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1. In Buddhist literature, samādhi can be analyzed in three stages: entering into, dwelling in, and emerging from samādhi. Additionally, there is theory of the “five kinds of mastery” in developing samādhi, which consists of the above three (entering, dwelling, and emerging), with the addition of the masteries of turning and observing. 2. Master Xuyun replied that the eighteen day-long samādhi experience on Mt. Zhongnan at the age of 62 (Dec. 1901～Jan. 1902) was not intentional, for if there is an intention, then one cannot enter samādhi. Neither, however, does one enter samādhi unintentionally, as one is not insentient like a stone or a statue. (I.e., samādhi is entered neither through intention nor without intention.) Thus one should say “concentrate the mind, and nothing is impossible.” He also used the Chan practice of “observing the source of the language” (by Master Huangbo Xiyun, Tang dynasty) to answer the question of how one enters samādhi.
3. According to the Abhidharma-mahāvibhāsa-śāstra (fasc. 153), beings in the desire realm require the nourishment of food and drink (called “sequential physical food”) to sustain the existence of the bodily elements. If one dwells in samādhi for an extended period of time, although the body will remain intact during samādhi, its elements would disperse after exiting samādhi. Thus, one could dwell in the “concentration of cessation” for no longer than seven days and nights due to the lack of alimentary nutrition to sustain the body. The text also uses two real cases of dwelling in the concentration of cessation (one for three months, the other for a month or half a month) as examples for illustration. 4. The Cheng weishi lun liaoyideng discusses long-dwelling in the concentration of cessation, in which life is sustained by three kinds of spiritual nutriment: consciousness, sensory contact, and volition. But the Abhidharma-mahāvibhāsa-śāstra and the Tattva-siddhi-śāstra presume the absence of all four kinds of nutriment (sequential physical food, consciousness, sensory contact, and volition) during the concentration of cessation. 5. During the Yunmen incident in 1951, at the age of 112, Master Xuyun meditated and dwelled in samādhi for nine days. Afterwards he mentioned the experience of “dreaming that I visited tusita heaven, and saw Maitreya, who gave a discourse.” There are numerous records of meditators in Kāśmīra and India in the fourth and fifth centuries having similar experiences of visiting tusitaheaven for Maitreya's discourses. 6. During Master Xuyun’s samādhi, the poem “Consciousness and Wisdom, Waves and Water” given by Maitreya states that the relationship of consciousness to wisdom is like that of wave to water: the essence of water is no different from the essence of waves. The content may relate to the Zongjing lu, Bashi guiju song and Yuanjue jing, etc. The last two lines of the poem encourage the preservation of the compassionate vows to liberate all beings despite suffering throughout aeons of lives. Therefore, samādhi is not only for the inner peace of meditators, derogatorily termed “escapist Chan,” but when further exploited, samādhi becomes a pillar of spiritual strength to establish the Pure Land on earth. |
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