Mañjuśrī's “Three and Three”

Engo's commentary on the case

Traveling on Wutai, Wuzhu reached a desolate place midway. Mañjuśrī manifested a monastery and lodged him there. Their exchange followed. Afterward they drank tea. Mañjuśrī raised a glass cup and asked, “Does the south have this?” Wuzhu said no. “What do you ordinarily use to drink tea?” Wuzhu had no words and took his leave. Mañjuśrī ordered the boy Junti to escort him to the gate. Wuzhu asked the boy, “A moment ago he said, ‘Before, three and three; behind, three and three.’ How many is that?” The boy called, “Worthy!” Wuzhu responded. The boy said, “How many is that?” Wuzhu then asked the monastery's name. The boy pointed behind Vajra. When Wuzhu turned his head, monastery and boy vanished, leaving an empty valley. The place was later called Vajra Cave.² A monk later asked Fuketsu, “Who is the host within Mount Qingliang?” Fuketsu said: One sentence left Wuzhu no leisure to ask; even now he remains a wandering monk. To penetrate the level and solid, with feet on the earth, recognize beneath Wuzhu's words. Then boiling cauldrons do not feel hot and cold ice does not feel cold. To penetrate the solitary, perilous, and steep, like the jeweled sword of the Vajra King, recognize beneath Mañjuśrī's words. Then water cannot wet and wind cannot enter. Jizō asked a monk where he came from. “The south.” “How is the Buddha Dharma there?” “Endless discussion.” Jizō said, “How does that compare with planting fields here and getting rice to eat?” Is this the same as Mañjuśrī's answer or different? Some say Wuzhu's answer was wrong while Mañjuśrī's included dragon and snake, ordinary and holy. That has no connection. Can you distinctly discern “before three-and-three, behind three-and-three”? The first arrow is shallow; the later arrow deep. If you penetrate here, a thousand and ten thousand phrases are one phrase. Cut it off and hold it firmly beneath this single phrase, and you draw near this realm. Some say Setchō merely repeats the case and does not versify it. But a monk asked Hōgen, “What is one drop of water from Sōkei?” Hōgen answered, “One drop of water from Sōkei.” Another asked Rōya Jiao, “Pure and fundamentally so—how did mountains, rivers, and earth suddenly arise?” Rōya repeated, “Pure and fundamentally so—how did mountains, rivers, and earth suddenly arise?” These cannot merely be called repetition. Myōshō, the one-eyed dragon, versified: Vast, throughout the sand-realms, the finest monastery; before the eyes, Mañjuśrī alone converses. Not knowing to open the Buddha-eye beneath the words, turning the head, one sees only green mountain cliffs. The manifested grass-hut monastery displayed provisional and real together. Yet can the scene be called Mañjuśrī's, Samantabhadra's, or Avalokiteśvara's realm? It is not this principle. Setchō transforms Myōshō's function with fine stitching: “A thousand peaks coil, blue as indigo,” without injuring the blade or hand. The phrase contains provisional and real, principle and event. “Who says Mañjuśrī was the one conversing?” Wuzhu spoke all night without knowing it was Mañjuśrī. Later, when Wuzhu served as cook on Wutai, Mañjuśrī repeatedly appeared above the porridge pot. Wuzhu struck him with the porridge-stirring paddle. Even so, that was drawing the bow after the thief had passed. When Mañjuśrī first asked how southern Buddhism was maintained, a blow across the back would have been somewhat closer. “Laughable—how many are in Qingliang's assembly?” Setchō's laugh contains a blade. Understand what he laughs at and you see “before, three and three; behind, three and three.”