Master Yüan was an iconoclastic teacher who appears in the ''Long Scroll'' (also called the ''Bodhidharma Anthology'' by Jeffrey Broughton)'','' which contains the earliest known records of Chan. According to Broughton, despite being an obscure figure and not appearing in traditional collections of biographies or Chan genealogical charts, Yüan may be the earliest "Zen master."
Teachings
According to Broughton, Yüan's teachings prefigure the hallmark doctrine of
sudden awakening
Sudden awakening or Sudden enlightenment (), also known as subitism, is a Buddhist idea which holds that practitioners can achieve an instantaneous insight into ultimate reality (Buddha-nature, or the nature of mind). This awakening is describe ...
famously advocated by the later Southern School of Chan, thus making its hero,
Huineng
Dajian Huineng or Hui-nengThe Sutra of Hui-neng, Grand Master of Zen, with Hui-neng's Commentary on the Diamond Sutra, translated by Thomas Cleary, Shambhala Publications, 1998 (; February 27, 638 – August 28, 713), also commonly known as the ...
, a "descendant in rhetoric" of Yüan. Yanagida Seizan also considers Yüan's teaching to anticipate Shenhui's critique of the gradualistic meditation methods of the Northern School,John R. McRae. Yanagida Seizan's Landmark Works on Chinese Ch'an, page 89, Cahiers d'Extrême-Asie, vol. 7, 1993. Numéro spécial sur le Chan/Zen : Special Issue on Chan/Zen. En l'honneur de Yanagida Seizan and sees Yüan as foretokening the radical and spontaneous approach of
Linji Yixuan
Japanese painting of Linji
Linji Yixuan (; ''Rinzai Gigen''; died 866 CE) was a Tang dynasty (618-907) Chinese monk and teacher of the Hongzhou school of Chinese Chan (Zen). Linji was the leading figure of Chan Buddhism in the Tang, and the '' ...
as well, as Yüan taught that one must have energy and liveliness so as to not be deceived by others and the Dharma. Broughton states that:
He üanis iconoclastic, consistently criticizing reliance on the Dharma, reliance on teachers, reliance on meditative practice, reliance on canonical texts. Faith in Buddhist teachings and teachers, praxis according to the traditional rules, and learning in scripture lead to nothing but self-deception and confusion. From this stance Master Yüan never budges. His relentless boldness prefigures much in the stance of the full-blown Ch'an tradition.
According to Master Yüan, not only should one not rely on others, but even reliance on Dharma itself is ultimately mistaken. As John Jorgensen points out, this goes a step further than classical sources such as the four reliances taught in the ''
Vimalakīrti Sūtra
The ''Vimalakīrti Nirdeśa'' (Devanagari: विमलकीर्तिनिर्देश) (sometimes referred to as the ''Vimalakīrti Sūtra'' or ''Vimalakīrti Nirdeśa Sūtra'') is a Buddhist text which centers on a lay Buddhist medita ...
'' which argued that, rather than rely on people, one should rely on Dharma; as well as the ''Dazhidu lun'' which says, "when the Buddha was about to enter Nirvana he said to his followers: 'From now on, rely on the Dharma, and not on people!'" For Master Yüan, to value one person as correct, even the Buddha, is for one's mind of faith to become heavy. On the other hand, to depend on Dharma was "still a one-sided view." Instead, Yüan says, "If you have bodily energy, you will avoid the deceptive delusions of people and Dharma, and your spirit will be all right."
While Yüan criticizes such things as reliance on texts, teachers, and traditional practices, he speaks positively of bodily energy (''t'i-ch'i'') and spirit (''ching-shen''). The latter term can be found in Daoist works such as the ''Zhuangzi'' and ''
Liezi
The ''Liezi'' () is a Taoist text attributed to Lie Yukou, a c. 5th century BC Hundred Schools of Thought philosopher. Although there were references to Lie's ''Liezi'' from the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC, a number of Chinese and Western scholar ...
'', and in Chinese medical texts, where ''ching-shen'' refers to vim, vigor, and stamina. For Yüan, energy and spirit are necessary to overcome ingenious artifice (''ch'iao-wei''), another term appearing in the ''Zhuangzi''. However, as Broughton points out, this does not make Yüan a Daoist, but rather a Buddhist in the
Bodhidharma
Bodhidharma was a semi-legendary Bhikkhu, Buddhist monk who lived during the 5th or 6th century CE. He is traditionally credited as the transmitter of Chan Buddhism to China, and is regarded as its first Chinese Lineage (Buddhism), patriarch. ...
circle who cast his understanding in native Chinese terms. According to Master Yüan, to give rise to the thought of moving toward the path is to have "crafty artifice," a mind of devices in which "a hundred ingenious schemes arise." For Yüan, this is to fall into having mind. Yüan says:
If you desire to cut off crafty artifice, don't produce the thought of enlightenment and don't use knowledge of the sutras and treatises. If you can accomplish this, then for the first time you will have bodily energy. If you have spirit, do not esteem understanding, do not seek Dharma, and do not love knowledge, then you will find a little quietude. ... If you do not seek wonderful understanding, do not serve as a teacher for people, and also do not take Dharma as your teacher, you will walk alone spontaneously.
In the same vein as
Vimalakīrti
Vimalakīrti ( ' "stainless, undefiled" + ' "fame, glory, reputation") is a bodhisattva and the central figure in the ',Śāriputra
Śāriputra (; Tibetan: ཤཱ་རིའི་བུ་, Pali: ''Sāriputta'', lit. "the son of Śāri", born Upatiṣya, Pali: ''Upatissa'') was one of the top disciples of Gautama Buddha, the Buddha. He is considered the first of the Buddh ...
for his addiction to sitting in the cross-legged posture, Master Yüan saw attachment to sitting meditation as a form of "ingenious artifice." According to Broughton, this criticism was directed at members of the Bodhidharma circle who reified the practice of sitting meditation. Yüan says:
All the sutras and treatises are dharmas that produce mind. If you produce a mental focus on the path, then ingenious artifice will give rise to knowledge and a complement of events. If mind is not produced, what need is there for cross-legged sitting dhyana? If ingenious artifice does not arise, why toil over right mindfulness? If you do not raise the thought of enlightenment and do not seek insight and understanding, then you will exhaust both phenomena and principle.
For Yüan, entering into meditation so that the mind does not move is a form of bondage. He says even the four dhyānas are just temporary states that should not be valued. According to Yanagida, these critiques served as the basis for Shenhui's later criticism of the Northern School. When asked how one should quiet the mind, Yüan replies that mind is "mysterious and not something to be concerned about." For Yüan, the man of spirit is neither drawn into disturbance nor quiescence. Yüan says, "If there is one dharma to be esteemed or valued, this dharma will be the one most capable of binding and killing you, and you will fall into having mind. This is an unreliable state of affairs." Yüan instead states that he has no Dharma to teach, since to set up a Dharma would be to deceive people. When pressed on this by a questioner, Yüan simply remains silent, echoing
Vimalakīrti
Vimalakīrti ( ' "stainless, undefiled" + ' "fame, glory, reputation") is a bodhisattva and the central figure in the ',Prajñāpāramitā sutras, for example: "non-renunciation of moral training consists in the non-observation of all moral duties."
According to Yanagida, Master Yüan may have been the inspiration for the
Oxhead School
The Oxhead school (牛頭宗 ''Niu-t'ou zong'') was an important tradition of Chinese Chan Buddhism in the Tang dynasty, which claimed to have been founded by Niutou Farong 牛頭法融 (594–657), whom the tradition regards as a Dharma heir of t ...
text, the ''Jueguan lun'' (Treatise on Cutting Off Contemplation). Broughton too observes that the ''Jueguan lun'' contains a dialogue between two figures, Ju-li (Entrance-into-Principle) and Yüan-men (Gate-of-Conditioned). According to Broughton, the latter may be a literary representation of Master Yüan, whose name means "conditioned."Jeffrey Broughton. The Bodhidharma Anthology: The Earliest Records of Zen, pages 84-85, University of California Press, 1999 Yanagida also believed that Master Yüan's dialogues were known to the author of the ''Zhengdao ge''.