PZI Teacher Archives

Jiashan Gardening (BS68)

KOAN:

A student asked Jiashan, “What if you sweep away the dust and see the Buddha?”
Jiashan said, “You have to wield your sword. If you don’t, you’ll be like a fisherman stuck in a tangle of reeds, unable to catch a single fish.”

The student then asked Shishuang, “What if you sweep away the dust and see the Buddha?”
Shishuang said, “The Buddha has no country. Where will you meet her?”

The student reported this to Jiashan. Jiashan stepped up to the rostrum and said,“As far as gardening tools go, Shishuang is inferior to me, but for discourse on the
deepest reality, he’s a hundred steps ahead of me.”

—Book of Serenity, Case 68