Huangbo

Realize the One Mind and You Will Be a Buddha

The master said to me, [Pei] Xiu:

All the buddhas and sentient beings are only the one mind; there is no other dharma. Since time immemorial, this mind has never been produced or extinguished. It is neither green nor yellow; it has neither form nor characteristics (lakṣaṇa). It does not belong to the categories of either existence or nonexistence. It cannot be measured in terms of new or old, long or short, large or small. It transcends all limits, measures, names, traces, and comparisons. What is right in front of you — that is it. But if you start to think, you will be far off the mark [The one mind] is like empty space. It has no boundaries and cannot be measured. Only this one mind is the buddha. There is utterly no difference between the buddha and sentient beings. Sentient beings are attached to appearances and seek outside [for the buddha]; but in seeking the buddha, they lose the buddha. They make a buddha look for a buddha and use the mind to grasp the mind. Even though they exhaust themselves until the end of the eon, they will never be able to get it. They do not know that, once they stop thinking and forget their pondering, a buddha will appear right in front of them. This mind is in fact the buddha. The buddha is in fact sentient beings. When it is in sentient beings, this mind is not diminished. When it is in all the buddhas, this mind is not augmented.

[This mind] is inherently endowed with even the six perfections and myriad [bodhisattva] practices, along with merit as abundant as the sands of the Ganges (Gaṅgānadīvālukā). One need not try to cultivate still more. When you encounter the [appropriate] conditions, act; when those conditions dissipate, remain quiescent. If, without definitive faith in the fact that this [mind] is a buddha, you want to seek merit through practice that is attached to characteristics, you will stay mired in deluded conceptions and will deviate from the Way. This mind is in fact the buddha. There is no other buddha and no other mind. This mind is bright and clear like empty space; it has not even the slightest mark or appearance. Arousing your mind and starting to think deviates from the essence of the dharma and creates an attachment to characteristics. Since time immemorial, no buddhas have clung to characteristics. If you pursue buddhahood by cultivating the six perfections and myriad practices, this involves a sequence [of practices]. Since time immemorial, no buddhas have followed a sequential approach. If you merely awaken to this one mind, there will not be the slightest dharma that you need to attain, for this one mind is in fact a genuine buddha. Since buddhas and sentient beings are the one mind, they are not different.

Like empty space, that mind is free from admixture or deterioration. It is like the great orb of the sun that shines over all four quarters of the world. When the sun rises, its light shines over the entire world, but empty space has never been illuminated. When the sun sets, darkness pervades the entire world, but empty space has never been darkened. The realms of light and dark alternate, but the nature of empty space is expansive and invariable. The minds of both buddhas and sentient beings are also like this. Say one observes buddhas as having the characteristics of purity, radiance, and liberation or observes sentient beings as having the characteristics of foulness, darkness, and birth and death. One who generates such an understanding will not be able to attain bodhi [enlightenment] even after kalpas [eons] as numerous as the sands of the Ganges, because one is attached to characteristics. There is only this one mind; there is not another dharma, even as small as a mote of dust, to be attained. The mind is the buddha. Those who train in the Way these days do not awaken to the essence of this mind. They then give rise to mental states overlaying this mind, seek the buddha externally, and practice while being attached to characteristics. All these are harmful techniques, not the path to bodhi.

    From: A BIRD IN FLIGHT LEAVES NO TRACE: The Zen Teaching of Huangbo with a Modern Commentary by Seon Master Subul.  Translated by Robert E. Buswell Jr. and Seong-Uk Kim.Wisdom Publications