Master Chushi Fanqi and His West Studio Pure Land Poems

In the history of our Pure Land tradition, there is one ancestral master we would do well to remember. Though he is not formally counted among the Pure Land patriarchs, he was a Chan master with a deep karmic affinity for Pure Land practice: Master Fanqi Chushi of the Ming Dynasty. In his early years he practiced Chan, attaining awakening under the elder Yuansou. He later opened a Chan meditation hall and accepted disciples, spreading the Chan teachings widely.

But from childhood, he had deep spiritual roots. Even as a boy he was drawn to the practice of Buddha-name recitation, and began reciting the Buddha’s name early on. After taking monastic vows, even as he continued his Chan practice, he kept to the Ten Recitations practice each day. He served as abbot of many monasteries, and after stepping down from his administrative duties, he built a place of practice called the Western Chamber — Xizhai — dedicated solely to Buddha-name recitation. Inside the Western Chamber he placed a simple cot, where he would sit in full lotus position, silently observing his own mind.

How did he practice Buddha-name recitation? He attained the samadhi of Buddha-recitation. He would silently observe his own mind, letting the three time periods of past, present, and future fall into stillness, then turning his contemplation to the eight directions above and below — the full ten directions of space — and letting those too fall into stillness. With both time and space stilled into emptiness, a lotus bloom would appear, and upon it sat Amitabha Buddha. Amitabha radiated blazing, brilliant light, and within that light were pavilions, ornate balustrades, and other such structures, with Guanyin Bodhisattva and Dashizhi Bodhisattva standing on either side, surrounded by the assembly of sages from the Western Pure Land.

Every time he sat to practice, this vision would appear before him, and what he beheld was the supremely magnificent Reward Body of the Buddha. Through this, his wisdom surged forth like a flowing spring. He composed a vast number of poems and verses — two to three thousand in all — and these were not the product of effortful construction by the ordinary sixth consciousness. They welled up spontaneously from his own nature. Only a tiny selection of his work was included in the Ten Essential Texts of the Pure Land, yet even that small sampling earned praise from Master Ouyi that could not be exceeded. Master Ouyi praised him thus: “I bow to the great guide Chushi — he is none other than Amitabha’s Perfect Enlightenment.” He encouraged all practitioners to read the Xizhai Pure Land Poems, saying that a single or double reading could dispel mundane thoughts, three or four readings could open wisdom, and after hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, even hundreds of millions of readings, your very body would be seated upon a lotus bloom.

As these lines show, the Xizhai Pure Land Poems are exquisitely crafted, rich in imagery and quiet beauty. I will share one with you now, to illustrate how he expressed the experience of beholding Amitabha Buddha.

Among his Pure Land poems is this one:

To behold the Infinite-Life One’s compassionate face, Look straight into the mind that holds you now. Sit and cut through the path of birth and death, of coming and going, Encompassing earth, water, fire, wind, and space. From the ushnisha atop his crown, a thousand beams of light stream out, Seated upon a lotus throne of woven brocade. At every turn, jeweled pavilions rise, Where pearls gleam bright and jade glows cool and clear.

This poem lays out exactly how he came to behold Amitabha Buddha. First, to contemplate Amitabha’s compassionate face, you do not look outward — it is all found within your own thoughts, right here in the mind you have right now. This aligns perfectly with what the Contemplation Sutra teaches: that Amitabha’s three bodies — Dharmakaya, Sambhogakaya, and Nirmanakaya — enter into the minds of all sentient beings. This is why we turn our contemplation inward, to the mind itself.

“Sit and cut through the path of birth and death, of coming and going” — this “sitting and cutting through” is the practice of entering into the emptiness of time. “Encompassing earth, water, fire, wind, and space” — the term “world” (shi) refers to time, while “realm” (jie) refers to space. The directions that make up a realm are composed of these five elements. To behold Amitabha, one must completely still both time and space. In this way, one can behold Amitabha’s ushnisha — one of the Buddha’s thirty-two major marks — radiating hundreds of thousands of beams of light. Amitabha sits upon his lotus throne, and all around him rise the pavilions of the Seven Jewels, hung with jeweled nets and strung with every kind of mani pearl, dazzling to the eye, exquisite in every detail.

These poems welled up directly from his own nature, and they also reflect what he perceived firsthand in his meditative visions. This kind of imagery fills his Pure Land poems: the visions are exquisitely beautiful, and fully aligned with the Dharma.

Master Fanqi Chushi practiced Chan and Pure Land as a single, integrated path. When he was on the verge of rebirth in the Western Pure Land, he composed his own farewell verse:

True nature, perfectly luminous, Fundamentally without birth or cessation. A wooden horse neighs in the night, The sun rises in the West.

“True nature, perfectly luminous, fundamentally without birth or cessation” — this is his realization of the original face before his parents were born, the highest, most direct step forward: a state of being beyond all arising and ending. Yet he did not rest in this state. If the first two lines express this non-abiding realization, the second two lines show the spontaneous arising of compassionate activity: “A wooden horse neighs in the night, the sun rises in the West.”

After writing the verse, he spoke to his fellow practitioner, the monk known as Mengtang E-gong. “Senior brother,” he said, “I am leaving.”

His fellow practitioner asked, “Where will you go?” Master Chushi replied, “To the West.” His senior brother pressed him: “There is a Buddha in the West — is there no Buddha in the East?” He may have thought Chushi was overly attached: why fixate on the West? Does the East not have its own Buddha? To this question that mixed insight with confusion, Master Chushi said nothing. He let out a single sharp, resonant shout — and passed on. It is a remarkable little exchange.

Master Fanqi Chushi attained this very samadhi. Within it, he could behold Amitabha Buddha directly — and to behold Amitabha is to behold all Buddhas of the ten directions, for Amitabha is the Dharmakaya that pervades the entire Dharma realm. This samadhi is thus one of the utmost importance in spiritual practice — the king of all samadhis.