慧思

慧思的事，藏中有兩隻眼：一是他自己的筆，一是道宣的傳。他親撰的《立誓願文》開卷即自道來歷，末法之數與生地一併交代：「我慧思即是末法八十二年。太歲在乙未十一月十一日。於大魏國南豫州汝陽郡武津縣生。至年十五出家修道。誦法華經及諸大乘。」〔T46n1933 0787a04〕道宣所記鄉里與之相合：「釋慧思。俗姓李氏。武津人也。少以弘恕慈育知名。」〔T50n2060 0562c06〕出家之後他以誦持為業：「誦法華等經三十餘卷。數年之間千遍便滿。」〔T50n2060 0562c12〕「末法」二字在他筆下不是對時代的評語，是他替自己定的位置——先定了位置，才有那一段誓：「我為眾生及為我身求解脫故。發菩提心立大誓願。欲求如來一切神通。若不自證何能度人。」〔T46n1933 0787a13〕

Two eyes in the canon look upon Huisi: his own brush, and Daoxuan's account. The Text of the Great Vow, written in his own hand, opens by placing him — the count of the Latter Dharma and the place of his birth given together: "I, Huisi, am of the eighty-second year of the Latter Dharma. In the year yiwei, on the eleventh day of the eleventh month, I was born in Wujin county, Ruyang commandery, Southern Yu province, in the state of Great Wei. At fifteen I left home to cultivate the Way, reciting the Lotus Sūtra and the other Mahāyāna scriptures" 〔T46n1933 0787a04〕. Daoxuan's record of his native place agrees: "Śramaṇa Huisi. His lay surname was Li; he was a man of Wujin. From his youth he was known for a broad forbearance and a nursing kindness" 〔T50n2060 0562c06〕. After going forth he made recitation his work: "He recited the Lotus and other scriptures, more than thirty scrolls in all; within a few years he had completed a thousand recitations" 〔T50n2060 0562c12〕. Under his brush "Latter Dharma" is no verdict on the age but the position he assigned himself — and only once the position was fixed did the vow follow: "For the sake of beings, and for the sake of my own body's liberation, I raised the mind of awakening and set up the great vow, seeking all the spiritual powers of a Tathāgata. If I do not myself verify them, how shall I deliver others?" 〔T46n1933 0787a13〕

求定的路上他歸依了慧文：「時禪師慧文。聚徒數百。眾法清肅道俗高尚。乃往歸依從受正法。」〔T50n2060 0562c28〕一夏束身長坐，過了兩時仍無所證；夏竟受歲，慨無所獲，自傷昏沈。轉機恰恰落在放下的那一刻：「放身倚壁。背未至間霍爾開悟。法華三昧大乘法門一念明達。」〔T50n2060 0563a11〕背還沒靠到牆，事情已經成了。這一段是天台觀門的來處：所悟不是一句道理，是「法華三昧」四字裡的一整條路。

On the road of seeking concentration he took refuge with Huiwen: "At that time the meditation master Huiwen had gathered several hundred followers; the discipline of the assembly was pure and strict, and monks and laity alike held them in esteem. He went and took refuge, receiving the right Dharma from him" 〔T50n2060 0562c28〕. He bound his body to long sitting for a summer, and after two seasons still had verified nothing; when the summer ended and the year was received, he grieved at having gained nothing and reproached his own torpor. The turn came precisely at the moment of letting go: "He let his body fall back against the wall, and before his back had touched it he was suddenly awakened; the Lotus samādhi and the Dharma-gate of the Great Vehicle were understood clear through in a single thought" 〔T50n2060 0563a11〕. His back had not yet reached the wall and the thing was already done. Here is where the Tiantai gate of contemplation comes from: what he awakened to was not a proposition but a whole road folded into four words — the Lotus samādhi.

避難南行，權止光州大蘇山：「權止大蘇山。數年之間歸從如市。」〔T50n2060 0563a25〕天台一宗的師資就在這座山上接了起來。他以道俗福施造金字經：「又以道俗福施。造金字般若二十七卷金字法華。」〔T50n2060 0563a29〕又命學生代講：「後命學士江陵智顗。代講金經。至一心具萬行處。顗有疑焉。」〔T50n2060 0563b04〕釋疑之語不從理上答，從身上答：「吾昔夏中苦節思此。後夜一念頓發諸法。吾既身證不勞致疑。」〔T50n2060 0563b06〕於是「顗即諮受法華行法。」〔T50n2060 0563b08〕——師資之立，不從寒暄起，從功夫起。

Fleeing southward from danger he halted for a time at Mount Dasu in Guangzhou: "He halted for a time at Mount Dasu, and within a few years those who came to follow him were like a market" 〔T50n2060 0563a25〕. It was on this mountain that the master-and-disciple line of the Tiantai school was joined. From the merit-offerings of monks and laity he had scriptures made in gold letters: "From the merit-offerings of monks and laity he had made a gold-lettered Prajñā in twenty-seven scrolls and a gold-lettered Lotus" 〔T50n2060 0563a29〕. And he set his student to lecture in his place: "Afterwards he directed his student Zhiyi of Jiangling to lecture on the gold-lettered scripture in his stead; and when Zhiyi reached the passage on the one mind being furnished with the ten thousand practices, he had a doubt" 〔T50n2060 0563b04〕. His resolving words answered not from doctrine but from the body: "In a former summer I toiled at this in strict austerity, and in the last watch of a night all dharmas broke open in a single thought. Since I have verified it in my own person, there is no need to press the doubt" 〔T50n2060 0563b06〕. Thereupon "Zhiyi at once received from him the practice-method of the Lotus" 〔T50n2060 0563b08〕 — a master-disciple bond founded not on courtesies but on the work.

其後率眾南趣衡岳：「又將四十餘僧經趣南岳。即陳光大年六月二十二日也。」〔T50n2060 0563b14〕臨終大集門學連日說法，苦切呵責，末以一問付眾：「告眾人曰。若有十人不惜身命常修法華般舟念佛三昧方等懺悔常坐苦行者。」〔T50n2060 0563c18〕苦行事難，竟無答者，於是「因更攝心諦坐至盡。咸聞異香滿於室內。」〔T50n2060 0563c26〕道宣繫其日：「即陳太建九年六月二十二日也。取驗十年宛同符矣。春秋六十有四。」〔T50n2060 0563c27〕——來日與去日同是六月二十二，十年之約分毫不爽。本編天台宗書第二章即以此段師資與付囑立宗〔《天台宗通》第二章〕。

He then led his community south to Mount Heng: "He led some forty monks and made his way to Mount Nanyue; this was on the twenty-second day of the sixth month of the Guangda era of Chen" 〔T50n2060 0563b14〕. At the end he gathered his students for days of teaching, rebuking them bitterly, and left the assembly with one question: "He said to the assembly: if there be ten among you who will not spare body or life, but constantly cultivate the Lotus, the pratyutpanna and the buddha-recollection samādhis, the extended repentance, constant sitting and austere practice —" 〔T50n2060 0563c18〕. Austerity being hard, no one in the end answered; and so "he gathered his mind once more and sat upright to the end. All present smelled a strange fragrance filling the room" 〔T50n2060 0563c26〕. Daoxuan fixes the day: "This was the twenty-second day of the sixth month of the ninth year of Taijian under the Chen; measured against the ten years he had foretold, it tallied exactly. He was sixty-four" 〔T50n2060 0563c27〕 — the day he came and the day he went were both the twenty-second of the sixth month, and the ten-year reckoning did not miss by a hair. Chapter two of this edition's Tiantai school volume founds the school on precisely this transmission and entrustment 〔Tiantai exposition, chapter 2〕.