One of the best-known texts of early Ch'an is the Treatise on the Transcendence of Cognition (Chüeh-kuan lun) of the Oxhead school faction, whose members were known for literary creativity. This text describes an imaginary dialogue between two hypothetical characters, Professor Enlightenment (ju-li hsien-sheng) and the student Conditionality (yüan-ch'i), of which the following is only the barest skeleton:
Professor Enlightenment was silent and said nothing. Conditionality then arose suddenly and asked Professor Enlightenment: "What is the mind? What is it to pacify the mind (anxin)?" [The master] answered: "You should not posit a mind, nor should you attempt to pacify it-this is called 'pacified.'"
Question: "If there is no mind, how can one cultivate enlightenment (tao)?" Answer: "Enlightenment is not a thought of the mind, so how could it occur in the mind?" Question: "If it is not thought of by the mind, how should it be thought of?" Answer: "If there are thoughts then there is mind, and for there to be mind is contrary to enlightenment. If there is no thought (wunian) then there is no mind (wuxin), and for there to be no mind is true enlightenment." ... Question: "What 'things' are there in no-mind?" Answer: "No-mind is without 'things.' The absence of things is the Naturally True. The Naturally True is the Great Enlightenment (ta-tao)."...
Question: "What should I do?" Answer: "You should do nothing." Question: "I understand this teaching now even less than before." Answer: "There truly is no understanding of the Dharma. Do not seek to understand it." ... Question: "Who teaches these words?" Answer: "It is as I have been asked." Question: "What does it mean to say that it is as you have been asked?" Answer: "If you contemplate [your own] questions, the answers will be understood [thereby] as well."
At this Conditionality was silent and he thought everything through once again. Professor Enlightenment asked: "Why do you not say anything?" Conditionality answered: "I do not perceive even the most minute bit of anything that can be explained." At this point Professor Enlightenment said to Conditionality: "You would appear to have now perceived the True Principle."
Conditionality asked: "Why [do you say] 'would appear to have perceived' and not that I 'correctly perceived' [the True Principle]?" Enlightenment answered: "What you have now perceived is the nonexistence of all dharmas. This is like the non-Buddhists who study how to make themselves invisible, but cannot destroy their shadow and footprints." Conditionality asked: "How can one destroy both form and shadow?" Enlightenment answered: "Being fundamentally without mind and its sensory realms, you must not willfully generate the ascriptive view (or, "perception") of impermanence."
[The following is from the end of the text.]
Question: "If one becomes [a Tathaagata] without transformation and in one's own body, how could it be called difficult?" Answer: Willfully activating (ch'i) the mind is easy; extinguishing the mind is difficult. It is easy to affirm the body, but difficult to negate it. It is easy to act, but difficult to be without action. Therefore, understand that the mysterious achievement is difficult to attain, it is difficult to gain union with the Wondrous Principle. Motionless is the True, which the three [lesser vehicles] only rarely attain."[?]
At this Conditionality gave a long sigh, his voice filling the ten directions. Suddenly, soundlessly, he experienced a great expansive enlightenment. The mysterious brilliance of his pure wisdom [revealed] no doubt in its counter illumination. For the first time he realized the extreme difficulty of spiritual training and that he had been uselessly beset with illusory worries. He then sighed aloud: "Excellent! Just as you have taught without teaching, so have I heard without hearing..."
- The Antecedents of Encounter Dialogue in Chinese Ch'an Buddhism by John R. McRae
Submitted September 07, 2017 at 09:12AM by Sunn_Samaadh http://ift.tt/2xQqdHs
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