Secrets on Cultivating the Mind by Seon Master Bojo of Goryeo
The following is my translation of and commentary on this treatise, as found in the Taisho Tripitaka text 202, volume 48, lines 1005c-1009b. My translation is very indebted to three prior translations: Robert E. Buswell Jr.’s translation, Moguja’s Secrets on Cultivating the Mind, in Chinul’s Works: Selected Translations; the translation Secrets on Cultivating the Mind in the Won Buddhist publication The Essential Scriptures of the Buddhas and Patriarchs; and Thomas Cleary’s Secrets of Cultivating the Mind in Minding Mind: A Course in Basic Meditation.
In the Secrets on Cultivating the Mind, Jinul taught a model of Buddhist practice wherein gradual cultivation is based upon a sudden enlightenment to one’s true nature. This treatise also extols the simultaneous practice of concentration and wisdom, or in Sanskrit samadhi and prajna. Jinul teaches that concentration is the essence and wisdom is the function of the true nature of the mind. This mind can be characterized as an empty and quiescent yet numinous awareness. This mind is the true buddha. Sudden enlightenment is to realize the true nature of the mind. Afterward, one can cultivate one’s practice by the light of that realization and live more and more in accord with the true nature, gradually seeing through and overcoming countless lifetimes of deluded thinking and the unwholesome habit-patterns that had obscured it.
I hope that this translation of and commentary on Jinul’s Secrets on Cultivating the Mind will illuminate the importance of the model of sudden enlightenment followed by gradual cultivation which I believe that Nichiren also upheld, though without using that specific terminology. I also believe that this model is a very realistic and practical model that is shared by many other Buddhist traditions. I also believe that his discussion of the true nature of mind as being the true buddha, and that the essence of that mind is concentration while its function is wisdom is very much in line with the teachings of Nichiren and Tiantai Buddhism. There are some places, however, where I feel that Jinul’s rhetoric sounds too much like the kind of philosophical idealism that the Buddha, as well as later teachers including Tiantai and Dogen, cautioned against. All in all, I hope that this treatise and my commentary will help open up perspectives whereby we can all gain a greater understanding and appreciation of Buddhist teachings, our own practice, and most importantly the true nature of our lives and our ability to live in accord with that true nature.
Secrets on Cultivating the Mind by Seon Master Bojo of Goryeo
高麗國普照禪師修心訣
#2020 Volume 48
1005c20
1005c21
三界熱惱猶如火宅。其忍淹留甘受長苦。欲免輪迴莫若求佛。若欲求佛佛即是心。心何遠覓不離身中。色身是假有生有滅。眞心如空不斷不變。故云。百骸潰散歸火歸風。一物長靈蓋天蓋地。
1. The triple world with its feverish vexations is like a burning house. How can you bear to tarry here and willingly endure such constant suffering? If you desire to avoid samsara, there is no better way than to seek buddhahood. If you desire to seek buddhahood, [know that] the buddha is the mind, so how can you search for the mind in the far distance when it is not apart from the body? The physical body only exists provisionally, for it is subject to arising and ceasing; the true mind is like space, for it is uninterrupted and immutable. Therefore, [Danzia] said, “These hundred bones will crumble and return to fire and wind, but one thing is everlastingly numinous and envelops heaven and earth.”
Comment: The triple world refers to the “three realms” of samsara (the cycle of birth and death): 1) the desire realm, 2) the form realm, and 3) the formless realm. Unawakened sentient beings undergo rebirth through these three realms. The world of desire extends from the hells up to the more concrete heavens. The worlds of form and formlessness include the higher heavens of increasing refinement that are attained through the practice of meditative absorption. The third chapter, “A Parable,” of the Lotus Sutra, likens the triple world of delusion and suffering to a house on fire.
If Jinul means the mind is eternal while the body is not, and that the mind is within the body then this is very problematic. On at least two occasions, Shakyamuni Buddha specifically refuted this kind of thinking.
In the Middle Length Discourses, the Buddha speaks to a monk named Sati who believes that it is the same consciousness that is reborn over many lifetimes:
The Blessed One then asked him: “Sati, is it true that the following pernicious view has arisen in you: ‘As I understand the Dhamma taught by the Blessed One, it is this same consciousness that runs and wanders through the round of rebirths, not another’?”
“Exactly so, venerable sir. As I understand the Dhamma taught by the Blessed One, it is this same consciousness that runs and wanders through the round of rebirths, not another.”
“What is that consciousness, Sati?”
“Venerable sir, it is that which speaks and feels and experiences here and there the result of good and bad actions.”
“Misguided man, to whom have you ever known me to teach the Dhamma in that way? Misguided man, have I not stated in many ways consciousness to be dependently arisen, since without a condition there is no origination of consciousness? But you, misguided man, have misrepresented us by your wrong grasp and injured yourself and stored up much demerit; for this will lead to your harm and suffering for a long time.” (Majjhima Nikaya 38.6; Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha, p. 350)
In the Connected Discourses, the Buddha taught an assembly of monks that while even ordinary people might not identify the body as an eternal self, they might still try to identify the mind as such a self. This, however, is also a mistaken idea. The Buddha tells them:
It would be better, bhikkhus, for the uninstructed worldling to take as self this body composed of the four great elements rather than the mind. For what reason? Because this body composed of the four great elements is seen standing for one year, for two years, for three, four, five, or ten years, for twenty, thirty, forty, or fifty years, for a hundred years, or even longer. But that which is called ‘mind’ and ‘mentality’ and ‘consciousness’ arises as one thing and ceases as another by day and by night. Just as a monkey roaming through a forest grabs hold of one branch, lets that go and grabs another, then lets that go and grabs still another, so too that which is called ‘mind’ and ‘mentality’ and ‘consciousness’ arises as one thing and ceases as another by day and by night. (Samyutta Nikaya 12.61; The Connected Discourses of the Buddha, p. 595)
If Jinul is referring to the One Mind of Tathagatagarbha thought, that is also problematic because it is a kind of monism. But if he is talking about mind in the sense of an awareness of the unconditioned, or a way of talking about the Dharma-body or buddha-nature then it is perhaps understandable. His point is that instead of looking to external conditioned things for happiness, one must get in touch with the numinous awareness of the buddha-nature, what in Nichiren and Tiantai Buddhism we would call the single thought-moment that contains all three thousand worlds as its provisional display. However, we should note that Tiantai Zhiyi did not say that mind or thought precedes phenomena or vice versa. He said:
“If there is no mind then there is nothing else, but if there is even a transient thought then there is a mind that contains the three thousand realms. But we cannot say that a single mind has prior existence and that all dharmas exist later, nor can we say that all dharma have prior existence and that the single mind exists later. … It is just that mind is all dharmas and all dharmas are mind.” (Clear Serenity, Quiet Insight, pp. 815-816, adapted)
Zhiyi is careful to not reduce all things to being mind, nor to reduce mind or thoughts to just being an epiphenomena of mind. For Zhiyi, all dharmas, mental or physical, are empty, provisionally existent, and mutually interdependent, and are each equally expressive of the middle way that is empty and provisionally existent.
The citation at the end is from the Verses of Appreciation for the Pearl by the Zen Master Danzia Zichun (1064-1117).
1005c25
嗟夫今之人迷來久矣。不識自心是眞佛。不識自性是眞法。欲求法而遠推諸聖。欲求佛而不觀己心。若言心外有佛性外有法堅執此情欲求佛道者。縱經塵劫燒身錬臂。敲骨出髓刺血寫經。長坐不臥一食卯齋。乃至轉讀一大藏教修種種苦行。如蒸 沙作飯只益自勞。爾但識自心恒沙法門無量妙義不求而得。故世尊云。普觀一切衆生具有如來智慧徳相。又云。一切衆生種種幻化皆生如來圓覺妙心。是知離此心外無佛可成。
2. Alas, people have been deluded for a long time now. They do not know that their own mind is the true Buddha. They do not know that their own nature is the true Dharma. They desire the Dharma, but then dismiss it as pertaining only to noble ones far away. They desire buddhahood, but then will not even contemplate their own mind. If they say that the Buddha is apart from mind, or that the Dharma is apart from their own nature, persisting in such feelings even while aspiring to the Buddha Way, then, even though they spend a billion kalpas burning their bodies, smelting their arms, breaking their bones to extract the marrow, stabbing themselves to use blood as ink for copying sutras, constantly sitting in meditation without lying down, eating only one alms meal at the hour of the rabbit (5-7 am), or even quickly reciting the entire tripitaka and practicing all manner of painful austerities, it will be like steaming sand to make rice. It will only increase their troubles. If people would only come to know their own minds, then without even looking for it they would attain the boundless wondrous meanings of Dharma gates as numerous as the sand of the Ganges. Therefore, the World Honored One said, “Everywhere I see that all sentient beings are endowed with the Tathagata’s wisdom and virtuous marks.” He also said, “All sentient beings many illusory transformations all arise in the wondrous mind of the perfect enlightenment of the Tathagata.” Truly, know that apart from this mind there is no buddhahood that can be attained.
Comment: This is pretty straightforward. The true Buddha is only found when our own mind is awake, and the buddha qualities are not going to be found apart from the actual phenomena that comprise our lives. There is no use looking elsewhere or thinking that we have to undergo endless painful austerities to earn it or find it.
The first quote from the Buddha refers to the following passage from the “Manifestation of Buddha” chapter of the Flower Garland Sutra:
Similarly, the knowledge of the Buddha, infinite and unobstructed, universally able to benefit all, is fully inherent in the bodies of sentient beings; but the ignorant, because of clinging to defiled notions, do not know of it, are not aware of it, and so do not benefit from it. Then the Buddha, with the unimpeded, pure, clear, clear eye of knowledge, observes all sentient beings in the cosmos and says, “How strange - how is it that these sentient beings have the knowledge of Buddha but in their folly and confusion do not know it or perceive it? I should teach them the way of sages and cause them forever to shed deluded notions and attachments, so they can see in their own bodies the vast knowledge of buddhas, no different from the buddhas.” (The Flower Ornament Scripture, p. 1003)
The second quote from the Buddha comes from the Complete Enlightenment Sutra:
Virtuous man, all illusory projections of sentient beings arise from the wondrous mind of the Tathagata’s Complete Enlightenment, just like flowers in the sky which come into existence from out of the sky. (Complete Enlightenment, p. 20)
1006a06
過去諸如來只是明心底人。現在諸賢聖亦是修心底人。未來修學人當依如是法。願諸修道之人切莫外求。心性無染本自圓成。但離妄縁即如如佛。
3. All the tathagatas of the past were people who simply illumined their own minds. All the saints and sages of the present are also people who simply cultivate their own minds. The learned cultivators of the future will likewise rely on such a dharma as this. May those who cultivate the Way cut off all external seeking. “The nature of the mind is undefiled and originally perfectly complete in and of itself. Just separate from false conditioning and it will itself be the suchness of the Buddha.”
Comment: Contemplation of the mind is the way to cultivate oneself, to overcome oneself, and to realize that buddhahood is not somewhere else at some other time but right here in the suchness of the phenomena that is closest to us - the true nature of our own mind. My only reservation is, again, that this rhetoric can mistakenly give the impression that the mind is the only phenomenon whose true nature is undefiled and originally perfectly complete in and of itself, which would be the Consciousness-Only view as commonly understood. In fact, all dharmas, all phenomena, are unborn and deathless. As the Lotus Sutra states: “All things are from the outset in the state of tranquil extinction.” (The Lotus Sutra, p. 40) It is mind, however, that is most direct, intimate, and immediate, and therefore an optimal subject for contemplation. When the suchness of a single thought-moment is illumined, the suchness of everything is illumined.
Robert Buswell points out that the quote that ends this section is from the Jingde Record of the Transmission of the Lamp, a collection of biographies about the Zen Masters in India and China that was probably composed in China between 1004-1007.
1006a09
問若言佛性現在此身。既在身中不離凡夫。因何我今不見佛 性。更爲消釋悉令開悟。答在汝身中汝自不見。汝於十二時中知飢知渇知寒知熱。或瞋或喜。竟是何物。且色身是地水火風四縁所集。其質頑而無情。豈能見聞覺知。能見聞覺知者。必是汝佛性。故臨際云。四大不解説法聽法。虚空不解説法聽法。只汝目前歴歴孤明勿形段者。始解説法聽法。所謂勿形段者。 是諸佛之法印。亦是汝本來心也。
4. Question: If you say the buddha-nature is present in this body, then, being in this body, it is not separate from an ordinary person. So why cannot we not see our buddha-nature now? Explain further so that we may be enlightened.
Answer: It is in your body but you do not see it. What is it within you that knows hunger, knows thirst, knows cold, knows heat, gets mad, or is joyful during all the [twenty-four] hours of the day? This material body is a temporary conglomeration of the four conditions of earth, water, fire, and air. This matter is stupid and insentient. How can it see, hear, think, or know anything? That which can see, hear, think, and know must be your buddha-nature. For this reason, Linji said, “The four primary elements do not know how to expound the Dharma or listen to the Dharma. Space does not know how to expound the Dharma or listen to the Dharma. It is only that which is clearly before your eyes, formless, clear, and bright of itself, that can begin to expound the Dharma and listen to the Dharma.” This formless thing is the Dharma-seal of all the buddhas and also your original mind.
Comment: Once again, this seems to be arguing that it is the material that is impermanent while awareness or consciousness is not. Is this seeming mind-body dualism really what Jinul means? Or is “original mind” that which transcends the dichotomy between mind and matter?
Linji Yixuan (d. 866), whom Jinul cites, was the founder of the Linji lineage, one of the five houses of Zen in China. In Japan, it is known as Rinzai Zen. The passage is from the Record of Linji:
“Venerable Ones, get to know the one who plays with these configurations. He is the original source of all the Buddhas. Knowing him, wherever you are is home.
“Your physical body, formed by the four elements, cannot understand the Dharma you are listening to; nor can your spleen, stomach, liver or gall; nor can the empty space. Who then can understand the Dharma you listen to? The one here before your very eyes, brilliantly clear and shining without any form - there he is who can understand the Dharma you are listening to. If you can really grasp this, you are not different from the Buddhas and patriarchs. Ceaselessly he is right here, conspicuously present.
“But when passions arise, wisdom is disrupted; and the body separates from the changing pictures. This is the cause of transmigration in the Three Worlds with its concomitant suffering. But as I see it, there is nothing that is not profound, nothing that is not deliverance.” (The Zen Teachings of Rinzai, pp. 21-22)
1006a18
則佛性現在汝身何假外求。汝若不信略擧古聖入道因縁令汝除疑。汝須諦信。昔異見王問婆羅提尊者曰。何者是佛。尊者曰。見性是佛。王曰。師見性否。尊者曰。我見佛性。王曰。性在何處。尊者曰。性在作用。王曰。是何作用今不見。尊者曰。今見作用王自不見。王曰。於我有否。尊者曰。王若作用無有不是。王若不用體亦難見。王曰。若當用時幾處出現。尊者曰。若出現時當有其八。王曰。其八出現當爲我説。尊者曰。在胎曰身。處世曰人。在眼曰見。在耳曰聞。在鼻辨香。在舌談論。在手執捉在足運奔。遍現倶該沙界收攝在一微塵。識者知是佛性。不識者喚作精魂。王聞心即開悟。又僧問歸宗和尚。如何是佛。宗云。我今向汝道恐汝不信。僧云。和尚誠言焉敢不信。師云。即汝是。僧云。如何保任。師云。一翳在眼空華亂墜。其僧言下有省。
5. Therefore, the buddha-nature is presently in your own body. Why vainly seek outside for it? If you cannot believe this, [here are stories of] past occasions wherein sages of the past entered the Way so that you can remove your doubts. You should carefully attend to the truth and have faith.
In former times, a king of differing views asked the Venerable Bharati, “Who is the Buddha?”
The venerable one replied, “Seeing the nature is the Buddha.”
The king asked, “Has the master seen the nature or not?”
The venerable one replied, “I have seen the buddha-nature.”
The king asked, “Where is the nature?”
The venerable one replied, “The nature is [to be found] in functioning.”
The king asked, “I don’t see it now, so which function is it?”
The venerable one replied, “The functioning is visible now, but your highness doesn’t see it.”
The king asked, “Does it exist in me or not?”
The venerable one replied, “Majesty, whenever you perform a function, there are none wherein it is not present. Majesty, if you were not using your body it would be difficult to see.”
The king asked, “If you use it, at how many places does it appear?”
The venerable one replied, “It will appear at such a time in eight places.”
The king asked, “Could you explain what these eight places are to me?”
The venerable one replied, “In the womb, it is called a fetus. Upon birth, it is called a person. In the eyes, it is called sight. In the ears, it is called hearing. In the nose, it is smelling. In the tongue, it is talking. In the hands and feet, it is grasping and running. When expanded, it contains worlds as numerous as grains of sand, but when it is compressed, it is included within one minute particle of dust. The knowledgeable know that it is the buddha-nature. The benighted call it spirit.
As the king heard this, his mind immediately opened up to enlightenment.
In another case, a monk asked the Venerable Guizong, “What is buddhahood?”
Guizong answered, “I can point out the Way for you now, but I am afraid you won’t believe it.”
The monk said, “Venerable, if your words are sincere, how could I dare to disbelieve?”
The master said, “It is you!”
The monk asked, “How can I keep it and rely upon it?”
The master said, “If there is a single obstruction in the eye, sky-flowers will fall wildly.”
Upon hearing these words the monk understood.
Comment: Again, the rhetoric here seems to indicate that the buddha-nature is some kind of spiritual entity or life force within the body. It is significant, however, that it clearly states that this buddha-nature is so large that it encompasses all, and yet so minute that it is within the smallest thing and that only the benighted relate to it as spirit (as opposed to matter). So the buddha-nature here is something immanent and yet transcendent, something that is within all and yet able to embrace all. The only problem is that this seems to indicate that it is a thing or entity that can be within something else or contain something else. Such a thing would not be empty of self-nature but relative to other things.
The Venerable Bharati was a contemporary of Bodhidharma. Bodhidharma was the alleged 28th patriarch of Buddhism and the one who is credited with being the first patriarch of Zen in China. In a story from the Jingde Record of the Transmission of the Lamp, Bodhidharma sent the Ven. Bharati to convert a king in southern India to Buddhism.
Guizong Cezhin (d. 979) was a disciple of Fayan Wenyi (885-958), who established the Fayan lineage, one of the five houses of Zen in China. Here is how Guizong’s meeting with Fayan went:
Guizong’s first Dharma name was “Huichao” [Surpassing Wisdom].
Upon first meeting Fayan, he asked, “Surpassing Wisdom inquires of the master, what is Buddha?”
Fayan said, “You are Surpassing Wisdom.”
At these words Guizong entered enlightenment.
(Zen’s Chinese Heritage, p. 369)
1006b06
上來所擧古聖入道因縁。明白簡易不妨省力。因此公案若有信解處。即與古聖把手共行。
6. These stories of the past occasions wherein sages entered the Way are simple, uncomplicated, and effortless to understand. With even a partial understanding by faith from these koans, you can at once participate hand-in-hand with the sages of old in their practice.
Comment: This is simply encouragement that if one gets the point of the above stories one will be well on one’s way to realizing the buddha-nature for oneself.
1006b08
問汝言見性。若眞見性即是聖人。應現神通變化與人有殊。何故今時修心之輩無有一人發現神通變化耶。
7. Question: You talk about seeing the nature. If this is true, then upon seeing the nature one should immediately become a sage and be able to manifest supernatural powers and transformations, unlike other people. Then why is it that among those who cultivate their minds these days, there is not even a single person who can display supernatural powers and transformations?
Comment: Here we get to a very important question. If seeing our true nature is all that is required, and upon doing so one can instantly attain buddhahood and acquire supernatural powers then why don’t we see people doing this? If not supernatural powers, at the very least why aren’t we seeing people acquire all manner of miraculous blessings or even virtuous and admirable characters that would be in line with realizing their buddha-nature? Is it that there are no real cultivators? Or is this all just wishful thinking?
1006b11
答。汝不得輕發狂言。不分邪正是爲迷倒之人。今時學道之人口談眞理。心生退屈返墮無分之失者皆汝所疑。學道而不知先後。説理而不分本末者。是名邪見不名修學。非唯自誤兼亦誤他。其可不愼歟。
8. Answer: You should not say such crazy things lightly. To be unable to differentiate right from wrong is to be a person of deluded and inverted views. These days the people who study the Way talk about the true principle with their mouths, but their minds turn back and fall away, they are unable to discriminate [true from false], they become lost, and so you and everyone else have doubts. You study the Way and yet do not know what comes before and what comes after. You expound the principle and yet are unable to discriminate the roots from the branches. This is called having wrong views, it is not called learning and cultivation. You are not only deceiving yourselves but others as well. Therefore, how can you not be careful?
Comment: This seems like a rather harsh response to what seems to me to be a good question. Yet, I can also understand the impatience of those who have to put up with questions about supernatural powers and miracles when the real issue is whether or not one can realize the true nature of oneself and all things. This sharp admonition is really a rhetorical device to make it clear that questions about supernatural powers and miraculous transformations should be seen as trivial. The most important thing, the root issue, is to realize the buddha-nature, which is very subtle, natural, and so close and clear that it is constantly overlooked.
1006b15
夫入道多門。以要言之不出頓悟漸修兩門耳。雖曰頓悟頓。修是最上根機得入。也若推過去。已是多生依悟而修漸熏而來至於今生。聞即發悟一時頓畢。以實而論是亦先悟後修之機也。則而此頓漸兩門是千聖軌轍也。則從上諸聖莫不先悟後修因修乃證。所言神通變化依悟而修漸熏所現。非謂悟時即發現也。
9. There are many gates for a person to enter the Way, but essentially none of them goes beyond [the gate of] sudden enlightenment [followed by] gradual cultivation. Even if you speak of sudden enlightenment and sudden [completion of] cultivation, only those of the highest capacity can enter [into enlightenment that way]. If you were to look into their past, you would see that they already had many lifetimes as a basis to attain enlightenment through cultivation gradually perfuming [their lives] so that now they draw near [to completion of their practice] in their present lifetime. They hear [the Dharma] and immediately generate the awakening mind, simultaneously accomplishing the sudden completion [of their practice]. However, evaluating the truth of it, this also happens because there is an initial enlightenment followed by cultivation. This standard of sudden [enlightenment] and gradual [cultivation] is the two-fold gate that is the path followed by thousands of sages! Therefore, of all the many sages, none did not have an initial enlightenment followed by cultivation and because of this cultivation, they had a realization [of the Way]. The supernatural powers and transformations you speak of have their basis in [an initial] enlightenment [followed by] cultivation that gradually perfumes [one’s life] until they can manifest. It should not be said that they appear simultaneously with enlightenment!
Comment: Here the model of sudden enlightenment and gradual cultivation is introduced. Jinul goes so far as to say that all the different gates boil down to this two-fold gate. Even those who seem to attain sudden enlightenment and the sudden completion of cultivation are only reaping the benefits of prior gradual cultivation that followed an initial sudden enlightenment.
I can’t help but think that this is the same as the very orthodox model of the five paths found in the Treasury of the Abhidharma Treatise and the Consciousness-Only teachings. The first of the five is the path of accumulation, which begins when a practitioner arouses the mind that seeks awakening and practices to accumulate merit and wisdom for an innumerable kalpa of lifetimes. The second is the path of preparation that involves the practice of contemplating the Dharma until one sees it for oneself. This path has four stages called: heat, summit, patience, and highest mundane dharma. The first two stages each take innumerable kalpas of practice over countless lifetimes. The last two stages and the next path, the path of seeing, take only moments. On the path of seeing, a practitioner is no longer an ordinary person but has had a definite glimpse of the unconditioned. This is followed by the path of cultivation which can take many lifetimes. It all culminates in the path of no-more-learning, wherein one attains enlightenment. I believe that the moment of sudden enlightenment correlates with the path of seeing, and the gradual cultivation that follows is the path of cultivation.
Perfuming refers to the Consciousness-Only school idea of perfuming the seeds in the storehouse consciousness, particularly the seeds of awakening until the seeds are perfumed to the point wherein there is a transformation of the basis of consciousness.
1006b23
如經云。理即頓悟乘悟併消事非頓除因次第盡。故圭峯深明先悟後修之義。曰識氷池而全水。借陽氣以鎔消。悟凡夫而即佛。資法力以熏修。氷消則水流潤。方呈漑滌之功。妄盡則心虚通。妄盡則心虚通。應現通光之用。是如事上神通變化。非一日之能成。乃漸熏而發現也。況事上神通。於達人分上猶爲妖怪之事。雖或現之不可要用。今時迷癡輩。妄謂一念悟時即隨現無量妙。用神通變化。若作是解所謂不知先後亦不分本末也。既不知先後本末欲求佛道。如將方木逗圓孔也。豈非大錯。
10. A sutra says: “The principle is enlightened to suddenly and by making use of this enlightenment, though affairs are not extinguished suddenly, they are exhausted in an orderly manner.” For this reason, Guifeng, in a profound clarification of the meaning of “initial enlightenment followed by cultivation,” said, “Know that a frozen pond is all water, but it must still make use of the sun’s vital energy to melt [back into water]. [We may be] enlightened [to the fact that an] ordinary person is the same as a buddha, but the assistance of the power of the Dharma [is still needed] to perfume our cultivation. When the ice melts, then it can flow and moisten. Only then will it display its efficacy for irrigation and washing. [Likewise, only when] falsehood is exhausted will the mind be unimpeded, responsively manifesting the function of penetrating brightness.” According to these passages, supernatural powers and transformations cannot be attained in a single day. They will only manifest after gradual perfuming! Furthermore, concerning accomplished people, supernatural powers are like strange apparitions; they are only trivial affairs marginally related to sagehood. Even if some might show them off, they should not be put to use. This present generation is lost and deluded, falsely saying that in the moment of enlightenment, countless wonders immediately manifest, [and one can then] utilize supernatural powers and transformations. If this is the kind of understanding you have, I call this not knowing what comes before and what comes after and not being able to differentiate the roots from the branches. For example, desiring to seek the way to buddhahood without knowing what comes before and what comes after or [being able to differentiate] the roots from the branches is like trying to put a square peg into a round hole! How can this not be a big mistake?
Comment: Supernatural powers only come about as a result of gradual cultivation, they do not come immediately upon attaining sudden enlightenment and it is naive to think so. It also causes people to undervalue and overlook the importance of the moment of sudden enlightenment because they are looking for such superficial results and do not realize the importance of that first awakening. This is also probably why Zen speaks of kensho and then later satori, the initial sudden enlightenment of seeing the nature and the later more complete awakening.
The sutra quotation is from a commentary on the Awakening of Faith wherein it is cited as coming from the Surangama Sutra. See T1848_.44.0348b16. Apparently, this commentary was written by Changshui Zixuan (965-1038; 長水子璿), a teacher in the Linji lineage. (See Zen’s Chinese Heritage p. 414)
Guifeng Zongmi (780-841) is also cited by Jinul. Guifeng was a patriarch of Heze school of Southern Zen and the fifth patriarch of Huayen or Flower Garland school. The citation here is from a dialogue found in the Jingde Record of the Transmission of the Lamp.
Guifeng’s analogy about the sun melting frozen pond water so that it can flow again and be used for irrigation and washing is similar to that found in the Contemplation of the Universal Sage Bodhisattva Sutra, the last part of the Threefold Lotus Sutra. In that sutra, the Buddha says, “All wrongs are just a frost and dew, so the sun of wisdom can melt them away.” (The Threefold Lotus Sutra, p. 408)
1006c05
既不知方便故作懸崖之想。自生退屈斷佛種性者不爲不多矣。既自未明。亦未信他既有解悟處。見無神通者。乃生輕慢欺賢誑聖良可悲哉。
11. Since one does not know about skillful means, one supposes they have reached a sheer precipice. Alas, many naturally retrogress and eliminate their seed of buddha-nature. Since one does not yet have any understanding, one does not believe that anyone else has any liberating enlightenment. Seeing no supernatural powers in others, one gives rise to disdain, looking down on the worthy and lying to the sages. Isn’t this lamentable?
Comment: Because people’s expectations are too idealistic and frankly unrealistic, they become discouraged and cynical. They need to understand that perfection does not come all at once, nor is gaining supernatural powers the point. Sometimes the benefits are inconspicuous.
1006c08
問汝言頓悟漸修兩門千聖軌轍也。悟既頓悟何假漸修。修若漸修何言頓悟。頓漸二義更爲宣説令絶餘疑。答頓悟者。凡夫迷時四大爲身妄想爲心。不知自性是眞法身。不知自己虚知是眞佛也。心外覓佛波波浪走。忽被善知識指爾入路。一念迴光見自本性。而此性地元無煩惱。無漏智性本自具足。即與諸佛分毫不殊。故云頓悟也。
12. Question: You said, “The two-fold gate of sudden enlightenment and gradual cultivation is the path followed by thousands of sages!” But if enlightenment is really sudden enlightenment, what is the use of gradual cultivation? And if cultivation means gradual cultivation, why speak of sudden enlightenment? Please explain more about these two aspects of sudden and gradual to resolve our remaining doubts.
Answer: As for ‘sudden enlightenment,’ when the ordinary person is deluded, he assumes that the four great elements are his body and the deluded thoughts are his mind. He does not know that his own nature is the true Dharma-body; he does not know that his own numinous awareness is the true buddha! Searching for the buddha outside his mind, running hither and thither, a good friend might point out to him the entryway [to enlightenment]. Then, in a single moment, he can turn back the light and see his own original nature, and that the ground of this nature is fundamentally free of defilements, and that he is originally endowed with the nature of knowledge that is free from the outflows, which is not a hair’s breadth different from that of all the buddhas. Hence it is called sudden enlightenment!
Comment: The term “numinous awareness” is a translation of the Chinese characters 靈知 that are used in the recension of this treatise used in Won Buddhism and also the one translated by Robert Buswell in Tracing Back the Radiance. The character 靈 can mean godly or divine or spiritual or even efficacious, keen, or nimble. The character 知 can mean “wisdom,” “knowledge,” or “awareness.”
The Taisho recension of this treatise has the character 虚 instead of 靈. The character 虚 can mean “empty,” “hollow,” “false,” “humble,” “vain,” or “spacious.” Translating it in a more pejorative way would imply that the true nature of even our false, humble, or vain knowledge is the true buddha. I have decided to simply use the term “numinous awareness” as the Won Buddhist translations and Robert Buswell do, but if I were to translate 虚知 as it appears in the Taisho I would translate it as “spacious awareness,” retaining a link to the idea of “empty knowledge” but also implying the meditative state of all-around awareness that does not fixate or get hung up on any particular impression, feeling, or thought.
The method of turning back the light to see the purity of one’s original nature is similar to the fifth and sixth of the six wondrous Dharma gates of Zhiyi. In a short manual on meditation practice entitled The Six Wondrous Dharma Gates, Zhiyi described six methods of practice. The six methods are counting, following, stabilization, contemplation, turning, and purification. The first three methods are for the practice of calming, while the latter three are for the practice of contemplation. Of the wondrous dharma gate of turning he says, “In a case where the practitioner employs wisdom in his practice, he engages in a skillful relative analysis whereby he turns back to the root and returns to the source.” (The Six Dharma Gates to the Sublime, p. 33) Of the wondrous dharma gate of purification he says, “In a case where the practitioner is able to realize the fundamental purity of all dharmas, he then gains the realization of the dhyana of [cognition of] the fundamental nature.” (Ibid, p. 35) The method of turning one’s awareness back upon itself and abiding in the purity of the fundamental nature of all dharmas is therefore not a Zen innovation but the teaching of the Tiantai school that itself was derived from much earlier Indian sources (See Ibid, endnote 5, p. 141).
The “outflows” (S. ashrava) refer to contaminated mental tendencies that cause suffering through the leaking or flowing away of one’s attention and concern into objects.
1006c16
漸修者。頓悟本性與佛無殊。無始習氣難卒頓除。故依悟而修。漸熏功成長養聖胎。久久成聖故云漸修也。比如孩子初生之日諸根具足與他無異。然其力未充。頗經歳月方始成人。
13. As for ‘gradual cultivation,’ although [he is] suddenly enlightened [to his] original nature being no different from that of the buddha, the beginningless perfuming [of karmic activity] is difficult to remove suddenly. Therefore, he must rely on enlightenment and cultivation so that gradually the perfuming of merit will bring about the nurturing of the embryo of sagehood and after a long, long time he will become a sage. Hence, it is called gradual cultivation! It is like the maturation of an infant: from the day of its birth, [an infant] is endowed with all its faculties, just like any other [human being], but its physical capacities are not yet fully developed; it is only after the passage of many months and years that it will finally mature into an adult.
Comment: In the Infinite Meanings Sutra there is a similar analogy of a newborn prince who is respected though not yet matured. This is the fourth of the ten beneficial effects of the sutra listed in the “Ten Merits” chapter of the sutra.
Good children, the fourth inconceivably powerful merit of this sutra is as follows: After those living beings have heard this sutra, whether the whole of it, a verse of it, or a phrase of it, they will gain courage and be able to ferry others across, although they will not be able to ferry themselves. After they join the retinue of bodhisattvas, buddha-tathagatas will be constantly teaching the Dharma to these people. On hearing it, they will be able to receive and embrace it completely and follow it without turning away, and in turn appropriately expound it for others far and wide. “Good children, these people can be likened to the newborn prince of a king and queen. He might be one day, two days, or seven days old. He might be one month, two months, or seven months old. He might be one year, two years, or seven years old. Although he is still unable to manage affairs of state, his subjects revere him, and all the sons of great kings regard him as their companion. The king and queen love him dearly and always talk to him with special and deep affection. Why is this? Because he is still young and inexperienced. Good children, so is it also with the upholders of this sutra. The union of the buddhas and this sutra, the joining of king and queen, gives birth to this bodhisattva child. “Suppose that a bodhisattva child can hear this sutra, whether a phrase of it, a verse of it, or the whole of it, or hear the whole of it twice, or ten times, or even a hundred times, a thousand times, a million times, or even as many times as the thousands of millions of the innumerable sands of the Ganges. Although he cannot yet experience the ultimate reaches of its truth, or shake the three-thousand-great-thousandfold world, or roll the great Wheel of the Dharma with a thunderous brahma voice, still he will be admired by all of the four groups and eight classes of guardians and will join the retinue of great bodhisattvas. He will enter deeply into the mysterious Dharma of buddhas, and whatever he will be able to expound of it will be without fault or omission. The buddhas will always be protecting and keeping him in mind, specially enveloping him in their love and care, because he will be just beginning to learn. Good children, this is called the fourth unimaginably powerful merit of this sutra. (The Threefold Lotus Sutra, pp. 24-25)
1006c20
問作何方便一念迴機便悟自 性。答只汝自心更作什麼方便。若作方便更求解會。比如有人不見自眼。以謂無眼更欲求見。既是自眼如何更見。若知不失即爲見眼。更無求見之心豈有不見之想。自己虚知亦復如是。既是自心何更求會。若欲求會便會不得。但知不會是即見性。
14. Question: Through what skillful means is it possible to turn back [one’s mental] capacity in a single moment and become enlightened to the self-nature?
Answer: The self-nature is simply your own mind, so what other skillful means do you need? If you ask for skillful means to seek another understanding, you are like a person who, because he does not see his own eyes, assumes that he has no eyes and desires another way to see. But since he does have eyes, what other way is he supposed to see? If he realizes that he has never lost his eyes, this is the same as seeing his eyes, and he will no longer expect another way to see. How then could he have any thoughts that he could not see? Your own numinous awareness is just like this. Since this [numinous awareness] is your own mind, what other understanding is there to seek? If you desire some other understanding, you will never understand. Simply knowing that there is no other understanding is precisely to see the nature.
Comment: In Tiantai Buddhism, the “single thought-moment” is made the object of contemplation not because it alone is the “self-nature” but because it is closest at hand and most intimate anywhere and everywhere and contains all else.
Also, as Tiantai explains in his Profound Meaning of the Lotus Sutra, it is the simplest dharma to contemplate for beginners:
How can the dharmas [of sentient beings and the Buddha] which I just clarified differ from that of mind? [It cannot and does not.] The only [tentative] difference is that the dharmas of sentient beings are very vast [since they include the nine realms] and the dharma of the Buddha is very superior and thus they are difficult for beginners to comprehend. However, [as the Avatamsaka Sutra says,] these three [dharmas of] mind, the Buddha, and sentient beings are not distinct. It is simple to merely contemplate one’s thoughts. (Foundations of T’ient-t’ai Philosophy, p. 197)
1006c26
問上上之人聞即易會。中下之人不無疑惑。更説方便令迷者趣入。答道不屬知不知。汝除却將迷待悟之心聽我言説。諸法如夢亦如幻化。故妄念本寂塵境本空。諸法皆空之處虚知不昧。即此空寂虚知之心。是汝本來面目。亦是三世諸佛歴代祖師天下善知識密密相傳底法印也。若悟此心。眞所謂不踐階梯徑登佛地。歩歩超三界。歸家頓絶疑。便與人天爲師。悲智相資具足二利。堪受人天供養日消萬兩黄金。汝若如是眞大丈夫一生能事已畢矣。
15. Question: People of supreme [capacity] listen to [the Dharma] and at once easily understand. People of average and inferior [capacities] are not without doubt and confusion. Could you provide further skillful means that will enable the deluded to gain entrance [to enlightenment]?
Answer: The way is not related to knowing or not knowing. You should get rid of the mind that clings to its delusion and waits for enlightenment to occur, and listen to my words.
Since all dharmas are like dreams or illusory transformations, false thoughts are originally quiescent, and worldly objects are originally empty. At the point where all phenomena are empty, numinous awareness is unobscured. That is, this mind of empty and quiescent, numinous awareness is your original face. It is also the inner Dharma-seal esoterically transmitted by all the buddhas of the three times, the successive generations of ancestral teachers, and the good friends under heaven! If you awaken to this mind, then this is truly what is called not climbing the rungs of a ladder; you ascend straight to the stage of buddhahood! Step by step you leap over the triple world. Returning home, your doubts will suddenly cease. You will become the teacher of humans and gods. You will be characterized by compassion and wisdom and fully endowed with the twofold benefit [for oneself and others]. You will be able to receive the offerings of humans and gods and every day you can spend ten-thousand taels of gold. If you can do this, you will truly be a great man who has indeed fulfilled the tasks of this life.
Comment: The answer seems to be alluding to case 19 of the Gateless Gate, the dialogue between Nanquan and Zhaozhou wherein the former says to the latter, “The way is not related to knowing or not knowing.” Nanquan also talks about the way as boundless and spacious. At the end of the dialogue, Zhaozhou has a sudden realization.
One day, Zhaozhou asked Nanquan, “What is the Way?”
Nanquan said, “Everyday mind is the Way.”
Zhaozhou said, “Does it have a disposition?”
Nanquan said, “If it has the slightest intention, then it is crooked.”
Zhaozhou said, “When a person has no disposition, then how can he know that this is the Way?”Nanquan said, “The Way is not subject to knowledge, nor is it subject to no-knowledge. Knowledge is delusive. No-knowledge is nihilistic. When the uncontrived way is really attained, it is like great emptiness, vast and expansive. So how could there be baneful right and wrong?”
At these words, Zhaozhou was awakened.
Thereafter Zhaozhou traveled to Mt. Song where he received ordination. He then returned to continue his practice under Nanquan. (Zen’s Chinese Heritage, p. 154)
1007a07
問據吾分上何者是空寂虚知之心耶。答汝今問我者。是汝空寂虚知之心。何不返照猶爲外覓。我今據汝分上直指本心令汝便悟。汝須淨心聽我言説。從朝至暮十二時中。或見或聞或笑或語或瞋或喜或是或非。種種施爲運轉。
16. Question: For someone like me, what is this mind of empty and quiescent, numinous awareness?
Answer: What has just asked me this question is precisely your mind of empty and quiescent, numinous awareness. Why don’t you reflect back the illumination [of this awareness within] rather than looking for it outside? I will now, for those like you, point directly to your original mind so that you may soon be enlightened. You should purify your mind and heed my words.
From morning to evening, throughout the twelve periods of the day, during all your actions and operations - whether you are seeing or hearing, laughing or speaking, raging or rejoicing, affirming or denying - now tell me, ultimately who is it that can act and operate in this way?
Comment: Who indeed? This seems to suggest some kind of “self.”
1007a14
若言色身運轉。何故有人一念命終都未壞爛。即眼不自見。耳不能聞。鼻不辨香。舌不談論。身不動搖。手不執捉。足不運奔耶。是知能見聞動作必是汝本心不是汝色身也。況此色身四大性空。如鏡中像亦如水月。豈能了了常知明明不昧感而遂通恒沙妙用也。故云。神通并妙用運水及搬柴。
17. If you say that it is the physical body that is operating, why is it that the moment a person’s life comes to an end, even though the body has not yet decayed, the eyes cannot see, the ears cannot hear, the nose cannot smell, the tongue cannot talk, the body cannot move, the hands cannot grasp, and the feet cannot run? You should know that what is capable of seeing, hearing, moving, and acting is certainly your original mind; it is not your physical body! Furthermore, the four elements that make up the physical body are by nature empty, they are like reflections in a mirror or the moon’s [reflection] in water. How can they be clear and constantly aware, always bright and never obscured - and, when stimulated, be able to put into operation wondrous functions as numerous as the sands of the Ganges? For this reason, [Layman Pang] said, “Supernatural powers and wondrous functions are carrying water and hauling wood.”
Comment: “Moment” here is actually a “single thought-moment.” Here the dualism is put in stark terms: “You should know that what is capable of seeing, hearing, moving, and acting is certainly your original mind; it is not your physical body!”
Avoiding a matter-mind dualism but still underscoring the importance of the single moment of awareness, Tiantai said:
If there is no thought, that is the end of the matter. If there is even an ephemeral thought, this includes the three thousand [realms]. But we cannot say that the single thought has prior existence, and that all phenomena (sarvadharma) exist later, nor can we say that all phenomena have prior existence, and that the single thought exists later. … It is just that thought is all phenomena, and all phenomena is thought. (Clear Serenity, Quiet Insight, pp. 815-816)
At the end of this section, Jinul is citing the last lines of a verse attributed to Layman Pang (740-808), who was a renowned lay practitioner of Zen.
One day Shitou asked, “What have you been doing each day since we last saw each other?”
Pangyun said, “If you ask about daily affairs, then nothing can be said.”
Pangyun then recited the verse whose last two lines are widely quoted:
How miraculous and wondrous,
Hauling water and carrying firewood.
(Zen’s Chinese Heritage, p. 109)
1007a20
且入理多端。指 汝一門令汝還源。汝還聞鴉鳴鵲噪之聲麼。曰汝返聞汝聞性還有許多聲麼。曰到這裏一切聲一切分別倶不可得。曰奇哉奇哉。我更問爾。爾道到這裏一切聲一切分別總不可得。既不可得當伊麼時莫是虚空麼。曰作麼生是不空之體。曰亦無相貌言之不可及。曰此是諸佛諸祖壽命更莫疑也。
18. Now there are many points at which to access the principle. I will point out the one gate that will allow you to return to the source. Do you hear the sounds of that crow cawing and that magpie calling?
“I hear them.”
“Turn back to listen to the nature of your hearing in and of itself. Would you say there many sounds there?”
“At that place, all sounds and discriminations are altogether unobtainable.”
“Marvelous! Marvelous! This is World Voice Perceiver’s gateway into the principle. Let me ask you further. You said, “At that place, all sounds and discriminations are altogether unobtainable.” But since they are unobtainable, at such a time isn’t the nature of hearing just like empty space?”
“Fundamentally it is not empty. It is perfectly clear and unobscured.”
“What is this entity that is not empty?”
“As it has no appearance or features, it is inexpressible.”
“This is the life of all the buddhas and ancestors - have no further doubts!”
Comment: “Life” is a translation of 壽命 which is the same as the “life” or “life-span” that is part of the title of chapter 16 of the Lotus Sutra, “The Duration of the Life-span of the Tathagata.”
This dialogue makes me think of the Japanese Zen Master Bankei (1622-1693) who would teach in this way about the Unborn Buddha Mind.
The Master addressed the assembly: “Among all you people here today there’s not a single one who’s an unenlightened being. Everyone here is a buddha. So listen carefully! What you all have from your parents innately is the Unborn Buddha Mind alone. There’s nothing else you have innately. This Buddha Mind you have from your parents innately is truly unborn and marvelously illuminating. That which is unborn is the Buddha Mind; the Buddha Mind is unborn and marvelously illuminating, and, what’s more, with this Unborn , everything is perfectly managed. The actual proof of this Unborn which perfectly manages [everything] is that, as you’re all turned this way listening to me talk, if out back there’s the cawing of crows, the chirping of sparrows or the rustling of the wind, even though you’re not deliberately trying to hear each of these sounds, you recognize and distinguish each one. The voices of the crows and sparrows, the rustling of the wind - you hear them without making any mistake about them, and that’s what’s called hearing with the Unborn. In this way, all things are perfectly managed with the Unborn. This is the actual proof of the Unborn. Conclusively realize that what’s unborn and marvelously illuminating is truly the Buddha Mind, straightaway abiding in the Unborn Buddha Mind just as it is, and you’re a living tathagata from today forever after. Since, when you realize conclusively, you abide like this in the Buddha Mind from today on, my school is called the School of Buddha Mind. (Bankei Zen: Translations from the Record of Bankei, p. 4)
“World Voice Perceiver’s gateway into the principle” is probably a reference to a passage in the apocryphal Shurangama Sutra wherein World Voice Perceiver Bodhisattva explained how he was taught to practice meditation by means of the faculty of hearing by a past buddha also named World Voice Perceiver. This was followed by Manjushri’s verses, in which he acclaimed the method of contemplating hearing as the most efficacious method for attaining enlightenment. (The Śūrangama Sūtra, pp. 135-150)
1007a28
既無相貌還有大小麼。既無大小還有邊際麼。無邊際故無内外。無内外故無遠近。無遠近故無彼此。無彼此則無往來。無往來則無生死。無生死則無古今。無古今則無迷悟。無迷悟則無凡聖。無凡聖則無染淨。無染淨則無是非。無是非則一切名言倶不可得。既總無如是一切根境一切妄念。乃至種種相貌種種名言倶不可得。此豈非本來空寂本來無物也。
19. Since it has no appearance or features, how can it be either large or small? Since it is neither large nor small, how can it have any boundaries? As it has no boundaries, it cannot have inside or outside. As there is no inside or outside, there is no far or near. As there is no far or near, there is no here or there. As there is no here or there, there is no coming or going. As there is coming or going, there is no birth or death. As there is no birth or death, there is no past or present. As there is no past or present, there is no delusion or enlightenment. As there is no delusion or enlightenment, there is no ordinary person or sage. As there is no ordinary person or sage, there is no purity or impurity. As there is no impurity or purity, there is no right or wrong. As there is no right or wrong, all names and words are unobtainable. Since none of these concepts apply, all sense-faculties and sense-objects, all false thoughts, and even appearances and features, names and words are all unobtainable. Is this not originally empty and quiescent and originally no-thing?
Comment: This has a lot in common with the verses from the first chapter of Infinite Meanings Sutra with its thirty-four negations concerning the physical existence of the Buddha that begins, “His physical existence is neither being nor nothingness, It has neither causes nor conditions and is neither itself nor something else.” (Threefold Lotus Sutra, p. 7)
It is also like the following passage in chapter 14 of the Lotus Sutra:
Furthermore, bodhisattva-mahasattvas perceive that all things are emptiness and that they are ultimate reality. They are undistorted, unmoving, unreceding, and unturning. They are devoid of any intrinsic nature, just like empty space. They defy all courses of words and expressions. They are not produced, not emerging, not arising, nameless, without attributes, and truly without existence. They are immeasurable, boundless, unimpeded, and unhindered. They come into being only through causes and conditions, and they are produced through distorted perceptions. (Ibid, p. 246)
Likewise, in chapter 16 of the Lotus Sutra the Buddha says:
The Tathagata perceives the character of the threefold world as it really is. Birth and death do not leave it or appear in it. There is no staying in the world or departing from it for extinguishment. It is neither substantial nor insubstantial. And it is neither thus nor otherwise. This is not how the threefold world sees itself, but the Tathagata sees such things as these clearly and without error. (Ibid, p. 278)
It is also like the following passage from the preface to Zhiyi’s Great Calming and Contemplation which is known as the Endon Shikan:
The perfect and sudden tranquility and insight from the very beginning takes ultimate reality as its object. No matter what the object of insight might be, it is seen to be identical to the middle. There is here nothing that is not true reality. When one fixes [the mind] on the Dharma-realm [as object] and unifies one’s mindfulness with the Dharma-realm [as it is], then there is not a single sight nor smell that is not the Middle Way. The same goes for the realm of self, the realm of Buddha, and the realm of living beings. Since all aggregates and sense bases [of body and mind] are thusness, there is no suffering to be cast away. Since ignorance and the defilements are themselves identical with enlightenment, there is no origin of suffering to be eradicated. Since the two extreme views are the Middle Way and false views are the right view, there is no path to be cultivated. Since samsāra is identical with Nirvāna, there is no cessation to be achieved. Because of the [intrinsic] inexistence of suffering and its origin, the mundane does not exist; because of the inexistence of the path and cessation, the supramundane does not exist. A single, unalloyed reality is all there is – no entities whatever exist outside of it. That all entities are by nature quiescent is called “tranquility”; that, though quiescent, this nature is ever luminous, is called “insight.” Though a verbal distinction is made between earlier and later stages of practice, there is ultimately no duality, no distinction between them. This is what is called the “perfect and sudden tranquility and insight. (As translated in Shutei Hoyo Shiki, pp. 399-400)
1007b07
然諸法皆空之處虚知不昧。不同無情性。自神解此是汝空寂虚知清淨心體。而此清淨空寂之心。是三世諸佛勝淨明心。亦是衆生本源覺性。悟此而守之者。坐一如而不動解脱。迷此而背之者。往六趣而長劫輪迴故云。迷一心而往六趣者去也動也。悟法界而復一心者來也靜也。雖迷悟之有殊。乃本源則一也。所以云。所言法者。謂衆生心。而此空寂之心在聖而不増在凡而不減。故云。在聖智而不耀。故云。在聖智而不耀。隱凡心而不昧。既不増於聖不少於凡。佛祖奚以異於人。而所以異於人者。而所以異於人者。能自護心念耳。
20. Nevertheless, at that point where all phenomena are empty, the numinous awareness is not obscured. It is not the same as insentience. The release of your own spirit is your pure mind-entity of empty and quiescent numinous awareness. This pure, empty, and quiescent mind is that mind of outstanding purity and brilliance of all the buddhas of the three times; it is that awakened nature that is the original source of all sentient beings. One who is enlightened to it and safeguards it will sit in the one suchness and immovable liberation. One who is deluded and turns his back on it cycles between the six destinies, wandering on in samsara for a vast number of kalpas. As [Chengguan] said, “One who is deluded about the one mind and cycles between the six destinies keeps on going and remains active. But one who is enlightened to the Dharma-realm and returns to the one mind arrives and is still.”
Although there is a distinction between delusion and enlightenment, at their original source they are one. As it is said [in the Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana Treatise], “The word dharma means the mind of the sentient being.” But as there is neither more of this empty and quiescent mind in the sage, nor less of it in the ordinary person, we can say that in the knowledge of the sage it is no brighter; hidden in the mind of the ordinary person it is no darker. Since there is neither more of it in the sage nor less of it in the ordinary person, how are the buddhas and ancestors any different from other human beings? The only thing that makes them different is that they can protect their minds and thoughts.
Comment: This rhetoric seems rooted in the theory of “nature-origination.” Nature-origination is the teaching that all phenomena have their origin in the true nature or buddha-nature. In Tiantai Buddhism, this is viewed as part of the distinct teaching, but not the Perfect teaching, because it sets the buddha-nature or true nature of mind apart from other phenomena in that all other phenomena find their origin in the true nature but the true nature is pure and does not arise from or depend upon anything else.
In the perfect teaching according to the Tiantai school, all phenomena are equally empty, equally provisionally existent, and equally expressions of the middle way. This means that buddha-nature is not something apart from other phenomena. All phenomena just as they truly are, are the buddha-nature itself; and each phenomenon as it truly is, is the buddha-nature itself. So it is not that one realm, the buddha-realm, stands apart and originates the others, but that all ten realms mutually implicate and include one another in their wholeness. So one can also say that, in the mutual possession of the ten realms as taught in the Tiantai school, the buddha-realm is not more present in the sage nor is it less present in the ordinary person, but it is more conspicuous in the sage and inconspicuous in the ordinary person.
The statement that begins, “The one who is deluded…” is a citation from The Meaning of the Flower Garland Sutra Based on an Earlier Commentary by the fourth patriarch of the Flower Garland school, Chengguan (738-839).
The statement, “The word dharma means the mind of the sentient being,” is from the Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana. The passage it is taken from says:
Dharma refers to the mind of sentient beings. This mind includes all mundane and supramundane dharmas. The meaning of Mahayana is disclosed on the basis of this mind. Why? Because the aspect of this mind as suchness directly reveals Mahayana’s intrinsic reality; and because the aspect of this mind as the cause and condition of arising and ceasing is the revealer of Mahayana’s intrinsic reality (ziti), characteristics (xiang), and function (yong). (Treatise on Awakening Mahayana Faith, p. 66)
The Treatise on Awakening Mahayana Faith also says, “Moreover, suchness’ own intrinsic reality and characteristics neither increase nor decrease for any ordinary people, hearers (śrāvaka), solitary realizers (pratyekabuddha), bodhisattvas or buddhas.” (Ibid, p. 102) Jinul’s comments in this section are an elaboration of this.
1007b19
汝若信得及疑情頓息。出丈夫之志。發眞正見解。親嘗其味自到自肯之地。則是爲修心 人解悟處也。更無階級次第。故云頓也。如云於信因中契諸佛果徳分毫不殊。方成信也。
21. If you can have faith so that your doubts suddenly cease, put forth a heroic will, and generate authentic vision and understanding; you will know its taste for yourself and arrive at the ground of self-affirmation! This is the experience of the liberating enlightenment achieved by people who have cultivated their minds. Since no further steps or stages are involved, it is called “sudden!” Therefore [Li Tongxuan] said, “When the cause of faith tallies without a hair’s breadth difference with all the qualities of the fruition of buddhahood, then faith is fulfilled!”
Comment: Here we should discuss the difference between the faith that one can become a buddha and the faith that one already has the realm of buddhahood complete and active in one’s life even if it is inconspicuous and one must gradually cultivate the ability to live in accord with it in one’s daily life.
There is a treatise called Straight Talk on the True Mind that discusses these two different kinds of faith. Since the 17th century it was believed to have been written by Jinul, but recent scholarship has indicated that it was probably written by a Jurchen Zen monk named Zhengyan (d. c. 1184-1185). In any case, Straight Talk on the True Mind states that there are two kinds of faith in Buddhism: the faith of the ancestral gate (by which is mean the successive Zen patriarchs) and the faith of the teaching gate (by which is meant the teachings based on the sutras and treatises). Here is the relevant section on the two kinds of faith from that treatise:
Straight Talk on the True Mind
眞心直説
#2019 Volume 48
999a04
Correct Faith in the True Mind
The Flower Garland [Sutra] says:
Faith is the fountainhead of the path
and the mother of all meritorious qualities.
It nourishes all good roots.
Moreover, the Consciousness-Only [teachings] say, “Faith is like a water-purifying gem which can purify cloudy water.” It is clear that faith takes the lead in the development of myriad wholesome qualities. For this reason the Buddhist sutras always begin with “Thus have I heard…,” an expression intended to arouse faith.
Question: What difference is there between the faith of the ancestral gate and the faith of the teaching gate?
Answer: They are different in many ways. The teaching gate encourages men and gods to have faith in the law of karmic cause and effect. Those who desire the pleasures that come from merit must have faith that the ten good acts are the wondrous cause and that rebirth as a human or god is the pleasurable result. Those who want to indulge in the empty tranquility of nirvana must have faith that its primary cause is the understanding of the cause and condition of arising and ceasing and that its noble fruition is the understanding of suffering, its origin, its extinction, and the path leading to its extinction. Those who delight in the fruition of buddhahood should have faith that the practice of the six perfections over three innumerable kalpas is its major cause and awakening and nirvana are its right fruition.
Right faith in the ancestral school is different. It does not put faith in the causes and effects of conditioned phenomena. Rather, it stresses faith that everyone is originally a buddha, possesses impeccable self-nature and that the wondrous entity of nirvana is perfectly complete in everyone. There is no need to search elsewhere; since time immemorial, it has been innate in everyone. As the Third Patriarch said:
The mind is full like all of space,
Without deficiency or excess.
It is due mostly to grasping and rejecting
That it is not so now.
Master Zhi said:
The signless body exists within the body which has signs
The road to the unborn is found along the road to ignorance.
Yongjia said:
The true nature of ignorance is buddha-nature.
The empty body of illusory transformations is the Dharma-body.
Hence we know that sentient beings are originally buddha.
Once we have given rise to right faith, we must add understanding to it. As Yongming [Yanshou] said, “To have faith but no understanding increases ignorance; to have understanding but no faith increases wrong views.” Consequently, we know that once faith and understanding are merged, entrance onto the way will be swift.
Question: Is there any benefit which accrues solely from the initial arousing of faith even though we are not yet able to enter the way?
Answer: The Awakening of Faith [in the Mahayana] Treatise says:
If a person hears this dharma without feeling fainthearted it should be known that this man will surely perpetuate the seed of buddhahood and receive an assurance of future buddhahood from all the buddhas. Even if there were a man who could convert all the sentient beings throughout the world systems of this trichiliocosm and induce them to practice the ten good acts, he would not be as good as a man who can rightly consider this dharma for a period of a single thought-moment. It is beyond analogy just how much it exceeds the previous merit.
Furthermore, it is said in the Prajna sutras: “And if they give rise to one thought of pure faith, the Tathagata fully knows and sees this; through this faith all sentient beings will gain incalculable merit.” We know that if we want to travel for a thousand li it is essential that the first step be right; if the first step is off, we will be off for the entire thousand li. To enter the unconditioned kingdom, it is essential that our initial faith be right, for if that initial faith is wrong, we will move away from the myriads of good qualities. This is why the [Third] Patriarch said, “One iota of difference, and heaven and earth are rent asunder.” This is the principle we are discussing here.
(Tracing Back the Radiance, pp. 120-121, adapted with reference to T48.2019, 999b12-999c10)
The quotation at the end of this section is from Li Tongxuan’s (635-730) Treatise on the New Translation of the Flower Garland Sutra.
All of this is very much in line with what the Lotus Sutra teaches about the importance of the initial moment of faith and rejoicing. In Chapter Ten of the Lotus Sutra the Buddha says, “If after my extinction anyone rejoices, even on a moment’s thought, at hearing even a verse or a phrase of the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma, I also will assure him of his future attainment of unsurpassed, complete, and perfect awakening.” (The Lotus Sutra, p. 176, adapted) In Chapter Seventeen, the Buddha says, “Anyone who hears that my life is so long, and understands it by faith even at a moment’s thought, will be able to obtain innumerable merits.” (Ibid, p. 260). To understand by faith is a translation of the Sanskrit adhimukti.
I would also point out that the faith that one can become a buddha and the faith that one is originally buddha both originate with the Lotus Sutra. The faith that one can become a buddha after ages of practices derives from the Trace Gate, wherein the Buddha gives the assurance of future buddhahood to his major disciples and many others in the assembly, though that buddhahood will be attained in the distant future. The faith that one is originally buddha derives from the teaching of the Original Gate, wherein the Buddha reveals that is lifespan as a buddha is practically unquantifiable and that his actual attainment of buddhahood was in the remotest past. This means that during all those ages in which he was practicing as a bodhisattva up until the moment of attaining buddhahood beneath the Bodhi tree as Siddhartha Gautama he was already a buddha using skillful means to show people how to become buddhas. His practice was not to gain buddhahood but to display it, to utilize it, to show others how to also realize and actualize their own buddhahood.
Nichiren understood all this to mean that one initially faithfully rejoices in the message of the Lotus Sutra based on the Original Gate of the Buddha’s attainment in the remotest past. Through the practice of that faith, there will come a more complete and direct understanding. In his treatise The Four Depths of Faith and the Five Stages of Practice he wrote:
Beginners should refrain from giving alms, observing the precepts, and the rest of the first five bodhisattva practices, and for the present should instead take up the practice of Namu Myoho Renge Kyo which is the spirit of the single moment of understanding by faith and the stage of rejoicing. This is the true intention of the Lotus Sutra! (Writings of Nichiren Shonin: Faith and Practice, Volume IV, p. 110)
Regarding the balance between faith (taking the Buddha’s word on trust) and wisdom (knowing directly what one does or does not know), Tiantai taught the following in relation to the idea that their are successive stages of growing identification with buddhahood:
If you are endowed with both wisdom and faith, then upon hearing that a single thought-moment is identical with the positive [aspects that are conducive to bodhicitta], faith will keep you from denigrating [what you do not understand], and wisdom will keep you from being apprehensive [about your inability to attain enlightenment]. [In this case,] both the beginning and later [stages] are positive. If you do not have faith, then [you despair that] the exalted levels of the sage are not part of your own wisdom, and if you do not have wisdom, you become arrogant and think that you are already equal to a Buddha. [In that case,] both the beginning and the later are negative [and not conducive to attaining bodhicitta]. (Clear Serenity, Quiet Insight, pp. 230-231)
Bodhicitta is the Sanskrit word that means “awakening mind” and it is refers to the mind that aspires to awakening and believes that it is possible to attain buddhahood for the sake of all sentient beings.
Faith that one is originally a buddha is practically the same as sudden awakening. It is a deep confidence that buddhahood is not something far off or only to be realized in another world or to be earned after lifetimes of effort. The qualities of buddhahood are already the true reality of one’s life, but one is alienated from them, cut off by delusions and disbelief. The initial faith that buddhahood is one’s true nature or that the realm of buddhahood is already an integral part of this moment we are living crosses that gap of delusion and disbelief. It brings with it a change of perspective, a new understanding that in turn leads to a moment-by-moment practice of living in accord with that realization. Deepening one’s faith (i.e. confidence and trust) brings an increasing manifestation of generosity, self-discipline, patient acceptance, wholesome efforts, calm focus, and even the wisdom that directly sees for itself the true nature of things.
In terms of Nichiren Buddhism, it seems to me that Nichiren was concerned that people were practicing to have these perfected qualities of the Buddha and the bodhisattvas and were getting discouraged that they were not perfect. This was undermining their confidence and trust in the teachings and themselves. It was undermining their faith in the Buddha Dharma. Nichiren believed that by focusing on faith in the Lotus Sutra, specifically faith in the teaching hidden in the depths of the Original Gate that we are already buddhas becoming buddhas, we can manifest the qualities of buddhahood naturally as our faith develops into direct understanding. The six perfections are no longer a ladder to climb but the fruition of faith.
Sudden awakening, therefore, is found in that moment of trust and confidence that we are buddhas which is the real intention of the Odaimoku practice. The gradual cultivation of the six perfections follows naturally from this as the benefit of our practice. If we fail to live up to the standard set by the six perfections it shows that we must examine ourselves, and see where doubt, delusion, and unwholesome habits have interfered. We then rebuke them, turn away from them, and return to our initial faith that our true nature is the buddha-nature. Then, from the outlook of faith, not discouragement, we proceed along the way.
1007b23
問既悟此理更無階級。何假後修漸熏漸成耶。答悟後漸修之義前已具説。而復疑情未釋。不妨重説。汝須淨心諦聽諦聽。凡夫無始曠大劫來至於今日。流轉五道生來死去。堅執我相妄想顛倒。無明種習久與成性。雖到今生頓悟自性本來空寂與佛無殊。而此舊習卒難除斷。故逢逆順境瞋喜。是非熾然起滅客塵煩惱與前無異。若不以般若中功著力。焉能對治無明。得到大休大歇之地。如云頓悟雖同佛多生習氣深。風停波尚湧。理現念猶侵。又杲禪師云。往往利根之輩。不費多力打發此事。便生容易之心更不修治。日久月深依前流浪未免輪迴。則豈可以一期所悟便撥置後修耶。故悟後長須照察。妄念忽起都不隨之。損之又損以至無爲方始究竟。天下善知識悟後牧牛行是也。
22. Question: Since one is enlightened to this principle, no further steps are needed. Why do you presume that there is subsequent cultivation, gradual perfuming, and gradual attainment [of buddhahood]?
Answer: The meaning of gradual cultivation after enlightenment has been explained fully before, but since you are not yet free of doubt, I will repeat my explanation. You should purify your mind and listen carefully!
Ordinary people, for vast numbers of kalpas without beginning until today, have cycled between the five destinies, coming and going between birth and death. They persist in clinging to characterizations of self, false thoughts, inverted views, and ignorance for such a long time that these become ingrained as their very nature. Although, in this present life, they might be suddenly enlightened to the fact that their self-natures are originally empty and quiescent and no different from that of the buddhas, these old habits are exceedingly difficult to eradicate. Consequently, when they come into contact with either favorable or adverse sensory objects, then hatred or delight, right or wrong, feverishly arise and cease, and their adventitious afflictions are no different from before. If they do not increase their efforts and apply their power through their prajna, how will they ever be able to counteract ignorance and reach the ground of great rest and great repose? As [Guifeng Zongmi] said, “Although through sudden enlightenment, one is the same as the buddhas, the perfuming built up over many lives is deep. The wind ceases, but the waves still surge; the principle appears, but thoughts still invade.” Zen Master Dahui Zonggao said: “Often people with sharp faculties can resolve this matter and achieve sudden enlightenment without expending a lot of power. Then they come to think it was easy and so do not cultivate the counteragents [to the defilements]. As the days lengthen and months deepen, they simply wander on as before and are unable to avoid samsara.” How, then, could you neglect subsequent cultivation simply because of one moment of enlightenment? For this reason, after enlightenment, you must constantly examine and check yourself. If false thoughts suddenly arise, do not chase after them. Reduce them and keep reducing them again until you reach the unconditioned, only then will you reach completion. This is the practice of ox-herding that follows enlightenment, [cultivated by] all good friends under heaven!
Comment: In other words, just because you have a flash of insight doesn’t mean you should become complacent in your practice. There are a lot of bad habits to overcome bit by bit. Note that five instead of six destinies are spoken of here, oftentimes in Buddhism the realm of the asura or fighting demons is included within the heavenly realm.
Dahui Zonggao (1089-1163) was a Zen master in the Linji lineage. He is known for inventing the practice of contemplating the hua tou, which means “head of speech.” The hua tou refers to an essential word or phrase of a koan, a Zen anecdote or dialogue.
1007c09
雖有後修已先頓悟。妄念本空心性本淨。於惡斷斷而無斷。於善修修而無修。此乃眞修眞斷矣。故云。雖備修萬行。唯以無念爲宗。圭峯總判先悟後修之義云。頓悟此性元無煩惱無漏智性本自具足與佛無殊。依此而修者。是名最上乘禪。亦名如來清淨禪也。若能念念修習。自然漸得百千三昧。達磨門下轉展相傳者是此禪也。則頓悟漸修之義。如車二輪闕一不可。
23. Nevertheless, although you must cultivate further, you have already awakened suddenly to the fact that false thoughts are originally empty and the mind-nature is originally pure. Thus you keep cutting away the unwholesome, but there is no cutting away; you keep cultivating the wholesome, but there is no cultivating. This is true cultivation and true cutting away! For this reason [Guifeng Zongmi] said, “Although one may be prepared to cultivate myriad practices, no-thought is the source of them all.” Guifeng summed up the distinction between the implications of initial enlightenment followed by cultivation when he said:
“One has the sudden enlightenment to the fact that one’s nature is originally free of defilements and that one is originally in full possession of the knowledge-nature without outflows that is no different from that of the buddhas. To cultivate while relying on this is called the supreme-vehicle meditation; it is also called the pure meditation of the tathagatas! If moment after moment one continues to cultivate, then naturally one will gradually attain hundreds of thousands of samadhis. What has been transmitted successively by the followers of Bodhidharma is this meditation!”
Therefore sudden enlightenment and gradual cultivation are like the two wheels of a cart, one cannot be missing.
Comment: In other words, practice without getting caught up in the idea that there are substantial defilements or substantial merits to cultivate. It is all there in the original empty mind, nothing is missing, and nothing needs to be gotten rid of except mistaken views and habits that are not substantial.
In different ways, none of the ten realms are places to cling to or dwell in. We should not get mired in the lower realms. It should also be obvious not to get stuck in the realms of the two vehicles. The bodhisattvas do realize that they are in a transitional state and are constantly striving to attain the realm of buddhahood and/or they are reaching down into the lower realms. Even the realm of buddhahood is constantly returning to and embracing the lower realms. This is the mutual possession of the ten realms.
1007c18
或者不知善惡性空。堅坐不動捺伏身心。如石壓草以爲修心。是大惑矣。故云。聲聞心心斷惑。能斷之心是賊。但諦觀殺盜淫妄從性而起起即無起。當處便寂何須更斷。所以云。不怕念起唯恐覺遲。又云。念起即覺。覺之即無。故悟人分上雖有客塵煩惱倶成醍醐。但照惑無本。空華三界如風卷煙。幻化六塵如湯消氷。
24. Some people do not realize that the nature of wholesome and unwholesome [merit and demerit] is empty. They sit rigidly without moving and suppress both body and mind, like a rock that is crushing grass. To regard this as cultivation of the mind is a great delusion. For this reason, [Baozhi] said, “Voice-hearers cut away their delusions thought by thought, but the thought that does the cutting is a brigand.” If they would just truly contemplate the fact that killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, and lying all arise from the nature, then their arising would be the same as non-arising. Since at that point these would then be quiescent, what else would need to be cut off? As [Yanshou] said, “Do not fear the arising of thoughts: only be concerned lest your awareness of them be tardy.” [Zongmi] also said, “If we are aware of a thought at the moment it arises, then in that very awareness it vanishes.” In the case of a person who has had an awakening, although he still has adventitious defilements, these have all been clarified into ghee. If he merely reflects on the fact that delusion is without basis, then all the sky-flowers of the triple world are like smoke swirling in the wind, and the illusory transformations of the six sense fields are like ice melting in hot water.
Comment: This section describes repentance by principle, realizing that defilements should not be confirmed even by fighting with them but recognizing that, like all dharmas, they are empty and have no real power over us. Again see Contemplation of the Universal Sage Bodhisattva Sutra, the last part of the Threefold Lotus Sutra. In that sutra, the Buddha says, “All wrongs are just a frost and dew, so the sun of wisdom can melt them away.” (The Threefold Lotus Sutra, p. 408)
Baozhi (418-514) was a Chinese Zen master.
Yongming Yanshou (904-976) was Chinese Zen Master of the Fayan lineage.
1007c25
若能如是念念修習。不忘照顧定慧等持。則愛惡自然淡薄。悲智自然増明。罪業自然斷除。功行自然増進。煩惱盡時生死即絶。若微細流注永斷。圓覺大智朗然獨存。即現千百億化身於十方國中。赴感應機似月現九霄影分萬水。應用無窮度有縁衆生快樂無憂。名之爲大覺世尊。
25. If moment after moment he continues to cultivate and does not forget to maintain concentration and wisdom equally, then craving for what is unwholesome will naturally weaken, and compassion and knowledge will naturally increase in brightness; transgressive karma will naturally be cut off, and meritorious practices will naturally increase. When defilements are exhausted, birth and death are brought to an end. If the subtle streams of defilements are forever cut off, the great knowledge of perfect awakening subsists brilliantly of itself. Then he will be able to manifest billions of transformation-bodies in the lands of the ten directions, responding in accordance with the capacities [of sentient beings], like the moon in the nine heavens reflecting in ten thousand pools of water. His omnipresent response enables the ferrying across of boundless sentient beings with whom he has affinities to where there is happiness and no more sorrow. Such a person is called a World Honored One of Great Enlightenment.
Comment: Are the “nine heavens” the same as the nine heavens in the heaven of the fourth meditative absorption among the four heavens of meditative absorption? Herein is a description of gradual cultivation that patiently takes one moment at a time until all is fulfilled through innumerable transformations. Or is this already happening?
1008a02
問後修門中定慧等持之義實未明了。更爲宣説委示開迷引入解脱之門。答若設法義入理。千門莫非定慧。取其綱要則但自性上體用二義。前所謂空寂虚知是也。定是體慧是用也。即體之用故慧不離定。即用之體故定不離慧。定則慧故寂而常知。慧則定故知而常寂。如曹溪云。心地無亂自性定。心地無癡自性慧。若悟如是任運寂知遮炤無二。則是爲頓門。箇者雙修定慧也。
26. Question: In the approach of subsequent cultivation, we really do not yet understand the meaning of maintaining concentration and wisdom equally. Would you please expound further on this point in detail, so that we may free ourselves of delusion and be guided to the gate of liberation?
Answer: If we were to establish the principle for entry into the meaning of the Dharma, there may be thousands of gateways into it, but none of them are without concentration and wisdom. Taking into account only their essentials, from the standpoint of the self-nature, they are characterized as the two aspects of entity and function. This is what is called the empty and quiescent, numinous awareness! Concentration is the essence, wisdom is the function! Because wisdom is the functioning of the entity, it is not separate from concentration. Because concentration is the entity of the function, it is not separate from wisdom. Because where there is concentration there is wisdom, [concentration] is calm yet constantly aware. Because where there is wisdom there is concentration, [wisdom] is aware yet constantly quiescent. As Caoqi said, “The mind-ground that is free from disturbance is the concentration of the self-nature. The mind-ground that is free from delusion is the wisdom of the self-nature.” If you are enlightened to this, then naturally the restraint and illumination of quiescence and awareness are not two. This is the sudden gate, wherein there is the two-fold cultivation of concentration and wisdom!
Comment: Caoqi is Huineng (638-713), the Sixth Patriarch of Zen in China. All of this is very similar to what Tiantai Zhiyi says about the unity of calming and contemplation. For example, in his Smaller Calming and Contemplation he wrote:
Therefore it says in the Lotus Sutra:
The Buddha himself dwells in the Mahayana,
And in accordance with his attainments
Is adorned with the power of concentration and wisdom,
With which he saves sentient beings.
It should be known that these two aspects are like the two wheels of a cart, or the two wings of a bird: if one side is cultivated disproportionately, then you fall prey to mistaken excess. (Clear Serenity, Quiet Insight, p. 1661)
In addition, recall that the Endon Shikan says, “That all entities are by nature quiescent is called “tranquility”; that, though quiescent, this nature is ever luminous, is called “insight.” This means that the true nature of all things is naturally quiescent and luminous, which is to say has the power of calming and contemplation, concentration and insight.
1008a11
若言先以寂寂治於縁慮。後以惺惺治於昏住。先後對治均調昏亂以入於靜者。是爲漸門。劣機所行也。雖云惺寂等持。未免取靜爲行。則豈爲了事人不離本寂本知任運雙修者也。故曹溪云。自悟修行不在於靜。若靜先後即是迷人。
27. If you claim, “Initially control conditioned thoughts with quiescence and subsequently control dullness with alertness; these initial and subsequent counteractive measures subdue both dullness and disturbance and one thereby will access peace”: this is the gradual gate that is practiced by those of inferior capacities! Although you say that alertness and quiescence should be maintained equally, it cannot avoid clinging to peace as its practice. How then will it enable those who would understand this matter never to leave the original quiescence and original awareness and to practice the two-fold cultivation [of concentration and wisdom] naturally in all situations? As Caoqi said, “One’s enlightenment and cultivation of practice has nothing to do with quarreling. If you are quarreling about what is first and what comes after, you are a person who has lost their way.”
Comment: The last sentence in the Taisho seems to have been miscopied. The citation of Caoxi in the Platform Sutra on the Taisho reads: 自悟修行不在於諍。若諍先後即同迷人 (2008, 352c19-20). Again, the remedial use of calming and contemplation is covered by Zhiyi in his Smaller Calming and Contemplation.
1008a16
則達人分上定慧等持之義。不落功用元自無爲。更無特地時節。見色聞聲時但伊麼。著衣喫飯時但伊麼。屙屎送尿時但伊麼。對人接話時但伊麼。乃至行住坐臥。或語或默或喜或怒。一切時中 一一如是似虚舟駕浪隨高隨下。如流水轉山遇曲遇直而心心無知。今日騰騰任運。明日任運騰騰。隨順衆縁無障無礙。於善於惡不斷不修。質直無僞視聽尋常。則絶一塵而作對。何勞遣蕩之功。無一念而生情。不假忘縁之力。
28. In the case of an accomplished person, the meaning of maintaining concentration and wisdom equally is not a matter of effort, for he is always spontaneous and unconcerned about place or time. When seeing forms or hearing sounds, he is just so, when wearing clothes or eating food, he is just so, when defecating or urinating, he is just so, When talking with people, he is just so, whatever he is doing, walking, standing, sitting, and lying down, whether speaking or keeping silent, whether joyful or angry, at all times, and in everything he is thus, like an empty boat riding on the waves, following the crests and troughs, or like a torrent flowing through the mountains, following the bends and straights, in all his thoughts he remains without intellection. Today, he is naturally buoyant; tomorrow, he is naturally buoyant. He follows all conditions without obstacles or obstructions. He neither cuts off the unwholesome nor cultivates the wholesome. His character is straightforward, without deception, and his seeing and hearing are ordinary. Thus, there is not even a single speck of dirt to encounter. Why would he need to bother to work at clearing anything away? He has not a single thought giving rise to passion, so he need not make provisions to have the power of forgetting all conditioning.
Comment: This is like the samadhi of neither-walking-nor-sitting wherein one goes about one’s daily business and in that way accomplishes the practice of perfect and sudden calming and contemplation.
1008a26
然障濃習重觀劣心浮。無明之力大。般若之力小。於善惡境界未免被動靜互換。心不恬淡者。不無忘縁遣蕩功夫矣。如云六根攝境心不隨縁謂之定。心境倶空炤鑑無惑謂之慧。此雖隨相門定慧漸門劣機所行 也。對治門中不可無也。若掉擧熾盛。則先以定門稱理攝散心。不隨縁契乎本寂。若昏沈尤多。則次以慧門擇法觀空。照鑑無惑契乎本知。以定治乎亂想。以慧治乎無記。動靜相亡對治功終。則對境而念念歸宗。遇縁而心心契道。任運雙修方爲無事人。若如是則眞可謂定慧等持明見佛性者也。
29. But obstacles are formidable and habits are deeply ingrained; contemplation is weak and the mind drifts. The power of ignorance is great, but the power of wisdom is small. When he comes in contact with wholesome and unwholesome sense objects, he still cannot avoid alternately being either affected by them or remaining at rest. Since his mind is not peaceful, he cannot but work at forgetting all conditioning and clearing away [defilements]. As [Jianfu] said, “When the six sense faculties are absorbed in the object [of meditation] and the mind no longer responds to the conditioning, that is called concentration. When the mind and its objects are both empty and the mirror [of the mind] shines without obscurity, that is called wisdom.” Even though this is the gate to concentration and wisdom that adapts to signs as practiced by those of inferior capacity in the gradual gate, it should not be neglected as a counteractive measure! If restlessness is blazing forth, then arrest the distraction utilizing the gate of concentration that accords with the principle; for when the mind does not follow after conditions, it will conform with original quiescence. If dullness is especially heavy, then contemplate emptiness utilizing the gate of wisdom that investigates phenomena; for when the mirror [of the mind] shines without obscuration, it will conform with original awareness. Control distracting thoughts with concentration. Control indetermination with wisdom. When activity and stillness both disappear, the act of counteraction will be finished. Then, even while one is in contact with sense objects, thought after thought returns to the source; even while one is in contact with conditions, every mental state conforms with the way. Naturally in all situations, [concentration and wisdom] are concurrently cultivated until finally, one becomes a person without any concerns. When this is so, this then truly can be called maintaining concentration and wisdom equally and one will have clearly seen the buddha-nature!
Comment: Jianfu Hongbian (782-865) was a Chinese Zen master.
1008b08
問據汝所判。悟後修門中定慧等持之義有二種。一自性定慧。二隨相定慧。自性門則曰。任運寂知元自無爲。絶一塵而作對。何勞遣蕩之功。無一念而生情。不假忘縁之力判云。此是頓門。隨相門則曰。稱理攝散擇法觀空。均調昏亂以入無爲。判云。此是漸門。劣機所行也。爲兩門定慧不無疑焉。
30. Question: According to your assessment, during the cultivation that follows enlightenment, two types of concentration and wisdom are to be maintained: first, the concentration and wisdom of the self-nature; second, the concentration and wisdom that adapts to signs. The self-nature gate was said to mean, “Naturally in all situations, he will be quiescent and aware. … He is always spontaneous. … there is not even a single speck of dirt to encounter. Why would he need to bother to work at clearing anything away? He has not a single thought giving rise to passion, so he need not make provisions to have the power of forgetting all conditioning.” You assessed that this was the sudden gate’s equal maintenance of concentration and wisdom that never leaves the self-nature. The gate that adapts to signs was said to mean, “Stay in accord with principle to arrest distraction … [and] investigate phenomena and contemplate their emptiness. … subdue both dullness and disturbance and one thereby will access the unconditioned.” But you assessed that this was the practice for those of inferior capacity in the gradual gate. We are not yet free of doubts about the two-fold gate of concentration and wisdom.
1008b16
若言一人所行也。爲復先依自性門定慧雙修然後更用隨相門對治之功耶。爲復先依隨相門均調昏亂然後以入自性門耶。若先依自性定慧則任運寂知。更無對治之功。何須更取隨相門定慧耶。如將皓玉彫文喪徳。若先以隨相門定慧對治功成。然後趣於自性門。則宛是漸門中劣機悟前漸熏也。豈云頓門。箇者先悟後修用無功之功也。
31. Would you say that a person’s practice should first rely on the self-nature gate by cultivating concentration and wisdom concurrently, and then subsequently make further use of the countermeasures of the gate that adapts to signs? Or should one first rely on the gate that adapts to signs, controls dullness and disturbance, and then subsequently start on the self-nature gate? If after initially employing the concentration and wisdom of the self-nature, one is then able to remain quiescent and aware naturally in all situations, thus rendering the counteractive measures unnecessary, why would one subsequently have to apply the gate of concentration and wisdom that adapts to signs? It is like a piece of white jade engraved as a funeral tablet [it loses its original quality]. Likewise, after the initial application of the gate of concentration and wisdom that adapts to signs, if the work of counteraction is brought to a close and one then progresses on to the self-nature gate, this would be little more than the gradual suffusion prior to enlightenment as practiced by those of inferior capacities in the gradual gate! How would you then be able to say that the sudden gate’s approach of initial awakening and subsequent cultivation makes use of effortless effort?
1008b23
若一時無前後。則二門定慧頓漸有異。如何一時並行也。則頓門箇者依自性門任運亡功。漸門劣機趣隨相門對治勞功。二門之機頓漸不同。優劣皎然。云何先悟後修門中並釋二種耶。請爲通會令絶疑情。答所釋皎然。汝自生疑隨言生解轉生疑惑。得意忘言不勞致詰。若就兩門各判所行。則修自性定慧者。此是頓門用無功之功並運雙寂自修自性自成佛道者也。
32. If in a single moment there is no before or after, yet there is a difference between the two gates of sudden or gradual concentration and wisdom; how could they be practiced together in that single moment? Those taking the sudden gate rely on the self-nature gate and eschew effort naturally in all situations. Those of inferior capacity in the gradual gate cling to the gate that adapts to signs and they exert themselves in applying countermeasures. The respective capacities of these two gates are different as regards their suddenness and gradualness; their superiority and inferiority are clearly obvious. So why is it explained that, in the gate of initial enlightenment followed by cultivation, there are two kinds? Please help us to understand this and eliminate our doubts.
Answer: The explanation is clearly obvious. Your doubts only come from yourselves. If you try to gain understanding by merely following the words, you will only end up giving rise to doubt and confusion. It is best to get the meaning and forget the words; do not bother scrutinizing them in detail. Now let me assess the practice entailed with each of these two gates:
The one [following] the sudden gate uses effortless effort, in which both [calming and contemplation] are mobilized and both are quiescent; so there is self-cultivation of the self-nature and accomplishment of the Buddha Way.
Comment: In other words, don’t overthink this. The first way is to just be yourself, relying upon your own good instincts. Simply don’t get in your own way.
1008c03
修隨相門定慧者。此是未悟前漸門劣機用對治之功。心心斷惑取靜爲行者。而此二門所行頓漸各異不可參亂也。然悟後修門中兼論隨相門中對治者。非全取漸機所行也。取其方便假道。托宿而已。何故於此頓門亦有機勝者。亦有機劣者。不可一例判其行李也。
33. Cultivation of the concentration and wisdom that adapts to signs: this involves the use of counteractive measures prior to enlightenment by those of inferior capacities in the gradual gate; thought after thought, one cuts off confusion, so this is a practice that clings to stillness. These two gates differ in their respective suddenness or gradualness; they should not be applied haphazardly! Although the counteractive measures of the gate that adapts to signs are also discussed in the gate involving cultivation after awakening, it does not employ in their entirety the practices of those of gradual capacities. It adopts its skillful means only as a provisional way. This is because in the sudden gate also there are those whose capacities are outstanding and those whose capacities are poor; their baggage cannot be weighed according to a single standard.
1008c09
若煩惱淡薄身心輕安。於善離善於惡離惡。不動八風寂然三受者。依自性定 慧任運雙修。天眞無作動靜常禪。成就自然之理。何假隨相門對治之義也。無病不求藥。雖先頓悟。煩惱濃厚習氣堅重。對境而念念生情。遇縁而心心作對。被他昏亂死殺昧却寂知常然者。即借隨相門定慧。不忘對治均調昏亂以入無爲。即其宜矣。雖借對治功夫暫調習氣。以先頓悟心性本淨煩惱本空故。即不落漸門劣機汚染修也。
34. If the defilements are weak and one’s body and mind light and at ease; if regarding the wholesome one leaves the wholesome and in the unwholesome one leaves the unwholesome; if one is unmoving amid the eight winds; if the three types of feeling are quiescent - then one can rely on the concentration and wisdom of the self-nature and cultivate them concurrently in all situations naturally. Artless and uncontrived, whether in action or at rest one is constantly in meditative absorption and achieves the principle of spontaneity. What need is there to borrow the gate of adapting to signs? If one is not sick, there is no need to go looking for medicine. Even though a person might initially have had a sudden enlightenment, if the defilements are thick and the perfuming [of karma] is densely layered; if passions arise from one moment to another whenever sense objects are encountered; if confrontations arise from one moment to another whenever conditions are encountered; if one is in the dark and confused, thereby killing and obscuring the constancy of quiescence and awareness - such a person should then borrow the gate of concentration and wisdom that adapts to signs, not neglect the counteractive measures that control both darkness and confusion and thereby access the unconditioned: this is what is proper here. But even though he borrows these countermeasures to bring the perfuming [of karma] under temporary control, since he has already had an initial sudden enlightenment to the fact that the mind-nature is originally pure and the defilements originally empty, he therefore does not fall into the tainted cultivation of those of inferior capacities in the gradual gate!
1008c18
何者修在悟前則雖用功不忘念念熏修。 著著生疑未能無礙。如有一物礙在胸中。不安之相常現在前。日久月深對治功熟。則身心客塵恰似輕安。雖復輕安疑根未斷。如石壓草。猶於生死界。不得自在。故云。修在悟前非眞修也。悟人分上雖有對治方便。念念無疑不落汚染。日久月深自然契合。天眞妙性任運寂知。念念攀縁一切境。心心永斷諸煩惱。不離自性定慧等持。成就無上菩提。與前幾勝更無差別。則隨相門定慧雖是漸機所行。於悟人分上可謂點鐵成金。若知如是。則豈以二門定慧有先後次第二見之疑乎。
35. Why is this? Although during the cultivation prior to enlightenment [a person following the gradual gate] does not forget to be diligent and moment after moment perfumes his cultivation, he still gives rise to doubts everywhere and is not yet unhindered. It is as if he had something stuck in his chest: he is constantly uncomfortable. As the days lengthen and months deepen, the work of counteraction matures and then the adventitious defilements of body and mind become tranquil. Although they are tranquil, the root of doubt has yet to be cut out. Like a rock that is crushing grass, he is still not autonomous in the realm of birth and death. Therefore, [Zongmi] said, “Cultivation prior to enlightenment is not true cultivation!” In the case of an enlightened person, although he employs the skillful means of such countermeasures, moment by moment he is free of doubts and does not become tainted. As the days lengthen and the months deepen, he naturally conforms to the nature that is artless and wondrous. He is naturally quiescent and aware in all situations. Moment by moment, as he becomes involved in conditions in all the sense realms, thought after thought he always cuts off the many defilements, for he is never separate from the attainment of the concentration and wisdom of the self-nature. He perfects unsurpassed awakening and is no different from those of outstanding [capacities] mentioned previously. Thus, although the concentration and wisdom that adapts to signs is a practice for those of inferior capacities in the gradual gate, for the person who is enlightened it can be said that iron has been transmuted into gold. If you understand it in this wise, then how can you have doubt based on dualistic views concerning the sequence or progression involved in the practice of these two gates to concentration and wisdom?
Comment: In other words, before sudden enlightenment, one is very confused, uncertain, and in doubt. The practices performed then are attempts to gain a buddhahood that one does not believe one has or to turn oneself into a buddha. After the moment of faith and sudden enlightenment to the true nature, any remedial practices performed are to bring oneself back into alignment with that nature. These practices are not done to get anything, make anything, or become something one is not. They are temporary skillful means to turn away from what is false and restore what is authentic done in a spirit of confidence and clarity.
1009a1
願諸修道之人。研味此語更莫狐疑自生退屈。若具丈夫之志求無上菩提者。捨此奚以哉。切莫執文。直須了義一一歸就自己契合本宗。則無師之智自然現前。天眞之理了然不昧。成就慧身不由他悟。而此妙旨雖是諸人分上。若非夙植般若種智大乘根器者。不能一念而生正信。豈徒不信。亦乃謗讟返招無間者比比有之雖不信受一經於耳暫時結縁。其功厥徳不可稱量。如唯心訣云。聞而不信尚結佛種之因。學而不成猶益人天之福不失成佛之正因。況聞而信學而成守護不忘者。其功徳豈能度量。
36. I hope that all cultivators of the way will study these words carefully; do not give in to doubt or you will naturally retrogress. If you have a heroic will and seek unsurpassed awakening, what will you do if you abandon this? Do not grasp at the words; you must instead directly grasp the definitive meaning, at every point return to yourselves and stay in accord with the original core principle. Then the knowledge that cannot be learned from any master will naturally appear and that artless principle will be clear and unobscured. Attaining the wisdom-body does not come from any other awakening. Even so, while this wondrous teaching applies to everyone, unless one early on sows the seeds of prajna, the faculty of knowledge of the Mahayana, you will not be able to produce right faith in a single thought-moment. And how can this merely lead to a lack of faith? You will also end up slandering [the Dharma] and will fall away and invite punishment in the Hell of Incessant Suffering. This happens all too frequently! But even though you are not yet able to accept this in faith, if it passes through your ears just once and you feel an affinity with it for even a moment, the efficacy and merit will be incalculable. As it says in the Secrets on Mind-Only, “Hearing [the Dharma] but not having faith is still forming a cause that is the seed of buddhahood. An incomplete study still increases human and heavenly merit without loss of the direct cause for attaining buddhahood.” Still more, one who hears and studies with faith, and safeguards their attainment without forgetting it - how can their merit be calculated?
Comment: The quote from Yongming Yanshou’s Secrets on Mind-Only ends with “…heavenly merit.” (2018.48.996c22-23)
1009a13
追念過去輪迴之業。不知其幾千劫。隨黒闇入無間受種種苦。又不知其幾何。而欲求佛道。不逢善友長劫沈淪。冥冥無覺造諸惡業。時或一思不覺長吁。其可放緩再受前殃。又不知誰復使我今値人生爲萬物之虚不昧。修眞之路。實謂盲龜遇木纖芥投鍼。其爲慶幸。曷勝道哉。我今若自生退屈。或生懈怠而恒常望後。須臾失命退墮惡趣。受諸苦痛之時。雖欲願聞一句佛法信解受持欲免辛酸。豈可復得乎。及到臨危悔無所益。願諸修道之人。莫生放逸莫著貪淫。如救頭然不忘照顧。無常迅速身如朝露。命若西光。今日雖存明亦難保。切須在意切須在意。
37. If we consider our actions during our past wanderings in samsara, we have no way of knowing for how many thousands of kalpas we have fallen into darkness or entered the Hell of Incessant Suffering and endured all kinds of suffering. Nor can we know how many times we have aspired to the Buddha Way but, because we did not meet with good friends, remained submerged [in the sea of samsara] for many long kalpas, dark and benighted, performing all sorts of unwholesome actions. Though we may reflect on this once in a while, we continue to lament for a long time. So how can we relax and suffer again the same calamities as before? Furthermore, we cannot know who will enable us to again be born as human beings who can govern the unobscured spaciousness of all things on the path of true cultivation. Truly, as it is said, [it is as rare as] a blind turtle finding a log [in the ocean it can rest on] or throwing a minute mustard seed and [hitting the tip of] a needle. How can we possibly express how fortunate we are? What is more superior than the [Buddha] Way? Nowadays, whenever we allow ourselves to retrogress or become indolent, we should always consider what might come next. In one instant we might happen to lose our lives and fall back into the evil destinies where we would have to undergo unspeakable suffering and pain. At such a time, although we might want to hear one phrase of the Buddha Dharma and would be willing to receive and keep it with faithful devotion to ease our misfortune, how would we ever have the chance to encounter it? At this point of crisis, remorse is of utterly no use. I hope that all of you who are cultivating the path will not be heedless and will not indulge in attachment and greed. As if you were trying to save your head from burning, do not forget to reflect upon this. Impermanence is swift and the body is like the morning dew. Life is like the twilight in the West. Although we are alive today, there is no assurance about tomorrow. You must bear this in mind! You must bear this in mind!
1009a25
且憑世間有爲之善。亦可免三途苦輪。於天上人間得殊勝果報受諸快樂。況此最上乘甚深法門。暫時生信所成功徳。不可以比喩説其小分。如經云。若人以三千大千世間七寶。布施供養爾所世界衆生皆得充滿。又教化爾所世界 一切衆生令得四果。其功徳無量無邊。不如一食頃正思此法所獲功徳。是知我此法門最尊最貴。於諸功徳比況不及。故經云。一念淨心是道場。勝造恒沙七寶塔。寶塔畢竟碎爲塵。一念淨心成正覺。願諸修道之人。研味此語切須在意。此身不向今生度。更待何生度此身。今若不修萬劫差違今若彊修難修之行。漸得不難功行自進。嗟夫今時人飢逢王膳不知下口。病遇醫王不知服藥。不曰如 之何如之何者。吾未如之何也已矣。
38. Temporarily relying on worldly conditioned wholesome conduct, we will also avoid suffering in the three evil destinies of the wheel [of birth and death]. In the heavens above and among humans we will obtain the superlative karmic ripening of receiving abundant happiness. But how much more is this the case if we give rise to faith in this most profound Dharma gate of the supreme vehicle for only a moment?No simile can convey even the smallest portion of the merit we will achieve. As it is said in the sutras:
If one takes all the seven treasures in all the world systems of the trichiliocosm and offers them to all the sentient beings of those worlds until they are completely satisfied; or, furthermore, if one instructs all the sentient beings of those worlds and causes them to realize the four fruitions, the merit so gained will be immeasurable and boundless. But it is not as great as the merit gained from thinking of this Dharma correctly for even the time it takes to eat a single meal.
Therefore, we should know that this Dharma gate of ours is the most revered and most precious of all; its merit is incomparable. As the sutras say:
A single thought-moment of the pure mind is the place of awakening,
It is better than building stupas of seven treasures numerous as the sands of the Ganges.
Those treasure stupas will ultimately be reduced to dust,
But a single thought-moment of the pure mind attains right awakening.
I hope that all people who cultivate the way will study these words carefully and keep them always in mind. If this body is not ferried across to the other shore in this lifetime, then what body are you waiting for to cross over with? If you do not cultivate now, you will go off in the wrong direction for ten thousand kalpas. But if you practice assiduously now, practices that are difficult to cultivate will gradually become easier, until, finally, meritorious practice will advance of itself.
Alas! When starving people today are given a royal feast, they do not even know enough to put them in their mouths. When they are sick they meet the king of physicians but do not even know enough to take the medicine. If no one asks, “What shall I do? What shall I do?” then what shall I do for him?
Comment: The first citation from the sutras is a paraphrase from the Diamond Sutra. The second citation is not from a sutra but from a verse written by Shi Wuzhuo (737-767).
The analogy of a starving person at a royal feast is from Chapter Six of the Lotus Sutra, wherein the following verses are said by Mahamaudgalyayana, Subhuti, and Mahakashypa:
If you see what we have deep in our minds,
And assure us of our future buddhahood,
We shall feel as cool and as refreshed
As if we were sprinkled with nectar.
Suppose a man came
From a country suffering from famine.
Now he saw the meal of a great king.
He did not partake of it in doubts and fears.
After he was told to take it by the kind,
He took it at once.
We are like that man.
(The Lotus Sutra, pp. 120-121)
The analogy of meeting the king of physicians but not taking the medicine given is of course a reference to the parable of the excellent physician and his children in Chapter Sixteen of the Lotus Sutra.
1009b11
且世間有爲之事。其状可見其功可驗。人得一事歎其希有。我此心宗無形可觀無状可見。言語道斷心行處滅。故天魔外道毀謗無門。釋梵諸天稱讃不及。況凡夫淺識之流其能彷彿。悲夫井蛙焉知滄海之闊。故知末法世中聞此法門。生希有想信解受持者。已於無量劫中承事諸聖植諸善根。深結般若正因最上根性也。故金剛經云。於此章句能生信心者。當知已於無量佛所種 諸善根。又云。爲發大乘者説。爲發最上乘者説。
39. Although the appearances of worldly conditioned matters can be seen and their effects experienced, if a person succeeds in one matter, everyone praises the rarity of it. The source of this mind of ours has neither shape that can be observed nor form that can be seen; the way of words and speech is cut off and the activities of mind therein cease. For this reason, the heavenly devil and non-Buddhists can find no opening for slander, and even the praises of Indra, Brahma, and all the gods are inadequate, much less the shallow thinking of ordinary people.
How pitiful! How can a frog in a well know the vastness of the ocean? How can a wild fox roar like a lion? Therefore we know that in this Latter Age of the Dharma, a person who can hear this Dharma gate, comprehend its rarity, and receive and keep it with determination has for innumerable kalpas served all the sages, planted all the wholesome roots, and fully formed the direct cause of prajna - he is of best innate character! As the Diamond Sutra says, “If there is a person who can generate faith in these words … you should know that such a person has already planted all the wholesome roots in the presence of incalculable numbers of buddhas.” It also says, “[The Tathagata] expounds it for those who aspire to the Mahayana; he expounds it for those who aspire to the Supreme Vehicle.”
1009b22
爲發最上乘者説。莫生怯弱須發勇猛之心。宿劫善因未可知也。若不信殊勝甘爲下劣生艱阻之想。今不修之。則縱有宿世善根今斷之故。彌在其難展轉遠矣。今既到寶所不可空手而還。一失人身萬劫難復。請須愼之。豈有智者知其寶所。反不求之長怨孤貧。若欲獲寶放下皮嚢。
40. I hope that those of you who seek the way will not be timid and weak-willed, for you must have a heart of valor and vigor. Wholesome causes made in past kalpas cannot be known! If you do not have faith in the extraordinary, willingly go along with the inferior, and decide that you will not practice this now because it is too difficult, then, even though you might have the wholesome roots from past lives, you now cut them off. The difficulty will keep increasing and you will move further from the goal. Since you have now arrived at the treasure trove, you cannot return empty-handed. Once you lose a human body, for ten thousand kalpas it will be difficult to recover. Please be careful about this. Knowing that there is a treasure trove, how can a knowledgeable person turn back and not look for it, and yet continue to resent bitterly his destitution and poverty? If you want to gain this treasure you must cast aside this skin-bag.
Final comment: There is very little that I feel needs to be added to this. These exhortations seem very clear.