Chimon's Lotus Flower and Lotus Leaf

Engo's commentary on the case

If this is Chimon responding to a working and meeting people, he is somewhat close. If it is cutting off every stream, he is a thousand or ten thousand miles away. Tell me: are the lotus before it emerges and the lotus after it emerges one or two? If you can see here, I grant that you have an entry. Even so, say they are one and you have muddle-headed buddha-nature and indiscriminate suchness. Say they are two and, with mind and object not forgotten, you run along the road of interpretation. When will that ever stop? What was the ancient's intent? In truth there are not so many affairs. Touzi said, “Simply do not attach to names, words, numbers, and phrases. If you comprehend the various affairs, you naturally do not attach, and there are no such differences of rank and stage. You encompass all dharmas; all dharmas cannot encompass you. Fundamentally there is neither gain nor loss. So many dreamlike names cannot forcibly be established for it. Could they deceive all of you? Because you ask, there are words. If you did not ask, what could I tell you? Every affair is something you bring here. None of it concerns me.” An ancient said, “If you wish to know the meaning of buddha-nature, observe the conditions of the time.” Unmon once cited a monk asking Lingyun, “What about before the Buddha appeared in the world?” Lingyun raised his whisk. The monk asked, “What about after he appeared?” Lingyun again raised his whisk. Unmon said, “The first one hit; the later one missed.” He also said, “I do not speak of appearing or not appearing. Where was there any occasion for his question?” The ancients' questions and answers met the time and occasion; there were not so many affairs. Follow words and chase phrases and you have no connection at all. Penetrate the words within the words, the intent within the intent, and the working within the working; then let everything rest at ease. Only then will you see where Chimon's answer comes from. “What about before the Buddha appeared?” “What about before Niutou met the Fourth Patriarch?” “What about before chaos had divided within the mottled stone?” “What about before your parents were born?” Unmon said, “From antiquity to the present, it is only this one affair: no right or wrong, no gain or loss, no birth or not-yet-born.” Arriving here, the ancients left one thread of a path, with exit and entry. Those who have not understood feel along fences and walls, clinging to grasses and trees. Tell them to let go and they are knocked into a boundless, vacant waste. A person who has attained depends on no single thing throughout the twelve periods of the day. Yet even when that person reveals one working and one scene, how will you get hold of them? The monk asked, “What about before the lotus emerges?” Chimon said, “Lotus blossom.” He stopped the question with a single answer—remarkable indeed. Communities everywhere call this “inverted speech.” How could it be merely that? Gantō said, “What I always value is before the mouth has opened.” That is somewhat close. Where the ancients revealed a working, they had already leaked. Students now do not understand the ancients' intent. They keep theorizing about emergence and non-emergence. What connection does that have? A monk once asked Chimon, “What is the essence of prajñā?” Chimon said, “A clam holds the bright moon.” “What is the function of prajñā?” “A hare conceives.”² Look at answers like these: no one in the world can trace their verbal pulse. If someone asked here at Kassan, “What about before the lotus emerges from the water?” I would answer, “The bare pillar and the lantern.” Are these the same as the lotus or different? “What about after it emerges?” I would answer, “The staff-tip carries sun and moon; beneath the feet the mud is deep.” Is that right or not? Do not mistake the fixed calibration mark on the balance for the answer.³ Setchō is excessively compassionate: he breaks through ordinary conceptual interpretation and therefore produces his verse. Chimon was originally from Zhejiang. He made the journey into Sichuan expressly to study with Kōrin. Once he had penetrated, he returned and resided at Chimon in Suizhou. Setchō was his Dharma son and saw well, plumbing the mysterious and exhausting the subtle. He says directly: Lotus blossom and lotus leaf—I report them for you to know. Emerging from the water—how does it compare with before emergence? Here a person must understand immediately. This mountain monk says, “What about before emergence? The bare pillar and the lantern. What about afterward? The staff-tip carries sun and moon; beneath the feet the mud is deep.” Do not mistake the fixed mark on the balance. How many people now gnaw on other people's phrases? Tell me: what time and occasion is emergence? What time and occasion is non-emergence? If you see here, I grant that you have met Chimon face to face. Setchō says that if you do not see, then north and south of the river ask some old master. His intent is this: you go everywhere north and south asking senior teachers about emergence and non-emergence. Jiangnan adds two phrases; Jiangbei adds two more. One layer piles upon another as doubt generates doubt in turn. When will you be free of doubt? A wild fox, being deeply suspicious, walks over river ice while listening for the sound of water beneath it. Only when there is no sound will it cross.⁴ If a student settles one fox-doubt only to produce another, when will there ever be secure ground?