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一七二　无字天书

大师声称他有一本书，记载着人们想要知道有关天主的一切。

从没有人见过这书，直到有位学者来访，禁不住他的苦苦哀求，终于从大师那儿挣得此书。他带囘去迫不及待地翻开，却发现每一页都是空白的。

「这书根本没说什么嘛！」学者极其失望。

「我知道，」大师心平气和地说：「仔细看看它所暗示的何等丰富！」

INSINUATION

The Master claimed he had a book that contained everything one could conceivably
know about God.

No one had ever seen the book till a visiting scholar, by dint of persistent entreaty,
wrested it from the Master. He took it home and eagerly opened it — only to find that
every one of its pages was blank.

“But the book says nothing.” wailed the scholar.

“I know,” said the Master contentedly. “But see how much it indicates!”

一七一　天　职

大师虽乐于看到科技的进步，却也清楚意识到它的限度。

当一位企业家问起他的职业，他答道：「我从事人类企业。」

「那算什么企业？」企业家问。

「就以你为例，」大师说：「你致力于制造优良产品，我致力于生产优良人类。」

后来大师告诉弟子：「生活的意义就是造就人类。可是现代人好像只关心改良产品。」

PRECEDENCE

The Master welcomed the advances of technology but was keenly aware of its
limitations.

When an industrialist asked him what his occupation was, he replied, “I’m in the
people industry.”

“And what, pray, would that be?” said the industrialist.

“Take yourself,” said the Master. “Your efforts produce better things; mine better
people.”

To his disciples he later said. “The aim of life is the flowering of persons. Nowadays
people seem concerned mostly with the perfection of things.”

一七０　揭　示

有天，大师问弟子：「天主存在吗？」
「存在。」弟子异口同声答道。
「错！」大师说。
「不存在。」弟子立刻改口。
「也错。」大师说。
「什么才是正确答案？」弟子问。
「没有答案。」
「为什么？」
「因为没有问题。」大师说。

事后，大师解释：「如果超越言词及槪念的那位，根本「不可说」，你如何能够提出任何问题？」

DEMONSTRATION

“Does God exist?” said the Master one day. “Yes.” said the disciples in chorus.
“Wrong.” said the Master. “No,” said the disciples. “Wrong again.” said the Master.
“What’s the answer?” asked the disciples. “There is no answer. “ “Why ever not?”

“Because there is no question.” said the Master.

Later he explained: “If you cannot say anything about Him who is beyond thoughts
and words, how can you ask anything about him?”

一六八　差　距

一座「趣味公园」的园主向大师叙述他矛盾的处境：当孩子们在他的公园内开怀作乐时，他常感到忧闷不堪。
「你宁愿拥有公园呢，还是拥有乐趣？」大师问。
「两样都要。」

大师无言以对。
事后有人问起此事，大师引用一位浪子对地主所讲的一番话：「你拥有土地所有权，他人却享有大地。」

The owner of a "fun park" described his contradictory feelings to the master: whenever children laughed and played joyfully in his park, he often felt deeply troubled.
"Would you rather have the park or the joy?" the master asked.
"I want both," the owner replied.

The master was left speechless.
Later, when someone asked the master about this, he quoted a wanderer's words to a landowner:
"You hold the deed to the land, but others enjoy the earth."

一六七　活于真实

大师似乎非常珍惜自己的生命，活得极其充实；同时，当他责斥政府的暴虐，或率领弟子照顾蔓延传染病的村民时，人人都看得出，他是在玩命。

「真正的智者对死亡一无所惧。」他曾说。

有囘，弟子问他：「一个人怎能如此轻易地交付自己的生命呢？」

「当天色已经破晓，有谁会躭心烛光将逝呢？」

REALITY

While the Master seemed to relish life and live it to the full he was also known to take
great risks, as when he condemned the tyranny of the government, thereby courting arrest
and death; and when he led a group of his disciples to serve a plague-stricken village.

“The wise have no fear of death.” he would say.

“Why would a man risk his life so easily?” he was once asked.

“Why would a person care so little about a candle being extinguished when day has
dawned?”

一六六　自我空虚

有个弟子为明心见性锲而不舍，终致病倒床榻。大师说：「光明可以捕捉，但不是用手；见性也可以获得，但不是用你的蛮力。」

弟子大惑不解：「你不是教我们应专致于自我空虚之道吗？我正是照你的指示做啊！」

「所以你就拼着老命地空虚自己？！」大师大笑不止。

DISAPPEARANCE

To a disciple who strained after enlightenment till he became physically weak, the
Master said, “A ray of light can be grasped — but not with your hands. Enlightenment can
be attained — but not by your efforts.”

The puzzled disciple said. “But did you not tell me to strive to become empty? That is
what I am attempting to do.”

“So now you are full of effort to be empty!” said the Master through his laughter.

一六五　鸢飞鱼跃

「什么是一个人最高明的作为？」

「静坐冥思。」

「可是我们很少看见大师自己静坐冥思。他常在家务事及田里来囘奔波，或是接待访客，从事写作等等。他甚至还负责整理寺内图书这类琐事呢！」

「你为什么把所有时间都耗在工作上呢？」

「当一个人工作时，他未必不在静坐冥思啊！」

CREATIVITY

“What is the highest act a person can perform?”

“Sitting in meditation.”

“But the Master himself was rarely seen to sit in meditation. He was ceaselessly
engaged in housework and fieldwork, in meeting people and writing books. He even took
up the book-keeping chores of the monastery.

“Why then do you spend all your time in work?”

“When one works one need not cease to sit in meditation.”

　

一六四　回　归

「一个人最高明的行动是什么？」

「是静坐冥思。」

「这不是导向无为吗？」

「它是无为。」

「那么无为胜有为囉？」

「无为是有为之动能。离开这源头，所有的行为都是死的。」

SURRENDER

“What is the highest act a person can perform?”

“Sitting in meditation.”

‘’Wouldn’t that lead to inaction?”

“It is inaction.”

“Is action then inferior?”

“Inaction gives life to actions. Without it they are dead.”

一六三　

有位作家请大师一语道出现代世界的面貌。

大师毫不迟疑地说：「人们对于宇宙的知识愈来愈丰富，对于自我的认识却愈来愈浅。」

有个天文学家，他简直被近代发现的天文奇观震慑迷住了，大师立即说：「宇宙内充满了亿万奇妙的东西，恒星也好，电波球体也好，即使是黑洞也好，最神奇的，莫过于自己了。」

SHALLOWNESS

A journalist one day asked the Master to name one thing that characterises the Modern
World.

The Master unhesitatingly replied, “People every day know more and more about the
Cosmos and less and less about themselves.”

And to an astronomer who held him spellbound with the wonders of modern
astronomy, the Master suddenly said, “Of all the millions of strange objects in the
universe — the black holes and quasars and pulsars — the strangest, unquestionably, is the
self!”

一六二　成　长

有个人常抱怨自己能力不足。大师说：「你的能力确实有限，可是你是否发现你今天已经能做十五年前你认为不可能做到的事情？究竟是什么改变了？」

「我的才能改变了。」

「不对，是你改变了。」

「这不是同一囘事吗？」

「不同，若你认定自己如此这般，你就是如此这般。当你的想法改变，你也就改变了。」

DEVELOPMENT

To a disciple who complained of his limitations, the Master said, “You are limited
indeed. But have you noticed you can do things today that you would have thought
impossible fifteen years ago? What changed?”

“My talents changed.”

“No. You changed.”

‘Isn’t that the same thing?”

“No. You are what you think you are. When your thinking changed, you changed.”