Dharma Nature

THE DHARMA NATURE

Huángbò Xīyùn  黄檗希運 (d.850)

Huángbò Xīyùn (Huang-po) Hsi-yüan 黄檗希運 (d. 850), inspired by Baizhang Huaihai, 百丈懷海, a Mazu student, declared in his record:

"This very mind is Buddha. It reaches upward to all the Buddhas, and downwards to things that slither on the ground; everything that contains spirit (shen) possesses Buddha-nature, and is equal with respect to the substance of the one mind."

This "shen" is possesed by every living creature and is the higher unconscious motivator that transforms the Feminine Principle programs into Male expression.

The non-living inanimate elements of the apparent world do not possess this Shen; they do however follow the dictates of their nature.

Nanyuan Huiyong 南陽慧忠

(Nan-yang Hui-chung) (675-775)

In support a dialogue between the master and a student Ch'an master Hui-chung may well have been responding to the teachings of Shen-hui (or vice versa).

[The student] asked: "A venerable elder has said:

Lush groves of emerald bamboos,

Are wholly suchness.

Luxuriant clusters of chrysanthemums,

Nothing is not prajna.

As emerald bamboos do not lie beyond the Dharma-realm, are they not the Dharma-body? Moreover, the Mahaprajnaparamita-sutra says: 'Since matter is boundless, prajna is also boundless.' As chrysanthemums are but matter, are they not prajna?"

Now Hongren and another atrocity of manipulation by Heze Shenhui's faction. In a list of "transmission verses" among the Dun-huang documents a verse of Hongren is given as follows: 

Sentient beings come and lay down seeds,

And insentient flowers grow.

Without sentiency and without seeds,

The ground of mind produces nothing.

The clarity of this verse lies simply in the concept that insentient flowers are only produced by a mind that has own awareness and the capacity to lay the seeds of that awareness upon flowers, giving them apparent existence and life.

Thus Buddha Nature since it brings them into being is within all that is projected by the mind. The wise man perceives his own Buddha Nature reflected in what he has mind-produced.

Later versions of the verse found in the Shenhui "vulgate" edition of the Platform Sutra published in 1291, modifying the wording in such as way as to highlight complete opposition:

Sentient beings come and lay down seeds,

From the earth fruit is produced.

Without sentiency and without seeds,

There is no (Buddha) nature and nothing is produced.

A subtle change which presents a different idea.

 Shen-hui and his followers evidently saw the Buddha Nature doctrine as something that could be used to insert a wedge to make a larger division between the East Mountain rivals and his own group, by pulling Hongren into his own line of thought.