Huangbo Xiyun
Overview
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
master of Zen
Zen
Zen is a school of Mahāyāna Buddhism founded by the Buddhist monk Bodhidharma. The word Zen is from the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese word Chán , which in turn is derived from the Sanskrit word dhyāna, which can be approximately translated as "meditation" or "meditative state."Zen...
Buddhism
Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...
. He was born in Fujian
Fujian
' , formerly romanised as Fukien or Huguing or Foukien, is a province on the southeast coast of mainland China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, and Guangdong to the south. Taiwan lies to the east, across the Taiwan Strait...
, China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
in the Tang Dynasty
Tang Dynasty
The Tang Dynasty was an imperial dynasty of China preceded by the Sui Dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period. It was founded by the Li family, who seized power during the decline and collapse of the Sui Empire...
. Huángbò was a disciple of Baizhang Huaihai (720-840) and the teacher of Linji Yixuan (died 866) (Wade-Giles: Lin-chi I-hsüan; Japanese: Rinzai Gigen).
Very little about Huángbò‘s life is known for certain as, unlike other Transmission of the Lamp
Transmission of the Lamp
The Transmission of the Lamp is a compilation of biographies of prominent Buddhist monks produced in the Song dynasty by Shi Daoyuan .The first two characters of the title are the Song dynasty reign name , which dates the work to between 1004 and 1007 CE...
literature, there is no biographical information included with Huángbò‘s collection of sayings and sermons, the Ch’uan-hsin Fa-yao (Essential of Mind Transmission) and the Wan-ling Lu (Record of Wan-ling: Japanese: Enryōroku).
Quotations
A perception, sudden as blinking, that subject and object are one, will lead to a deeply mysterious understanding; and by this understanding you will awaken to the truth.
The Wan Ling Record of Xiu Pei, quoted in Why Lazarus Laughed : The Essential Doctrine, Zen — Advaita — Tantra (2003) by Wei Wu Wei
The foolish reject what they see and not what they think; the wise reject what they think and not what they see.
As quoted in Visions from Earth (2004) by James R. Miller, p. 17
:The Zen Teachings of Huang Po : On the Transmission of Mind (1958) by John Blofeld|John Blofeld,
When thoughts arise, then do all things arise. When thoughts vanish, then do all things vanish.
p. 80