathāgata sometimes obscured his previous traces to exalt the foundation, or manifested the path of birth to establish his form; sometimes he uniquely arose in a realm that cannot be traced, or stood in mutual dependence in an already existing place. Rising uniquely is akin to the form; mutual dependence is akin to the shadow. Examining that dark lodging, is it dependent, or is it non-dependent? Looking at it from ourselves, there is a gap within the gapless. Seeking it in the dharmakāya, originally there are no two systems. Who can demarcate the division between form and shadow? Yet those who hear the Way today all model the sacred body in an age long past, without realizing that the spiritual response is right here. In vain do they know that the complete transformation is not form, yet in their movements they liken it to its traces—is this not a distortion? In the past, when I followed my former master and served him for many years, although I received his compassionate instruction and entrusted my aspiration to profound texts, whenever I thought of rare tidings to consolidate my sincerity, I would listen to the accounts of wandering whenever I met śramaṇas from the Western Regions. Thus I knew that there was a Buddha's shadow, though the accounts were not yet clear. When I was at this mountain, I met a dhyāna master from Kashmir and a Vinaya-studying daoshi from the southern countries; their accounts agreed with what I had heard in the past, and both were places those persons had traveled through. Questioning them thoroughly in turn, there were many previous omens. Only then was it verified that the divine path has no fixed direction, lodging wherever it encounters an image. What a hundred thoughts converged upon was not the feeling of a single moment. Thereupon, my understanding penetrated its sincerity, and my response deepened its station. Intending to lead those of like accord to develop their true inclination, I therefore, together with the worthy ones who rejoiced in accord, painted it and composed an inscription.