When the Disciples First Came,
They Met with
Difficulty
Before Patriarch Bodhidharma himself went to
China, he sent two of his disciples there first. Who would have
thought that when they got to China they would be totally ostracized
and bullied?
Those two disciples, named Fo Tuo and Ye She, were
Indians who went to China to transmit the Sudden Teaching Dharma Door
of the Chan School that advocates seeing the nature and becoming a
Buddha, and which does not abide in language.
At that time in China
another Indian monk
named Bodhiruchi was aware that these two monks
had also come from India to explain the Chan School. Chan
belongs to the Great Vehicle Teaching, but Bodhiruchi explained the Tripitaka
Teaching, which belongs to the Small Vehicle.
For that reason,
Bodhiruchi got all other monks to join together to ostricize these two
Indian monks. No matter what they said, no one would listen. No matter
where they went, everyone ignored them. Deciding that the situation
was meaningless, they left. That is how these two disciples of
Patriarch Bodhidharma came to leave the western capital of Changan.
