Of the Chen clan of Linhai, Taizhou; his mother of the Lin clan. At seven he entered the village school and never needed a lesson twice. Before he came of age he asked his parents to let him enter the sangha and was tonsured under Jizhao at Jingshan. He called on Lingshi at Jingci and on Yiyuan, then went with Mu'an Cong to Zhuyuan Miaodao at Jianyan monastery on Mount Zituo in Taizhou; barely had he opened his mouth on the 'wu' case when Zhuyuan shouted, and he awakened outright. He was abbot of Lingyan on Mount Xiang and then of Ruiyan in Huangyan. In 1374 a Japanese embassy asked the Ming court to send him to teach in Japan; nearing seventy and ill, he declined. He died on the tenth day of the seventh month of 1386, aged 78, in his fifty-ninth year as a monk, having written: 'Seventy-eight years, no dharma to speak of; the last word — the pillar wags its tongue. Bah!'
References: DILA Authority A009005 | DILA Authority
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