Once Across, Let Go of the Raft; Not Yet Across, You Still Need the Boat

Verse One: Given to His Students

[Tang] Chan Master Guishan Zhengyuan

How many times has the vast sea turned to mulberry fields—

Only empty space, alone, shines clear and still.

Those who have reached the shore, let go of the raft;

Those not yet across, still need the boat.

Chan Master Guishan Zhengyuan of Changxi in Fuzhou was a native of Nanling in Xuanzhou, surnamed Cai. Disenchanted with the world from childhood, he left home and was tonsured at Jishan in his home prefecture. In the twelfth year of Yuanhe, he received the full precepts at Qianyuan Temple in Jianzhou. Later he called on Chan Master Lingmo of Wuxie and pressed into the most profound and subtle questions. In the tenth year of Xiantong he passed away at Guishan, at the age of seventy-eight, with fifty-four monastic years. By imperial decree he was given the posthumous title "Xingkong Daishi" (Master Xingkong, "Nature Emptiness").

"How many times has the vast sea turned to mulberry fields"—the opening line reveals that all phenomena are illusory and impermanent. Everything in the universe is in constant flux, rising or sinking, vast or minute; nowhere can a permanent, unchanging substance or self-nature be found. "Only empty space, alone, shines clear and still"—empty space is offered as a likeness for the wondrous, luminous true mind the Buddhas awaken to. Though the blue sea has long since given way to mulberry groves, our suchness, our Buddha-nature, this wondrous, luminous true mind, remains forever clear and bright—everlasting, blissful, filled with true self, and pure. This is the true face all beings inherently possess, the very truth the Buddhas have realized.

"Those who have reached the shore, let go of the raft; those not yet across, still need the boat." Saints who have realized the patience of the unborn dharma and reached the far shore of nirvana may, of course, set aside the various expedient means of the Dharma, no longer taking up attachment to the teachings themselves. Yet neither should they grow intoxicated with the pleasure of "quiescent extinction" and settle complacently into a state of empty stillness. Countless beings have yet to make the crossing, and so they should turn the boat around and, with compassionate vows, ferry all who share the affinity across.