1The Life of Zhaozhou行狀

The master was a student of Nanquan. His family name was Hao, and he came from Hao village in Caozhou. His given name was Congshen. A stupa inscription at Zhenfu says he lived seven hundred and sixty years. When King Wu moved against Buddhism, the master fled into the wild mountains, ate roots and berries, wore grass for clothes, and never once gave up the monk's life.

When he first set out traveling with his teacher, they came to Nanquan's place. His teacher paid his respects first; then the master paid his. Nanquan was lying down in the abbot's room when he saw the master come to call. He asked, "Where have you just come from?"

"From Auspicious Image Temple," the master said.

"And did you see the auspicious image?"

"No, but I do see a reclining Buddha."

At that Nanquan sat up. "Are you a novice with a master, or a novice without one?"

"A novice with a master."

"And who is your master?"

The master said, "It's still cold this early in spring. I trust your reverence is keeping well, and I wish you every blessing."

Nanquan called the head monk over. "Find this novice a special place to stay."

After his full ordination, the master heard that the teacher who had ordained him was living at Huguo Temple, west of Caozhou, and went back to visit. When he arrived, his old teacher sent word to the Hao family: "Your son is back from his travels." The whole family rejoiced and made plans to come see him the next day, every one of them. Hearing this, the master said, "The dust of the world, the net of attachments. There's no end to it. I've already left home; I don't care to see them again." That same night he packed up and moved on.

After that he carried his own bottle and staff and wandered everywhere. He used to say, "If a child of seven has something to teach me, I'll ask him. If an old man of a hundred has nothing to teach me, I'll teach him." Not until he was eighty did he settle, at Guanyin Temple east of the city of Zhao, ten miles from the Stone Bridge.

He lived poor and bare, set on matching the old masters. The monks' hall had no racks at either end. He cooked the meals as they came. One leg of his rope chair had broken, so he bound a length of charred firewood to it with cord, and whenever someone offered to make him a new one, he wouldn't have it. In forty years as abbot he never once sent off a letter asking a patron for anything.

A monk came up from the south and brought a story. He had asked Xuefeng, "How is it, the cold spring in the old ravine?"

Xuefeng said, "You can stare straight down and never see the bottom."

"And the one who drinks it?"

"It doesn't go in through the mouth."

When the master heard this, he said, "It doesn't go in through the mouth. It goes in through the nostrils." Then the monk turned and asked him, "How is it, the cold spring in the old ravine?"

"Bitter," the master said.

"And the one who drinks it?"

"Dead."

When Xuefeng heard the master's words, he praised him: "An old buddha. An old buddha." After that Xuefeng stopped answering questions.

Later, when Prince Yan of Hebei led troops to take Zhenfu, his army reached the border, and an astrologer who read the omens reported to him, "A sage dwells in Zhao. If you fight, you will surely lose." So the Princes of Yan and Zhao laid out a banquet together and both called off the battle. They asked, "On this golden ground of Zhao, who is the great man?"

Someone said, "There is a master who lectures on the Avatamsaka Sutra, a man of rare and solitary conduct. In a great drought everyone sent him to Mount Tai to pray, and before he was even back the sweet rain came pouring down."

"That may not be the finest of them," they said.

Someone else said, "A hundred and twenty miles from here is Guanyin Temple in Zhao. There's a Chan master there, high in years and seasons, with a clear eye for the Way."

They all agreed: "This must be the one the omen points to." The two princes turned their carriages and went to see him.

When they came inside the temple, the master sat where he was and did not rise. Prince Yan asked, "Which is higher, the king of men or the king of the Dharma?"

The master said, "Among kings of men, the king of men is highest. Among kings of the Dharma, the king of the Dharma is highest."

Prince Yan assented. After a long pause the master asked, "Which of you is the great prince of Zhenfu?"

The Prince of Zhao answered, "I am, your disciple."

The master said, "I'm just an old monk astray among these hills and rivers, and could not come out to meet you."

A moment later the attendants asked the master to preach the Dharma for the prince. The master said, "The prince has so many attendants about him. How is an old monk to preach?" So he had them sent away.

Beside the master stood the novice Wenyuan, who said in a loud voice, "Your highness, those are not the attendants he means."

The prince asked, "What attendants, then?"

"Your highness has many forbidden names," he answered, "and so the master dares not preach."

Prince Yan said, "Then preach, master, and never mind the taboos."

The master said, "Now I see it: your kin from ages past are all your enemies. When our Buddha, the World-Honored One, has his name spoken but once, sins dissolve and blessings are born. But let anyone so much as brush against your ancestors' names, and rage flares up." Then, untiring in his compassion, the master preached a long while. The two princes bowed their heads in praise and honored him without end.

The next day, as they were about to leave, Prince Yan's vanguard officer heard that the master had not risen for them. At dawn he came into the temple to upbraid the master for arrogance toward his lord. When the master heard him, he came out to greet him. The officer asked, "Yesterday you saw the two princes come and did not get up. Today you see me, and you come out to meet me. Why?"

The master said, "When the duty officer is the equal of the great prince, this old monk won't get up to meet him either." At that the officer bowed again and again and left.

Soon after, the Prince of Zhao sent an envoy to bring the master to be honored. When he reached the city gate, the whole city turned out in full ceremony to escort him in. The moment the master stepped down from the royal carriage, the prince bowed to him and asked him to come up into the hall and take the seat of honor.

After a long pause the master tapped his forehead and said, "Who are these officials standing below the steps?"

His attendants said, "Those are the senior monks of the various temples, with the great masters and the men of great virtue."

The master said, "Each of them is a teacher leading people in his own region. If they stand below the steps, this old monk will stand too." So the prince had them brought up into the hall.

That day, as the banquet was ending, the monk officials had lined up in order from highest to lowest, each to ask a single question, one of them on the Buddha's Dharma. As soon as the master saw this, he asked, "What are you doing?"

"Asking about the Buddha's Dharma."

The master said, "This seat already has an old monk on it. What Dharma is there to ask about over there? Two honored ones do not teach side by side." So the prince had them stop.

The queen and the prince were both standing in attendance. The queen said, "Please, master, lay your hand on the prince's head and give him your blessing." The master laid his hand on the prince's head and said, "May the great prince live as long as this old monk."

While he was being received, the master was lodging for the time being at a nearby temple. The prince found an auspicious time and site and set about building him a Chan hall. When the master heard of it, he sent word to the prince: "If you disturb so much as a single blade of grass, this old monk goes back to Zhao." So the army officer Dou offered up an orchard of his, worth fifteen thousand strings of cash. It was named Zhenji Chan Temple, also called the Dou Family Garden.

After the master moved in, a sea of monks gathered like clouds. The Prince of Zhao honored him, and Prince Yan sent a memorial all the way from Youzhou and had imperial robes brought to Zhenfu, escorted in full ceremony. The master firmly refused them. The attendants carried the chest up before him and said, "The great prince begs the master, for the sake of the Buddha's Dharma, to wear these robes."

The master said, "It's for the sake of the Buddha's Dharma that I won't wear them."

"At least do it for the prince's sake," they said.

The master said, "And what has this to do with worldly officials?" Then he took the robes himself and draped them over his shoulders. They bowed in congratulation again and again, and the master only said, "Yes, yes."

The master lived in Zhao two more years. As he was about to pass away, he told his disciples, "After I'm gone and you've burned my body, don't go sifting for relics. A disciple of the Chan masters is not like ordinary worldly folk. The body is an illusion anyway, so where would relics come from? It won't do." He had a young disciple carry a whisk to the Prince of Zhao with this message: "This is the one thing this old monk could not use up in a whole lifetime."

The master died sitting upright, on the tenth day of the eleventh month, in the year wuzi. Tens of thousands came to the Dou Family Garden, clergy and laity, with their carts and horses, and the sound of their grief shook the air. They gave him the full funeral rites, and their weeping was no different from when the golden coffin hid its light at Kusinagara. They raised a high stupa for him and set up a great memorial stone. His posthumous title was Chan Master Zhenji, and his stupa was called the Stupa That Glorifies the Ancestors.

In the eleventh year of the Baoda era of the Later Tang, in early summer, on the thirteenth day, a student asked Chan Master Huitong of the East Temple in the Eastern Capital how Zhaozhou had lived and taught. Then he bowed and withdrew, took up his brush, and wrote this down.