Mujō Seppō

To expound the Dharma in expounding the Dharma is the accomplished case entrusted by the buddhas and ancestors. This expounding is the Dharma expounding. It is not sentient beings; it is not insentient beings. It is not conditioned; it is not unconditioned. It is not the cause and condition of the conditioned and the unconditioned; it is not the Dharma arising from conditions. Even so, it does not travel on the bird's path; it is given to the assembly of buddhas. When the great Way is fully accomplished, expounding the Dharma is fully accomplished. When the Dharma treasury is entrusted, expounding the Dharma is entrusted.

At the time of picking up the flower, there is picking up and expounding the Dharma. At the time of transmitting the robe, there is transmitting and expounding the Dharma. Therefore, all buddhas and all ancestors, equally, have reverently beheld expounding the Dharma since before the Buddha Vipashyin, and have fundamentally practiced expounding the Dharma since before all buddhas. Do not study only that the buddhas and ancestors have managed to arrive at expounding the Dharma. The buddhas and ancestors are managed and have arrived by expounding the Dharma.

This expounding of the Dharma is not merely the unfolding of the eighty-four thousand gates of the Dharma accumulation; there are immeasurable, boundless gates of the expounding Dharma accumulation. Do not study that the later buddhas expound the Dharma of the former buddhas. Just as the former buddhas, having arrived, are not the later buddhas, so too expounding the Dharma is not making the former expounding into the later expounding.

Therefore, the way of Shakyamuni Buddha is: "As all buddhas of the three times, in the manner of expounding the Dharma, I too now likewise expound the undifferentiated Dharma." Thus, just as all buddhas make use of expounding the Dharma, all buddhas make use of expounding the Dharma. Just as all buddhas correctly transmit expounding the Dharma, because all buddhas correctly transmit expounding the Dharma, it has been correctly transmitted from the ancient buddha to the Seven Buddhas, and from the Seven Buddhas it has been correctly transmitted to the present, and there is insentient beings expounding the Dharma. Within this insentient beings expounding the Dharma, there are all buddhas; there are all ancestors.

Do not study that my present expounding of the Dharma is a new branch not part of the correct transmission. Do not verify that the correct transmission since ancient times is the old den, a ghost cave.

In the Great Tang country, at Guangzhai Temple in the Western Capital, National Teacher Dazheng was asked by a monk, "Do insentient beings also understand and expound the Dharma?" The National Teacher said, "They constantly expound, ardently and unceasingly." The monk said, "Why do I not hear it?" The National Teacher said, "You yourself do not hear it; that should not hinder others from hearing it." The monk said, "I am not clear—who can hear it?" The National Teacher said, "All the sages hear it." The monk said, "Does the Reverend also hear it?" The National Teacher said, "I do not hear it." The monk said, "Since the Reverend does not hear it, how can you know that insentient beings understand and expound the Dharma?" The National Teacher said, "It is fortunate that I do not hear it.

If I were to hear it, then I would be equal to the sages, and you would then not hear my expounding of the Dharma." The monk said, "If so, then sentient beings have no share." The National Teacher said, "I expound for the sake of sentient beings, not for the sake of the sages." The monk said, "After sentient beings hear it, what then?" The National Teacher said, "Then they are not sentient beings." Beginners in study and late learners who would learn about insentient beings expounding the Dharma must earnestly study this encounter with the National Teacher. There is "constantly expounding, ardently and unceasingly." "Constantly" is every moment, a single moment.

"Expounding unceasingly" means that when expounding manifests, it is certainly unceasing. Do not study thinking that the manner of insentient beings expounding the Dharma must necessarily be like that of sentient beings. Because it should be like the sounds of sentient beings and like the manner of sentient beings expounding the Dharma, to seize the sounds of the sentient realm and liken them to the sounds of the insentient realm is not the Buddha Way.

Insentient beings expounding the Dharma is not necessarily sound as an object. For example, it is like the expounding of the Dharma by sentient beings not being sound as an object. For a while, one must investigate and study, questioning oneself and questioning others: what are sentient beings, what are insentient beings? Therefore, one should study carefully, with close attention: what could the manner of insentient beings expounding the Dharma be? Foolish people think that the rustling of trees in the forest, the blooming and falling of leaves and flowers, is insentient beings expounding the Dharma—such a person is not one who studies the Buddha Dharma.

If it were so, who would not know insentient beings expounding the Dharma, who would not hear insentient beings expounding the Dharma? For a while, one must turn the light around. In the insentient realm, are there grasses, trees, forests, or not? Is the insentient realm mixed with the sentient realm or not? Yet, to regard grasses, trees, tiles, and pebbles as insentient is not thorough study. To regard the insentient as grasses, trees, tiles, and pebbles is not full investigation.

Even if one now tries to regard the grasses and trees seen by humans as insentient, grasses and trees are not within the scope of ordinary thought. Why? The trees and forests of the heavens and the human world are vastly different; they are not the same as those produced in the central lands or border regions. The grasses and trees of the ocean depths and mountain recesses are all different. How much more so are there trees growing in the sky, trees growing in the clouds? Among wind, fire, and so on, of the hundreds of grasses and myriad trees that grow, there are some that should be studied as sentient, and some that are not regarded as insentient. There are grasses and trees like people and animals. Sentient and insentient are not yet clear. How much more so are the trees, stones, flowers, fruits, hot springs, and waters of the immortals' realm—even if seeing them does not give rise to doubt and attachment, would it not be difficult to speak of them?

Do not merely look at the grasses and trees of the divine continent of one country, become accustomed to the grasses and trees of one island of Japan, and then speculate and consider that all directions and the whole world must be like this. The National Teacher said, "All the sages hear it." That is to say, in the assembly where insentient beings expound the Dharma, all the sages stand and listen directly. They cause hearing to be fully realized for the sages and the insentient, and expounding to be fully realized. The insentient already expound the Dharma for the sages. Are they sages, or ordinary beings?

If one clarifies and exhausts the manner of insentient beings expounding the Dharma, one should fully comprehend that what the sages hear is like this. Having attained full comprehension, one can measure and know the realm of the sage. Furthermore, one must study the practice of the path that penetrates the night, transcending the ordinary and surpassing the sage. The National Teacher said, "I do not hear it." Do not think this saying is easy to grasp. Is it because of transcending the ordinary and surpassing the sage that he does not hear?

Is it because of smashing the nest of the ordinary and the sage that he does not hear? One must fully realize the expression through such investigation. The National Teacher said, "It is fortunate that I do not hear it. If I were to hear it, then I would be equal to the sages." This raising up is not one principle or two principles. "It is fortunate that I" is not the ordinary or the sage; could "it is fortunate that I" be the buddhas and ancestors? Because the buddhas and ancestors transcend the ordinary and surpass the sage, they would not be on the same level as what the sages hear.

One should cultivate the principle of the National Teacher's saying, "you would then not hear my expounding of the Dharma," and manage the bodhi of all buddhas and all sages. Its essential meaning is the so-called insentient beings expounding the Dharma, which the sages hear. The National Teacher expounds the Dharma, which this monk hears. One must make this principle the deepening days and months of investigative study.

For a while, one should question the National Teacher: not asking about after sentient beings hear, but when sentient beings are precisely hearing the expounding of the Dharma, what then?

The Great Ancestor Tōzan Gohon Daishi, when he visited his former teacher, the Great Monk Ungan, asked, “When insentient beings expound the *dharma*, who can hear it?” The former teacher Ungan said, “Insentient beings expound the *dharma*; insentient beings hear it.” The Great Ancestor said, “Do you, Reverend, hear it or not?” The former teacher said, “If I heard it, then you would not be able to hear me expounding the *dharma*.” The Great Ancestor said, “If it is like that, then I do not hear the Reverend expounding the *dharma*.” The former teacher said, “You do not even hear when I expound it—how much less when insentient beings expound the *dharma*!” Thereupon, the Great Ancestor composed a verse and presented it to his former teacher, saying: “How wondrous, how wondrous!

The insentient expounding the *dharma* is inconceivable. If you try to listen with your ears, you will never understand it. Only when you hear the sound with your eyes will you truly know.” Now, the principle of the Great Ancestor’s saying, “When insentient beings expound the *dharma*, who can hear it?” must be carefully investigated through one lifetime and many lifetimes of practice.

This very question itself possesses the merit of both asking and expressing. This expression has its skin, flesh, bones, and marrow; it is not merely a transmission from mind to mind. Transmission from mind to mind is an acknowledgment for beginners and late learners. There is a pivotal point of directly transmitting by raising the robe and directly transmitting by holding up the *dharma*. How could people today exhaustively master the practice of three autumns and four months?

Although the Great Ancestor had seen and heard the principle of the great verified Way, “When insentient beings expound the *dharma*, the sages hear it,” now there further arises the question, “When insentient beings expound the *dharma*, who can hear it?” Is this assenting to the great verification, or not assenting to the great verification? Is it asking, or is it expressing? If you do not assent to the great verification, how can you speak like this? If you do assent to the great verification, how can you understand speaking like this?

The former teacher Ungan said, “Insentient beings expound the *dharma*; insentient beings hear it.” One must correctly transmit this bloodline and have the practice of dropping off body and mind. That is to say, “Insentient beings expound the *dharma*; insentient beings hear it” must be the characteristic and appearance of “buddhas expound the *dharma*; buddhas hear it.” The assembly that listens to insentient beings expounding the *dharma*, whether sentient or insentient, whether ordinary beings or sages, must be insentient. Based on this characteristic and appearance, one should judge the authenticity of past and present.

Even if it is brought from India, if it is not a correctly transmitted true ancestor, it should not be used. Even if learning has continued unbroken for thousands of years, if it is not a direct transmission from successor to successor, it is difficult to inherit. Now that the correct transmission has already reached the Eastern Land, the distinction between authentic and inauthentic should be clear. Even when hearing the expression “sentient beings expound the *dharma*; sentient beings hear it,” one must receive the marrow of the buddhas and ancestors.

Listening to the expression of the former teacher Ungan and listening to the expression of the National Teacher Daishō, if one grants and denies, the sages who express “the sages hear it” must be insentient. The insentient that expresses “insentient beings hear it” must be sages. What insentient beings expound is insentient; because insentient beings expounding the *dharma* is precisely insentient. Therefore, it is insentient beings expounding the *dharma*; expounding the *dharma* is insentient.

The Great Ancestor said, “If it is like that, then I do not hear the Reverend expounding the *dharma*.” The “if it is like that” heard now is raising and holding up the principle of “insentient beings expound the *dharma*; insentient beings hear it.” Based on the principle of “insentient beings expound the *dharma*; insentient beings hear it,” it is “I do not hear; the Reverend expounds the *dharma*.” At this time, the Great Ancestor not only participated in the assembly of insentient beings expounding the *dharma*, but his aspiration to expound the *dharma* for insentient beings manifested and soared to the heavens.

He not only fully realized insentient beings expounding the *dharma*, but he fully investigated the hearing or not hearing of sentient beings expounding the *dharma*. Advancing further, he fully realized the expounding or not expounding of sentient beings expounding the *dharma*, in the already expounded, now expounded, and to be expounded. He exhaustively clarified the principle of which is sentient and which is insentient in the expounding of the *dharma* of hearing and not hearing. Generally, hearing the *dharma* is not merely the realm of the ear faculty and ear consciousness.

It is hearing the *dharma* with the exertion of power, exertion of mind, exertion of body, and exertion of the Way from before one’s parents were born, before the time of King *Vairocana*, extending even to the end of the future, and the endless future. There is hearing the *dharma* where the body precedes the mind. All these ways of hearing the *dharma* are beneficial. Do not say there is no benefit in hearing the *dharma* if it does not involve the mind consciousness. Those whose mind perishes and body disappears should receive benefit from hearing the *dharma*.

Those without mind and without body should receive benefit from hearing the *dharma*. Buddhas and ancestors invariably pass through such moments, become buddhas, and become ancestors. How could ordinary thinking completely perceive the contact of the power of the *dharma* with body and mind? The limits of body and mind cannot be completely clarified by oneself. The merit of hearing the *dharma* sowing seeds in the field of body and mind knows no time of decay. Ultimately, it grows together with the season and necessarily bears fruit.

Foolish people think that even if they diligently hear the *dharma*, if they make no progress in understanding and do not commit it to memory, there will be no benefit. To broadly memorize and hear much with the body and mind of humans and gods—this is most essential. To think that being forgetful on the spot and blank after leaving the seat is of no benefit, that there is no merit in study—this is because one has not met a true teacher and has not seen that person. Not having received direct face-to-face transmission is called not meeting a true teacher. One who has been correctly transmitted from buddha to buddha is a true teacher.

What foolish people call being retained by mind consciousness and not forgotten for a while is a moment when the merit of hearing the *dharma* slightly covers mind and covers consciousness. At this truly right such time, there is merit in covering body, covering body-before, covering mind, covering mind-before, covering mind-after, covering cause, effect, karma, characteristic, appearance, essence, power, covering buddha, covering ancestor, covering self and other, covering skin, flesh, bones, marrow, and so on. The merit of covering speech, covering sitting and lying down manifests and fills heaven and earth.

Truly, the merit of hearing the *dharma* like this is not easily known, but when meeting in the great assembly of buddhas and ancestors and investigating skin, flesh, bones, and marrow, there is no time when the power of expounding the *dharma* is lacking, and there is no place where the power of the *dharma* of hearing is not received. In this way, one makes the *kalpas* of time sudden and gradual and sees the manifestation of the fruition. That broad hearing and memorization, too, should not be utterly despised, but it is not to be taken as the sole essential point.

Practitioners should know this; the Great Ancestor fully realized this. The former teacher said, “You do not even hear when I expound it—how much less when insentient beings expound the *dharma*!” This is the former teacher, following along, opening his robe and verifying the marrow of the father-ancestor, as the Great Ancestor instantly manifests verification upon verification, carrying it forward. You still do not hear what I say; this is not merely the case of ordinary people. Even if the preaching of insentient beings were ten thousandfold, one must not be concerned—this is what is verified. The transmission at this time is truly secret and essential.

The realms of the ordinary and the sage are not easily approached or scrutinized. When the Great Ancestor composed a verse and presented it to his former teacher Ungan, he said: "The preaching of insentient beings is inconceivable; it is too wondrous, too wondrous." Therefore, both insentient beings and their preaching are difficult to conceive. What, then, is this so-called "insentient"? You must investigate that it is neither ordinary nor sage, neither sentient nor insentient.

The ordinary and the sage, the sentient and insentient—both preaching and not preaching—are realms beyond conception. Now, being inconceivable and too wondrous, they are beyond the reach of the wisdom, mind, and consciousness of ordinary people, worthies, and sages. They must not fall within the reckonings of heavenly beings or humans. "If you try to hear with your ear, you will never understand"—even with the heavenly ear, even with the *dharma*-ear that pervades worlds and times, if you attempt to hear with your ear, you will never understand. Even if you have an ear on the wall or an ear on the staff, you cannot comprehend the preaching of insentient beings, because it is not a matter of sound-objects. "If you try to hear with your ear" is not non-existent; even if you exhaust effort over hundreds of thousands of *kalpas*, you will never understand. It is already a single path of dignified activity beyond sound and form; it is not a den at the edge of the ordinary and the sage.

"Hearing sound with the eye, one can then know." Regarding this saying, some individuals think it means that the coming and going of grasses, trees, flowers, and birds, seen now by human eyes, is called "hearing sound with the eye." This view is completely mistaken. It is not the Buddha-Dharma at all. The Buddha-Dharma has no such principle. In investigating the Great Ancestor's "hearing sound with the eye," the place where one hears the sound of insentient beings preaching *is* the eye. The place where the sound of insentient beings preaching manifests *is* the eye. You must broadly investigate this "eye." Because "hearing sound with the eye" should be the same as "hearing sound with the ear," therefore "hearing sound with the eye" is *not* the same as "hearing sound with the ear." You must not investigate that there is an ear-faculty in the eye. You must not investigate that the eye is the ear. You must not investigate that sound appears within the eye.

An ancient said, "The entire ten-direction world is a single eye of a monk." If you hear sound with this eye, you must not deliberate and consider that it is the Great Ancestor's "hearing sound with the eye." Even if you study the ancient's saying that "the entire ten directions is a single eye," the entire ten directions *is* that single eye. Furthermore, there are a thousand hand-head eyes, a thousand true *dharma*-eyes. There are a thousand ear-eyes, a thousand tongue-tip eyes. There are a thousand mind-tip eyes. There are a thousand penetrating mind-eyes, a thousand penetrating body-eyes. There are a thousand staff-tip eyes, a thousand body-before eyes, a thousand mind-before eyes. There are a thousand eyes of death within death, a thousand eyes of life within life. There are a thousand self-eyes, a thousand other-eyes. There are a thousand eye-tip eyes, a thousand investigation-eyes. There are a thousand vertical eyes, a thousand horizontal eyes.

Therefore, even if you study the entire eye as the entire realm, there is still no thorough investigation of the "eye." You must urgently make it your essential task to investigate hearing the preaching of insentient beings with the eye. Now, the essential point of the Great Ancestor's teaching is this: with the ear, it is difficult to understand the preaching of insentient beings. With the eye, one hears the sound. Furthermore, there is hearing sound with the whole body, hearing sound pervading the body. Even if you do not thoroughly investigate "hearing sound with the eye," you must thoroughly realize and cast off the preaching of insentient beings and the hearing of insentient beings.

Because this principle is transmitted, my late teacher, the Ancient Buddha of Tiantong, said, "A gourd vine seed entwines a gourd." This is the preaching of insentient beings, in which the true eye of the former teacher is transmitted, the marrow is transmitted. By the principle that all preaching is insentient, there is the preaching of insentient beings—this is the so典故. Insentient beings preach for insentient beings. What do you call "insentient"?

Know that it is "the one who hears the preaching of insentient beings." What do you call "preaching"? Know that it is "the one who does not know my insentience.

Master Ciji of Mount Touzi in Shuzhou [successor to Master Cuwei Wuxue, posthumous name Datong. Mingjue said, "Touzi is an ancient buddha."], when a monk asked, "What is it for insentient beings to expound the dharma?" The master said, "Do not speak harshly." Now, this very expression by Touzi is precisely the dharma-model of the ancient buddhas, the governing image of the ancestors. "Insentient beings expound the dharma" and "expounding the dharma is insentient," and so on—in all cases, it is "do not speak harshly." Know that insentient beings expounding the dharma is the comprehensive canon of the buddhas and ancestors. It is not for the likes of Linji and Deshan to know; it is for the buddhas and ancestors alone to investigate.