HISTORY OF ZEN BUDDHISM FROM BODHI-DHARMA TO HUI-NENG (YENO) (520 A.D.–713 A.D.)
Project Gutenberg EPUB edition
Suzuki, Daisetz Teitaro
This satisfied the disciple who now said, “To-day for the first time I realise that sins are neither within nor without nor in the middle; just as Mind is, so is the Buddha, so is the Dharma; they are not two.”f96
He was then ordained by Hui-k‘ê as a Buddhist monk, and after this he fled from the world altogether, and nothing much of his life is known. This was partly due to the persecution of Buddhism carried on by the Emperor of the Chou dynasty. It was in the twelfth year of K‘ai-huan, of the Sui dynasty (A.D. 592), that he found a disciple worthy to be his successor. His name was Tao-hsin.[4.40] He asked the master,
“Pray show me the way to deliverance.”
“Who has ever put you in bondage?”
“Nobody.”
“If so,” said the Master, “why should you ask for deliverance?”
This put the young novice on the way to final enlightenment, which he attained after many years’ study under the master. When Sêng-ts‘an thought that the time was ripe to consecrate him as his successor in the faith, he handed him as the token of the rightful transmission of the Law the robe which had come down from Bodhi-Dharma, the first patriarch of Zen in China. He died in A.D. 606. While much of his life is obscure, his thought is gleaned from a metrical composition known as Hsin-hsin-ming, or “Inscribed on the Believing Mind,” which is one of the most valuable contributions by the masters to the interpretation of Zen teaching. Here follows a somewhat liberal translation of the poem:
Inscribed on the Believing Mind.f97[4.41]
The Perfect Way knows no difficulties
Except that it refuses to make preference:
Only when freed from hate and love,
It reveals itself fully and without disguise.
A tenth of an inch’s difference,
And heaven and earth are set apart:
If you want to see it manifest,
Take no thought either for or against it.
To set up what you like against what you dislike—
This is the disease of the mind:
When the deep meaning [of the Way] is not understood
Peace of mind is disturbed and nothing is gained.
[The Way is] perfect like unto vast space,
With nothing wanting, nothing superfluous:
It is indeed due to making choice
That its suchness is lost sight of.
Pursue not the outer entanglements,
Dwell not in the inner void;
When the mind rests serene in the oneness of things,
The dualism vanishes by itself.
And when oneness is not thoroughly understood,
In two ways loss is sustained—
The denial of reality may lead to its absolute negation,
While the upholding of the void may result in contradicting itself.
Wordiness and intellection—
The more with them the further astray we go;
Away therefore with wordiness and intellection,
And there is no place where we cannot pass freely.f98
When we return to the root, we gain the meaning;
When we pursue the external objects, we lose the reason.
The moment we are enlightened within,
We go beyond the voidness of a world confronting us.