Te-shan Hsuan-chien (Jap., Tokusan Senkan), ca. 781 -867; great Chinese Ch’an (Zen) master; a student and dharma successor (hassu) of Lung-t’an Ch’ung-hsin (Jap., Ryūtan Sōshin). Te-shan had nine dharma successors, among whom Yen-t’ou Ch’uan-huo (Jap., Gantō Zenkatsu) and Hsueh-feng I-ts’un (Jap., Seppō Gison) are the best known. As the master of Hsueh-feng, from whom both the Ummon school and the Hōgen school derive, he was one of the forefathers of these schools and one of the most important Zen masters of the T’ang period. He appears in examples 13 and 28 of the Wu-men-kuan and in example 4 of the Pi-yen-lu.
Te-shan was a Buddhist scholar from Szechuan. His given name was Chou, and since he was especially well versed in the teachings of the Diamond Sūtra and had composed a learned commentary on it, he was called Diamond Chou. In this sūtra it is said that it requires thousands of world ages for a person to attain buddhahood. When Te-shan heard that there was a Buddhist school in the south (the Southern school) that asserted that “[one’s own] mind i s Buddha,” he packed up his commentaries and headed south with the intention -as he thought- of refuting this false teaching. On the way he met an old woman, who made clear to him with a single comment that he, the great scholar, had not really grasped the deep meaning of the Diamond Sūtra. When Te-shan asked her about a master who had realized this deep meaning, she sent him to Master Lung-t’an. (For more on this, see Master Yuan-wu K’o-ch’in’s commentary on example 4 of the Pi-yen-lu.)
In example 28 of the Wu-men-kuan, we hear of Te-shan’s enlightenment under Master Lung t’an:
Once Te-shan was asking Lung-t’an for instruction late into the night. Lung-t’an said, “It is the middle of the night. Will you not retire?” Te-shan took his leave, raised the door hanging, and went out. As he saw the darkness outside, he turned around and said, “Dark outside.”
At this Lung-t’an lit a paper torch and handed it to him. Te-shan was about to take it when Lung-t’an blew it out.
All of sudden Te-shan had a moment of insight. He prostrated.
Lung-t’an said, “What truth did you see?”
Te-shan said, “From now on this one here [I] will not harbor doubts about the words of the old master [famous everywhere] under Heaven.”
The next day Lung-t’an ascended the high seat and said, “Among you there is a fellow with fangs like a sword-tree and a mouth like a bowl full of blood. If you hit him, he won’t turn his head. One day he’ll settle on some lonesome peak and establish our way there.”
Then Te-shan took his commentaries [on the Diamond Sūtra] went to the front of the dharma hall and said, “Even if we have mastered the profound doctrine, it is only like placing a hair in vast space; even if we have exhausted the essential wisdom of the world, it is only letting a drop fall into a great abyss.” He picked up his commentaries and burnt them. Then he bowed and departed.
After thirty years of living in hiding, Te-shan finally yielded with reluctance to pressure from the governor of Wu-lin in Honan to assume the leadership of the monastery on Mount Te-shan, from which his name is derived. Te-shan became famous for his use of the stick (shippei, kyosaku) in training his students (also Bōkatsu). The following remark of his has been handed down: “Thirty blows if you speak; thirty blows if you remain silent!”
Source: The Encyclopedia of Eastern Philosophy and Religion: Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Zen. Shambhala Publications, Inc.
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