Gatha 15 - 17
Commented by Master Yung Hsi, translated by Dr Chou Hsiang-Kuang
15
(Original) Jo Chien Tai Jen Fei, Tze Fei Ch'ueh Shih Tso | Tai Fei Wo Pu Fei, Wo Fei Tze Yu Ko
(English version) If we find fault with others, we ourselves are also in the wrong | When other people are in the wrong, we should ignore it; for it is wrong for us to find fault.
According to the previous paragraph, 'He who treads the path in earnest, sees not the mistakes of the world,' means that if we still criticise others' faults, our discriminating mind has arisen, and we will insist on the ejects of the ego.(1) Actually, others' faults do not concern us [in that they are not ours]. Once your discriminating mind has come out, it will evolve into dislike and hatred. Then the defilemental seeds will enter into the field of consciousness and there will be errors and mistakes.
Such things are not beneficial to us; it is called left. The meaning of left is weakness of position; this is because the use of the right hand and right leg are more convenient [for right hand persons]. This is why the Sixth Patriarch said, If we find fault with others, we ourselves are also in the wrong. Others' faults are theirs; my faults are mine. [If I act accordingly] there is no fault in me.
Chuang Tze said, 'The superman's mind is like a clear mirror which itself remains motionless and reflects all forms.'(2)
Once mental activity is started and you want to refute what others have to say, either you will criticise them by word of mouth, or you approach them in an unfriendly manner; this would be a fault.
Confucius said, 'It was difficult to talk profitably and reputably with the people of Hu-hsiang, and a lad of that place having had an interview with the Master, the disciples doubted. The Master said, "I admit people's approach to me without committing myself as to what they may do when they have retired. Why must one be so severe?'(3) You see, Confucius was a worldly sage who advocated the idea of 'Recompense injury with justice, and recompence kindness with kindness.' He had such broad mind and never spoke of others' faults and mistakes. Why shouldn't we, who are the followers of Buddha, who hold the idea of sameness of enemy and friend, follow suit? This is why the Sixth Patriarch said, When other people are in the wrong, we should ignore it; for it is wrong for us to find fault.
Notes:
(1) [Gatha 13, footnote 2.]
(2) [It is on this metaphor that the 'battle' between masters Shin Shau and Huineng was won by the latter. Shin Shau's words on the wall read: 'Our body is like the Bodhi-tree, | And our mind a mirror bright. | Carefully we wipe them hour by hour, | And let no dust alight.'
Huineng replied with: 'There is no Bodhi-tree, | Nor stand of a mirror bright. | Since all is void, | Where can the dust alight?'
The battle shows how one part of the chan-community relied on, among other texts, the Suràngama sūtra, and the other part not. Huineng belonged to the first party since we find in the writings of Daoxin, the fourth Patriarch a passages that elaborates on the Suràngama: "When the eye sees things, the things are not there in the eye." Daoxin continues: " .... evidently the person's face is not in the mirror ... we realize that from the beginning neither the mirror nor the face has ever gone out or gone in, gone or come."]
(3) [The passage continues with, 'If a man purifies himself to wait upon me, I receive him so purified, without guaranteeing his past conduct.']
16
(Original) Tan Tze Ch'uen Fei Hsin, Ta Ch'u Fan Nao P'o | Ai Sen Pu Kuan Hsin, Chang Shen Liang Ch'uen Wu
(English version) By getting rid of the habit of fault-finding, we cut off a source of defilement | When neither hatred nor love disturb our mind, serenely we sleep with our legs fully stretched.
The word ch'uen means reject or remove. The words fei hsin mean to stop the thinking of or criticising others' faults. [This is] Because cultivators of the mind should abide in the practice [or dwellingplace] of suchness; they should not interfere with others' right or wrong, or good and evil. Lao Tze said, 'I recompense the good man with kindness, and I recompense the wicked man with kindness too.' At that moment your mind will be peaceful like clean water, and you are able to remove the defilements and reveal your real mind. [Compare it to] the clouds that [part to show] the bright moon.
The holy sang Pao Chih [418-514, of Ta-ming-ssu temple] said,
'Defilements exist owing to the activity of the mind,
If a person is mindless, where can defilements stay?
Don't think of catching the various forms discriminately,
Naturally you will attain enlightenment in an instant.'
Again he said,
'If my body is empty(1), everything will be empty.
Then the thousand grades and the ten thousand kind of things are sameness.'
The external phenomena being void [without essence], where can there be the man who exists, and where lies his fault?(2)
It is just as Dhyana teacher Yun Men [Jap.: Unmon] said,
'If you stand and you don't see your standing
If you walk and you don't see your walking
The four elements and the five skandha are nowhere to obtain
[From] Where then can you see the mountains, the rivers and the earth coming?
Every day you use your alms bowl for taking food; what will you call food?
Where is a grain of rice coming [to]?'
Once at this stage [of cultivating] love, hatred, good and evil have nothing to do with our real essence of mind and the world will be at once at peace.
The sentence serenely we sleep with our legs fully stretched means that when you finish seeking religious instructions, you attain a state of great and complete rest. That is, when you feel hungry you take food, and when you feel sleepy and tired you go to sleep.
There was, for example a Dhyana teacher by the name of Yi Ching who had attained enlightenment at Fu Shan [shan = mountain]. After his attainment he called on abbot Hsiu of Yun T'ung Monastery where he did not ask for religious instructions. He used to sleep all day long. The attendant of the monastery informed master Hsiu about it. Immediately Hsiu entered the preaching hall with his stick in hand and saw Yi Ching sleeping. Hsiu said:
'There is no food here for you since you [waste your time in] sleeping.
— 'What do you want me to do?' said Yi Ching.
— 'Why don't you meditate?'
— 'Delicious food is not coveted by one who's belly is full.'
— 'There are many people here who won't believe you.'
— 'Even if they believe me, what use [what the heck]?'
— 'Did you see who was coming? '
— 'I saw Fu Shan coming.'
— 'Now I realize why you are so naughty and lazy.'
Hsiu smiled, they shook hands, and Hsiu went back to the abbot's room. In later years Yi Ching became abbot at T'ou Tze. On the fourth day of May, in the sixth year of emperor Yun Fong's reign (Sung Dynasty), after he had taken a bath, he [Yi Ching] called all the monks of the monastery together to say goodbye. On this oocasion he wrote a few gatha, let go of his brush and passed away.
If we see how free his birth and death were, we may know that a person like Yi Ching had thourougly understood the real meaning of the sentences, By getting rid of the habit of fault-finding, we cut off a source of defilement | When neither hatred nor love disturb our mind, serenely we sleep with our legs fully stretched.
Notes:
(1) [Without inherent essence.]
(2) [There are scores of sources that give introductions on emptiness, viz sunyatā. Without this knowledge of a basic treat of Mahāyāna Buddhism these words cannot be understood.]
17
(Original) Yu Yi Hwa Tai Jen, Tze Hsu Yu Fong Pien | Fa Lin Pi Yu Yi, Hi Shih Tze Hsin Hsien
(English version) Those who intend to be the teachers of others, Should themselves be skilled in the various expedients (upāya) that lead others to Enlightenment | When the disciple is free from all doubts, then it indicates that his essence of mind has been found.
If people are ignorant and you want to instruct them to be enlightened, and they are in the wrong way, and you wish to lead them to the right way, then you have the original mind of the Tathāgata who came to this world to lead others to enlightenment. It is also the Bodhisattva's right cultivation for [the same] attainment of enlightenment. But we should be skilled in the various expedient means; only then can we cause others to practice.
'Various expedient means' is called upāya in Sanskrit. Upāya means 'convenient to the place', 'suited to the occasion', opportune, appropriate. But the word fong [in this composite] is to be interpreted as method, mode, means, and the word pièn means 'convenient for use'. I.e. it is a convenient or expedient method. Fong also means correct, and pièn is also skillful. So it implies 'strategically correct'. It [the composite] is also interpreted as 'relative' (teaching or knowledge) of reality, in contrast with Prajñā, absolute truth or reality as opposed to the seeming. In short, the meaning of upāya is teaching according to the capacity of the hearer, by any suitable method, including that of device or stratagem [as long as it is] expedient and beneficial for the recipient. It is also interpreted as the gate that leads from Hīnayāna to Mahāyāna. That's why it is called upāya .
The establishing of Three Vehicles in order to communicate the One is therefore also called upāya. This is why we classify the Buddha's teachings into upāya and reality.
The abovementioned definition of upāya teaching is still on the side of the teaching sect of Buddhism. When we talk about upāya we lay emphasis on both the canonical teachings and on the teaching of the Chan School. Compare it to general Li-Kwang who in commanding his troops very crafty and cleverly placed them in horizontal and vertical positions, in a [seeming] imprecise way.
We cannot explain these things in one sentence, but its outline has been given in the 'Sūtra Spoken by the Sixth Patriarch, on the High Seat of the Law', as follows,
One day the Patriarch sent for his disciples Fa Hai, Chi Cheng and others, and addressed them as follows:
'You men are different from the common lot. After my entering into Parinirvana each of you will be the Dhyana teacher of a certain district. I am, therefore, going to give you some hints on preaching, so that when doing so, you may keep up the tradition of our School.
'First mention the three categories of Dharmas, and then the thirty 'pairs of opposites' in the activities (of the essence of mind). Then the extremes may be explained [in terms of] whether we are 'coming in' or 'going out'. In all preaching stray not from the essence of mind. Whenever a man puts a question to you, answer him always in antonyms, so that a 'pair of opposites' will be formed. (For example), 'coming' and 'going' are the reciprocal cause of each other; when the independence of the two is entirely done away with, there would be, in the absolute sense, neither 'coming' nor 'going'.
......
'He who knows how to use these thirty-six pairs [of opposites] realises that all-pervading principle which goes through the teaching of all sūtras. Where he is 'coming in' or 'going out', he is able to avoid the two extremes.
'In the functioning of the essence of mind and in conversation with others, we should outwardly free ourselves from attachment to objects when coming in contact with objects, and we should inwardly, [with regard] to the teaching of the 'void', free ourselves from the idea of Nihilism.
......
'whenever an answer is put to you, answer in the negative if it is a positive one [i.e. question], and vice versa. If you are asked something about an ordinary man, tell him something about a sage, and vice versa. From the correlation or inter-dependence of the two opposites, the doctrine of the 'mean' may be grasped. If all other questions are answered in this manner, you will not be away from the truth.
'(Let me explain more fully.) Suppose someone asks you what is darkness. Answer him thus: Light is 'hétu' (root condition), and darkness is 'pratyáya' (conditions that bring about any given phenomenon). When light disappears, darkness is the consequence. These two are in contrast to each other. From the correlation or inter-dependence of the two, the doctrine of the Mean 'arises'.'
In this talk the Sixth Patriarch revealed all details in connection with the expedient methods to lead others to enlightenment.
There was a monk named Chen Chi(1) of Sung Mountains. One day Chen Chi asked the Dhyana teacher [whose name is not mentioned here],
'What is the person who is cultivating good deeds?'
— 'He is wearing cangues [shackles] and carrying locks', said the teacher.
—'What is the person who is doing evil action?'
— 'He is doing meditation to enter samadhi.'
— 'My fundamental quality is [yet] imperfect, you please point out plainly.'
— 'If you ask me about evil, evil will not follow the good; if you ask me about good, good does not agree with evil.'
The monk kept silent for a while, then the Dhyana teacher said to him,
'Do you understand it?'
— 'No.'
— 'The evildoer will not have a good idea, and the good man will not have an evil mind. Therefore we say that good and evil are like floating clouds, both rising from no place, and where they are annihilated nobody knows.
Hereupon the monk attained enlightenment. Later the holy monk P'o Chuang Tu(2) heard about it and said in admiration: 'The man knows all dharmas of no-birth.'
This story illustrates the expedient method of the upright sect of the Sixth Patriarch of the Chan School; it can make the monk doubtless.
Such instruction methods are meant only for those learned Audiences who can understand and handle them. Because if you only learn a method of argumentation that presents each time the contrary, such as answering a question like 'what is the meaning of the verb to have' with no, or when they ask you what is good, and you answer 'bad', you would be like a cockatoo who learns human language. It would not be beneficial, but harmful. [Let's go back to the conversation of the monk Chen Chi]: had the Dhyana teacher not instructed him later on [i.e.in his last sentence], he would have been full of errors and doubts. Had the Dhyana teacher not instructed him [by uttering his last sentence], he would, during this conversation, never have realised the essence of mind [by himself] by his unique intuitive certainty and power's utility to stop that which perpetually flows out of one's own mind, [an outflow] that is perceived as something external to oneself. [By the same token, since he had this unique intuitive certainty and power's utility, and since we cannot instill this in someone,] we also cannot make him enlightened.(3) This is the great learned audiences' wonderful and secret method to point out the people's essence of mind in a straightforward manner.
In the olden days there was a Dhyana teacher by name of Hsiu-Chen of the Hu Kuo Monastery. He was under the instruction of the ven Paotze of Hu-nan. One day Paotze was seated on his High Dharma-seat when the Chan Buddhist Yenhua came in and asked,
—'What is the true Buddhanature?'
— 'Who hasn't Buddhanature?' said Paotze.
After the meeting was over a Sthávira(4) asked Yenhua and said,
— 'Do you remember the question that you asked the ven Paotze?'
— 'No.'
— 'You are so kind and compassionate; why can't you remember? [You asked] Who hasn't Buddhanature. All sentients have Buddhanature.
Yenhua said, 'Thank you for clearing my doubts.
Hsiu-Chen heard this and became angry. He said, 'This fellow [the Stávira] has no eyes and will make others blind as well.
He [Hsiu-Chen] called Yenhua and asked,
— 'What did the Stávira just now tell you?
Yenhua repeated the story [uptill and included the passage] of removing his doubts.
Hsiu-Chen said,
— 'Buddhadharma is not what he said. If you don't believe it, go ask the ven Paotze'
Yenhua called upon the ven Paotze and requested him to approve the matter. Paotze too said,
— 'Buddhadharma is not this.'
[Yenhua was perplexed and said,] — 'Just now Dhyana teacher Hsiu-Chen told me 'Buddha's Dharma is not this.' Therefore I came to you to enquire from you; please solve my problem.'
— [Paotze:] 'Go and ask Hsiu-Chen.'
Yenhua returned to Hsiu-Chen, bowed down and said,
— 'The ven Paotze asked me to go here and ask for instructions.'
— [Hsiu-Chen:] 'Ask away.'
— 'What is true Buddhanature?'
— 'Who hasn't Buddhanature.'
After hearing this Yenhua was suddenly enlightened [Jap. kenshō] and his body was full of perspiration. To all members of the monastery he said that from then onwards he would dedicate his life to the propagation of the Dharma. In later years he became abbot of the Hu Kuo Monastery.
This above kung-an tells us that the Sthávira himself had not realized the essence of mind. Therefore he didn't have the expedient means [upaya]. He could not make Yenhua see his orginal face before he was born.
Since Dhyana teacher Hsiu-Cheng sought enlightenment at the feet of the ven Jen of Su Shan, he knew the Buddhist canon as well as the expedient means of the Chan School. Within the time span of a flash of lightning Yenhua cut off his false mental activity and cleared all his doubts. Those persons who didn't enlighten their hearts to realize their essence of mind will not have such wonderful and useful methods. That is why the Gātha says, Those who intend to be the teachers of others, Should themselves be skilled in the various expedients (upāya) that lead others to Enlightenment | When the disciple is free from all doubts, then it indicates that his essence of mind has been found.
Notes:
(1) [This might have been Chao-chou Chen-chi who was the thirty-seventh patriarch.]
(2) The monk P'o Chuang Tu, literally 'the Broken Furnace Falling', was an eminent Dhyana teachers during the Tang Dynasty. He never revealed his real [Dharma-] name [given at the occasion of higher ordination]. He used to stay at the Sung mountains where there was a [non-Buddhist] temple and a furnace. Many people came there to worship [the furnace], and as a consequence many [animal] lives were taken there as a sacrifice.
One day the monk came to this temple and used his stick to strike the furnace by saying, 'Ah! the furnace has been put together by using tiles made out of mud; where its saintship is coming from, and where its spirit is coming out? Why kill so many lives here? Thereupon he used his stick again and struck the furnace thrice; it fell on the ground [and was broken]. After a little while there was a man who bowed down before the monk. The monk asked, 'who are you?' The other replied, 'I am the kitchen spirit here. I received the karma reward long time ago, and this time I listened to your preaching the Dharma of the unborn. I therefore left this furnace and went to the state of enlightenment. I came [back] here to pay homage to you.' As the monk did not disclose his name, he became known as P'o Chuang Tu or the Broken Furnace Falling.
(The simile of the furnace is directly taken from a statement in the Zhuangzi, the mystical book of the Daoists: The Mysterious Furnace there is another expression for "the continuous process of transformation".
When therefore the Buddhist monk is called P'o Chuang Tu ('Broken Furnace Falling') it indicates that he broke through this continuous transformation, that is, through the cycle of life. I.e. he was considered to be enlightened to the degree of a "non-returner" to another life after death.)
(3) [What is meant here is that the Dhyana teacher can offer the right key with which a person can unlock his own door from the inside. No-one else has this access. There is no source from outside that can 'give' us enlightenment. We, in the mind frame of Bodhisattva Fu, have our own innate Buddhahood; others have theirs.]
(4) [The name Sthávira stands for a member of the Teaching Schools. The passage that follows is an illustration of how 'great doubt' was raised in Yenhua. 'Great doubt', it is said, is necessary for obtaining this degree of enlightenment.
The 'Sthávira' too was a member of the great plot of Chan Buddhism, that is, the Huayen Chan, the Chan meditation connected with the Rounded Teaching of Totality.]
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