15Case 15

問：「如何是四種無相境？」師云：「爾一念心疑，被地來礙；爾一念心愛，被水來溺；爾一念心嗔，被火來燒；爾一念心喜，被風來飄。若能如是辨得，不被境轉，處處用境，東涌西沒、南涌北沒、中涌邊沒、邊涌中沒，履水如地、履地如水。緣何如此？為達四大如夢如幻故。道流！爾秖今聽法者，不是爾四大能用。爾四大若能如是見得，便乃去住自由。約山僧見處，勿嫌底法。爾若愛聖，聖者聖之名。有一般學人向五臺山裏求文殊，早錯了也，五臺山無文殊。爾欲識文殊麼？秖爾目前用處，始終不異，處處不疑，此箇是活文殊。爾一念心無差別光，處處總是真普賢。儞一念心自能解縛，隨處解脫，此是觀音。三昧法互為主伴，出則一時出，一即三、三即一。如是解得，始好看教。」

A monk asked, "What are the four kinds of formless states?"

Linji said: "One flicker of doubt in your mind, and earth blocks you. One flicker of craving, and water drowns you. One flicker of anger, and fire burns you. One flicker of giddy joy, and wind sweeps you off your feet. Learn to see this clearly, and circumstances stop jerking you around. Instead you put them to use, everywhere. You surface in the east and vanish in the west, surface in the south and vanish in the north, surface in the center and vanish at the edge, surface at the edge and vanish in the center. You walk on water as if it were solid ground, and on ground as if it were water. How? Because you have seen that the four elements are a dream, a mirage.

"Followers of the Way! The one listening to this teaching right now is not your four elements running the show. See your four elements for what they are, and you come and go as you please.

"The way I see it, there is no state of mind worth turning your nose up at. You want something holy? 'Holy' is just a word. There are students who go trekking up Mount Wutai to look for Manjushri. Already wrong. There is no Manjushri on Mount Wutai. You want to meet Manjushri? It is the very thing at work in you this second, never wavering, never in doubt anywhere. That is the living Manjushri. The light of your mind that draws no distinctions, everywhere at once, that is the real Samantabhadra. Your mind untying its own knots wherever it goes, free on the spot, that is Avalokiteshvara. These three serve each other as host and guest; when they come out, they come out all at once. One is three, three is one. Get this, and then you are finally ready to read the scriptures."

Pointer

Picking up the monk's question from the talk just before (14), Linji takes the "four elements," the old physics where earth, water, fire, and air make up body and world, and pairs each with an emotion that hijacks you: doubt sits heavy as earth, craving drowns like water, anger burns, giddy joy blows you off your feet. None of these is the problem once you stop letting it run the show. Then the part with teeth: Manjushri, Samantabhadra, and Avalokiteshvara are the three superstar bodhisattvas, revered for wisdom, virtue, and compassion, and Mount Wutai was the famous pilgrimage where you went to "find" Manjushri in the flesh. Linji says cancel the trip. There is no Manjushri on the mountain. The wisdom you'd hike for is the ordinary, undoubting awareness already working in you this second, the same "leaning on nothing" listener from case 14. That is the only holy there is, which is exactly why looking for it elsewhere fails.