Notes Beside the Bamboo Window — Second Collection, Part 11

Someone asked: "It is said that no sutra can be compared to the Flower Ornament Sutra — what does this mean?" I answered: "Long ago, Master Xuanzang, having completed his translation of the six-hundred-fascicle Great Prajñāpāramitā Sutra, presented it to the emperor. The emperor said: 'The Great Prajñāpāramitā Sutra is so vast — why should it not be ranked ahead of the Flower Ornament Sutra?' The master answered: 'The Flower Ornament Sutra contains boundless gates of teaching; the Great Prajñāpāramitā Sutra, however extensive, is only a single gate among the Flower Ornament's boundless gates.'" There was once a monk who built a multi-tiered bookcase to hold the sutras, placing the Flower Ornament Sutra on the topmost shelf. One day, after reading and reciting from it, he set it back down on a middle shelf — and the next morning found it had returned to the topmost shelf on its own, to his great astonishment. This is surely the sutra's own spiritual power at work, and also the response drawn forth by the sincerity of whoever recites it. And besides, among the entire Tripiṭaka, the Flower Ornament Sutra alone governs like a heavenly king ruling the whole realm — feudal lords, ministers, officials of every rank, down to the common people, are all subject to its rule — what other sutra could possibly stand as its equal?

Layman Yuan's mother, of the Zhang family, had taken refuge in the Universal Gate Bodhisattva with great devotion since childhood. When she married, she brought the bodhisattva's image with her into her new household. Throughout the ten months she carried Layman Yuan in her womb, she never once let a single day pass without paying reverent homage to the image — this is exactly what is meant by prenatal education. It is common enough in this world for a wife to turn her heart wholly toward the Buddha — but for a woman on the very eve of her wedding, rather than rushing to adorn herself with fine clothing and ornaments for the occasion, to instead place the bodhisattva's image among her own dowry goods — this surpasses ordinary sentiment entirely, something never before seen or heard. In the past, Su Zizhan carried a painted image with him when banished to the south, and Grand Master Ge displayed a Buddha image openly in his own government office, undeterred by others' mockery — and those with real discernment admired them greatly for it. Is Layman Yuan's mother, then, not also an extraordinary great figure in her own right?

The sages of Confucianism and Buddhism each direct their teaching toward a different purpose — there is no need to treat them as opposed, and no need to force them together as one, either. Why? Confucianism governs this world; Buddhism governs what lies beyond it. For governing this world, it is naturally enough to follow the Great Learning's own program — investigating things, extending knowledge, making the intentions sincere, rectifying the mind, cultivating the person, ordering the family, governing the state, bringing peace to the whole realm — and to go beyond this into excessive depth would leave the fundamental bonds and constant relationships of society without any stable footing at all. For what lies beyond this world, one must naturally exhaust the highest and deepest truth before genuine liberation can be reached — and this necessarily gives somewhat less attention to family, state, and the realm. This is simply the natural course of principle and circumstance, nothing to find strange.

If one insists that Confucianism simply is Buddhism, then the Six Classics, the Analects, and the Mencius already provide everything in full and complete form — why would there be any need at all for Śākyamuni to be born into this world, or for Bodhidharma to come from the West? If one insists that Buddhism simply is Confucianism, then why did no ruler ever govern the realm using the Śūraṅgama Sūtra or the Lotus Sutra, relying instead on the institutions established by Fuxi, Shennong, Yao, and Shun, and the principles set forth by Confucius, Mencius, and other worthies? Treating the two as opposed, and forcing them together as one, are therefore equally mistaken. And yet, for a person of truly all-encompassing capacity, treating them as separate is acceptable, and treating them as unified is acceptable too — neither approach carries any real fault for such a person. This, too, must not go unrecognized.

"Standing meditation" derives from the Pratyutpanna Samādhi teaching, meant only to guard against drowsiness during especially intense, sustained practice through sitting — it was never meant to suggest that standing itself constitutes the Way. Those who fail to grasp this point have gone so far as to bind an iron band around their own waist to help hold themselves rigidly upright — which is laughable enough! And more recently still, there are those who build a brick enclosure tightly around their own body and stand upright within it, like a sword sealed inside its own scabbard — and even use this display to solicit donations from others. Ignorant people, lacking any real discernment, revere and serve such a person, and gradually more and more begin imitating this same behavior.

I urge those of genuine wisdom: whenever you encounter such a person, guide them at once, and persuade them to leave their enclosure — do not let this degenerate age produce such bizarre, demonic displays, adding further disgrace to the monastic community.

The Tathāgata spoke the sutras; bodhisattvas composed treatises upon them; later worthies wrote commentaries — all of this was meant to make the sutras' meaning accessible, opening a path for sentient beings to attain genuine understanding, and its merit is truly great! And yet there are those who claim that the Buddha's own sutras are already clear enough in themselves, needing no further explanation at all, and that commentaries only make them more obscure — and on this basis reject every commentary altogether, without regard to quality, without regard to whether its author was an ordinary person or a sage, dismissing all of them as unworthy of attention. This position sounds plausible but is in fact mistaken. Why? To trust the sutra itself over any commentary on it does show some grasp of what matters most — but to then read a profound sutra carelessly and superficially, as though this alone were sufficient, is no small error either. This mistake, in fact, comes from two underlying afflictions: laziness, and arrogance. Laziness shrinks from broad, thorough study, wearies of careful reflection, and seeks only the easiest path, unwilling to expend real mental effort. Arrogance looks down on the ancient masters above and belittles present-day scholars below, indulging only its own private opinion, self-assured and unwilling to defer to anyone. New students, lacking real wisdom, are only too eager to follow this fashion — and I genuinely pity them for it, which is why I speak so earnestly on this point.