廣弘明集 22
English (machine translation) 22
- Language
- English
22.1
Compiled by the Śramaṇa Shi Daoxuan of Ximing Temple of the Great Tang
22.2
Section 4: Doctrinal Meanings, Part 5
22.3
The Meaning of Sentient Beings and Buddhas Not Being Different (Shen Yue, courtesy name Xiuwen, of the Southern Qi)
The Meaning of the Six Destinies Progressively Attaining Buddhahood (Shen Yue)
The Meaning of Causes and Conditions (Shen Yue)
The Meaning of Physical Form and Spirit (Shen Yue)
The Meaning of the Indestructibility of the Spirit (Shen Yue)
Refutation of Fan Zhen's Meaning of the Extinction of the Spirit (Shen Yue)
Treatise on Causes and Conditions Having No Intrinsic Nature (Śramaṇa Zhenguan of the Chen, along with Zhu Shiqing's Treatise on Spontaneity)
Vow Text for the Three Divisions of the Entire Canon of the Northern Qi (Wei Shou)
Vow Text for the Canon of the Zhou (Wang Bao)
Vow Text for the Baotai Scripture Canon (Emperor Yang of the Sui)
Preface to the Sacred Teachings of the Tripiṭaka (along with the Memorial of Request and the Grateful Response by Emperor Taizong, the Literary Emperor)
Account of the Preface to the Sacred Teachings of the Tripiṭaka (along with the Grateful Response by the Present Emperor)
Account of the Preface to the Commentated Prajñā-sūtra (Chu Liang of the Tang)
Preface to the Collected Commentaries on the Diamond Prajñā-sūtra (Li Yan, Grand Master of Siyuan)
Letter to the Monks Translating the Scriptures (with reply) (Liu Xuan, Erudite of the Court of Imperial Sacrifices)
22.4
The Meaning of the Buddha's Knowing Not Being Different from Sentient Beings' Knowing
22.5
Shen Xiuwen
22.6
A Buddha is one who is awakened. Awakening is knowing. Between an ordinary mortal and the Buddha-stage, the establishment of the good and the knowing of evil have never been different. It is only that what the Buddha-stage knows attains the correct path of the good, whereas what the ordinary mortal knows loses the good to the deviant path. The knowing of an ordinary mortal when obtaining the correct path is not different from the knowing of a Buddha. It is precisely because one takes what is not good to be good that one loses the correct path. Therefore, we know that the knowing of an ordinary mortal is not different from the knowing of a Buddha; it is because the things known are different, while the knowing itself is not different. As for what an ordinary mortal knows, it is not that he intends the known object not to be good; it lies in seeking the good but ending up in what is not good. If one accumulates this mind of seeking the good, one will eventually find the path of returning to the good; when one finds the path, one reaches the Buddha. That sentient beings possess the Buddha-nature truly lies in the perpetual transmission of their knowing-nature.
22.7
The Meaning of the Six Destinies Progressively Attaining Buddhahood
22.8
Shen Yue
22.9
All-knowledge and the sentient beings of the five paths and six destinies share the capacity to receive knowing; there is no division or difference. Question: Is receiving knowing not knowing itself? Answer: It is not. Question: What does this take as its essence? Answer: It is continuity without annihilation. Because of continuity without annihilation, it is able to receive knowing. If in the present life the merit of refinement is gradually accumulated, then the principle cognized in the future fruit becomes increasingly refined. This increasingly refined knowing arrives in response until Buddhahood, without interruption or severance. If in the present life there is ignorance, then the cognition in the future fruit becomes increasingly darkened. This increasingly darkened knowing also arrives in response, down to the six destinies. The instrument that receives knowing receives knowing according to conditions; the quality—good or bad—of knowing has nothing to do with this instrument that receives knowing. Question: I have heard your command regarding knowing and non-knowing. The receiving of knowing is itself continuous and indestructible, while knowing naturally arises from causes and conditions; does it correlate in principle with this instrument that receives knowing? Answer: There is this continuous, indestructible [nature] that naturally arises from causes and effects. Where there are causes and effects, how could there be an absence of good and evil?
22.10
The Meaning of Causes and Conditions
22.11
Shen Yue
22.12
Of all beings possessed of sentience, none do not take pleasure in living. The paths of seeking life are uneven and diverse. Once they drift and migrate, their roads and paths diverge. In the span of a single thought, multiple conditions arise mutually. Between a single cause and a single fruit, discrepancies occur within. The nature of loving life is shared by the myriad species; endowed by nature, it is not established through conditions. Thus we know that taking pleasure in living is not causes and conditions, and causes and conditions are not taking pleasure in living. Although they both reside within the physical frame, each is a distinct entity. Since a single thought summons multiple conditions, the multiple conditions each arise in accordance with that thought. The two thoughts of good and evil are indeed different, yet both rely on external assistance; in this matter they follow a single principle. It is just as when, without water and without earth, the grain sprout will not grow. The nature of causes and conditions and that of consciousness are originally different; that cause and effect are unmistakable is indeed inevitable, yet when good and evil arise independently, they also meet with obstruction. Though said to arise independently, once arisen they become causes; internal causes and external conditions truly stem from this.
22.13
Treatise on Physical Form and Spirit
22.14
Shen Yue
22.15
When an ordinary mortal has a single thought, his seven-foot body is no longer connected to the locus of that thought. The ordinary mortal has a single thought, whereas for the sage, there is no thought that is not exhausted. The sage has no self; his seven-foot body is originally like emptiness. Using a seven-foot body that is like emptiness to encompass the myriad thoughts without leaving any unexhausted, he is able to differ from the ordinary mortal. When an ordinary mortal, in a single thought, forgets that seven-foot body, his eyes cease seeing and his feet cease treading. At the moment he forgets eyes and feet, how does this differ from having no eyes and no feet? For an ordinary mortal, this temporary absence is originally grounded in having; before a blink of an eye has passed, having has already followed it. When thought is disjointed from the physical form, there is temporary forgetting; when thought and mind fade away, they reunite. When thought resides in one part of the seven-foot body, the other parts are the same as another person, not different from what is not-self. But for the ordinary mortal, this temporary absence is very brief; for the sage, the enduring absence is very vast. The paths of the ordinary and the sage are originally the same: to forget temporarily in a single thought is the mortal grade; to forget completely across the myriad thoughts is the great sage. Speaking in these terms, physical form and spirit are almost [separable]. Someone may doubt: cause and effect govern each other without the slightest error, and the coming of good and evil are all fixed karma, whereas the cultivation of the six perfections completely relies on effort; if the cultivation of this effort also has a prior cause, and the ripe cause produces the fruit through mutual resonance, then the efficacy of effort can no longer be established, and the cultivation of the six perfections would be nearly nullified. Śākya surpassed nine kalpas through the accomplishment of vigorous striving; if the cause of this vigorous striving was fixed from the beginningless past and originally did not rely on the nine [kalpas], how could it be said to arise? I consider that cause and effect, on the one hand, and emotional cognition, on the other, are originally two different things. First there is emotional cognition, and only then is there cause and effect. Once emotional cognition stirs, cause and effect follow it; before there is emotional cognition, upon what could cause and effect rely? The two paths of cause and consciousness combine in function, but are fundamentally different. Since their origins are different, their essences are not identical. That emotional cognition arises separately presents no obstruction to principle; thus the difference of the six perfections and the nine kalpas leaves no room for doubt.
22.16
Treatise on the Indestructibility of the Spirit
22.17
Shen Yue
22.18
Among sentient kinds, cognitive discernment differs vastly, with uneven gradations piling up by thousands and myriad layers. Insects do not equal flying birds; flying birds do not equal dogs and horses. Clear and distinct as this is, one cannot say it is not so. Furthermore, from the human grade upward, the natures of the worthy and the foolish diverge; they do not interact with or understand one another, so that north of Yan and south of Yue cannot serve as an adequate comparison. The foolish among them cannot distinguish beans from wheat; the perverse do not know love and respect. Progressing upward from this, the nature and understanding gradually broaden; Ban Gu's nine grades do not encompass a ten-thousandth of it. Why is this? The distinction between the worthy and the foolish stems from knowing and not knowing. What the foolish know is little; what the worthy know is much. Yet myriad things intertwine, diverse regions are vast, emotional natures are either clear or dim, and the purports of principle are deep and mysterious. Seeking the principle along their respective paths, because there are differences of clarity and dimness, gradations of high and low are formed. Tipping toward one another from here, the ranks become ever steeper. Exhausting their origins and plumbing their ultimate foundations, their mutual reverence must have a point of culmination; when that path is exhausted, nothing subtle remains unplumbed. Again, one cannot say it is not so. Moreover, the five senses each have their separate realms; the ears and eyes each have their assigned duties. When the mind moves, the physical form is forgotten; when the eyes are employed, the ears are neglected. Why is this? Because the emotional spirit is shallow and weak, and mental deliberations are turbulent and confused. To encompass both in a single thought is impossible to achieve. Since one cannot encompass both, confusion and entanglement alternate: before one thought is completed, other concerns arise in succession. The successive arising of multiple concerns again stems from the same cause of inability to encompass both. This is due to shallow delusion. Taking shallow delusion as an illness, one is afflicted by clinging to existence. To be neither shallow nor deluded comes from dual forgetting; through this dual forgetting, one attains this comprehensive illumination. From an ordinary mortal up to the Rightly Awakened One, one progresses from delusion to non-delusion, from inability to encompass to ability to encompass. Again, one cannot say it is not so. Furthermore, insects have short and fleeting lives, yet their sentient nature is no different. Some are born in the morning and perish by evening; some know neither spring nor autumn. Progressing from this, long and short life spans vary; since there is shortness, how could there not be length? Vain expenditure diminishes years; skillful nourishment increases longevity. Becoming better and still better, how could this not exist? Again, one cannot say it is not so. Since life can be cut short, then in longevity there cannot be non-death; yet when cutting short is absent, life cannot be limited. The distinction between physical form and spirit is indeed like this. Yet since the physical form can be nourished, how could the spirit alone be different? The spirit is subtle and the physical form is coarse, with a clear distinction between them. If nourishing the form can lead to incorruptibility, how could nourishing the spirit ever have an end? Nourishing the spirit without end is neither born nor extinguished; comparing beginning to end, how could there not be such a person? From the ordinary mortal to the sage, the meaning of sentience is equal; it is only because matters have the refined and the coarse that people have the ordinary and the sagely. If the sage is eternally existent while the ordinary mortal alone is extinguished, then being fundamentally the same yet divergent at the end is an untenable doctrine. How could the Great Sage's bequeathed instructions be confused about this?
22.19
Refutation of Fan Zhen's Treatise on the Extinction of the Spirit
22.20
Shen Yue
22.21
Your treatise says: "The body is the spirit; the spirit is the body." It also says: "The human body is a single whole; therefore, the spirit cannot be two." If, as your refined treatise holds, these two things cannot be separated from each other, then there would be no part of the seven apertures and the hundred body parts that is not the spirit. As the functions of the seven apertures are already different and the activities of the hundred body parts are not uniform, and as the spirit also responds according to circumstances, its names should likewise change according to circumstances. "Spirit" is a name given in contrast to "body"; and if the parts within the body each have their own function, then the spirits within the spirit should likewise each have their own name. Now, to speak of the body, there are the differences of the four limbs and hundred parts, and the distinctions between bending and extending, hearing and receiving: each has its own name, and each has its own function. Yet you say the spirit has only a single name, while its functions are divided among the hundred parts; this is something I truly fail to understand. If body and spirit correspond to each other without the slightest divergence, why is it that the names for the body are numerous, while the names for the spirit are few?
22.22
If it were as your treatise says, for a spirit of seven feet, there would be no part of the spirit that is not body, and no part of the body that is not spirit. In the case of a knife, sharpness belongs only to the blade; what is not the blade does not receive the designation of sharpness. Hence "blade" is an appellation for the entire substance, whereas "sharpness" is the designation of a single part. Since the knife and its sharpness are already not identical, how could body and spirit be arbitrarily equated?
22.23
Furthermore, if a knife of yesterday is cast into a sword today, the sharpness of the sword is the sharpness of the knife, but the shape of the knife is not the shape of the sword. The function of sharpness has not changed, yet the form of its substance has already shifted. How does this differ from someone being born as A in a former life and as C in a later life? The realms of devas and humans may differ, but the spirit of past consciousness is still transmitted. How is this any different from a sword becoming a knife, or a knife becoming a sword?
22.24
Moreover, if the substance of one knife is divided into the shapes of two knives, the shapes are already divided, yet each has its sharpness. Now, if you take the body of an ox and cut it into two, the life that drinks and grazes instantly ceases, and its capacity to bear heavy loads cannot be divided. How then can one use the knife and its sharpness to analogise the body and its spirit? Your treatise states that the knife and its sharpness are just like the body possessing a spirit: the knife across its entire substance has a single sharpness, and the body across its entire substance has a single spirit. When the spirit functions in the body, there are the distinctions of ears, eyes, hands, and feet: the function of the hands cannot serve as the function of the feet, and the function of the ears cannot serve as the function of the eyes. Yet the functioning of sharpness is universally applicable: it can sever flood-dragons and serpents, and it can slice through wild geese; it is not that one part exclusively can cut melons from Dongling, while another part exclusively can cut bamboo from the Southern Mountains.
22.25
If you say that the function of sharpness can also be divided, then feet could grasp objects and eyes could hear sounds. If you say that the back of the knife also has sharpness and both sides also have sharpness, but they have merely not been forged and whetted, [I reply that] if sharpness were applied across all four directions, the substance of sharpness would have nowhere to stand: square shapes and straight shapes alike could not be sharp. The function of sharpness resides precisely in a single edge as thin as a hair. If the spirit and the body correspond as an entire whole, how could they possibly be identical? If the knife throughout its entire substance were sharpness, the spirit's functions would divide according to the body. If the principles of the knife and sharpness were identical [to body and spirit], then eyes could also be placed beneath the shoulder blades, and a nose could also be installed on the back. Could this be? It could not.
22.26
If this analogy is considered exhaustive, it is not exhaustive. If it is said to have been inherently non-exhaustive, then it cannot serve as an analogy. If the body is the spirit and the spirit is the body, the two supporting each other so that by principle neither can perish unilaterally, then on the day the person dies, the body should also vanish. Yet now the conscious spirit has perished while the insentient body remains. This shows that the spirit was originally not the body, and the body was originally not the spirit; nor can they forcibly be made into one.
22.27
If you say that the totality of the hundred parts' substance is called the body, and the totality of the hundred parts' functions is called the spirit, now the hundred parts each have their own share: the eye is the eye-body, and the ear is the ear-body; the eye-body is not the ear-body, and the ear-body is not the eye-body. Then the spirit must also divide according to the hundred parts: the eye would have an eye-spirit, and the ear would have an ear-spirit; the ear-spirit would not be the eye-spirit, and the eye-spirit would not be the ear-spirit. Furthermore, in a paralysed body, one half has already perished, and the half that has perished is just like wood or stone, comparable to a stiff corpse that does not decay for years; thus the spirit of this half should likewise be extinguished along with this half. When half the spirit is already extinguished while half the body still remains, the simultaneous demise of body and spirit becomes all the more alarming and implausible. As for the corpse of Erfu, which did not decay over millions of years, or the body of Shan Kai, whose remains are still preserved on Mount Luofu—if spirit and body were unified, these two figures should not have had their spirits extinguished while their bodies remained.
22.28
Your treatise also says: "Those that arise suddenly perish suddenly; those that arise gradually perish gradually." Allow me to borrow your own battering ram to attack your city wall. By "perishing gradually," you mean that the physical remains of the deceased begin as insentient and culminate in rotting away. If that is so, then body and spirit are fundamentally a single thing: when the body falls ill, the spirit likewise reports illness; when the body perishes, the spirit likewise perishes. The working of gradualness should proceed together with the body. When the body has just died and not yet decayed, this constitutes gradualness; why alone should the spirit not undergo gradualness from beginning to end?
22.29
Your treatise also says: "The physical remains of the living turn into the skeleton of the dead." Examining this according to your treatise: the spirit of the living and the physical remains of the living have already transformed into a skeleton; does the spirit of the living alone not transform along with the body? If it transforms in dependence on the body, it should share the same substance with the body. If the physical remains are the skeleton, then the spirit of the dead cannot be different from the spirit of the living, so what was previously called dead was certainly not yet dead. If the physical remains are not the skeleton, then the living spirit transforms into a dead spirit; if the living spirit transforms into a dead spirit, this implies three lifetimes, so how can you say it is not extinguished? If the spirit follows the body, the body is already insentient; since the body is already insentient and the spirit fundamentally lacks material substance, insentience means the demise of the spirit. That the spirit has perished while the body remains is, once again, completely untenable.
22.30
If the body, though insentient, still possesses a spirit that is sentient, then since body and spirit cannot be different, the aforementioned dead body would, on the contrary, not be dry wood.
22.31
Preface to the Treatise on Causes and Conditions Lacking Self-Nature
22.32
By the Chen Dynasty Śramaṇa Shi Zhenguan
22.33
In Quanting there was a person of eminent virtue named Zhu Sanyi. Not only was he conversant and sharp in non-Buddhist learning, but his inner faith was also profound and clear. He consistently venerated the Mahāyāna in his heart and chanted the prajñā scriptures with his mouth. Suddenly, he composed a treatise on spontaneous nature (ziran), thereby falling into the grasping after inherent nature. Perhaps he was pretending to agree with heterodox views, or perhaps an inverted mind had genuinely arisen in him; in either case, this inevitably damaged the correct and true, and excessively harmed the supreme Path. I have briefly composed the following treatise to dispel his grasping. Although its phrasing is not worth adopting, its reasoning may perhaps be worthy of examination. If there are those who share my aspiration, I hope we may peruse it together.
22.34
Treatise on the Inherent Nature of Dharmas Being Spontaneous
22.35
By Zhu Shiqing
22.36
Master Yuzi sighed deeply and said: "All the myriad phenomena and myriad natures are principles of nature (spontaneity). Only because they are natural, they cannot be altered or exchanged. Therefore, although a good person knows that goodness cannot be relied upon, a good person ultimately cannot for a single moment become evil. An evil person, moreover, though knowing that evil is not to be warned against, likewise cannot for an instant become good. Furthermore, one who embodies benevolence is not self-conscious of their goodness, and one who embodies foolishness is not self-aware of their evil. Both are naturally so of themselves." A guest seated to his right, Grandee Jiashi, suddenly changed countenance and said to him: "How obstinate is the Master's doctrine! It runs counter to the Great Way and errs against the words of the sages." The Master said: "Who governs the Great Way, and what did the sages say?" The Grandee said: "The Great Way has no master, yet there is nothing it does not govern; the sages have no words, yet there is nothing they do not speak." The Master said: "Please speak of what they said. Did they speak of whence nature and destiny derive? Please explain what it governs: does it govern the retribution of good and evil?" The Grandee said: "Why should it not be so? Heaven and earth sustain the merits of the Great Way to nurture and rear [all things]; the sages accord with the virtue of heaven and earth to establish their teachings. They set forth the five virtues of benevolence and righteousness to regulate the mind, and expounded the Odes, the Documents, and the six arts to instruct people in their vocations. These are the words of the sages. 'A family that accumulates goodness will surely have a surplus of blessings; a family that accumulates evil will surely have a surplus of calamities.' Thus it is said: 'The sage has no favorites, but ever assists the good man.' The six extremities are set out to inflict punishment on misconduct; the five blessings are arrayed to encourage the mind toward goodness. Serving as a general for three generations brings the power of ruin and defeat; cultivating goodness for seven generations yields an inhering nature of flourishing prosperity. Chen Shang was favored yet could not become a marquis; Bing Chang was distant yet inherited the state. These are the efficacious proofs of the Way. Why does the Master say that all are principles of nature and cannot be altered or exchanged?" The Master smiled and replied: "Those whom the world calls 'men who follow the line', when the line comes to an end, do not know how to adapt; men like the Grandee are just so! Allow me reverently to set forth for you my meager and narrow views. When the two forms (heaven and earth) were manifested, the six children were deployed; when the common people were reared, the five materials were employed. To apply this line, it partitions the myriad phenomena yet is entirely so. Humans are the most spiritual among living beings, receiving the exquisite qi of nature, endowed with physical constitutions of beauty or ugliness, fullness or depletion, harboring the emotions of sorrow, joy, delight, and anger, possessing destinies of obscurity or prominence, longevity or brevity, and fixed in natures of folly or wisdom, goodness or evil. Sorrow, joy, delight, and anger are latent within emotion, moving when stimulated by things. Obscurity, prominence, longevity, and brevity are hidden within destiny, becoming clear only after events arrive. Beauty, ugliness, fullness, and depletion are manifested in physical form, displayed outwardly from birth. Folly, wisdom, goodness, and evil are sealed within nature, shining through when encountering circumstances. These eight phrases encompass human affairs to the full. All stem from the fate of nature; there is no creator among them. If there were a creator, he would surely toil; if things were to be entered or exited by him, there would surely be oversights; if he were to respond and interact, there would surely be errors. These three are not the working of the Maker of Things. Thus Mozi said: 'If the Creator of Changes took three years to make a single leaf, how few leaves there would be under heaven!' The sages established skillful means to accomplish their teachings, borrowing resemblances of events to encourage and deter. Seeing the fierce and valiant tyrannize over the few and cowardly, and fearing that punishments and executions would not stop it, they set forth the terrifying awe of calamities befalling licentiousness. Pained that earnest goodness was not encouraged, and knowing that nature and destiny could not be altered, they set forth blessings and goodness to reward them. Therefore, listening to their words, it seems as though there is no discrepancy, but examining the facts, not one in ten thousand is verified. You take the flourishing of branches to be brought about by treading the Way, and the absence of someone to host the seasonal ancestral sacrifices to be incurred by abandoned conduct; having one's person dwell in ease and joy to be the clear retribution of a good gentleman, and having one's person suffer distress and bitterness to be the overt punishment of an evil man. [Yet] if Sunshu [Ao] had not buried the snake when young, would he have lacked the noble rank of Chief Minister when grown? If Bing Ji had no prior hidden merit, would he ultimately have missed the honor of Chancellor? If it were truly so, then the Way of Heaven would have answered the utter foolishness of the Blind Old Man with Chonghua (Shun) and Wenming (Yu), and recompensed the utmost sagehood of Yao and Shun with Shangjun and Danzhu. For three generations Taibo had no fault of playing with arms, yet the succession was borrowed by Zhongyong. For seven generations the Han founder was never heard to have practiced earnest goodness, yet he accomplished an enterprise rivaling heaven. Jizi was said to enjoy the five blessings, yet in person endured the grief of extermination; Confucius stated that blessings center upon the accumulation of goodness, yet personally experienced the sorrow of an exiled wanderer. Yan Hui, crowning the seventy [disciples], met with the lament of failing to bloom; Ran Geng, foremost among the four categories, brought about the sigh of 'Alas, that such a man should have such a disease!' Meanwhile, Shangchen reigned for successive generations in Jingnan, and Modu dwelt for generations in the northern frontier. Mount Shou has no ghost that unbends its furrowed brow, while the Miluo River has a soul harboring unredressed grievance. Zheng Kangcheng changed the name of his village due to his surname, yet could not save [his son] from the calamity of the Small Sage; Wang Bao's grief changed the trees on the ridge, yet he merely suffered the disaster of unwarranted execution. The two brothers dwelt in Wei: who was to blame for the grief of boarding the boat? The three benevolent men were in Bo: of what crime was the cruelty of opening the heart guilty? As for those close to the capital and intimately adjacent generations, not recorded in the ancient texts but right before our eyes and ears: there are those who conceal the treachery of the Mengmen Pass in their bellies and harbor the venom of jackals and vipers in their minds. Exerting their thoughts, they care only to harm others; conducting themselves, they invariably put self-interest first. An awl or knife would acknowledge their sharp point; a valley or ravine would wonder at their being hard to fill. Yet externally a hundred carriages flourish, and internally a thousand zhong of grain fill their storehouses; at ease they recline amid damask and silk, sitting before ranks of rich and savory foods, sounding chimes and sporting jades, enjoying wealth and leisure all their lives. Again, there are those who embrace a hundred jade bi as their lapels and possess lustrous pearls as their nature; their minds cannot bear to kill a hibernating insect, and their hands cannot bear to snap a growing shoot. They harbor extraordinary talents, yet none select them; they cherish admirable ambitions, yet who looks upon them? Erroneously mixed among the redundant and disorderly, they sink to the bottom at the lower end of the villages; hugging hunger and cold, they suddenly die, buried alongside the deer. Their ancestral sacrifices are desolate, their widows and orphans have no one to rely upon, their names remain unheard, extinguished like a flash of lightning. That things should be regrettable like this—is it only one person? From this we know that the cruelty of Jie and Zhi harbored no fear of impending calamity arriving, and the earnest conduct of Min and Zeng should not anticipate the due arrival of future blessings. Thus the Heguanzi says: 'Fate is that which is natural. The worthy does not necessarily obtain it, nor does the unworthy necessarily lose it.' This is what it means."
22.37
The Grandee said: "If you cite the words of the various philosophers, then Liezi says: 'One who seeks a name will surely be incorruptible, and incorruptibility brings poverty; one who seeks a name will surely yield, and yielding brings baseness.' If that is so, then poverty and baseness are what gentlemen who establish a name strive for and attain; wealth and honor are what greedy and contentious people seek and obtain. How can it be called the reckoning of nature?" The Master said: "This is a one-sided doctrine, not one that is comprehensive in principle. Wealth and honor naturally have greed and contention, yet wealth and honor are not something greed and contention can obtain. Poverty and baseness naturally have incorruptibility and yielding, yet poverty and baseness are not something incorruptibility and yielding desire to invite. There are those who possess wealth and honor without being greedy, and those who suffer poverty and baseness without being incorruptible or yielding. Moreover, Confucius seldom spoke of fate; the Way depends on man to broaden it. Thus the principle of nature and destiny is what former sages dreaded speaking of. How could the retribution of good and evil, and the constancy of the Way of Heaven, be involved here? It is like the warm breeze turning blossoms and the cold gale scattering snow: some fall into cesspools and filth, while others alight atop jade staircases. The wind and gale have no intention regarding thick or thin, yet the blossoms and sleet follow distinct paths of defilement and purity. The Way of Heaven has no intention regarding love or hatred, yet nature and destiny have differing paths of adversity and success. You have heard of Lord Yu waiting to be enfiefed and the enfiefment arriving, or Mother Yan awaiting mourning and the mourning befalling. If, seeing a good person, one immediately says their descendants will surely prosper; or seeing an evil person, immediately says their descendants will surely perish, this is merely like waiting by the tree trunk for the rest of one's life, hoping that the cunning hare will be caught again." Thereupon the Grandee composed his expression and apologized, saying: "One such as myself held to a biased transmission and was blind to the thoroughfare; clung to what was narrow and close at hand and lost sight of the distant and vast. Now, having received your profound words, I am delightfully enlightened: like Shu You whose recumbent corpse suddenly awoke after ten thousand ages, or the heavy drunkard of Zhongshan who abruptly sobered up in less than a thousand mornings. I beg to take these words and engrave them upon my sash." Someone asked: "Master Zhu relied on a fictional discourse to express the depths of his mind; his discussions of emotion and pointing to facts are profound and intriguing. However, examining them against the ancient classics, there is something I have not understood. Human emotions of sorrow, joy, delight, and anger contain the natures of good and evil. When the provisions for reliance and support were insufficient, affairs of contention and plunder arose. When those of equal talent and knowledge could not govern one another, Heaven produced the benevolent and sage, genuinely causing them to shepherd [the people]. Music was created by the sages; rites were instituted by the former kings. The three thousand deportments were used to regulate their actions; the harmony of the five tones was used to guide their minds. Ranks were established to encourage goodness; punishments were suspended to chastise evil. Not a hair's breadth was missed, responding and interacting like an echo. When jade and silk are mentioned, are they not presented by something other than non-action (wuwei)? When drums and bells harmonize, how could it be naturally attuned? The thousand categories filling the eyes are entirely constructed through effort and application; the hundreds of strings strung unevenly all arise from wisdom and thought. You, sir, are a subject of Tang and Wu, a disciple of Zhou and Confucius; coming and going through doors and windows, you have embraced the orthodox moral teaching. Yet you say that good people know goodness cannot be relied upon, evil people know evil cannot be warned against, goodness cannot invite blessings, and calamity cannot requite evil. What kind of unreasonable talk is this? Furthermore, flying birds and creeping insects still know what to seek and what to avoid, how much more so should man, being the most spiritual, be identical with a thing of nature? How could this poem of the High and Deep draw analogies from what is not of the same category? Regarding what my understanding has not reached, I reverently await your clear response." [The Master] replied: "In the past, Lu Ao traveled north and encountered the desolate wastes, grieving that his footprints had not been vast; the River Count looked eastward toward the boundless ocean, only then sighing that the autumn waters were not abundant. You, sir, have become habituated to what is close until it has become second nature; it is not easy to discuss the distant and great with you. Now, you consider bending and stretching, bowing and looking up, to be the doing of thoughts of the mind; carving, chiseling, clipping, and polishing to be the work of body and hands; rites and music to be the creations of sages; and sages to be what is born of heaven and earth. Please allow me to take examples near at hand from the body for you, so that you may extend them far to myriad things. When your ears hear, your eyes see, your feet tread, your hands grasp, and your mind considers—who makes it so? When the body has disease or ailment, cold or heat, it is not self-aware of them. Where do the rise and fall of sorrow, joy, delight, and anger reside? What place has a consciousness that knows of itself where consciousness resides? Has a wise person self-knowledge of where wisdom exists? If consciousness pervaded the body, when the body is injured, consciousness would be torn; if wisdom arose along with affairs, when affairs subsided, wisdom would be extinguished. Truly, consciousness does not know consciousness, and wisdom does not know wisdom. Thereupon, extending what is near to reach what is far, and developing things by analogy, we therefore know that rites and music do not know of themselves whence they were instituted; sages do not know of themselves whence they were born; and the two images (heaven and earth) likewise do not know of themselves whence they were established. Thereupon, distinct shapes and differing thoughts accumulate and fill to overflowing; stillness and motion, union and separation, self-arise and self-extinguish. Of stillness and motion, none recognizes their master; of arising and extinguishing, none understands their root. Thus the principle of nature is manifest! That which is called non-natural is precisely Great Nature; that which is active (youwei) is precisely Great Non-Action (wuwei). You said: 'Heaven produced sages, genuinely causing them to shepherd [the people].' Why, then, in Tang and Yu were sages piled one upon another, augmented by five ministers; and Wen and Wu repeated their brilliance, augmented by ten capable ministers? Could it be that the Way of Heaven cannot maintain unity from beginning to end, or that degenerate ages pass blame onto heaven and earth? Great Shun and Great Yao did not wish to father unworthy sons; how could Longfeng and Bigan have rejoiced in submitting their bodies to execution and dismemberment? Confucius traveled through states, harassed and flustered, and finally said that he would not shrink from holding the whip; Yan Hui, having declared 'While you live, Master, how would I dare to die?', ultimately caused his loving father to request the Master's carriage [for his outer coffin]. Those three sages and three benevolent men could be said to have excelled in taking and leaving! Heaven can cause a severe drought in Donghai, but that is not as good as rectifying the grievance of the filial widow; Earth can cause high city walls to return to moats, but that is not as good as saving Qiliang from death. Therefore, flourishing and withering, death and life, are determined allotments of nature; even sages and the benevolent cannot exempt themselves. Ponder my humble words deeply, and the principle resides clearly within them."
22.38
Treatise on the Non-Nature of Causes and Conditions (Hetupratyaya)
22.39
By Dharma Master Zhenguan of the Chen Dynasty
22.40
The doubting gentleman addressed the Master of Penetrating Keenness, saying: 'When the two cosmic forces were first divided, all categories of beings came to depend upon them; once the seven luminaries were hung, the myriad people looked up to them. Yet what lies before birth and after death was left unclarified by the diagrams of the Changes; through antiquity and down to the present, sages and worthies have failed to fathom it. Thus gentlemen aspiring to the dark mystery vie in pursuing their inquiries, and famed men cherishing underlying principles compete in far-fetched analyses. In what Master Yu expounded, spontaneity was profusely defended; in what Master Jia made clear, retribution was loftily proclaimed. Although the spears and arrows of spontaneity were victorious at first, the shields and lances of retribution suffered defeat later. Still, the foolish mind is difficult to awaken and clouded consciousness easily goes astray. When the two principles intersect, it is unknown which is right.' The Master of Penetrating Keenness clapped his hands and replied: 'Examining the pure treatises of the two gentlemen, each indeed commands only a partial corner. Spontaneity relies on Laozi and Zhuangzi, while retribution takes its ancestry from the Duke of Zhou and Confucius. It can be said that Chu has already lost it, yet Qi has not gained it either. Now I shall weigh and present it for you, sir. In the Three Graves and the Five Canons, the principles of good and evil are not made manifest; in the Eight Cords and Nine Hills, the pathways between the hidden and manifest remain obstructed. How much more so for the arrogant clerk of the lacquer garden, who in bewildered madness alone claimed to capture the ancestor of creation and partiality based himself upon spontaneous nature! That was merely an expedient to correct the vulgarities of his era, not a profound design in accord with ultimate truth. Now permit me to ask: toward what does the root of spontaneity tend? Does it possess cause and effect, or is it devoid of cause and effect? If one says that spontaneity still allows discussion of cause and effect, this is like spear and shield countering each other: two statements consuming each other, laughed at by fools and lamented by the wise. Collapsing on its own, it needs no further refutation. If one says that there is never retribution and that cause and effect are completely cut off, then the way between ruler and subject, father and son, would no longer function; what use would there be in words like benevolence, righteousness, filial piety, and compassion? One would then commit evil and invite blessings, or do good and bring about calamity. Drilling for fire would yield ice, and planting beans would grow wheat! One has never seen a harmonious sound produce an unruly echo, or a bent form cast an upright shadow. If you consider Fangxun, a supreme sage, having bred a Danzhu, and Chonghua, possessing utmost virtue, having been born to Gu Sou, as being so purely through spontaneity, I would quietly not accept that from you. The way of closest kin is called heavenly nature, yet each individual follows their own karmic deeds without any mutual bearing. Yao and Shun cultivated virtue in past lives, and thus received this spiritual wisdom; Gu Sou harbored evil in previous existences, and thus incurred this stubborn stupidity. Yet they bound heavy ties together and reciprocally brought them to manifestation, wishing to reveal the sage by means of the commoner and transform the foolish by means of the wise. Without the wickedness of Gu Sou, how could one know the beauty of harmonious reconciliation? Were it not for the sage Fangxun, who could have transformed the evil of unrestrained arrogance? Thus Ānanda and Devadatta were both cousins of the World-Honoured One, and Rāhula and Sunakṣatra were both descendants of the Tathāgata. Yet Ānanda was constantly in close attendance, whereas Devadatta repeatedly plotted harm and treason; Rāhula protected the jewel and never violated it, whereas Sunakṣatra was like a broken vessel impossible to mend. Viewed from this, it may surely be known! If one says that each has an innate self-nature that cannot be altered or exchanged, this is utterly untrue. Consider when a hawk transforms into a dove, its original nature is completely gone; when a sweet orange changes into a bitter trifoliate orange, its prior flavor is forever lost. In poverty today after being wealthy in the past, how can the principle of a fixed nature hold sway? Noble before and base later, where is the doctrine of an endowed destiny? Lü Wang was a butcher of cattle, yet ultimately enjoyed the position of Grand Tutor; Yi Yin was a man carrying cooking vessels, yet finally ascended to Prime Minister. Dai Yuan was a menace to his four neighbors, but later gained an illustrious name; Zhou Chu was the foremost of the three perils, yet in his later years was praised for splendid virtue. King Ajātaśatru committed sins deserving Avīci, yet turned about and changed his ways; King Aśoka committed the gravest of transgressions, yet suddenly could honor the good. If one relied on the principle of self-nature, how could such meaning ever be admitted? Good people should only cultivate good, incapable of generating evil for a single instant; evil people should constantly generate evil on their own, with no room to give rise to good even in a single thought. This would mean that flourishing and withering, favor and disgrace, would all be bound to inevitability, and that the foolish and wise, noble and base, could never reform. Could this truly be so? It is decidedly not so! Furthermore, if one considers that a person cultivating virtue contrarily incurs sorrow and distress, or that one practicing good conversely meets ruin, and takes this to be spontaneous destiny, this too is not so. If one practices good while expecting a reward, one is all the farther from goodness; if one cultivates virtue to seek renown, one strays even more distantly from virtue. If one indeed displays the nature of ceremonial jade and harbors the heart of precious jade, originally having no intention toward fame and renown and never delighting in wealth and honor, then a distinguished reputation will certainly be modest while elegant blessings only then arrive. Or perhaps, not yet encountering one who understands their worth, they are like useless timber; failing to meet one who recognizes jade, they remain like sunken mud. Temporarily lying dormant like a dragon, there is no flaw in their phoenix-like virtue. How could they allow themselves to be agitated in the realm of heaven and earth or tossed about in the secular world? Naturally they can adhere firmly to poverty without falling into dejection. Take Taibo, whose lofty yielding diffused fragrance for a thousand generations; or Zhongni, whose destitution transmitted his name for myriad ages. Yan Hui was said to have died young merely because the lifespan resulting from his karmic deeds was not long. Ran Geng contracted that disease surely because the causes of the sickness were not yet severed. The execution of the two sons brought further to light the wickedness of Duke Ling of Wei; the murder of the three benevolent men only then made visible the transgression of King Zhou of Yin. Starvation on Shouyang Mountain could not escape the blame of seeking renown; drowning in the Mi River still left the fault of harboring resentment. Moreover, determinate karma cannot be rescued by spiritual powers; when retribution must be received, how could holy wisdom avert it? All arise from past causes, not from present deeds. If one claims that those who make butchery their occupation live to a hundred years, or that those who harbor thievery amass wealth by the hundreds of millions, and regards this as being so by fixed nature, this too is something I have not understood. This is because a sliver of goodness in a past life induced such lifespan and wealth, while the grave calamities of their present life have not yet invited their fruition. Because their guilt is already great, the suffering they must receive should be manifold; therefore their punishment is temporarily deferred and their evil is allowed to run its course. Once their misfortune is full and their offenses have accumulated, the nest will be overturned and the eggs smashed; they will forever return to the boiling cauldrons of Niraya and eternally abide in the Avīci hell. Thus the classic says: 'Unless evil is accumulated, it is insufficient to destroy one's person.' This is what it refers to. There are also instances where fruit and retribution are manifestly invited, matters immediately evident to seeing and hearing. When Wang Mang usurped and rebelled, his head was hung from the Gradual Terrace; when Dong Zhuo was fierce and cruel, his corpse was exposed in the city market. The Marquis of Jin murdered Zhao Shuo and suffered the sorrow of falling into the latrine; the Lord of Qi harmed Pengsheng and bore the agony of tumbling from his chariot. The overthrow of the Xia mandate was the sin of Jie; the destruction and loss of the Yin dynasty was the fault of Zhou. Therefore know that the principle of cause and effect is complex and hard to gauge; the law of karmic retribution is uneven and unfixed. These are what are called retribution in the next life, retribution in the present life, and retribution in subsequent lives.'
22.41
The doubting gentleman said: 'If the view of spontaneity is unacceptable in principle, then the doctrine of retribution should be correct in words. Yet your earlier instruction also said that the expositions of the two gentlemen both fail to accord with truth. May I hear the meaning of this?'
22.42
The Master of Penetrating Keenness said: 'Since you, sir, have repeatedly and earnestly made this request, I will make an effort to answer you. But examining my own unworthiness, I may fail to expound its essentials and subtleties. In investigating dharmas, they are originally not existent; being not existent, there is no arising. Principle naturally is not non-existent; being not non-existent, there is no cessation. With no arising and no cessation, where do all dharmas reside? Neither existent nor non-existent, upon what do the myriad things rely? Boundlessly pure, the pathway of discursive inquiry is severed; serenely equal, the route of grasping and rejecting has nowhere to turn. How could there be any principle of retribution to be sought, or any notion of good and evil to be grasped? It is solely because ordinary sentient beings have not comprehended this truth that they arbitrarily raise disputations and forcefully produce discriminations. This is what is called a thirsty person chasing a mirage while water is in rivers and ponds, or diseased eyes seeing sky-flowers when the empty sky never had a tree. It is merely to guide and accommodate proximate sentiments and dispel their heavy delusions that causes and effects are subtly indicated and karmic conditions are briefly displayed, causing attachment to fixed natures to be eliminated and spontaneous views to be extinguished. If one reaches the correct principle and awakens to this true Dharma, what then exists, and what does not exist?' Thereupon the several gentlemen looked at one another in astonished reverence and joyfully grasped the meaning. Stepping back from their seats, they respectfully submitted, saying: 'Today we may truly say: having heard the Way in the morning, one may die in the evening; going empty, we return full! The piled-up blockages have all collapsed, like leaves falling before the autumn wind; our manifold doubts have all dispersed, like ice melting in the spring sun. We shall conscientiously cast aside our previous confusions and together follow the subsequent practice.'
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- 廣弘明集 — Classical Chinese