Pŏmil
Pŏmil
810 – 889
Pŏmil (梵日, 810–889) is the founder of the Saguelsan school, another of the Nine Mountain Schools of Korean Seon[1]. He travelled to Tang China in 831 and received transmission from Yanguan Qi'an, a senior heir of Mazu Daoyi[1]. After fifteen years in China — including the disruption of the Huichang persecution of Buddhism (842–846) — he returned to Silla and established Gulsansa on Mount Saguelsan. Pŏmil's lineage was distinctive for cultivating close ties with the eastern Korean coast and the burgeoning trade networks with Japan; his successors maintained the school as one of the longest-running Mountain communities, and the Goryeo-era hagiographies preserve his teaching that the awakening transmitted to him in China is identical to the awakening of Mahākāśyapa under the Bodhi tree — a characteristic Mountain-school assertion of unbroken patriarchal lineage[2].
Names
Teachers and lineage of Pŏmil
Teacher / root master:
Teachings
The autumn moon rises without invitation. The mountain stream flows without effort. Where is the original nature? Asking is already arriving.
The King of Silla sent a royal messenger to Beomil at굴산사 (Gulsan-sa) with an invitation to come to the capital and serve as royal teacher. Beomil received the messenger courteously and replied: 'The king's mind and this mountain mind are not two minds. If the king wishes to study this mountain mind, let him sit quietly in the palace for one hour each day without affairs. The teaching will come of itself. If I were to come to the capital, I would bring the mountain with me, and the palace would become a mountain monastery. Better to leave each where it belongs.' He then offered the messenger tea and sent him back with a handful of mountain soil, saying: 'Give this to the king as my gift. The palace and the mountain are made of the same earth.'
Other masters in Seon
Master Record Sources
- biographyThe Formation of Ch'an Ideology in China and Korea — Robert E. Buswell