Essays in Zen Buddhism : $b First seriesSuzuki, Daisetz Teitaro
Religion
Essays in Zen Buddhism : $b First series
Suzuki, Daisetz Teitaro
Zen Buddhism
failed to see the meaning of this remark and earnestly implored to be
instructed in the ultimate teaching of Buddhism. This was done, and
Fa-jung became the founder of the Niu-t‘ou school of Zen Buddhism.
Tao-hsin died at the age of seventy-two, A.D. 651.
Hung-jên, 605–675, the fifth patriarch, came from the same province as
his predecessor, Ch‘i Chou, now in the district of Fu-pei. His temple
was situated in Wang-mei Shan (Yellow Plum Mountain), where he preached
and gave lessons in Zen to his five hundred pupils. He is claimed by
some to have been the first Zen master who attempted to interpret the
message of Zen according to the doctrine of the _Vajracchedikā-sūtra_.
Though I cannot quite agree with this view for the reason already
referred to elsewhere, we can consider the fifth patriarch the
beginning of a turning in the history of Zen, which opened up to a full
view under the sixth patriarch, Hui-nêng. Until now, the Zen followers
had kept quiet, though working steadily, without arresting public
attention; the masters had retired either into the mountains or in the
hurly-burly of the world where nobody could tell anything about their
doings. But the time had at last come for a full proclamation of Zen,
and Hung-jên was the first who appeared in the field preparing the way
for his successor, Hui-nêng.
* * * * *
Besides this orthodox line of patriarchs, there were some sporadic
expositors of Zen throughout the sixth and the seventh century. Several
of them are mentioned, but there must have been many more such who were
either altogether forgotten or not at all known to the world. The two
best known are Pao-chih (died 514)[4.46] and Fu-hsi (died 569)[4.47];
and their lives are recorded in the _Records_ as “adepts in Zen but
not appearing in the world though well-known at the time.” This is a
strange phrasing, and it is hard to know definitely what “not appearing
in the world” means. Usually it applies to one who does not occupy
any recognised position in an officially registered monastery. But of
those that are classed under this heading, there is one at least to
whom the designation does not properly apply; for Chi-i was a great
high priest occupying an influential ecclesiastical post in the Sui
dynasty. Whatever this was, those recorded here did not belong to the
orthodox Zen school. The Tendai (T‘ien-tai) followers object to see two
of their Fathers Hui-szŭ and Chi-i mentioned as “adepts in Zen but not
appearing in the world though well-known at the time.” They think that
these two are great names in the history of their school and ought not
to be so indifferently referred to in the records of the Zen masters.
But from the Zen point of view this classification is justifiable for
the reason that the Tendai, except its metaphysics, is another current
of Zen started independently of the line of Bodhi-Dharma, and if this
were allowed to take a more practical course of development, it should
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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