He immediately inquired about the sutra, and decided to seek out the Fifth Patriarch Hongren at his monastery on Huang Mei Mountain.
Huineng |
He stated that attaining perfect enlightenment was equal to becoming a Buddha, and this was also equal to definitively solving the gong'an, remarking that this was not his unique teaching, but that of numerous masters including Huineng, Ma Tzu, all the way down to current masters.
The story of Sun Wukong first meeting Subhūti was a play on the Zen story of Huineng meeting Hongren, as told in the Platform Sūtra of Zen Buddhism.
During a subsequent visit to the tomb of the Sixth Patriarch in Guangdong, Yunmen ended up joining (c. 911 CE) the monastery of Rumin Chanshi/Ling-shu Ju-min, who died in 918 CE.
Prime figures are the fifth patriarch Daman Hongren (601–674), his dharma-heir Yuquan Shenxiu (606?-706), the sixth patriarch Huineng (638–713), antagonist of the quintessential Platform Sutra, and Shenhui (670-762), whose propaganda elevated Huineng to the status of sixth patriarch.
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After being chosen by Hongren, the fifth patriarch, Huineng had to flee by night to Nanhua Temple in the south to avoid the wrath of Hongren's jealous senior disciples.