Shinsan Asks About Nature

Banshō's commentary on the case

Zen Master Hongjin, master of Qingxi Mountain in Xiangzhou, was the head-seat monk under Master Guichen of Jizō. At the time, two monks both bowed to Jizō. Jizō said, “Both are wrong.” Neither monk had anything to say. After leaving, they asked Master Xiushan for instruction. Xiushan said, “You yourselves are majestic and imposing, yet you bow to someone else. Is that not wrong?” When Shinsan heard this, he would not accept it. He said, “You are yourself lost in darkness—how can you guide people?” Indignant, Xiushan went up to the abbot's quarters to ask Jizō for instruction. Jizō pointed beneath the corridor and said, “The cook has gone down into the storehouse.” Xiushan then recognized his fault.⁴ One day Shinsan asked Xiushan, “Clearly knowing the nature that neither arises nor ceases, why is one detained by birth?” The girl Antizhe was of brahman lineage, the daughter of the householder Posini in Changti Village, more than twenty li west of Shravasti. Because her family held a great assembly and invited the Buddha and the sangha, Antizhe thereby caused her good name to resound.⁵ The great being Manjushri asked, “Is there anyone who clearly knows the characteristic that does not arise”—the earlier text has “nature”—“yet is detained by birth?” The girl said, “There is. One who clearly sees for herself, yet whose strength is not complete, is detained by birth.” Master Xiushan answered, “A bamboo shoot will eventually become bamboo. Can it be made into binding strips and used right now?” A strip is bamboo skin used to bind things, a bamboo cord. A tender shoot has no strength; mature bamboo has strength. Because a shoot's strength is not complete, it cannot serve as a strip. Juefan's “Praise of Guanyin” says: Have pity: my mind is clear, but its power does not reach; again and again the seeds emerge into present conduct. It is like someone driven mad by wine, who vows off drink, then meets another fine vintage. This too says that the power is not yet complete.⁶ How humbling that the ancients had thoroughly mastered the doctrinal vehicles: the words and breath they brought forth agreed with the sutras. Master Shinsan wanted to turn the saying around, so he would not immediately approve it. He said, “Later on, you will awaken for yourself.” Xiushan said, “My point of view is only this. What is your meaning, senior?” Master Xiushan had first settled himself in a place square and full on every side. Shinsan roused him from it: surely there had to be another living road. He accordingly pointed and said, “This is the rector's room; that is the cook's room.” Now say: did he understand the nature that neither arises nor ceases, or did he not? Was he detained by birth, or was he not? Xiushan immediately bowed. He investigated the living phrase, not the dead phrase. This was no different from “The cook has gone down into the storehouse.” Everywhere people say that under Hōgen there is a single flavor of plain reality, with mystery embodied within it. Please look at the earlier exchange. Tendō saw that this saying was extraordinary and exceptional, and therefore versified it exhaustively. This versifies Master Shinsan's “This is the rector's room; that is the cook's room.” When reliance is gone, one is naturally open and unbound. Where there is no tether, one is by nature lofty and at ease. How many can reach the place where home and nation are at peace? There must be no affliction to cut off and no Zen way to investigate. Throughout the twelve periods of the day, apart from putting on clothes and eating food, where is there any spare place to apply the mind? Judging from Shinsan's question, it still slightly tests ancient and present, divides ranks, and lays down the plumb line that determines strength. Yet in its vast openness, body and mind originally cut off right and wrong. Master Xiushan certainly understood the Tathagata Zen of plainly discussing the fundamental matter. What can be done about Hyakujō's saying, “To interpret meaning by relying on scripture wrongs the buddhas of the three times”?⁷ Thus strength was distinguished slightly and a ladder provisionally established: the shoot is tender and has no power for use; bamboo becomes strips that can draw a thousand-pound weight. When verbal traces arise, right and wrong form through them. Shinsan cleared these away for him and pointed instead to a road of living potential. He certainly did not open doors and windows or establish tracks and ruts in order to deceive a companion in the Way. Xiushan made a bow to apologize for his dullness. Do you recognize the home forge of these two teachers? Once it enters the fire, it still needs exact refining; only upon the anvil can it endure the heavy drill and hammer.