![]() generation in the sense of a leader of all other Teachers and monks, Shenhui
presented himself as the Seventh Ancestor. Shenhui died soon after and because the
other heirs of Huinengs such as Qingyuan Xingsi and Huairang Nanyue did not see
each others as rivals, Huineng was the last Chinese Ancestor regarded as the only
legitimate embodiment of Bodhidharmas Transmission. Instead, his successors were
all successors of the Lineage as a whole. Qingyuan and Huairang were both Thirty-
Fourths instead of Sevenths. As such and for a variety of reasons, Huineng became a
towering figure in Chan history.
The story goes that Huinengs father had been a government official who had
been exiled in disgrace to the then wild south of Tang China. His father died and he
and his mother lived in poverty. Eventually he was able to eke out a living gathering
fallen branches and twigs and selling them for firewood. It is said that simply on
hearing the phrase Give rise to the mind that abides nowhere, he immediately
understood its importance. In the text Immo, Dogen zenji says,
Once this sudden insight arose, he had to leave behind sentiments because
he knew the importance of knowing the truth and so he arranged for his
mothers support and then went away to find a teacher. But who taught him
to do that? This shows that people of wisdom just hear and then understand.
Wisdom is not something that people acquire on their own nor is it
something given to them. Wisdom seeks wisdom, Knowing communicates
Knowing to itself.
This recognition of the need to follow through, to fully embody what has been
glimpsed is what we can learn from Huineng.
In Gyoji, Dogen says,
It might have been easy for Huike to cut off an arm, but this severing of the
bonds of love must have been extremely difficult because abandoning filial
obligations is not easy. He joined Hongrens community on Mt. Huangmei
where he neither slept nor rested but pounded rice all night and day for eight
months. As a result, he received the authentic transmission of the robe and
bowl in the middle of the night.
Although later in the text Dogen will have many strong things to say about
the narrowness of a life based upon filial and social obligations, here he points out
that tearing oneself away from feelings of love for family is often more difficult than
other hardships that one might endure. And of course while your knees might hurt
during long hours of zazen, it is what the mind stupidly does with it that really
smarts. Huineng was willing to do this, to abandon everything that had defined him.
He arrived at the Fifth Chinese Ancestors monastery an illiterate born into disgrace
in the barbarian south. Although he and Hongren glimpsed each other, they were
separated by these circumstances and the monastery officials set Huineng to menial
work with other lay servants. Huineng however used this situation fully. Day and
night he worked, using his work of grinding and polishing rice to grind and polish
himself.
There is the famous story of Huineng, the illiterate barbarian without rank or
standing, surpassing the senior most student, Shenxiu, in understanding and
expressing the Way.
Shenxiu wrote:
The Body is like a bodhi tree,
the mind a mirror bright.
Wipe it carefully again and again
never letting dust alight.
Huineng answered with:
Enlightenment is not a tree
and the clear mirror stands nowhere.
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