Dual Cultivation of Chan and Pure Land, and the Abandonment of Chan for Pure Land

The second doubt concerns the claim that "there is no need for investigative meditation."

We know that Master Ouyi had practiced Chan and had even attained awakening. In his early years, he did to some extent practice the dual cultivation of Chan and Pure Land, but by the time he wrote the Essential Explanation of Amitabha, he had become a Pure Land patriarch pure and simple, having entirely set Chan aside. This is what is meant by "dissolving Chan into Pure Land." Hence, with great severity here, he declares that no investigative meditation is necessary.

For many Chan practitioners, this becomes a point of doubt. Someone might ask, for example: "Chan masters like Tianqi Benrui and Dufeng Benshan both advocated the investigation of the topic 'Who is it that recites the Buddha's name?' So how can you say there is no need for such investigation?" Now observe the spirit Master Ouyi displays here. First, he tells the questioner: although this saying comes from Patriarchs Tianqi and Dufeng, you must understand where their true intent lay.

These patriarchs saw that those who recite the Buddha's name could not grasp the ultimate compassionate intention behind Shakyamuni Buddha's teaching of the Pure Land dharma. So they took the act of reciting the Buddha's name as a topic for awakening rather than as a means toward rebirth and Buddhahood—and that is to go against Shakyamuni's compassionate heart. Seeing that you did not understand, and unable to remain silent, they pointed directly at you with this instruction: investigate "Who is reciting the Buddha's name?"—as a way of waking you up.

What were they waking you up to? "How much more so when the long night is broken by the returning dawn!" Chan practitioners often speak of "the Pure Land of Mind Only" and "Amitabha of one's own nature," yet the kind of "mind" they speak of is the mind of dependent impressions. Where is the Pure Land within such a mind of dependent impressions? This mind of dependent impressions is itself the "long night"—the long night of ignorance.

To break through this long night and welcome the returning dawn is to manifest the boundless light of Amitabha's name. It is the merit of this boundless light bearing the power of the name that can resolve the problem of our cyclic existence! When you reach the Western Land of Ultimate Bliss, the flower opens and you behold the Buddha—this is not ordinary awakening, but the realization and certification of the patience of the non-arising dharma.

Ordinary Chan practitioners do not understand this situation, so they take the topic "Who is reciting the Buddha's name?" as their subject of investigation. The aim toward which they are pointing is problematic. The patriarchs used this kind of wake-up call precisely because of that. We, however, having failed to grasp the patriarchs' true intent, even now "refuse to settle the mind in recitation," insisting on treating the recitation of the name as a topic for Chan investigation. This is like taking a tile used for knocking at the door and hurling it at one's own birth parents inside the house. You must understand: this name is a golden brick! You discard the golden brick, pick up a broken tile, and use it to beat your own father and mother. The "house" represents the body, and the mind-nature is like the birth parents.

In reality, this is adding a head atop a head, piling one bed upon another. By this stage, Master Ouyi no longer advocated the dual cultivation of Chan and Pure Land—pure and simple recitation of the name was his entire teaching. Within the name itself lies the supreme, profound, and wondrous Chan; there is no need to search for some Chan outside of the name. If you still treat the recitation of the Buddha's name as a topic for investigation, it is like using a door-knocking tile to strike at one's birth parents inside the house. Then, regarding those patriarchs: failing to understand their intention, you cannot "follow their intent with goodness," and instead turn it into "evil transgression." That is the meaning here. This is a particularly penetrating understanding.

The questioner then asks further: "If one's recitation of the Buddha's name is to accord with the Buddha's vow and the Buddha's mind, one must have faith in order for that accord to exist. But if a person lacks such faith and does not acknowledge this, how can he or she correspond with the Pure Land dharma?" The answer comes: "Yi…" The interjection "Yi" (Alas!) carries a tone of lament over their unwillingness to strive—pity for their misfortune, and vexation at their refusal to fight.

Alas! Because you refuse to believe and refuse to recite the Buddha's name, you have not adorned the name with faith and vow. You have reduced the name to a mere technique of practice—and that is a deeply regrettable situation. Therefore, one must speak to you in this way, urging you to truly "respond with a willing heart."

But you people have not yet unveiled a right faith in Amitabha's name; you have not grasped the true purport of "the Pure Land of Mind Only, Amitabha of one's own nature." Still bound by self-clinging and dharma-clinging, you are like a raw cowhide that cannot be bent or folded.

One who understands the merit of the name is as though the eyes of right faith have been opened. Once the eyes of right faith are open, there is no longer any need to engage in Chan investigation.

It is like the midday sun already shining brightly—do you still need to light an oil lamp beneath it? What use would that oil lamp have under the blazing midday sun?! Those who possess right view have no need of it.

But for those who lack right view, why would they labor so hard to seek out a lamp beneath the blazing midday sun?