Kuei-shan Ling-yu also Wei-shan Ling-yu (Jap., Isan Reiyū), 771 -853; great Chinese Ch’an (Zen) master; a student and dharma successor (hassu) of Pai-chang Huai-hai (Jap., Hyakujō Ekai) and the master of Yang-shan Hui-chi (Jap., Kyōzan Ejaku) and Hsiang-yen Chih-hsien (Jap., Kyōgen Chikan). Kuei-shan was quite the best known Buddhist master of his time in southern China. The monastic community that gathered about him numbered 1,500, and he had forty-one dharma successors. He and his principal student Yang-shan founded the Igyō school, the name of which comes from the initial characters of their names (Igyō school). Kuei-shan appears in example 40 of the Wu-men-kuan, as well as in examples 4, 24, and 70 of the Pi-yen-lu. His sayings and teachings are recorded in the T’an-chou Kuei-shan Ling-yu-ch’an-shih yü-lu (Record of the Words of Ch ‘an Master Kuei-shan Ling-yu from T’an chou). Kuei-shan became a monk at the age of fifteen and first trained in a monastery of the Vinaya school of Buddhism. At the age of twenty-two he came to Pai-chang, became his student , and under h i m realize’d profound enlightenment. Even after his enlightenment he trained further under Pai-chang and served for twenty years in his monastery as head cook (tenzo). He is Pai-chang’s most important dharma successor and received from him his hossu as a token of confirmation (inka-shōmei). This hossu plays a role in the famous hossen with Master Te-shan (Pi-yen-lu 4).
When Master Pai-chang was looking for a suitable abbot for a newly founded monastery on Mount Kuei-shan, the following incident, which appears as example 40 of the Wu-men-kuan, took place:
Master Kuei-shan, when he was training under Pai-chang, worked as head cook. Pai-chang wanted to select an abbot for the Kuei-shan monastery. He opened the matter up to the head monk and all the monks, indicating that they should speak and the right one would go. Thereupon Pai-chang held up a jug, placed it on the fl o or and asked, “This you should not call jug; so what do you call it?”
Then the head monk said, “One can’t call it a wooden sandal.”
Now Pai-chang asked Kuei-shan. Kuei-shan immediately knocked the jug over and went away.
Pai-chang said, laughing, “The head monk lost to Kuei-shan,” and he directed that Kuei-shan should found the new monastery.
Thus empowered, Kuei-shan went to Mount Kuei-shan, the name of which he later assumed, built himself a hut, and did nothing other than train himself further there. He built no buildings, offered teaching to no students. Only after seven or eight years did anyone notice him; students began to gather around him and soon a large monastery came into being.
Source: The Encyclopedia of Eastern Philosophy and Religion: Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Zen. Shambhala Publications, Inc.
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