Of Yinjiang in Sinan, Guizhou; his father was a Yang, his mother a Lu. Born on the twenty-third of the eighth month of 1640. He was betrothed at thirteen, lost his father at twenty-seven, and took the precepts of abstinence at twenty-nine. He liked the Ox-herding verses, and found his way in on hearing someone read the Mencius line 'the nature of a sheep is like the nature of an ox; the nature of an ox is like the nature of a man'. Two years later he left home against his mother's wishes and was ordained by MINSHU; Minshu died within the year, and after helping raise his stupa Daole went on to SHENGKE DEYU of Huayan. Shengke beat him at their first interview until his head bled — 'and then I began to know what hurt'. Shengke offered him a verse of transmission in the spring of 1676 and he DECLINED IT. He went back to Guizhou to see his mother, held Longshan monastery for three years, retreated to Mt. Gaotun through the fighting, buried his mother, and in 1684 came out of Shu to Zunyi, where he was kept at Yuquan monastery. In the spring of 1685, hearing that Shengke had left his monastery and was staying at Fangshan in Luzhou, he went to attend him again — and this time the old master tested him with the dead phrase, the live phrase and the neither-dead-nor-alive phrase, and sealed him with a verse, a staff and a whisk. He was abbot of Huayan in western Shu.
View interactive profile →