Gensha Comes to the County

Banshō's commentary on the case

Great Master Zongyi of Gensha in Fuzhou, personal name Shibei, delighted in straw sandals, a cloth patchwork robe, and meager food. Seppō esteemed his ascetic practice and regularly called him “Ascetic Bei.”³ A popular saying held, “Gensha did not leave the ridge; Baoshou did not cross the river.” Gensha once stumbled and injured a toe. He sighed, “This body is not existent—where does pain come from? This body is suffering, yet ultimately there is no arising. Enough, enough! Bodhidharma did not come east; the Second Ancestor did not go west.” He then turned back.² Later, reading the Surangama Sutra, he attained clarification. Therefore his responses to occasions were quick and acute and agreed with the sutras. Even when questioning and challenging Seppō, he did not yield where responsibility was his. Seppō said, “Ascetic Bei is a person returned to life.” The military commissioner of Min, Wang Shenzhi, and Lord of the Secretariat Wang Yanbin both treated him with the ceremony due a teacher. His assembly regularly numbered eight or nine hundred.⁴ Gensha arrived in Putian County, where varied entertainments welcomed him. The next day he asked elder Xiaotang, “Where did all of yesterday's commotion go?” Xiaotang raised a corner of his kasaya. It was certainly taut and sharp. First of all, do not set your eye upon commotion versus quiet or yesterday versus today, thereby missing the great matter directly before you. Without expending mental effort, Xiaotang casually picked up his robe. Gensha said, “What a head-tilt—no connection.” At what point is Xiaotang without connection? Does Gensha approve or not? Dawei Zhe said, “Great Gui would be different. If someone asked, I would only snap my fingers once. If a patch-robed monk came forward and said, ‘What a head-tilt—no connection,’ I would then approve him. Why? For a resolute man, stroking the tiger's whiskers is the fundamental duty. Now say: where does benefit or harm lie?” He also said, “Xiaotang held a supreme treasure within. Meeting one who could distinguish it increased its radiance. Gensha struck once with the drill and hammer of the fundamental matter, and its light flowed through a thousand ages.” Hōgen answered differently, “How much commotion was there yesterday?” Fadeng said, “Today is even more laughable.” See how these two honored elders, descendants within the same stream, saw through Gensha's function. Outwardly they extended a broad screen and net; inwardly they shot hidden arrows at one another.⁵ Tendō possessed the eye that passes through every direction. He saw the strengths and weaknesses of their household and versified them through to the bottom. Gensha's question about yesterday's commotion is like the “Great Ancestral Teacher” chapter of the Zhuangzi: Hide a boat in a ravine and a mountain in a marsh, and call them secure. Yet at midnight a strong person may carry them away and run, while one in darkness does not know it. There are appropriate places to hide small and great, yet something still escapes. But hide the world within the world, and there is nowhere for it to escape: this is the great constancy of things.⁶ Tendō uses Gensha's question setting yesterday against today—secretly carrying away the hidden boat—to test Xiaotang. Yet he returns and still poles a solitary boat within the clear source's limpid water. The Inscription in the Mysterious fears stagnation in dead water. The eye within Gensha's phrase is alive; he wants people to recognize the root of movement and stillness. Master Qiu of Wolong said: “If you want the concise essential, mountains, rivers, and the great earth clarify it for you. Since the matter is constant, it can also be brought to completion. “If you enter through Manjushri's gate, every conditioned thing—earth, wood, tiles, and stones—helps trigger your potential. If you enter through Guanyin's gate, every sound—frogs and earthworms included—helps trigger your potential. If you enter through Samantabhadra's gate, you arrive without moving a step. “I use these three gates as skillful means to show you. It is like stirring the great ocean with a single broken stick so that fish and dragons know water as their life. If you constantly know the root of movement and stillness, speech and silence, coming and going, you will not pass your time in vain.”⁷ This versifies Gensha's way of working for people. For an expert, box and lid meet, arrowpoints oppose; sounding poles and shadow grass probe; holding firm and releasing proceed together. Examine raising the kasaya and saying “no connection.” What principle is this? In the “Tortoise Divination” treatise of the Records of the Historian, the Grand Historian said, “I went to Jiangnan and observed their practices. They say a thousand-year-old turtle roams upon lotus leaves.”⁸ This has no connection. When hidden and withdrawn, it does not hinder roaming in play; when roaming in play, it does not hinder hidden withdrawal. People now paint pictures of fish and waterweeds. Waterweeds sway with the waves and form patterns of themselves; 藻 also means patterned water plants, as in the Analects: “mountain-shaped brackets and duckweed-carved rafters.” Do you want to recognize these two old men? Where there is spirit, add spirit; where there is no elegance, there too is elegance.