集沙門不應拜俗等事 6.10

6.10

The śramaṇa Xuanfan ventures to submit this memorial to the royal princes, dukes, marquises, earls, and all officials of the Department of State Affairs (Zhongtai). Although I, Fan, am not ranked among those included in the deliberation, I have nevertheless heard of these matters. In antiquity, the venerable Master of Mount Lu encountered the vicissitudes of the times and thereupon composed the five essays of the Discourse on Śramaṇas Not Paying Homage to Kings. Its principles and reasoning are profound and subtle, and its questions and answers are abstruse and marvelous; yet because one seeks to clarify them succinctly, they are difficult to comprehend at first reading. I now briefly recount the records of the inner and outer scriptures to demonstrate and prove the principle of not paying homage, and reverently submit this memorial, requesting that the discussion requiring them to bow be quelled.
Now, though Heaven is supremely profound, it must manifest the brilliance of the sun and moon; though Earth is supremely tranquil, it must firmly maintain the transforming power of mountains and rivers. Though the sagely ruler communicates with unseen forces and operates in secret, he also must employ the worthy and talented to assist and govern the common people as his children. When the sovereign employs his ministers with ritual propriety, the ministers must serve the sovereign with loyalty. If one does not remonstrate at court before matters take shape, one fears that the critical moment will arise from oneself.
Now, the Buddha's teaching lies beyond the worldly realm: it surpasses the dignity of the four great elements, transcends the boundaries of the universe, goes beyond the duties owed to the three [father, teacher, and sovereign], proclaims compassion without conditions, and spreads a transformation that works without words. Its unseen merits operate in secret; thus it is said that one is bathed and gradually permeated by it. It is only people of middling capacity who regard it as useless, truly failing to realize what it lets go.
Therefore, the late emperor's Preface to the Sagely Teaching states: 'The subtleties of yin and yang are difficult to exhaust because they are formless. Does not the Buddhist Way hold emptiness in esteem, ride upon the unseen, master tranquility, broadly deliver the myriad beings, and govern the ten directions?' Now that the sun of wisdom has hidden its radiance and the semblance teaching operates unseen, who else but the monks can uphold the Dharma with harmony and reverence? Thus the Buddha told the Bodhisattva *Faith-Mark* (Xinxiang): 'I say that the Three Jewels are solely one single body, having no separate characteristics.' The transmission and preservation of this semblance Dharma must rest upon this.
If King Aśoka bowed to a novice monk and instructed his heterodox ministers by trading various heads, was this not an admirable embodiment of the Way? Now, to wish monks and nuns to bend their bodies in worldly ceremonial and toil at bowing and making deep bows is to cause the Buddha to bow to humans, rather than having humans pay homage to the Dharma. This is like turning the ceremonial cap and shoes upside down upon head and feet; indeed, it is an extreme reversal and confusion!
Moreover, the king has three classes of persons who are permanently treated as not being subjects, five who are temporarily not treated as subjects, four who are not called by their personal names, and one who does not act as a subject. The Classic of Documents says: 'When the guest of Yu was in his place, Shun did not treat Zhu as a subject.' The Classic of Poetry says: 'There is a guest, there is a guest; his horses also are white.' Since these were heirs to the two preceding royal dynasties, even emperors did not treat them as subjects. How much less should monks, who are the descendants of the Great Sage, pay homage to the ruler of men? Why should the guest protocol of the state lose its proper decorum by inappropriately applying the reverence shown by Never-Disparaging to the fourfold assembly to the single person of a ruler? This was because that bodhisattva-monk had eliminated the concept of self and other; how much less should it apply today when the stations of noble and base are distinct and entirely non-comparable?
Furthermore, citing Vimalakīrti to require bowing, and quoting 'knowing the Dharma' to summon respect: in antiquity, when teaching novices within the ten-foot room, medicine was prescribed without examining the capacity, thereby forgetting this inner meaning midway and adhering to the incomplete teaching (ardhākṣara). Once they rested peacefully in correct mindfulness, brought forth their past lives, and manifested awakening, they returned to their original minds and revered the complete teaching (pūrṇākṣara). Thereupon, with signless bowing of the head and thoughtless touching of the feet, they confounded the black and white robes for a time and obliterated nature and characteristics for myriad kalpas. These were the expedient, sincere actions of great beings (mahāsattvas); they cannot be universally standardized for those of lesser capacities. Therefore, the Nirvāṇa Sūtra says: 'I spoke such a verse for bodhisattvas.' Now, as śrāvakas uphold the utmost of precept-seniority and strictly maintain solemn deportment, this is not out of arrogance or defiance toward sovereign and parents; rather, it is truly out of a desire to exalt the state and benefit ministers and subjects.
Furthermore, the Abhidharmakośanyāyānusāra Śāstra says: 'The hosts of devas and spirits dare not hope for or seek the bows of those who observe the five precepts, just as the ruler of a state does not seek the bows of bhikṣus, for fear of diminishing their merit and lifespan.' Now, to wish to impose the teachings of the Duke of Zhou and Confucius upon them and suppress them with secular rituals—I privately consider that benevolent men should not adopt this.
Moreover, the lineages of monks and nuns are not of barbarian clans, and their natures are clear of the Rong and Man tribes. Born in the Central Plains, they are models for the four barbarian tribes; having received the tonsure, they carry on the Three Jewels. According to their teaching, bowing to sovereign and parents brings harm; practicing their Dharma to assist family and state brings benefit. One fears that if the holy words are concealed, disaster will strike those who transgress them. The Dharmagupta Vinaya states that it causes people to revere the elderly and that one should not bow to white-robed laymen, precisely because they are not tethered to titles and stipends and are distinguished from the secular net by their canonical instructions.
The Royal Regulations state: 'If there are those who do not act harmoniously in the ancestral temple, they are demoted in rank; if there are spiritual beings of the mountains and rivers who are not sacrificed to, their lands are stripped.' How much more so when monks and nuns seek reverence from ghosts and spirits, yet reverse their rites toward parents! If the correct teaching is allowed to drown in such defilement and vulgarity, I fear that the bright spirits will not bring peace and prosperity, good fortune and celebration will not flow and moisten the land, calamities will frequently arise, and disasters will constantly occur. Sentient beings would abandon the transformative influence that establishes customs, and aristocratic youths would lack instruction to enlighten their ignorance. The ministers and subjects of the entire land would bend before the wind, unable to renew themselves through teachers and precepts, and there would be nothing to assist the state in moral transformation. The Brahmājāla Sūtra clearly states that one should not bow to sovereign, parents, ghosts, or spirits.
Furthermore, one who is wet with rain does not bow down, as it is a loss of decorum; how much more so with shaved heads and cut garments, which are not the attire of girdles and sashes, and tonsured hair, which lacks the ornament of hairpins for bowing! In the standards of schools, this would be regarded as an abnormality at court. The Buddha's teaching is the transformation of distant lands and different customs; it does not share the climate of the central harmony and compliant movement. Its survival or demise truly rests upon human agency. The Great Commentary says: 'Where the calendar does not reach, the gentleman does not treat as a subject.' It is better to bring good fortune through what they teach, benefit through what they receive, employ them through their labor, and serve them by availing of their peace and profit. Thus, winning the joyful hearts of the common people means that the One Man has cause for celebration.
Furthermore, those clad in armor do not bow down, lest it break their martial dignity; an emperor does not treat his teacher as a subject, lest it diminish his Way. How much more so for those who wear the armor of forbearance and don the woven mail, who subdue dragons by frightening them with their kāṣāya, and terrify the might of Māra with dhūta practices! When an escaped slave renounced worldly life, the king in person descended to pay him homage; when Upāli entered the Way, his royal father offered bows. Thus we know that wherever the Way resides, it is noble, and it does not derive its weight from the person. Hence it is true that the Way greatly magnifies humanity, and humanity can magnify the Way.
Now, the reason the bequeathed Dharma was entrusted to kings was to rely on them for protection and depend on them for its circulation. Because the fourfold assembly is weak, and out of fear that the Three Jewels might fall into ruin, they rely on the king's majestic power to subdue opposition and make use of the king's authority to ward off pressure. If they are now made to gather their robes, bend their knees, clasp their hands, and knock their foreheads on the ground, then the transformation of the River [Gaṅgā] will be broken from here on. The Classic of Poetry says: 'The king rose in his fury, and marshaled his forces.' The monks are trembling with fear and apprehension, terrified of compromising the original intent of the bequeathed teaching and humiliating the Dharma robes of shared merit. The toil of a single bow will not necessarily add to the loss of the saṃgha, and the respect of a single bow will not necessarily enhance the majesty of the Ruler of Ten Thousand Chariots. The reason the monks have recently been anxious and unsettled in their vocations is not merely for the sake of their ordinary physical bodies, but out of deep concern for the flourishing transformation.
One fears that the radiant beauty of the Dharma will not grace this prosperous era, and how could inquiries from foreign lands be heard in our present day? If one definitely considers the scriptures and images to be weeds and rubbish unworthy of veneration, and monks and nuns to be rot and decay unworthy of being fields of merit—so that those who look at religious texts scorch their eyes, those who practice bows become stooped and crippled, those who put on dark robes suffer cramps, and those who discuss canonical rites get tooth decay—and thereupon disdains and discards them, alters the customs of Tianzhu, expands the rituals of China, starts afresh with all things, and spurs the three great ones to self-renewal: then the foundation for adopting goodness will merely be established in vain! It would be far better to keep the net of teaching outside worldly bounds and release their decorum beyond mundane things, while treating them as ministers and sons would suffice to fulfill the virtue of loyalty and filial piety.
Thus, historical records need not be an endless night, and the classics and masters are not necessarily the sun. Though the Minister of Education learns without weariness, there will still be omissions in the Great Instruction; how much worse would it be if the beauty that aids the state were lost in disorder? Securing peace without multiplying prohibitions, and achieving one's aim without altering human feelings—even King Wen, a supreme sage, still studied under Guo Shu; Confucius, most enlightened, still took Tanzi as his teacher. The king is supremely exalted, yet he treats the Sanlao as a father and the Wugeng as an elder brother; when it comes to the Shakuden ceremony, he personally holds the wine goblet, kneels down, and acts with solemnity and circumspection. Even in the utmost of filial service, nothing could exceed what is shown to a strict father. For this reason, the Gu hexagram of the Great Changes teaches not serving kings and princes, and the 'Conduct of the Scholar' in the Great Rites speaks of not treating [the scholar] as a subject of the Son of Heaven. Therefore we know that the Way is noble because it is held to be noble, and is not degraded merely because someone belittles it.
I humbly imagine that when court officials mock the correct scholars, regarding them as destructive pests about to spawn caterpillars and locusts, and debate requiring them to bow, this is no grand strategy for the imperial court.
Now, since the True Dharma laid its foundation in the west down to this day, more than a millennium and a half has already passed. Since the Great Teaching flowed east, it has been barely seven hundred years. Although dynasties and markets have undergone transitions, its flourishing has never been interrupted. Among them, sagely rulers and worthy ministers were more than could be counted, yet they never restrained or restricted it, much less degraded monks and nuns. Truly we know that such broad-minded generosity has lasted for a long time. In recent times, there were minor rulers who seized power, and petty sovereigns who plotted usurpation, flattering themselves to curdle favor and causing their families and states to collapse; there were also one or two small barbarian states where rulers struggled against one another, and though they briefly eradicated [the Dharma], their earlier errors were soon corrected. Toward such as these, one might well roll up one's sleeves, pump one's elbows, glare with furious eyes, gnash one's teeth, stare wide, and shout in condemnation—would that not be a magnificent sight of loyalty and valor?
Now our Great Tang has answered the destiny of the 'Nine and Five' and succeeded to the station of the Three Sovereigns. The eight extremities share the same track, and the four seas have a common script. The hundred officials uphold the laws in their departments, and the Three Jewels expound subtle words to guide and save. Thus both the religious and secular build merit, and family and state extend their blessings; is this not magnificent? Is this not magnificent?
The imperial decree noted that the Song dynasty briefly changed this custom, but after a short while returned to the old practice; this was truly because it violated their constant sentiments. The current deliberation lies in not losing the constant principle. We hope you will reflect on this with solemnity, and broadly protect it. If the governance of the family and state flourishes, the sincerity of loyalty and filial piety will surely be manifest; unseen merits will quietly moisten the land, roots and branches will grow luxuriant, fine offices will naturally be bestowed, emoluments and honors will be abundantly granted, blossoms and calyxes will succeed in lineage, and orchids and chrysanthemums will transmit their fragrance. Moved by the inner support of blessings and good fortune, and mindful of outer protection for broad benefit, how could one fail to preserve this supreme era forever without decline during one's lifetime?
I now respectfully list the inner and outer canonical rites, and request that you look into and examine them. The śramaṇa Shi Xuanfan respectfully speaks.