Daizui's Kalpa Fire

Banshō's commentary on the case

Zen Master Fazhen of Daizui in Yizhou is also placed by some at Xiyuan in Fuzhou and called Changqing. He was a Dharma son of Da'an and a Dharma grandson of Great Wisdom Hyakujō. He visited more than sixty venerable adepts. In Isan's assembly he served as fire chief. Isan asked, “You have been here several years, yet you do not know how to put forward a question.” Daizui said, “What would you have me ask?” Isan said, “Do you not know to ask, ‘What is buddha?’” Daizui covered Isan's mouth with his hand. Isan said, “In the future you will not have even one tile over your head, nor will you find anyone to sweep the ground.” Later Daizui boiled tea and received travelers for three years on the road at Pengkou. Then he opened the mountain and lived at Daizui.³ A monk asked, “When the kalpa fire blazes through, the entire great-thousand world is destroyed. I do not yet understand: is this one destroyed or not?” This question originally comes from the Scripture for Humane Kings Who Protect the Nation. King Spotted-Foot trusted the words of the non-Buddhist Radha and took the heads of a thousand kings, making an excessive sacrifice to Mahakala, the Great Black God, among the tombs, in hope of prolonging his dynasty. King Puming requested one day's leave. Following the rites of the seven buddhas, he provided a vegetarian feast for a hundred Dharma teachers. The first teacher spoke a thirty-two-line verse for the king beginning, “When the kalpa fire blazes through, the great-thousand world is entirely destroyed.” The king went to his death and in turn recited it for the other kings. Spotted-Foot questioned him, heard the verse, and—according to this sutra narrative—his mind opened in understanding. He entrusted the kingdom to his younger brother, left home, and attained patient acceptance.⁴ According to doctrinal teaching, a three-thousandfold great-thousand world-system arises and is destroyed as one. When Emperor Wu of Han excavated Kunming Pool, he found ashes and asked Dongfang Shuo about them. Dongfang said, “Please ask a traveler from the western regions.” Later, under Emperor Ming of the Later Han, Kashyapa Matanga and Dharmaratna arrived. When asked, they said, “Those are ashes from a kalpa fire.” Banshō reports these as inherited cosmological legends.⁴ Yun'an asked a lecturer, “When the fire disaster arises, where will all the ashes of the world and empty space be placed?” Few could answer. The Calming and Contemplation says: “An arhat is like charcoal; a solitary buddha, like ash; a bodhisattva, like the little ash remaining; a buddha, like the kalpa fire, with neither charcoal nor ash.” The monk asks whether “this one” is destroyed. Foguo said, “Originally this monk did not know where the topic came down.” Now tell me: what is “this one”? Daizui said, “It is destroyed.” This saying, contrary to the usual, accords with the Way. It is extremely difficult to bite and chew. The monk said, “If so, it goes along with that.” The monk too is laughable. Who knows how long he had already been holding the whip and following the stirrup? Daizui said, “Let it go along with that.” Banshō says: the monk goes along with Daizui; Daizui goes along with the monk. Setchō and Mountain Master Xiushan were contemporaries. Setchō had not seen Xiushan's later answer, “It is not destroyed, because it is the same as the great-thousand world.” He versified only Daizui's story: In the kalpa fire's light he establishes his question; the patch-robed monk still sticks at a double barrier. Many people misunderstand this line, saying Daizui's “destroyed” is one barrier and Xiushan's “not destroyed” makes two. They have not read the preceding story: Setchō versified Daizui alone and had not seen Xiushan's record. The question “Is this one destroyed or not?” already is the double barrier. Setchō continued: Pitiful, the single phrase “Let it go along”; ten thousand miles, anxious, he travels out and back alone. This versifies how the monk did not understand Daizui and went directly to Shuzhou to question Touzi. Touzi said, “An ancient buddha has appeared in western Sichuan. Return there quickly.” When the monk returned, Daizui had already died. The Tang monk Jingzun inscribed: Completely clear, there is no separate Dharma; only the Way seals Huineng in the south. One phrase, “Let it go along,” sends a patch-robed monk across a thousand mountains. Setchō used the sense of this couplet for the last couplet of his own verse, then continued: A cold cricket cries among leaves by the steps; in the quiet night he bows before the shrine lamp. Having chanted beneath the solitary window's moon, he paces, unable to master his regret. Tendō's verse on the old case additionally includes Mountain Master Xiushan's saying, “It is not destroyed because it is the same as the great-thousand world.” Some copies read, “because it is not the same as the great-thousand world.” This story is best looked into closely. “Same” works; “not the same” also works. Taking an error and accommodating the error, there is neither can nor cannot.² Xiushan also said, “Destroyed obstructs and suffocates people to death; not destroyed obstructs and suffocates people to death.” Banshō says: Daizui's “destroyed” has a place to emerge. Xiushan's “not destroyed” also has a place to emerge. This is not simply without meaning and measure, yet it cannot be understood entirely through discriminating consciousness. Have you not seen Zen Master Zhiche of Jiangxi question the Sixth Ancestor about permanence and impermanence in the Nirvana Sutra? The Ancestor said, “What is impermanent is buddha-nature. What is permanent is the discriminating mind that divides all dharmas into good and evil.” Zhiche said, “The scripture says buddha-nature is permanent, yet you say it is impermanent. It says good and evil dharmas, even the thought of awakening, are impermanent, yet you say they are permanent. This contradicts it and makes a student increasingly doubtful and confused.” The Ancestor said, “If buddha-nature were permanent, what further need would there be to discuss good and evil dharmas? When I say ‘impermanent,’ this is precisely the Buddha's Way of true permanence. Further, if all dharmas were impermanent, each thing would have a self-nature that undergoes birth and death, while true permanent nature would fail to pervade somewhere. When I say ‘permanent,’ this is precisely the Buddha's meaning of true impermanence.”⁵ Beginners today, seeing Daizui say “Destroyed—let it go along,” cannot avoid bewilderment. If they consult the Sixth Ancestor alongside it, they can be free of doubt. Moreover, Daizui was Hyakujō's direct Dharma grandson, and Mountain Master Xiushan was Jizō's legitimate Dharma son. They surpassed calculation and departed from views, bending down compassionately for people today. Setchō at that time versified only half; Tendō today has finally made it whole. Setchō versified this monk's question, “Is this one destroyed or not?” and said, “The patch-robed monk still sticks at a double barrier.” Tendō begins his verse with “Destroyed? Not destroyed?” but his intention differs. He raises both monks' questions together and gathers both teachers' answers together, holding them before us at once. Only “Let it go along—the great-thousand world” follows Daizui's saying, draws out the hook-lines of both teachers, and marks the two monks as chasing a clod. Yunju instructed the assembly: “Words are like a drill, like pincers, like a hook, like a lock. They must be made continuous and unbroken; only then will they do.” Here the verse treats the two teachers' answers as direct and immediate, without involvement in fine-spun intricacy. Yet communities everywhere have already been tripped by entangling vines. Zhen Dianxiong once stayed in the congregation of Zen Master Zheng at Zhangjiang Monastery in Nanchang. One day Zhen lifted his robe, exposed his shins, and walked slowly past. Zheng found this strange and asked him about it. Zhen said, “The front corridor and rear framework are all entangling vines. I am afraid of being tripped.” Zheng laughed heartily. Tendō says, “I have versified it this plainly. Do you understand, or do you not?” For a superior person of long practice, it is like an expert trade and does not call for bargaining. Today Banshō only frightens those who have left home.