The Treatise on the Two Entrances and Four Practices (Chinese: 二入四行; Pinyin:èrrú sìxíng; Wade–Giles:Erh-ju ssu-hsing; Japanese:Ninyū shigyō ron) is aBuddhist text attributed toBodhidharma, the traditional founder ofChan (Japanese:Zen) Buddhism.
The text, sometimes referred to simply asThe Two Entrances, was first used in 6th century CE by a group of wandering monks in Northern China specializing in meditation who looked to Bodhidharma as their spiritual forebear. Though this text was originally attributed to Bodhidharma, a great deal of material was added to it, probably around the 8th century, by the monks or perhaps other anonymous groups. The work, along with T'an Lun's biography of Bodhidharma and other newly discovered manuscripts, was recompiled into a larger text called theLong Scroll by a renowned Japanese Zen practitioner,Daisetsu Teitaro Suzuki, in 1935.
Thetwo entrances referred to in the title are theentrance of principle (理入 lǐrù) and theentrance of practice (行入 xíngrù).[1][note 1]
To enter by principle means to realize the essence through instruction and to believe that all living things share the same true nature, which isn’t apparent because it’s shrouded by sensation and delusion. Those who turn from delusion back to reality, who "meditate on walls," the absence of self and other, the oneness of mortal and sage, and who remain unmoved even by scriptures, are in complete and unspoken agreement with principle. Without moving, without effort, they enter, we say, by principle.[3]
According to John R. McRae, "the “entrance of principle” refers to interior cultivation, mental practice undertaken deep within the individual's psyche, and the “entrance of practice” refers to practice undertaken actively and in interaction with the world."[5] Yet, McRae also notes that it's not clear what exactly the "entrance of principle" entailed.[6] The phrase "wall contemplation,"biguan, is not directly explicated, though it is commonly used in Buddhist and Taoist literature to refer to both physically facing a wall and metaphorically cultivating non differentiation between all things through internal stillness. Later tradition graphically depicted it as practicingdhyana while facing a wall, but it may be a metaphor, referring to the four walls of a room which prevent the winds from entering the room.[7]
The format of the text is that of a collection of the master's teaching as collected by his students. There are two entrances listed, one abstract and one concrete. In other words, the text list two different ways of achieving enlightenment, one based on inward reflection (the entrance of principle) and one based on outward action (the entrance of practice). The bimodal structure of this treatise was frequently copied and became typical in early Chan Buddhism.
TheTwo Entrances and Four Practices makes up one part of a larger text known as theLong Scroll, dubbed the "Bodhidharma Anthology" by Jeffrey Broughton, considered to contain the earliest records ofChan. Although some of the contents of theLong Scroll were already known, the completeLong Scroll was discovered among theDunhuang manuscripts in the early part of the twentieth century. TheLong Scroll, orBodhidharma Anthology, contains seven parts: [1] a biography of Bodhidharma, [2] theErru Sixing (Two Entrances and Four Practices), [3-4] two letters by anonymous authors, and [5-7] three records of dialogues and sayings by various masters, the second and third of which include the teachings of the iconoclasticMaster Yüan. According to Broughton, the items comprising theBodhidharma Anthology should be regarded as individual texts unto themselves, rather than treat the Anthology as one piece.[8]
