How to Transcend Birth and Death 如何了生死
Master Wang Xianglu | 2018-06-23 | Download | AI assisted translation
| 苦义既明其根，当可以言了生死矣。学佛人往往不明生死为何事，总以未死前尚是生，已死了始是死，并且死了再不来，便是真了生死，如此说法，真是盲人说瞎话，连因果轮回的道理亦不明白。 |
Now that the meaning of suffering and its root have been clarified, we may speak of transcending birth and death. Buddhist practitioners often do not understand what birth and death are. They generally take being alive before death to be birth, and dying to be death; they further think that if one does not return after death, one has truly transcended birth and death. Such talk is truly like blind people discussing darkness; it does not even understand the principle of cause and effect and rebirth. |
| 要明白生死的理，先要明白是用什么东西来生死，这个东西，究竟是什么道理，明白了生与死，方才可以讲到了生死之法。报身是肉身，本是生灭无常，虽有亦属暂有，毕竟幻化不实，故名曰空。 |
To understand the principle of birth and death, one must first understand what undergoes birth and death, and what this thing truly is. Only after understanding birth and death can one speak of the method for transcending them. The body received as karmic recompense is the physical body; it is inherently arising and ceasing, impermanent. Though it exists, its existence is only temporary; in the end it is illusory and unreal, and is therefore called empty. |
| 如到变灭时，在凡夫视之，自然是死，在慧眼视之，未死之前，早已是死，未变灭时，亦早已变变灭灭，更谈不到奇怪。 |
When it reaches the time of transformation and dissolution, ordinary beings naturally regard it as death. From the perspective of the eye of wisdom, however, it was already dead before its death; even before it transformed and dissolved, it had long been continually transforming and dissolving. There is nothing strange about it. |
| 至于不生不灭之性，永远存在，凡夫不能见，遂执为非有，慧眼人了了见性，见其恒常不变，更谈不到生死，故云涅槃生死等空华。盖已明白生死流转，即是幻心流转。 |
As for the nature that neither arises nor ceases, it exists forever. Ordinary beings cannot see it and therefore cling to it as nonexistent. Those with the eye of wisdom clearly see their own nature and see that it is eternally unchanging, so there can be no question of birth and death. Thus it is said that nirvāṇa and birth and death are equally like flowers in empty space. For one has understood that the cycle of birth and death is the circulation of the illusory mind. |
| 幻心流转如轮，在六道尘海中，忽上忽下，曰生死海，轮转不已，曰生死轮。此幻心作茧自缚，越缠越缚，曰生死缚，如梦之不醒，曰生死长夜。佛出世度众，只度这幻心，使其由迷转觉，曰了生死。 |
The circulation of the illusory mind is like a wheel: amid the dusty ocean of the six realms, it suddenly rises and suddenly falls. This is called the sea of birth and death. Its ceaseless revolving is called the wheel of birth and death. This illusory mind spins a cocoon and binds itself; the more it entangles itself, the more tightly it is bound. This is called the bondage of birth and death. Like a dream from which one does not awaken, it is called the long night of birth and death. When the Buddha appears in the world to liberate sentient beings, he liberates only this illusory mind, turning it from delusion to awakening. This is called transcending birth and death. |
| 了者，了解也，证于理也，又了脱也，使其不造因受果，证于事也。此为人生唯一大事，故曰生死事大。然则肉报身，谈不到生死；法性常存，亦谈不到生死。 |
To transcend means to understand and to realize at the level of principle; it also means to be liberated, so that one does not create causes and undergo results, which is realization at the level of phenomena. This is the one great matter of human life; hence it is said, “Birth and death are a great matter.” Yet the physical body of karmic recompense cannot truly be said to undergo birth and death; nor can the dharma-nature, which constantly abides. |
| 只有幻心作怪，因迷而认妄为真，遂有轮转生死，如知是空华，不去当真，即无轮转，亦无身心受彼生死。 |
It is only the illusory mind that makes mischief. Because of delusion, it takes the false for the true, and thus there is the revolving cycle of birth and death. If one knows it to be like flowers in empty space and does not take it as real, there is no revolving cycle, nor is there any body or mind that undergoes that birth and death. |
| 不是造作出来的无生死，因本性原来是无生死，但凡夫不解生死之理，圣人只好依幻说幻，假定一个生死，下根人不明生死，只是怕死。小根人但求了生死，以为确有个生死可了。 |
It is not that freedom from birth and death is something artificially made, for one’s intrinsic nature has always been free from birth and death. But ordinary beings do not understand the principle of birth and death, so sages can only speak provisionally of illusion in terms of illusion, positing birth and death. Those of lesser faculties do not understand birth and death; they merely fear death. Those of somewhat greater faculties seek only to transcend birth and death, believing that there really is a birth and death to be transcended. |
| 大根人知生死不在肉报身，只是幻心轮转，幻心才是生死。上上根人，却认识心不可得，本来无生死，亦无有涅槃，第为众生故，不偏于空，不废于有，要对之说了生死，使其自悟，知生死是我的迷惑幻心，要了生死，先了幻心，心知为幻。幻灭即了，是真了生死者。 |
Those of great faculties know that birth and death do not lie in the physical body of karmic recompense, but only in the circulation of the illusory mind; the illusory mind itself is birth and death. Those of the very highest faculties, however, recognize that mind cannot be obtained: originally there is no birth and death, nor is there nirvāṇa. Yet, for the sake of sentient beings, they do not incline solely toward emptiness or abandon existence. They speak to them of transcending birth and death so that they may awaken for themselves, knowing that birth and death are their own deluded, illusory mind. To transcend birth and death, one must first transcend the illusory mind and know the mind to be illusory. When the illusion is extinguished, one is liberated. This is truly transcending birth and death. |
| 生死假名有二，一曰分段生死，乃舍弃其分段而另转一生死者。例如人死，则抛弃此身之分段，转为牛羊矣，牛羊死，则牛羊之分段身亦舍弃矣，如是轮转，名曰分段生死。二曰变易生死，乃意境上之变易，例如由凡夫至罗汉，复转为菩萨，乃属意转，非是形迁，及常寂不动地，变易生死了，乃名圆照湛寂，方登佛地矣。 |
Birth and death provisionally have two names. The first is segmented birth and death: one abandons one segmented existence and is reborn into another. For example, when a person dies, that person abandons this segment of existence and is reborn as an ox or a sheep. When an ox or sheep dies, its segmented body is likewise abandoned. Such revolving is called segmented birth and death. The second is transformational birth and death, which is transformation in one’s mental state. For example, one progresses from an ordinary being to an arhat, and then becomes a bodhisattva. This is a transformation of mind, not a change of physical form. When one reaches the ground of eternal quiescence and immovability, transformational birth and death is ended; this is called perfectly luminous and profoundly quiescent, and one then ascends to the Buddha-ground. |
| 总之分段身，系随爱根而受生，爱属何道，即受何身，爱起于幻心，幻心由迷而觉，不着幻境，即无身心受彼生死。是先了分段生死，再进而去其法执，即了变易生死。我人所修必先明心见性，证得根本智后，再勤除习气，方可真了生死。 |
In sum, one receives a segmented body in accordance with the root of attachment. Whichever realm one is attached to, one receives the body of that realm. Attachment arises from the illusory mind. When the illusory mind turns from delusion to awakening and does not cling to illusory circumstances, there is no body or mind that undergoes that birth and death. One must first transcend segmented birth and death, then proceed to eliminate attachment to dharmas, thereby transcending transformational birth and death. In our cultivation, we must first realize the mind and see one’s true nature. After directly realizing fundamental wisdom, we must diligently eliminate habitual tendencies; only then can we truly transcend birth and death. |
| 凡人生死，先由生起，先取境以为根据，譬如人见一猪，心中先生一个猪之影象，印入脑海，朝于斯，夕于斯，习之既久，因缘果熟，自然交会而变猪矣。 |
The birth and death of ordinary people begins with birth. They first take an object as their basis. For example, when a person sees a pig, an image of a pig first arises in the mind and is imprinted in the mind. Morning and evening, it remains there. When this has continued for a long time and causes and conditions ripen, they naturally come together, and the person becomes a pig. |
| 若一切不立，心中影象皆灭，纵有诸景，已知为幻，过而不留，不落痕迹，外境既无所附丽，性田即不起变化。十二因缘，不外爱取而入生死，根本乃在无明，转无明即是觉，觉知生之所以然，即可了知死之所以然。 |
If nothing is established and all mental images are extinguished, then even though various scenes may appear, one already knows them to be illusory. They pass without remaining and leave no trace. Since external objects have nothing to which they can attach, the field of one’s nature does not undergo transformation. The twelve links of dependent origination involve nothing beyond craving and grasping leading into birth and death; their root lies in ignorance. To turn ignorance around is awakening. When one knows why birth occurs, one can understand why death occurs. |
| 未知生，焉知死，生既不有，死又何依。人若了知生死是无明幻心所造，是理上了生死，若实行修持，求明心解缚，痛除自己习气，才是事上了生死。 |
If one does not know birth, how can one know death? Since birth is not truly existent, on what could death depend? If a person understands that birth and death are created by the ignorant, illusory mind, this is transcending birth and death at the level of principle. But only by actually practicing, seeking to realize the mind and untie its bonds, and painfully eliminating one’s own habitual tendencies does one transcend birth and death at the level of phenomena. |
| 生死之事大矣哉，生死这个东西，就是无明幻心一念之动，起了作用，由微细而入粗分，坚固成性，习于不觉，易入而难出。然天下无难事，千里之行，始于足下，行者果能痛切生死为可怖者，则当拔除其根，先破无明，然未知无明为何物，又奈何？以下当细释之。 |
How great indeed is the matter of birth and death! This thing called birth and death is simply the stirring of a single thought in the ignorant, illusory mind, which then begins to function. From subtlety it enters into coarseness, becoming firmly established as one’s nature. One grows accustomed to unawareness; it is easy to enter but difficult to escape. Yet nothing in the world is difficult: a journey of a thousand miles begins beneath one’s feet. If practitioners can deeply recognize birth and death as fearful, they should pull out its root and first break through ignorance. But if one does not know what ignorance is, what can be done? This will be explained in detail below. |
