鐔津文集 3.6

3.6

When some disciples shave their hair and begin to serve our Way, if their parents summon them, they decline as 'disciples of the Buddha' and do not go. I once told them: 'A disciple of the Buddha must rectify sentiment, but must never abandon parents. Have you not heard that when our former Sage first arose, in formulating the great precepts, he declared: "Filial piety is called the precepts"? This is taking filial piety as the outset of the precepts. If you take the precepts while wishing to discard filial piety, they are not the precepts. Filial piety is what precedes the great precepts; the precepts are that from which all wholesome deeds arise. In doing good, without the precepts, from where could goodness arise? In observing the precepts, without filial piety, from where would the precepts originate? Thus the sutra says: "That which enabled me swiftly to accomplish the unexcelled, correct, and true Way was the virtue of filial piety."'