The Robe Is Not the Wearer

"Worthies! Everything this mountain monk has set out is for the sake of discerning Māra and telling apart what differs, so as to know the crooked from the correct. Followers of the Way! Genuine feeling is exceedingly hard to come by; the Buddhadharma is deep and mysterious, and to understand it is no small matter. This mountain monk explains it thoroughly all day long, yet students pay no real attention — trampling over it a thousand, ten thousand times, and still it remains dark and blank to them, with not one recognizable form, though it is vividly present and solitary and bright the whole time. Because the student cannot believe this, he forms his understanding right on top of names and phrases; by the time he reaches fifty, all he has done is carry a corpse from house to house, shouldering his own baggage as he runs about the world, and the day will come when he is asked to pay for the straw sandals he has worn out.

"Worthies! This mountain monk says there is no dharma to be found outside. Students, failing to understand this, go and form an understanding inside instead — sitting leaning against a wall, tongue pressed against the roof of the mouth, perfectly still and unmoving — and take this for the very Dharma of the patriarchal gate. A great mistake: take this unmoving, pure state to be correct, and you are simply recognizing ignorance itself as your true master. The ancients said: 'That vast, murky, dark pit is truly a fearful thing' — this is exactly it. Take instead what moves to be correct, and every plant and tree knows how to move, and so they too would have to be the Way. Hence: what moves is the element of wind, and what does not move is the element of earth, and neither moving nor not-moving has any nature of its own. Try to catch it where it moves, and it stands where it does not move; try to catch it where it does not move, and it stands where it moves — like a fish hidden in a spring, striking the waves and leaping up of itself. Worthies! Moving and not-moving are simply two kinds of circumstance; it is the person of no reliance who makes use of both. When students come to me, this mountain monk judges them by three kinds of capacity: for one of middling-to-lower capacity, I take away his circumstance but not his dharma; for one of middling-to-higher capacity, I take away both circumstance and dharma; for one of the very highest capacity, I take away neither circumstance, dharma, nor person; and for someone of truly exceptional understanding, this mountain monk simply acts with the whole body at once, without regard to capacity at all.

"Worthies! When you reach this point, there is no room at all for the student to apply effort — the spark from flint, the flash of lightning, and it is already past. If the student's eyes so much as flicker, it has nothing to do with the matter any longer; the instant a thought forms, it is already wrong. Anyone who understands this does not depart from what is right in front of him. Worthies! You go about shouldering your begging bowl and your bag of filth, running from house to house seeking the Buddha, seeking the Dharma — but this very act of running and seeking right now, do you recognize the one who is doing it? Vividly alive, it simply has no root or stem; gather it, and it will not collect; scatter it, and it will not disperse. Seek it, and it only recedes further; stop seeking, and it remains right in front of you. Its numinous sound reaches the ear on its own — if a person does not believe this, he will labor in vain for a hundred years.

"Followers of the Way! In a single instant you enter the Flower Treasury World, enter Vairocana's land, enter the land of liberation, the land of supernatural power, the land of purity, the dharma-realm, the impure and the pure, the ordinary and the sage, the realms of hungry ghosts and animals — searching everywhere for them, you will find no birth and no death anywhere, only empty names. Illusory transformations, flowers in the sky — do not trouble yourself to grasp at them; gain and loss, right and wrong — let them all go at once."

"Followers of the Way! This mountain monk's Buddhadharma has been genuinely transmitted, one lineage traveling the whole world — from Reverend Magu, Reverend Danxia, Reverend Daoyi, and Reverend Shitou of Mount Lu who dragged stones — yet nowhere has anyone truly believed it, and everywhere slander has arisen instead. Reverend Daoyi's own activity was pure and unmixed, yet three hundred, five hundred students never once grasped his meaning. The Reverend of Mount Lu's activity was free and genuine, going with or against as needed, yet students could never fathom its limits, and were all left at a loss. Reverend Danxia's playing with the pearl, now hidden, now shown, left every student who came to him thoroughly scolded. Reverend Magu's activity was as bitter as Huangbo's, and hardly anyone could get close to it. Reverend Shigong's activity sought out a person at the very point of an arrow, and everyone who came to him was afraid. As for this mountain monk's own activity today, it is genuinely both building up and breaking down, playing freely with supernatural transformation, entering every circumstance, at ease wherever I stand, never to be exchanged by any circumstance at all."

"Whenever someone comes seeking me, I go out to see him, and since he does not recognize me, I put on various kinds of robes. The student, forming his own understanding, plunges straight into my words, thinking: 'How pitiful — this blind, shave-pated, eyeless man takes the robe I am wearing for blue, yellow, red, or white; I will take it off and enter a pure state instead.' The moment he sees this, he grows delighted and eager. I then take that robe off as well, and the student, losing his composure, runs about in a frenzy, saying: 'I have no robe!' I then say to him: 'Do you recognize the person who wears the robe?' All at once he turns his head, and recognizes me at last. 'Worthies! Do not mistake the robe for the wearer — a robe cannot move on its own; it is the person who wears a robe. There is a robe of purity, a robe of no-birth, a robe of bodhi, a robe of nirvāṇa, a robe of the patriarchs, a robe of the buddhas. Worthies! Any reputation, any name, any phrase whatsoever is nothing but a change of robe, stirred up from the sea of breath at the navel-wheel, struck into shape by the clashing of the teeth — clearly nothing but an illusory transformation. Worthies! What is expressed outwardly as speech, and manifested inwardly as a mental factor — thought accompanied by consciousness — all of this alike is simply a robe. You go and mistake the very robe someone is wearing for the real understanding itself; even after kalpas as numerous as dust motes, this is nothing but mastery of robes, circling endlessly through birth and death in the three realms. Better to have nothing to do — to meet without recognizing, to converse without knowing each other's name. Students today cannot manage this, precisely because they take recognizing names for understanding, copying the words of dead old men into a great notebook, wrapping it in three or five layers of cloth so that no one else may see it, calling it the mysterious purport, and treasuring it as something precious. A great mistake, blind fools! What juice do you expect to find by squeezing dry bones? There is a type who cannot tell good from bad, who take up the scriptures, work out some meaning by discussion, and form it into a phrase — exactly like taking a lump of excrement into one's mouth and spitting it out for someone else to eat. It is exactly like an ordinary person passing along a rumor, wasting an entire lifetime on it. They call themselves home-leavers, yet the moment someone questions them about the Buddhadharma, their mouths clamp shut with nothing to say, their eyes as dark as lacquer, their mouths hanging like a plank across a door — people of this kind, when Maitreya appears in the world, will be moved off to some other world entirely and consigned to suffering in hell. Worthies! Why do you run about everywhere in such a fluster looking for something? You wear the soles of your feet flat with walking, yet there is no Buddha to seek, no Way to accomplish, no Dharma to attain. Seeking outwardly for a buddha with marks, you will find nothing resembling your own self at all; if you want to recognize your own original mind, it is neither united with anything nor separate from anything.'"

"Followers of the Way! The true buddha has no form; the true way has no substance; the true dharma has no mark. These three dharmas mingle and merge into a single place, and once you can no longer even discern them apart, this is called a sentient being of confused, busy consciousness."

Someone asked: "What are the true buddha, the true dharma, and the true way? Please instruct us." The master said: "'Buddha' is simply a pure mind; 'dharma' is simply a luminous mind; 'way' is simply pure light unobstructed everywhere. The three are really one, all of them empty names with nothing real to correspond to them — this is how it is for a person truly studying the Way, whose mind does not break off moment after moment. When the great teacher Bodhidharma came from the Western lands, he sought only a person who would not be deceived by others. Later he met the Second Patriarch, and a single word was enough — only then did the Second Patriarch know that all his earlier efforts had been wasted. This mountain monk's own understanding today is no different from the patriarchs and buddhas: grasp it at the level of the first statement, and you become teacher to patriarchs and buddhas themselves; grasp it at the second, and you become teacher to gods and men; grasp it at the third, and you cannot even save yourself."

Someone asked: "What was the intent of the Patriarch's coming from the West?" The master said: "If there were any intent at all, he could not even save himself." The questioner said: "If there was no intent, then how did the Second Patriarch attain the Dharma?" The master said: "'Attaining' is precisely 'not attaining.'" The questioner said: "If it is truly not attaining, then what is the meaning of 'not attaining'?" The master said: "It is because you go running after everything everywhere, and your mind cannot come to rest. That is why the Patriarch said: 'Ah, you fool! Carrying your own head, still searching for your head!' The instant you hear these words, turn your own light back upon yourself, and seek nothing further elsewhere. Know that body and mind are no different from the patriarchs and buddhas, and that right now, this instant, there is nothing the matter — only then is it called attaining the Dharma.

"Worthies! This mountain monk, having no choice in the matter, has spoken at such length about so many things not truly worth mentioning. Do not mistake this for something elaborate — as I see it, there is truly no such array of principles: use it when you need it, and let it be when you do not. As for what people everywhere call the six perfections and the ten thousand practices, taking them for the Buddhadharma, I say these are the gate of adornment, the gate of buddha-works, not the Buddhadharma itself; even keeping the fast, keeping the precepts, carrying a bowl of oil without spilling a drop — if the eye of the Way is not clear, all of it must be repaid one day, and the day will come to pay for the rice one has eaten. Why is this so? Because entering the Way without penetrating its principle only turns the body back to living off the alms of the faithful. An old man of eighty-one whose tree no longer grows leaves; solitary dwelling on a lonely peak, one meal at dawn, sitting for long stretches without ever lying down, performing the six periods of walking practice — all such people are simply creating karma; even giving away one's own head, eyes, marrow, brain, kingdom, city, wife, children, elephants, horses, and the seven treasures — views of this kind are all merely afflicting body and mind, and will only bring suffering as their fruit. Better to have nothing to do, pure and unmixed with anything else. Even a bodhisattva whose mind is full at the tenth ground, searching for the very tracks of this follower of the Way, could never find them — and so the gods rejoice, the earth-spirits hold up his feet, and the buddhas of the ten directions all without exception praise him. Why is this so? Because the activity of this person of the Way, listening to the Dharma right now, leaves no track at all."

Someone asked: "The Buddha of Great Penetration and Supreme Victory sat in the place of enlightenment for ten kalpas, yet the Buddhadharma did not manifest before him, and he could not accomplish the buddha-way. I am not clear what this means — please, master, instruct me." The master said: "'Great Penetration' is simply yourself, penetrating everywhere the fact that the ten thousand dharmas have no nature and no mark. 'Supreme Victory' is having no doubt anywhere, and attaining not a single dharma. 'Buddha' means a pure mind whose light penetrates the entire dharma-realm. 'Sitting in the place of enlightenment for ten kalpas' means the ten perfections. 'The Buddhadharma did not manifest before him' means the Buddha was never born to begin with, and the Dharma never ceases to begin with — so how could there be anything further to manifest? 'He could not accomplish the buddha-way' means the Buddha ought not become a buddha all over again. The ancients said: 'The Buddha is always present in the world, yet is not stained by any worldly dharma.' Followers of the Way! If you want to become a buddha, do not follow after the ten thousand things. When mind arises, every kind of dharma arises; when mind ceases, every kind of dharma ceases. Let the one mind not arise, and the ten thousand dharmas are without fault. Whether worldly or world-transcending, there is no Buddha and no Dharma; nothing ever manifests, and nothing has ever been lost. Even supposing there were something, it would only be names, words, and phrases, set up as medicine to lead children along, statements that merely point things out. Yet even these names and phrases do not name themselves — it is you, right in front of me, brilliantly, luminously perceiving, aware, hearing, knowing, and illuminating, who fix all these names and phrases in place. Worthies! Only by committing the five deeds of unbroken retribution do you attain liberation."

Someone asked: "What are the five deeds of unbroken retribution?" The master said: "Killing one's father, harming one's mother, drawing a buddha's blood, destroying the harmony of the saṅgha, and burning the scriptures and images — these are the five deeds of unbroken retribution." The questioner said: "What is 'father'?" The master said: "Ignorance is the father. The instant a single thought of your mind seeks the place where arising and ceasing occur and cannot find it — like an echo answering into empty space, with nothing the matter wherever it goes — this is called 'killing the father.'" The questioner said: "What is 'mother'?" The master said: "Craving and attachment are the mother. The instant a single thought of your mind enters the realm of desire seeking after this craving, and sees only that all dharmas are marked with emptiness, clinging to nothing anywhere — this is called 'harming the mother.'" The questioner said: "What is 'drawing a buddha's blood'?" The master said: "The instant a single thought forms any understanding at all within the pure dharma-realm, everywhere at once turns to darkness — this is 'drawing a buddha's blood.'" The questioner said: "What is 'destroying the harmony of the saṅgha'?" The master said: "The instant a single thought of your mind truly penetrates the bonds and fetters of affliction, finding them like empty space with nothing to rely on — this is 'destroying the harmony of the saṅgha.'" The questioner said: "What is 'burning the scriptures and images'?" The master said: "Seeing that causes and conditions are empty, that mind is empty, that dharmas are empty, and with a single thought cutting this off decisively, utterly free with nothing the matter — this is 'burning the scriptures and images.' Worthies! Penetrate it this way, and you will be free of the obstruction of the very names 'ordinary' and 'sage.' Yet you go on forming a real understanding out of a mere empty fist or pointing finger, conjuring up strange notions among roots, objects, and dharmas, belittling yourself and shrinking back, saying: 'I am only an ordinary person; he is a sage.' Blind fools! What is the desperate hurry? You put on the lion's own skin, only to yelp like a jackal. A great man does not carry himself like a great man — unwilling to trust the very thing in his own house, he goes seeking outside instead, climbing onto the idle names and phrases of the ancients, leaning on shade to bargain for sunlight, never able to reach through to anything, seizing on whatever circumstance he meets, clinging to whatever speck of dust he encounters, confusion arising at every contact, with no fixed ground of his own anywhere."

"Followers of the Way! Do not cling to what this mountain monk says. Why not? Because speech has no basis to stand on — it is only a temporary sketch drawn in empty space, like a painted likeness used for illustration. Followers of the Way! Do not take the Buddha as the ultimate — as I see it, he is no different from a latrine hole. Bodhisattvas and arhats are all no more than cangues and chains, things that bind people. That is why Mañjuśrī took up his sword to kill Gautama, and Aṅgulimāla took up his blade to harm Śākyamuni himself. Followers of the Way! There is no Buddha to be attained; even the three vehicles, the five natures, and the traces of the perfect and sudden teaching are all only medicine matched for the moment to a particular sickness, with no real, fixed dharma among them. Even supposing there were something, it would only be an approximation, a mere pointing-out, a laying-out of written words — that is simply how it is put into words.

"Followers of the Way! There is a type of shave-pated fool who applies himself intently on the inside, seeking a method for transcending the world — a mistake. If a person seeks the Buddha, that very person loses the Buddha; if a person seeks the Way, that very person loses the Way; if a person seeks a patriarch, that very person loses the patriarch. Worthies, do not make this mistake — I set no store at all by your understanding of the sūtras and treatises, nor by your being a king or a minister, nor by your debating as fluently as a river in flood, nor even by your cleverness and intelligence; the only thing I require of you is a true and correct understanding.

"Followers of the Way! Even if you could master a hundred volumes of sūtras and treatises, it would not equal being one ordinary monk with nothing to do. Master them, and you only end up despising others, competing for victory like the fighting asuras, caught in the ignorance of self and other, and lengthening the karma that leads to hell — like the monk Sunakṣatra, who understood the twelve divisions of the teachings perfectly well and yet fell alive into hell, with the whole earth itself unable to hold him. Better to have nothing to do and simply rest — eat when hungry, close your eyes when sleepy. The foolish laugh at me for saying this, but the wise understand. Followers of the Way! Do not go seeking inside written words — it only stirs the mind and wearies it, like sucking in cold air to no benefit at all. Better to see, in a single thought, that dependent arising is itself unborn, and so surpass even the provisional bodhisattvas of the three vehicles.

"Worthies! Do not idle your days away out of habit. In the days before this mountain monk had any understanding at all, everything was a vast, dark blank; I could not bear to let the time pass empty, and so, with a burning stomach and an anxious heart, I ran about seeking the Way — and only afterward did I gain any real strength from it, arriving at last at today, when I can speak with you, followers of the Way, in this manner. I urge every one of you not to labor merely for food and clothing: see how easily the world passes by, and how hard it is to meet a genuinely good teacher — as rare as the udumbara flower blooming for a single instant.

"You all, everywhere, have heard there is some old fellow called Linji, and so you come intending to press him with difficult questions, to make his teaching fail — only to find yourselves caught by this mountain monk's whole being acting at once. The student's eyes open uselessly, his mouth cannot move at all, and he is left utterly at a loss, not knowing how to answer me. I say to him: 'Only a dragon or an elephant can trample like this — no donkey could bear it.' Everywhere you go, you merely point at your own chest and tap your ribs, saying you understand Chan, you understand the Way — but two or three of you, brought right here, can do nothing at all. Ah, you carry this body and mind of yours everywhere, flapping two pieces of skin, deceiving the whole village — the day will come when you must eat the iron staff for it. You are no true home-leavers at all; every one of you belongs entirely to the realm of the asuras.

"As for the way of ultimate principle, it is not to be sought through argument and disputation, through clashing words meant to crush rival teachings — the transmission from patriarch to patriarch and from buddha to buddha has never had any other intent than this. Where there is verbal teaching at all, it falls within the provisional forms of the three vehicles, the five natures, and the causes and effects of gods and men; even the perfect and sudden teaching is no different — the boy Sudhana himself never went seeking beyond this. Worthies! Do not misapply your minds — like the great ocean, which does not harbor a single corpse, you go on carrying your own corpse about, trying to run across the whole world with it, only raising up your own obstruction of views to block your own mind. When the sun rises with no cloud in the sky, its bright light shines on everything equally; there is no film in the eye, and no flower in the empty sky. Followers of the Way! If you want to attain what accords with the Dharma, simply give rise to no doubt: unfurled, it fills the entire dharma-realm; gathered in, not even a single hair's breadth remains standing — vividly present, solitary, and bright, never lacking in anything at all. The eye does not see it, the ear does not hear it — what should we call it? The ancients said: 'To liken it to any one thing at all is already to miss the mark.' Simply look for yourself — what more is there? Speaking of it could never be exhausted. Each of you must make your own effort. Take care."