鐔津文集 11.6

11.6

按唐書曰。後魏之末有僧號達磨者。本天竺國王之子。以護國出家入南海。得禪宗妙法。自釋迦文佛相傳。有衣鉢為記。以世相付受。達磨齎衣鉢航海而來。至梁詣武帝。帝問以有為之事。達磨不說。乃之魏隱於嵩山少林寺。以其法傳慧可。可傳僧粲粲傳道信。信傳弘忍。忍傳慧能。而復出神秀。能於達磨在中國為六世。故天下謂之六祖。法寶記蓋六祖之所說其法也。其法乃生靈之大本。人焉鬼神焉萬物焉。遂與其清明廣大者。紛然而大異。六祖憫此乃諭人。欲人自求之。即其心而返道也。然天下之言性命者多矣。若其言之之至詳。理之之至當。推之之至悉。而釋氏得之矣。若其示之之至直。趨之之至徑。證之之至親而六祖之於釋氏。又其得之也。六祖於釋氏教道。可謂要乎至哉。今天子開善閣記。謂以本性證乎了義者。未有舍六祖之道而有能至於此者也。是則六祖者乃三界之慈父。諸佛之善嗣歟。偉乎。惟至聖而能知至道也。然六祖之說余素敬之。患其為俗所增損。而文字鄙俚繁雜殆不可考。會沙門契嵩作壇經贊。因謂嵩師曰。若能正之。吾為出財。模印以廣其傳。更二載嵩果得曹溪古本校之。勒成三卷。粲然皆六祖之言。不復謬妄。乃命工鏤板以集其勝事。至和三年三月十九月序。

According to the *Book of Tang*: At the end of the Later Wei, there was a monk named Bodhidharma. He was originally the son of a king in India, who left the household life for the protection of the state, went into the South Seas, and attained the wondrous Dharma of the Chan tradition. Transmitted consecutively from Śākyamuni Buddha, the robe and bowl were kept as tokens to be conferred generation after generation. Bodhidharma carried the robe and bowl and came sailing across the sea. Arriving in the Liang, he went to see Emperor Wu. The Emperor asked him about conditioned deeds, but Bodhidharma did not speak of them. He then went to the Wei and concealed himself at Shaolin Temple on Mount Song, transmitting his Dharma to Huike; Huike transmitted it to Sengcan; Sengcan transmitted it to Daoxin; Daoxin transmitted it to Hongren; Hongren transmitted it to Huineng; and Shenxiu also emerged. Huineng was the sixth generation in China from Bodhidharma, and therefore the empire called him the Sixth Patriarch. The *Record of the Dharma Treasure* is that in which the Sixth Patriarch expounded his Dharma. That Dharma is the great foundation of all living beings. Humans, ghosts, spirits, and the myriad things consequently became chaotically and vastly divergent from what is clear, luminous, and expansive. The Sixth Patriarch took pity on this and instructed people, desiring that they seek it for themselves, returning to the Way right within their own minds. Now, there are many throughout the empire who speak of the nature and mandate. Yet as for speaking of it with the utmost detail, ordering it with the utmost propriety, and deducing it with the utmost thoroughness, the Buddhists have attained it. And as for indicating it with the utmost directness, proceeding toward it by the most direct path, and realizing it with the utmost intimacy, the Sixth Patriarch again attained it within the Buddhist teaching. The Sixth Patriarch may be called essential and supreme regarding the doctrinal path of Buddhism. In his *Record of the Pavilion of Kaishan*, the current Son of Heaven said that of those who verify the definitive meaning through the original nature, none have been able to reach this without relying on the way of the Sixth Patriarch. If so, then is the Sixth Patriarch not a compassionate father of the triple realm and an excellent heir of all the Buddhas? How magnificent! Only the supreme sage can know the supreme Way. Yet while I have always revered the Sixth Patriarch's teachings, I was troubled that they had been augmented or abridged by worldly people, and that the language had become so vulgar, coarse, prolix, and mixed as to be almost impossible to examine. It happened that the śramaṇa Qisong composed the *Tanjing zan*. I therefore said to Master Song, "If you can rectify it, I will provide the funds to carve and print it so as to spread its transmission." After two more years, Master Song indeed obtained an ancient Caoxi edition, collated it, and arranged it into three fascicles; luminous and bright, all of it is the words of the Sixth Patriarch, free from error and falsity. I then ordered craftsmen to carve the printing blocks to bring this excellent event to completion. Prefaced on the nineteenth day of the third month of the third year of the Zhihe era [1056].