Master Dahui Zhonghao (1089-1163) was one of the most luminous and prolific Chan masters of the Southern Song dynasty. Already a monk at the age of 17, he very quickly captured the attention of some of the eminent masters of his time. According to some accounts, in mid-career, offended by the way the practice of gong’ans (Jap. /koans/) had, in his opinion, deteriorated into intellectual word games, he burned his set of the printing blocks of his own teacher Yuanwu’s compilation of gong’ans of past masters. Most of the lost gong’ans were later restored in the Blue Cliff Record.
Once, he addressed his monks with these (to us) cryptic yet vivid words: “Deshan’s stick Linji’s shout. Today, I present them to you Heaven is so high. The earth is so vast. So don’t be just adding more shit on top of a shit pile. Get rid of your bones and wash out your guts. I’ll take three steps backwards and let you discuss this. Tell me how you will discuss it!” (Quoted from Andy Ferguson’s Zen’s Chinese Heritage [Wisdom Books])
One of the more notable aspects of Dahui’s career was that many of his disciples were lay people. Two of the laywomen to whom he transmitted (acknowledged as enlightened) were given Dharma names Miaodao and Miaozong. (One of Dahui’s several names was Miaoxi.) Both women later became nuns and abbesses. Many of his male lay disciples were government officials. This resulted in Dahui’s not being immune to the politics of the turbulent Song dynasty, and when one of his patrons was banished, Dahui was forced into exile, taking with him one hundred monks to Hunan, then to a malaria-infested region in Kwangtung, where half the sangha perished.
Fifteen years later, a scion of the royal house who heard him lecture restored Dahui to his former eminence. According to the records of the ancient Chan masters, throughout his career Dahui guided many monastic and lay disciples to enlightenment. Before Dahui’s death, the emperor Xiaozong bestowed on him the name by which we call him, Dahui (Great Wisdom).
One day when he was 75, Dahui announced to his monks that he would be leaving for a journey on the morrow. The next day, he penned this verse:
Birth is thus
Death is thus
Verse or no verse
What’s the fuss?
Setting his brush aside, he lay down and died.
The following article is a commentary by Master Sheng Yen on a letter by Dahui to one of his probably lay disciples. This article will be part of a book based on lectures given at the Chan Meditation Center in Queens, New York, on the letters of Dahui. Oral translation of this lecture was by Jimmy Yu (Guogu), transcriber unknown, edited by Ernest Heau.
To Li Hsien-ch’ien – Clear the Mind
Buddha said, if you want to know the realm of buddhahood, you must make your mind as clear as empty space and leave false thinking and all grasping far behind, causing your mind to be unobstructed wherever it may turn. The realm of buddhahood is not some external world where there is a formal “Buddha”–it’s the realm of the wisdom of a self-awakened sage.
Once you are determined that you want to know this realm, you do not need adornment, cultivation, or realization to attain it. You must clear away the stains of afflictions from alien sensations that have been on your mind since beginningless time, (so that your mind) is as broad and open as empty space, detached from all the clinging of the discriminating intellect, and your false, unreal, vain thoughts too are like empty space. Then this wondrous, effortless mind will be unimpeded wherever it goes. From Swampland Flowers (Grove Press), J. C. Cleary (trans.)
[Note: The name of Dahui’s disciple is rendered Li Hsien-ch’ien in the Wade-Giles system of romanization used by Cleary, and Li Xianqian in the newer Pinyin system.]
In this letter from Master Dahui to one of his disciples, Li Xianqian, Dahui says that buddhahood can only be known by a mind as clear as empty space. To do this, one must forego all false thinking and grasping, allowing the mind to be unobstructed wherever it may turn. This clear state is the “realm of the wisdom of a self-awakened sage.” These ideas are found in the Lankavatara Sutra, which teaches that all sentient beings are innately buddhas.
In the context of Dahui’s words, there are two meanings of “mind.” There is ordinary mind that is characterized by false thinking and grasping. False thinking consists of thoughts that arise from having a sense of self. It includes not just unwholesome, negative thoughts, but also distinctions as to pleasure or pain, good or bad, right or wrong. You may also call it illusory thinking, or delusion. Grasping is any attachment or desire; like delusion, it is deep-rooted in ordinary mind.
The second meaning of mind occurs in the phrase “causing your mind to be unobstructed wherever it may turn.” This mind is the original, pure bodhi-mind, untainted by illusion and attachment. In Dahui’s words, this is the “realm of the wisdom of the self-awakened sage.”
So these two occurrences of “mind” in Dahui’s opening statement have different meanings. In the Chinese text, these words, translated as “mind,” are represented by different ideograms. The first refers to the Sixth Consciousness of the Yogachara, or Mind-Only School. This Mahayana school analyzed all experience into the so-called Eight Consciousnesses (organs) of eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind, ego (self), and the storehouse consciousness (/alaya/). The school taught that all experience is “mind-only” – that things have no reality except as processes of the mind. In the Yogachara teaching, the interaction of the Eight Consciousnesses results in the mental states Dahui refers to as “false thinking and grasping.”
The second Chinese character refers to the realized mind of bodhi, “unobstructed wherever it may turn.” The path of practice is to transform ordinary mind to bodhi-mind; to go from ordinary consciousness to the realm of wisdom, untainted by discriminating thought. This realized mind is bodhi-mind, or wisdom.
So, Dahui’s first sentence provides a complete method for buddhahood – cultivate a mind like empty space, a mind that does not discriminate and seeks nothing, unobstructed at every turn.
The realm of buddhahood is not some external world where there is a formal “Buddha,” it’s the realm of the wisdom of the self-awakened sage.
Buddhahood is not apart from our ordinary mind, to be found outside of it. There is no buddha out there with a specific form or appearance. Buddhahood cannot be experienced this way. If we put down all grasping and selfcenteredness, our buddha-nature naturally manifests, springing from the natural ground of our being. If we constantly seek buddhahood in a certain form, different from our own grasping and self-centered mind, we are bound to fail. A buddha outside of our own intrinsic mind does not exist, since buddhahood is our intrinsic mind.
When Shakyamuni attained bodhi did his body become the body of a buddha? He had a body before attaining buddhahood. He had the same body after buddhahood. Before buddhahood that body was not a buddha; likewise, afterwards, that body was also not a buddha. So what does it mean to attain buddhahood? If one thinks “I am a buddha,” that is discriminating mind, not bodhi. Thus, there can be no buddha inside. If buddha exists outside, how can one possibly attain it? If bodhi is neither inside, nor outside, it must be empty and without boundaries. So when Dahui says that buddhahood is as clear as empty space this is not mere analogy.
Let’s look at the phrase “wisdom as a selfawakened sage,” which is found only in the Lankavatara Sutra. When we let go of all attachments, self-awakening happens. We finally realize that all our mental activities are, and always have been, illusory. This is really what one is awakened to. When it happens, the wisdom of a buddha will also manifest. There are two stages here: first you have the self-awakening, then wisdom manifests.
People can intellectually grasp what Dahui is saying in this letter. But is it useful for practice? There’s a saying that if your mind is turned by the environment you are deluded, but if you can turn the environment, you are achieving something. This has to be properly understood. Knowing that your own mind is afflicted with illusions, you will be less vulnerable to the environment, and that is good. But if people want to aggressively convert others to think like themselves, this can lead to more problems. It is up to you to do something about clearing your own mind.
Let’s look at the second paragraph:
Once you have determined that you want to know this realm, you do not need adornment, cultivation, or realization to attain it.
People may think that to attain buddhahood one needs to cultivate wisdom and virtue, as if adorning oneself with merit guarantees buddhahood. Master Dahui says that to believe this is false thinking and grasping. If buddhahood is a matter of being adorned by wisdom and lots of virtues, then a buddha would be attached to such things. These discriminations do not appear in a buddha’s mind. So we should let go all discrimina tion, attachment, and self-centeredness; put down everything, including attachment to virtue, to reach this self-awakening named wisdom. Who among you can do this right now?
To be able to put down illusion, we need to practice the Six Paramitas (perfections) of generosity, morality, patience, diligence, meditation, and wisdom. Practicing the paramitas, we may accumulate virtue. But the aim of practice is not to gain virtue, or to become a buddha, but to let go of self-centeredness.
This advice is not part of Dahui’s text, although it may be implicit. I want to correct any impression that, because we are originally buddha, we are already enlightened; hence, there’s no need to practice. That idea is pure self-deception. Someone believing that will be awakened in the Year of the Donkey, and there is no Year of the Donkey. So, practicing Chan can be poisonous; if not used properly it can kill our life of wisdom.
You must clear away the stains of afflictions from alien sensations that have been on your mind since beginningless time.
Here “mind” again refers to the discriminating mind of the Sixth Consciousness. Let’s say someone is ill with cancer, which is alien to the body. To restore the patient’s health, the doctors may excise the cancer. In ordinary mind, our delusion is the cancer. By analogy, to regain one’s original mind, one needs to clear away all the “alien sensations” one has carried around. The Chinese term for this kind of defilement means “gassy stuff,” referring to the transient nature of illusions. “Stuff” refers to their obscuring effect on the mind. So our illusions are gassy stuff that covers up our original bodhi-mind. We need to clear away all of this gassy stuff, which has been with us since time without beginning, until not a single wisp remains. Then, our mind will be like empty space – open, completely unobstructed. With any speck of doubt left, there will still be egocentrism. When the mind is completely free from illusion, discriminating mind does not exist. You would then experience liberation.
Do not become too obsessed about this. Constantly worrying about it may even accelerate the disease. Someone who is not too obsessed, has no fear and no attachment to their own life, may experience improvement or recovery. There are numerous examples of such cures, not just to Buddhists. For example, a person who is ill may concentrate on repeating “Guanyin Pusa,” the Chinese name for Avalokiteshvara, the Bodhisattva of Compassion. By filling their mind with this mantra, they may attain a kind of clarity and freedom from their problems. Through this kind of meditation, it is also possible to develop “correspondence” or “affinity” with a buddha or bodhisattva. A person repeating Avalokiteshvara’s name in deep concentration may be freed from an obsession with their illness. In fact, he or she can be become very relaxed with that part of the body, which was previously very agitated, very intense. With relaxation, changes, transformations, can happen.
Likewise, when a person has psychological problems that they cannot put down, constantly worrying, they build layer upon layer of vexation. Their mental scope becomes narrower and narrower. This impasse can lead to thoughts of death or suicide. Analogously, to bring our minds to a healthier state, it is better to approach practice in a more relaxed, not too obsessed, manner. The idea after all, is to develop “effortless mind.”
Dahui’s letter closes with such a thought:
Then this wondrous effortless mind will be unimpeded wherever it goes.
So when we clear away all the “stains of affliction,” we finally understand that they are all unreal. The mind becomes like empty space – wondrous, effortless, unimpeded wherever it turns. This is indeed at a very high level; it corresponds to the eighth of the ten stages, or bhumis, on the bodhisattva path to buddhahood. This stage also corresponds to the phrase in the Diamond Sutra, “Without abiding, give rise to bodhi-mind.” Without attaching to anything, the mind still functions through its wisdom; without effort, it moves unimpeded. This clearing of the mind is the aim of practice. We should believe we can truly achieve this state of wondrous, effortless mind. The mind then encompasses everything without a sense of self, responding to any situation without any attachments.
Even though Master Dahui’s letter is brief, it offers some very useful guidelines. Always, in any situation, put aside deluded thinking. We still need to practice and we still need our wisdom to deal with events. If you have vexations, practice giving, making offerings, and practice the precepts. Make practice a habit. Like a patient who wants to clear away a cancer, we want to clear away the gassy stuff in our mind.
Once again, the gassy stuff is the content of our habitual illusions. What are these illusions? They are vexations generated by our attachments, that is, anything we cling to or grasp at: wrong ideas, emotions, love, ambitions, anger, fear, the various things that benefit, threaten, or concern us. To practice Chan means to begin clearing the gassy stuff that obscures our original mind of bodhi.
