---
title: "雲棲法彙（選錄） · 書放生卷後"
description: "雲棲法彙是明代高僧袾宏的著作彙編，由後人輯錄補印而成。袾宏世稱蓮池大師，身處明末佛教復興時期，他融通禪教律而歸宗淨土，力主念佛往生。該書內容廣博，涵蓋經論註疏、禪修指導、戒律闡釋、淨土法門及書信雜文等，系統闡述了其圓融的佛學思想與修行實踐。作為中國佛教史上具有深遠影響的文獻，雲棲法彙集中體現了明代淨土宗的理論精髓與實修體系，對後世漢傳佛教特別是淨土信仰的發展起到了重要的推動與規範作用。"
url: "https://rushiwowen.co/en/r/cmgn10lks1n3ijl04g0elothv"
---

### 書放生卷後

> After Writing the Volume on Releasing Living Beings

曩余三十有五為文，謂生日不宜殺生。既而五十為偈，謂生日不宜慶生。今茲十易暑寒，一週甲子矣。諸君子知余，又重愛余，不陳儀以放生慶生。或曰：不殺得矣，如不慶何？噫！如是慶生，慶萬物之生也。余惟恐人之不慶生也。或曰：鳥未舒其翼，弋者候於林；魚未揚其鬣，漁者盈於濱。雖曰甦之，其實枯之，惡在其能放也？噫！翔空入淵，遂厥生者，不知其幾也。重罹乎鉤矢，百未之能一耳。方其獻俘於獵師，待烹於庖人，卜兆於饞夫之腹中，死門甘伏，倏焉解之。雖未保所終，而脫刀鋸、逃鼎鑊，譬之臨刑遇赦，其樂為何如也？且西湖歌舞，歲無休時。假令諸君子春花秋月，朝宴而暮集，一舉箸則萬錢，一染指則千命。乃今易腥以素，轉殺為生，較其得失，奚趐霄壤？不謂之勝舉，吾不信也。於是迭詠為放生卷係之。辭曰：

> Some thirty-five years ago, I wrote an essay arguing that one should not take life on one's birthday. Later, at fifty, I composed a verse saying that one should not celebrate one's birthday. Now, ten more summers and winters have passed, and I have completed a full sixty-year cycle. You gentlemen know me well and care for me deeply, so you refrain from presenting gifts and instead release living creatures to mark the occasion rather than celebrate. Someone asked: "Not killing is all very well, but what about not celebrating?" Ah—this is precisely how to celebrate: by celebrating the life of all beings. I only fear that people will not celebrate life in this way. Someone else said: "Before the bird has spread its wings, the fowler already waits in the woods; before the fish has lifted its fin, the fishermen already crowd the shore. Though you call it revival, in truth it is destruction—where is the release in that?" Ah—those that soar through the sky and dive into the deep, fulfilling their lives—who can count them? Those who fall again to hook and arrow are not one in a hundred. When they are presented as captives to the huntmaster, waiting to be cooked by the chef, their fate sealed in the belly of the glutton—resigned to the gate of death—and then suddenly they are freed: though their end is not guaranteed, they escape the blade and the cauldron, like one facing execution who receives a pardon. What joy could be greater? Moreover, the singing and dancing of West Lake never cease, year after year. Suppose you gentlemen, amid spring flowers and autumn moons, feasted at dawn and gathered at dusk—one lift of the chopsticks costing ten thousand coins, one touch of the finger costing a thousand lives. Now instead you exchange the foul for the pure, turn killing into life. Weighing the gain and loss, is it not as far apart as sky and earth? That this is not a superior act, I cannot believe. So we composed verses in turn and bound them into a volume on releasing life. The words say:

上帝好生，下民傷生。捨財救生，圖財捕生。繇二念生，故有眾生。生無所生，亦無能生。無生不生，是名放生。

> God loves life, yet people below harm it. Some give up wealth to save lives, while others chase wealth to capture lives. From these two intentions, all living beings come to be. When life is not clung to as life, and there is no one who creates life, then no life is destroyed and no life is not created — this is called releasing life.