Den'e

The authentic transmission of the buddha-buddha robe and dharma was correctly transmitted to China solely by the High Ancestor of Shaolin. This High Ancestor is the twenty-eighth generation Ancestral Master from Śākyamuni Buddha. Through twenty-eight generations in Western India, the direct lineage was passed down, and it was personally transmitted through six generations in China. Altogether, across West and East, there are thirty-three generations. The thirty-third generation Ancestor, Great Mirror Chan Master (Dajian), received the authentic transmission of this robe and dharma from Huangmei in the middle of the night and protected and maintained it during his lifetime.

It is now still enshrined at Baolin Monastery on Mount Caoxi. Emperors of successive dynasties have in turn invited it into the inner palace to make offerings; it is a divine object they protect and maintain. During the Tang dynasty, Emperors Zhongzong, Suzong, and Daizong repeatedly returned it to the inner palace for offerings. Whether inviting it or sending it back, they dispatched imperial envoys and issued edicts. This was indeed a solemn ceremony.

Emperor Daizong, in an edict sending the buddha-robe back to Mount Caoxi, stated: "We now dispatch the Great General Who Guards the State, Liu Chongjing, to reverently carry and deliver it. We regard it as a national treasure. You should install it in the original monastery and have the monks who personally receive the ancestral teaching strictly protect it, not allowing it to be lost or damaged." Thus, emperors of several generations together regarded it as a weighty treasure of the nation. Truly, rather than ruling over immeasurable Ganges-sands of three-thousand great-thousand worlds, for a nation to possess this buddha-robe is a particularly superior great treasure.

It cannot be compared to the Bian He jade. Even if it were the imperial seal transmitted through dynasties, how could it equal the wondrous treasure transmitted by the buddhas? Since the Tang dynasty, monastics and laypeople who have beheld and paid homage to it have invariably been those of great capacity for faith and dharma. Unless aided by past good roots, how could one, in this very body, personally behold and pay homage to the buddha-buddha authentically transmitted buddha-robe?

The skin, flesh, bones, and marrow that accept it in faith should rejoice. Those who cannot accept it in faith, even if they blame themselves, should lament their lack of the seed of buddhahood. Even commoners say that seeing a person's belongings is seeing the person. Now, to behold and pay homage to the buddha-robe is to behold and serve the buddha. One should erect hundreds, thousands, ten-thousands of stupas and make offerings to this buddha-robe. In the heavens and in the seas, if there are beings with mind, they should revere it. Among humans, if there are those who know the truth of Wheel-Turning Sage Kings and recognize what is superior, they should revere it.

It is pitiable that members of families who become rulers generation after generation do not know that there is a weighty treasure in their own country. Often, confused by the teachings of Daoist priests, many abolish the buddha-dharma. At such times, they do not wear the kāṣāya but have shaven heads and wear leaf-shaped caps. What they preach are methods for prolonging life and extending years. This existed in the Tang dynasty and also in the Song dynasty.

Such types, even if they are rulers of nations, are surely more base than the citizens. One should quietly observe and consider that the buddha-robe remains and is present in our country. One should also consider whether this makes it a robe-buddha land. It is surely superior to śarīra relics. Śarīra relics exist even in Wheel-Turning Kings, exist in lions, exist in humans, and even exist in pratyekabuddhas and others. However, Wheel-Turning Kings have no kāṣāya, lions have no kāṣāya, humans have no kāṣāya. Only all buddhas have the kāṣāya; one should deeply accept this in faith.

Many foolish people of today, though they say they revere śarīra relics, do not know the kāṣāya, and rare are those who know it should be protected and maintained. This is because, from the outset, rare are those who have heard of the importance of the kāṣāya; it is so because they have not yet heard of the authentic transmission of the buddha-dharma. Carefully considering it, the time since Śākyamuni's presence in the world is merely over two thousand years.

There are many national treasures and divine vessels transmitted down to the present that are older than this. This buddha-dharma and buddha-robe are recent and new. Even if it were transmitted through fifty turnings in fields and villages, the benefit would be wondrous. Its merit is still fresh. This buddha-robe should be the same as that. That was not transmitted from the direct lineage; this was transmitted from the direct lineage. Know that hearing a four-line verse one attains the Way, hearing a single phrase one attains the Way. Why do a four-line verse and a single phrase have such spiritual efficacy? It is because they are the buddha-dharma.

Now, a single kāṣāya robe or a nine-strip robe is correctly transmitted from the buddha-dharma. It cannot be inferior to a four-line verse, its efficacy cannot be less than a single phrase of dharma. Therefore, for over two thousand years, all those of capacity for faith-practice and dharma-practice who study following the buddhas have all protected and maintained the kāṣāya, making it their body and mind. Those who defile the true dharma of the buddhas do not revere and honor the kāṣāya.

Now, Śakra Devānām Indra and the Dragon King Anavatapta, though they are lay heavenly lords, though they are dragon kings, protect and maintain the kāṣāya. Yet, among the shaven-headed types who call themselves sons of the buddha, there are those who do not know the kāṣāya as something that should be received and maintained. How much less do they know its substance, color, and measurement? How much less do they know the method for wearing it? How much less its dignified manner—it is something they have never even seen in their dreams.

Regarding the kāṣāya, it has long been called the garment that removes afflictions and the garment of liberation. Its merit is, in general, immeasurable. The threefold heat of the dragon's scales is liberated precisely through the merit of the kāṣāya. When all buddhas attain the Way, they invariably use this robe. Even if one is born in a remote land and encounters the latter age of the Dharma, if one must consider whether there is an authentic transmission or not, one should believe in, accept, and protect that which is the legitimate lineage of the transmission.

In which school is there a true transmission like our own, which correctly transmits both the robe and the Dharma of Śākyamuni? This exists in the Buddha Way alone. When one encounters this robe and Dharma, who would be lax in revering and making offerings to it? Even if it meant abandoning immeasurable, Ganges-sands-numbered bodies and lives in a single day, one should make offerings. One should also vow to encounter and receive it in life after life, generation after generation.

Although we are born beyond the barriers of mountains and seas, more than a hundred thousand li from the land of the Buddha's birth, and are ignorant people of a remote region, to hear this true Dharma, to receive and hold this kāṣāya even for a single day and night, and to investigate even a single phrase or verse—this merit is not merely that of having made offerings to one or two buddhas; it must be the merit of having made offerings to and reverently encountered immeasurable hundreds of thousands of millions of buddhas. Even if it is one's own self, one should revere it, cherish it, and hold it in high regard.

One should earnestly repay the great kindness of the ancestral teachers who transmitted the Dharma. Even beasts repay kindness; how could humans not know kindness? If one does not know kindness, one is inferior to beasts, more foolish than beasts. The merit of this Buddha-robe is something that people other than the ancestral teachers who transmit the Buddha's true Dharma have not yet known even in their dreams. How much less could they understand its form, color, and dimensions?

If one is to follow in the footsteps of all buddhas, one should truly follow this. Even a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand generations hence, to correctly transmit this correct transmission is precisely to be the Buddha Dharma. The verification of this is clear and manifest.

The common saying goes: "One does not wear what was not worn by the former kings; one does not practice what was not the law of the former kings." The Buddha Way is also like this. One must not use what is not the Dharma robe of the former buddhas. If it is not the Dharma robe of the former buddhas, what shall one wear to practice the Buddha Way and to attend upon the buddhas? Without wearing this, it would be difficult to enter the Buddha's assembly.

Since the era of Emperor Ming of the Later Han Dynasty in the Yongping period, monks coming from the Western Heavens to the Eastern Land have followed in an unbroken line, and monks going from China to India have been heard of from time to time, yet no one says they met anyone and received the Buddha Dharma face-to-face. They merely studied names and forms learned from scholastics and Tripitaka masters. They did not hear of the true lineage of the Buddha Dharma. Therefore, not only was there no talk of rightly transmitting the Buddha's robe, but no one says they met someone who rightly transmitted the Buddha's robe, nor is it said that they saw or heard of a person who transmits the robe.

We know they did not enter the innermost chamber of the Buddha's house. Such people, recognizing only the clothing and not knowing the reverence of the Buddha Dharma, are truly pitiable. In the true lineage of the transmission of the Buddha Dharma treasury, the Buddha's robe is also transmitted and received. That the patriarchs of the true transmission of the Dharma treasury all saw and heard the Buddha's robe is a principle known throughout the human and heavenly realms.

Thus, the form, color, and measure of the Buddha's kāṣāya have been rightly transmitted and rightly seen and heard; the great merit of the Buddha's kāṣāya has been rightly transmitted; and the transmission of the body, mind, bones, and marrow of the Buddha's kāṣāya exists solely in the proper work of the true transmission. It is unknown in the traditions of the various Āgama teachings. Those who now establish their own views based on individual deliberation are not of the true transmission and are not the true lineage.

When our great master Shakyamuni Tathagata entrusted the True Dharma Eye Treasury, the supreme awakening, to Mahakashyapa, he transmitted the Buddha's robe along with it. From that point, it has been authentically transmitted from heir to heir down to the Great Mirror Zen Master of Mount Caoxi, spanning thirty-three generations. The form, color, and dimensions of this robe have been personally seen and personally transmitted; long passed down within the family gate, its reception and upholding are ever fresh and new. The transmission received and upheld by each of the founding ancestors of the five schools is precisely this authentic transmission.

Whether spanning over fifty generations or over forty, the relationship between master and disciple has never been disordered. Whether draping it according to the Dharma of the prior Buddhas or making it according to the Dharma of the prior Buddhas, it is solely through the transmission and verification between Buddha and Buddha that, through the passing of generations, it remains equally fresh and new.

The orthodox and successive transmission of the Buddha's teaching states: for the nine-strip robe, three long and one short, or four long and one short; for the eleven-strip robe, three long and one short, or four long and one short; for the thirteen-strip robe, three long and one short, or four long and one short; for the fifteen-strip robe, three long and one short; for the seventeen-strip robe, three long and one short; for the nineteen-strip robe, three long and one short; for the twenty-one-strip robe, four long and one short; for the twenty-three-strip robe, four long and one short; for the twenty-five-strip robe, four long and one short; for the two-hundred-fifty-strip robe, four long and one short; for the eighty-four-thousand-strip robe, eight long and one short.

This is now presented in brief. There are, besides these, various other kinds of kāṣāya. All of these should be saṅghāṭī robes. Some receive and uphold them as laypeople, some receive and uphold them as monastics. To "receive and uphold" means to wear and use them. It is not merely to fold and carry them about idly.

Even if one has hair and beard, to not receive and uphold the kāṣāya, to detest and hate the kāṣāya, to fear the kāṣāya—this is the work of celestial demons and heretics. The great wise Chan master Baizhang said, "Those who lack the good roots planted in past lives will loathe the kāṣāya, will detest the kāṣāya, will fear and detest the true Dharma.

The Buddha said: If there are beings who enter my dharma and either commit grave offenses or fall into false views, yet in a single moment, with reverent mind, honor and respect the saṃghāṭī robe, then all buddhas and I will certainly confer prediction upon them among the three vehicles. Such a person shall attain buddhahood. Whether deva, nāga, human, or ghost, if they can revere even a small portion of the merit of this person's kāṣāya, they will immediately attain the non-retrogression and non-regression of the three vehicles. If there are ghosts, spirits, or various beings who can obtain even four inches of a kāṣāya, their food and drink will be fully provided.

If there are beings who are in mutual conflict and about to fall into false views, and they recall the power of the kāṣāya and rely on the power of the kāṣāya, they will immediately give rise to a mind of repentance and regain purity. If a person is on a battlefield and holds even a small piece of this kāṣāya, honoring and respecting it, they shall attain liberation. Therefore, know that the merit of the kāṣāya is supreme and inconceivable.

Where it is believed in, received, and protected, there will certainly be the attainment of prediction and the attainment of non-retrogression. It is not only Śākyamuni Buddha, but all buddhas also proclaim thus. Know that the very body and form of all buddhas is precisely the kāṣāya. Therefore, the Buddha said: Those who are destined to fall into the evil paths despise and loathe the saṃghāṭī. Therefore, when seeing or hearing the kāṣāya, if a thought of loathing arises, one should give rise to a mind of compassion, thinking, "This is my own self destined to fall into the evil paths," and one should feel shame, repent, and confess.

Moreover, when Śākyamuni Buddha first left the royal palace and was about to enter the mountains, a tree deity offered a single saṃghāṭī robe to Śākyamuni Buddha, saying, "If you receive this robe, you will avoid all demonic harassments." At that time, Śākyamuni Buddha received this robe, and it is said he wore it on his head for twelve years without ever removing it. This is according to the Āgama sutras and others. Some say the kāṣāya is the auspicious robe.

Those who wear it will certainly reach the supreme position. Generally, there is no time in the world when this saṃghāṭī robe does not appear. Its appearance in a single moment is the matter within the long kalpa. The matter within the long kalpa arrives in a single moment. To obtain the kāṣāya is to obtain the banner and mark of buddhahood. Therefore, there has never been a tathāgata who did not receive and uphold the kāṣāya. There is none who received and upheld the kāṣāya who did not attain buddhahood.

The method of donning the kāṣāya with the right shoulder bared is the usual practice, but there is also the method of donning it over both shoulders. In the method where both ends are layered over the left arm and shoulder, there are occasions, as part of the Buddha's dignified conduct, where the front end is layered with its surface showing, where the front end is layered with its lining showing, where the back end is layered with its surface showing, and where the back end is not layered with its lining showing. This protocol is not something witnessed, heard, and transmitted by the various śrāvaka assemblies. It is not something glimpsed in the various Āgama scriptural texts.

Generally, the dignified conduct of donning the kāṣāya in the Buddha Way is something necessarily received and upheld by the ancestral masters who transmit the true Dharma manifestly present before us. To receive and uphold it, one must necessarily receive and uphold it from these ancestral masters. The kāṣāya correctly transmitted by the buddhas and ancestors is precisely the correct transmission from buddha to buddha, not something arbitrary.

It is the kāṣāya of prior buddhas and later buddhas, of ancient buddhas and new buddhas. It transforms the Way; it transforms the buddha. In transforming the past, the present, and the future, it is correctly transmitted from the past to the present, from the present to the future, from the present to the past, from the past to the past, from the present to the present, from the future to the future, from the future to the present, and from the future to the past: it is solely the correct transmission between buddha and buddha.

Therefore, since the ancestral master came from the west, throughout the several hundred years from the Great Tang to the Great Song, many among the company of the Teaching School and Vinaya School, who were masters of scriptural exposition and had seen through their own karmic vocation, when entering the Buddha Dharma, cast off the worn-out robe of their former habitual nest and correctly received the kāṣāya correctly transmitted in the Buddha Way. Those circumstances are recorded in succession in the Transmission, Extensive, Continued, and Universal Lamp records, and others.

Having liberated themselves from the narrow views confined by teaching and precepts, and having revered the great Way correctly transmitted by the buddhas and ancestors, they all became buddhas and ancestors. People today should also learn from the ancestral masters of old.

One should correctly transmit and faithfully receive the authentic, transmitted kesa; one should not receive and uphold a falsely made kesa. What is called the authentically transmitted kesa is that which has been correctly transmitted from Shaolin and Caoxi; this is what has been passed down directly from generation to generation from the Tathagata without a single break. Therefore, it is because the Way-practice is truly received and the Buddha's robe is intimately taken in hand. The Buddha Way is transmitted correctly within the Buddha Way; it is not left to the transmission obtained by idle persons.

A common proverb says, "Hearing a thousand times is not equal to seeing once; seeing a thousand times is not equal to one sutra." Reflecting on this, even if there are a thousand sights and ten thousand hearings, they are not equal to one attainment. Nothing compares to the authentic transmission of the Buddha's robe. If one doubts that there is an authentic transmission, how much more should one doubt never having even dreamt of the authentic transmission? It is more intimate to have the Buddha's robe authentically transmitted than to hear about Buddhist sutras.

Even if there are a thousand sutras and ten thousand attainments, they would not equal one verification. Buddhas and ancestors are verification and accord. One should not follow ordinary persons of doctrine and precepts. Generally, the merit of the kesa in the ancestral school is that the authentic transmission has been correctly inherited, and the original capacity has been directly transmitted. Receiving, upholding, and succeeding to the Dharma continues unbroken to the present. Those who have received the correct transmission are all ancestral masters of verification-accord and Dharma transmission.

They surpass the ten sages and three worthies; one should make offerings, revere, bow to, and venerate them. Once this principle of the authentic transmission of the Buddha's robe is faithfully received by this very body and mind, it is immediately a sign of encountering the Buddha, it is the path of learning the Buddha. If one is incapable of receiving this Dharma, it is truly pitiful. One should deeply acknowledge that once this kesa covers the body, it is decisively the protective talisman for attaining bodhi.

It is said that if one dyes even a single phrase or verse with faith-mind, it becomes an eternal light without deficiency. Dyeing a single Dharma into body and mind is also exactly like this. That mind-thought is also without abiding; although it is not attached to "I have," its merit is already thus. The body too, although said to be without abiding, is also thus. The kesa has no place from which it comes, and also no place to which it goes. Although it is not "I have" nor "others have," it manifests and abides where it is held and benefits the person who receives and upholds it. The merit obtained will also be exactly like this.

The making of the kāṣāya robe is not the making of ordinary beings or sages. Its essential principle is not something even the ten sages and three worthies can exhaustively fathom. Those lacking the seed of the Way planted in past lives, even if they pass through one life, two lives, or even innumerable lives, will not see the kāṣāya, will not hear of the kāṣāya, and will not know the kāṣāya. How could they possibly receive and uphold it? There are those who obtain the merit of even once letting it touch their body, and there are those who do not.

Those who have already obtained it should rejoice; those who have not yet obtained it should aspire to it; those who are incapable of obtaining it should lament. Throughout the inner and outer reaches of the great-thousand world, it is known and witnessed universally by humans and gods alike that the Buddha's robe is transmitted solely within the gate of the Buddhas and Ancestors. Clarifying the true aspect of the Buddha's robe is also solely the work of the Ancestors' gate. Other schools do not know it. Those who do not know this, if they do not regret their own state, are foolish people.

Even if one knows the eighty-four thousand samādhis and dhāraṇīs, if one does not correctly transmit the robe and dharma of the Buddhas and Ancestors, and does not clarify the correct transmission of the kāṣāya, one cannot be a true legitimate descendant of the buddhas. How much must the beings of other worlds aspire that the Buddha's robe be correctly transmitted just as it was correctly transmitted in the land of China? They must feel ashamed that it is not transmitted in their own land; their hearts of lament must be deep.

Truly, encountering the dharma in which the Tathāgata, the World-Honored One's robe and dharma are correctly transmitted, comes from the great merit-seed of prajñā planted in past lives. Now, in this latter degenerate age, people are not ashamed at lacking the correct transmission themselves; there are many demonic companions who envy the correct transmission. What one possesses and dwells in is not one's true self. Solely making the correct transmission one's correct transmission—this is the straight path of learning the Buddha's way.

Know this broadly: the kāṣāya is the Buddha's body, the Buddha's mind. It is also called the robe of liberation, the robe of the field of merit. It is called the robe of patience, the robe of formlessness. It is called the robe of compassion, the robe of the Tathāgata, the robe of anuttarā samyak-saṃbodhi. One should receive and maintain it precisely thus. Even those now in the great Song nation who bear the name of Vinaya scholars, because they are drunk and mad on the wine of the śrāvaka, feel no shame, no remorse, and no awareness that they transmit to their own houses teachings unknown to their own gates.

The kāṣāya transmitted from the Western Heavens and long passed down through the Han and Tang dynasties they now alter to follow their own petty measure; this is due to petty views. They are bound by petty views. If you now employ a robe of such petty measure, the Buddha's majestic deportment will be greatly deficient and impaired. It is thus because the learning and transmission of the Buddha's deportment is not widespread.

That the Tathāgata's body and mind are correctly transmitted only within the ancestral gate and do not scatter into their family business is clear. If one knows the Buddha's deportment even ten-thousandth-fold, one must not violate the Buddha's robe. The texts are not yet clarified, the school is not yet to be heard.

Moreover, to rigidly determine coarse cloth as the proper material for robes is to profoundly violate the Buddha Dharma. It specifically destroys the Buddha’s robe; it is not what a disciple of the Buddha should wear. Why? It raises the view of cloth and thereby rends the kāṣāya. Pitiful indeed is the view of the śrāvakas of the Small Vehicle; one should lament its circuitousness. Only after your view of cloth is rent does the Buddha’s robe manifest. The use of silk and cloth spoken of is not the Way of one or two buddhas. As the great Dharma of all buddhas, refuse is taken as the superior and pure material for robes.

Among these, when one strings together the ten kinds of refuse for a moment, there are silk types, cloth types, and also types of other fabrics. Is one not to take the refuse of silk type? If it were so, it would contradict the Buddha Way. If one rejects silk, then one should also reject cloth. For what reason should one reject silk and cloth? To reject silk thread because it is produced from killing living beings is something to greatly laugh at. Is cloth not connected to living things?

The “sentience” of sentient and non-sentient beings has not yet liberated itself from the “sentience” of ordinary feelings; how could it know the Buddha’s kāṣāya? Furthermore, there are those who bring up the theory of transformed silk and thereby confuse the Way. Again, it is laughable. What is not a transformation? Although you believe the ear that hears of transformation, you doubt the eye that sees transformation. It is as if the eye had no ear and the ear had no eye. Where do the present eye and ear exist? For a moment, know that within gathering refuse, there may be what resembles silk and what seems like cloth. In using this, one should not name it silk, nor call it cloth.

One should precisely call it refuse. Because it is refuse, it is refuse and is not silk, is not cloth. Even if there is refuse produced by humans and gods, one should not call it sentient; it should be refuse. Even if there is refuse that has become pine or chrysanthemum, one should not call it non-sentient; it should be refuse. When one understands the principle that refuse is not silk or cloth and is apart from jewels and gems, the refuse-robe manifests; one meets and is born in the refuse-robe.

One whose view of silk and cloth has not yet fallen away has not yet even dreamt of refuse. Even if one takes coarse cloth as the kāṣāya and receives and holds it for a lifetime, if one retains the view of cloth, it is not the correct transmission of the Buddha’s robe. Also, among the several kinds of kāṣāya, there are cloth kāṣāya, silk kāṣāya, and leather kāṣāya. All are what all buddhas use; they are the Buddha’s robe, the Buddha’s virtue. There is a correctly transmitted principle; it has not yet been cut off.

Yet, there are those whose ordinary feelings are not yet liberated, who take the Buddha Dharma lightly and do not believe the Buddha’s words, who intend to follow their ordinary feelings elsewhere—they should be called heretics attached to Buddhism, a type that destroys the true Dharma. Some say they reform the Buddha’s robe following the teachings of heavenly beings. If so, should they pray to heavenly buddhas? Or have they become like the kind of heavenly beings? Disciples of the Buddha should expound the Buddha Dharma for the sake of heavenly beings and humans; they should not seek the Way from heavenly beings and humans.

Pitiful is the fact that without the correct transmission of the Buddha Dharma, it is like this. Although the view of the heavenly hosts and the view of the children of the Buddha are vastly different in greatness and smallness, the heavens descend and seek the Dharma from the disciples of the Buddha. The reason is that the Buddha’s view and the heavenly view are vastly different. Do not discard and learn the narrow view of the Vinaya masters and śrāvakas; know it to be the Small Vehicle. The Buddha said, “Killing one’s father and killing one’s mother can be repented; slandering the Dharma cannot be repented.” In general, the path of narrow views and fox-like doubt is not the Buddha’s original intent. The great path of the Buddha Dharma is where the Small Vehicle cannot reach. That the great precepts of all buddhas are correctly transmitted is known to exist nowhere outside the ancestral Way of the Dharma-transmission treasury.

Long ago, in the middle of the night at Huangmei, the Buddha’s robe and Dharma were rightly transmitted onto the head of the Sixth Ancestor. This is truly the right transmission of the transmitted Dharma and transmitted robe, made possible because the Fifth Ancestor recognized the person. The ranks of the four fruits and three worthies, the kinds such as the ten sages, and the kinds such as the doctrinal scholars and sutra masters of the teaching schools should be entrusted to Shenxiu; they should not receive the right transmission from the Sixth Ancestor.

Nevertheless, because the selection of a Buddha-Ancestor by a Buddha-Ancestor transcends the path of ordinary sentiment, the Sixth Ancestor has indeed become the Sixth Ancestor. Know that the principle of a Buddha-Ancestor’s true heir recognizing and being recognized is not something to be carelessly measured. Later, a monk asked the Sixth Ancestor, “The robe transmitted in the middle of the night at Huangmei—is it cloth, or is it silk, or is it damask? After all, what thing is it?” The Sixth Ancestor said, “It is not cloth, it is not silk, it is not damask.” Know that the Way of the High Ancestor of Caoxi is like this.

The Buddha’s robe is not silk, is not cloth, is not quxun. Yet, to idly perceive it as silk, perceive it as cloth, or perceive it as quxun is the kind of thing that slanders the Buddha-Dharma. How can one know the Buddha’s kāṣāya? Moreover, there is the opportunity of receiving the precepts through “Well come, bhikṣu.” That kāṣāya which they obtain is furthermore not a matter of discussing silk or cloth—this is the Buddha’s instruction in the Buddha’s Way.

Moreover, the robe of Śāṇavāsa is secular clothing while he is a layperson, and becomes a kāṣāya when he leaves home. One should quietly meditate and investigate this principle. It should not be set aside as if one has not seen or heard it. How much more so is there a teaching rightly transmitted by buddha after buddha and ancestor after ancestor. It cannot be fathomed by the kind who count letters, nor can it be measured. Truly, the thousand changes and ten thousand transformations of the buddha-way—how could they be the realm of ordinary streams? There is samādhi, there is dhāraṇī. Companions who count sands cannot see the jewel in the robe.

Now, one should take the essence, color, and measurement of the kāṣāya rightly transmitted by the buddhas and ancestors as the true standard for the kāṣāya of all buddhas. This precedent is already ancient in the Western Heavens and Eastern Lands, in the past and present. Those who distinguished the correct from the erroneous have already transcended and realized it. Even if there are those outside the ancestral way who speak of a kāṣāya, there is no fundamental ancestor who acknowledges it as branches and leaves.

How could they plant the seeds of wholesome roots, much less bear fruit? We now not only see and hear the buddha-dharma, unencountered since the distant kalpas of the past, but also are able to see and hear the buddha-robe, learn the buddha-robe, and receive and maintain the buddha-robe. This is precisely to serve and behold the buddha. We hear the buddha’s voice, emit the buddha’s light, and partake of the buddha’s enjoyment. It is the single transmission of the buddha-mind. It is to attain the buddha-marrow.

When I was in Song China, practicing on the long meditation platform, I observed the monk on the neighboring seat at my shoulder. Every morning at the opening of the silent period, he would lift his kāṣāya robe and place it upon his head, then, with palms joined in reverence, silently recite a verse. At that time, I felt an unprecedented thought; my joy was so extreme that tears of emotion secretly fell and moistened my robe. Although I had seen the passage on revering the kāṣāya while reading the Āgama sutras, I did not understand it clearly. Now I see it directly before my eyes, and I consequently think: How pitiable!

When I was in my native land, I had no teacher to instruct me, I met no virtuous friend to speak with. Shall I not regret and grieve for the light and shadow vainly passed for who knows how long? Now that I see and hear this, I should rejoice in my past good roots. Had I merely rubbed shoulders in the various temples of my home country, how could I have attained being shoulder-to-neighbor with a true saṃgha jewel who correctly wears the Buddha's robe? My sorrow and joy are not one-sided; tears of feeling flow in thousands of lines.

At that time I secretly made a vow: However unworthy I may be, how can I not correctly transmit the true lineage of the Buddha Dharma and, pitying the beings of my native land, cause them to see and hear the correctly transmitted robe and Dharma of the buddhas and ancestors? If the correct faith of that time secretly provides support, my heart's vow should not be in vain. Those buddha-sons who now receive and hold the kāṣāya must diligently practice the effort of revering it day and night; it is true merit and virtue. To see and hear a single phrase or verse—even trees and stones may have such a connection.

The merit of the correct transmission of the kāṣāya will be difficult to meet in the ten directions. In the tenth month of winter in the guǐwèi year [1223], the seventeenth year of the Jiading era of Great Song, two monks from the Three Han [Korea] came to Qingyuan fu. One was named Zhixuan, the other Jingyun. These two often discussed the meaning of Buddhist sutras and were, moreover, literary scholars. Yet they had no kāṣāya, no alms bowl; they were like laypeople. How pitiable!

Though they had the form of bhikṣus, they lacked the bhikṣu Dharma—this must be due to being from a small, border country. When the companions in bhikṣu form from our court go to other lands, they will likely become like those two monks. Śākyamuni Buddha himself revered it upon his head for twelve years and never set it aside. As his distant descendants, we should learn this. To now turn over that crown of the head which vainly bows to heaven, bows to spirits, bows to kings, and bows to ministers for the sake of fame and profit, toward the revering of the Buddha's robe upon the head—this is a great celebration in which to rejoice.

The material for making a kasaya must be pure. "Pure" means using material offered in faith by pure donors, or that which is bought in the marketplace, or that which is sent by heavenly beings, or the pure offerings of dragon deities, or the pure offerings of ghostly deities—one should use such material. Or the pure offerings of kings and ministers, or pure hides—these should be used. Also, the ten kinds of pāṃśukūla robes are considered pure.

The so-called ten kinds of pāṃśukūla robes are: first, robes chewed by cattle; second, robes gnawed by mice; third, robes burned by fire; fourth, robes soiled by menstrual blood; fifth, robes from a woman who has given birth; sixth, robes from a shrine; seventh, robes found by the roadside; eighth, robes offered in fulfillment of a vow; ninth, robes from a royal funeral; tenth, robes left by travelers. These ten kinds are specifically made into pure robe material. What the secular world discards, the Buddha Way uses. One should know the difference in vocation between the worldly and the Buddha Way. Therefore, when seeking purity, one should seek these ten kinds.

Having obtained these, one should know purity and discern impurity. One should know the mind and discern the body. Having obtained these ten kinds, even if they are of silk or of cloth, one should consider their purity and impurity. To think that using these pāṃśukūla robes is merely for dressing in ragged, worn-out clothing is the height of foolishness. It is for the sake of adornment and wondrous beauty that they are used and worn in the Buddha Way.

To learn to be clothed in the raiment of the Buddha Way means that garments of brocade, embroidery, fine silks, gold, silver, pearls, and such, which come from impurity, are what is meant by "worn-out." Generally, in the Buddha Way of this land and other realms, for using what is pure and wondrously beautiful, these ten kinds are precisely that. This is not merely transcending the boundaries of pure and impure; it is not within the realm of the defiled or the undefiled. Do not argue about matter and mind; it is unrelated to gain and loss. Only the correct transmission and receiving-maintaining of this are the buddhas and ancestors.

When one is a buddha-ancestor, because of correctly transmitting and receiving, receiving and maintaining this as a buddha-ancestor does not depend on the body's manifestation or non-manifestation, nor on the mind's raising or not raising; it is being correctly transmitted. One should truly lament that monks and nuns in this land of Japan have long not worn the kasaya, and rejoice that they now receive and maintain it. Lay men and women who receive the Buddha's precepts should wear the five-panel, seven-panel, or nine-panel kasaya. How much more so should monastics wear it! It is said that from Brahmā and the gods of the six heavens down to lustful men, lustful women, and servants, all should receive the Buddha's precepts and wear the kasaya—how could bhikṣus and bhikṣuṇīs not wear it? It is said that even animals should receive the Buddha's precepts and be covered with the kasaya—how could the children of the Buddha not wear the Buddha's robe?

Therefore, for those who would become children of the Buddha, without asking whether they are in heaven or among humans, kings or officials, without discussing lay or monastic, servant or animal, they should receive the Buddha's precepts and correctly transmit the kasaya. This is precisely the direct path for correctly entering the Buddha's position.

When washing the kasaya, one must use water mixed with powdered incense and flowers. After rinsing and drying it, fold it, put it away, and place it in a high location, making offerings to it with incense and flowers. After making three prostrations, then, kneeling respectfully, receive it upon the crown of the head, join the palms in devotion, and recite this verse: "How great is the robe of liberation, the formless field of merit! Donning it in accordance with the Tathagata's teaching, one widely saves all sentient beings." Recite this three times. Then, standing on the ground, one should don it.