Zen's Chinese Heritage: The Masters and Their Teachings (111 page)

Jinshan served as head monk at Dizang Monastery. One day, Dizang entered the hall. Two monks came forward and bowed.

Dizang said, “Both wrong.”

The two monks were speechless.

After leaving the hall they asked Xiushan [Longji Shaoxiu] about this matter.

Xiushan said, “You yourself are grand and majestic. Is it not a mistake to bow and inquire of others?”

When Jinshan heard this he did not agree with it.

Xiushan then asked him, “What do you think?”

Jinshan said, “If you are in the midst of darkness, how can you help others?”

Xiushan angrily went to the abbot’s room and sought the opinion of Dizang.

Dizang pointed down the pathway and said, “The cook should go into the kitchen.”

At these words, Xiushan realized his error.

Little biographical information is recorded about Jinshan. He appears in case 70 of the
Book of Serenity
, which is entitled “Jinshan Asks about the Nature of Life.” The same story also appears in the
Wudeng Huiyuan,
although the text is somewhat different. The following translation is from the latter volume.

Jinshan asked Xiushan, “Clearly understanding that the nature of life is unborn, why is there a stream of birth and death?”

Xiushan said, “These bamboo shoots will later become bamboo, so if you try to use them now for strapping, will they work properly?”

Jinshan said, “In the future you will be self-enlightened.”

Xiushan said, “I am just what you see. So what do you mean?”

Jinshan pointed and said, “This is the superintendent’s room. That is the head cook’s room.”

Xiushan then bowed.

After Jinshan took up residence as a teacher, a monk asked, “Everyone blindly gropes for form, each espousing some erroneous view. If you suddenly encountered a clear-eyed person, then what?”

Jinshan said, “You go ask this to the ten directions.”

Once, when Jinshan went for a walk, a large group of monks followed him. He said to them, “What were the words and phrases of the ancients? Everyone discuss it.”

A monk of the congregation named Congyi started to ask a question.

Jinshan said, “This hairless ass!”

Congyi was suddenly enlightened.

LONGJI SHAOXIU, “XIUSHAN”

LONGJI SHAOXIU (d. 954) was a disciple of Dizang and a Dharma brother of Fayan Wenyi. He is remembered by the name Xiushan. According to the
Transmission of the Lamp
, Xiushan’s spiritual attainment was comparable with that of Fayan, and these two friends set off together from Dizang’s temple on a pilgrimage:

Talking as they traveled, Fayan suddenly asked Xiushan a question, saying: “The ancients said that the single body is revealed in the ten thousand forms. Did they thus dispel the ten thousand forms or not?”

Xiushan said, “They didn’t dispel them.”

Fayan said, “What do you say dispels or doesn’t dispel them?”

Xiushan was confused, and returned to see Dizang.

Dizang asked him, “You haven’t been gone long, why have you come back?”

Xiushan said, “There’s an unresolved matter, so I’m not willing to go traveling to mountains and rivers until it’s resolved.”

Dizang said, “It’s not bad that you travel to difficult mountains and rivers.”

But Xiushan didn’t understand Dizang’s meaning, so he asked, “The single body is revealed in the ten thousand forms. What does this mean?”

Dizang said, “Do you say the ancients dispelled the ten thousand forms or not?”

Xiushan said, “They didn’t dispel them.”

Dizang said, “It’s two.”

For a time Xiushan was lost in thought, and then he said, “I don’t know whether the ancients dispelled the ten thousand forms or not.”

Dizang said, “What is it you call the ten thousand forms?”

Xiushan thereupon attained enlightenment.

Xiushan entered the hall and addressed the monks, saying, “Ordinary people possess it completely but they don’t know it. The saints possess it completely but don’t understand it. If the saint understands it, then he or she is an ordinary person. If ordinary people understand it, then they are saints. In these forms of speech there is one principle and two meanings. If a person can distinguish this principle, then he will have no hindrance to finding an entrance to the essential doctrine. If he can’t distinguish it, then he can’t say he has no doubt. Take care!”

Zen master Xiushan asked a monk, “Where have you come from?”

The monk said, “From Cuiyan.”

Xiushan said, “What does Cuiyan say to provide instruction to his disciples?”

The monk said, “He often says, ‘Going out—meeting Maitreya Buddha.
¹⁵²
Going in—seeing Shakyamuni.’”

Shaoxiu said, “How can he talk like that?”

The monk said, “What do you say, Master?”

Xiushan said, “Going out—who do you meet? Going in—who do you see?”

At these words the monk had an insight.