(３５)另一问题是：
“‘杀人凶手’才能成为阿罗汉，为什么？”

35) Now another question:

35) “How is it that a ‘man-killer’ could be an arahant?”

　　这问题很容易回答。这是说在成为阿罗汉之前，必须先死“人”(或“主体”)，如果我们没有杀死“人”，就无法成为阿罗汉。必须先杀死“人”、“自我”、“我”、“你”、“他”、“众生”等概念，这意思是：一定得止息对“这是动物”、“这是人”、“这是自我”等的执着，去杀死“人”或杀死所谓“人”的东西，这样作就会立刻成为阿罗汉，因为在成为阿罗汉之前，必须先将“人”一一杀死。
　　佛陀有时在某些场合用比这还强烈的字眼，他说：“成为阿罗汉之前，必得先杀死‘父母’。”这里的“父母”是指能够造作的烦恼，特别是无明、爱、取，或任何具有“父母”繁殖功能的“法”——它可以生产出“人”的感觉。所以必须先把它们一一杀掉，也就是必得先杀掉那个“人”的“父母”，才可能成为阿罗汉。

THIS CAN BE very easily answered. That which is called “the person” (or “the individual”) has to be killed before one can be an arahant. If what we call “the person” has not been killed, there is no way one can be an arahant. One has first to kill the idea of “the person”, of “self”, of “I” and “he” or “she”, of “animal” and “being”. That is, there must cease to be any attachment to the ideas that this is an animal, this is a person, this is an abiding entity, this is a self. To do this is to kill the person or to kill off the thing we refer to as “the person”. Doing this, one simultaneously becomes an arahant. Hence it is said that one has to kill off the person before one can be an arahant. The Buddha sometimes used stronger words than these. He said on several occasions that the parents must be killed before one can be an arahant. The parents are the mental defilements such as ignorance, craving, and clinging, or any karmic activities that function as parents or propagators coming together to give birth to the “I”, to the idea of “the person”. So one has to kill them off; one has to kill the parents of that person so that one can be an arahant.

　　这里有个恶名昭彰的杀人魔——盎掘摩罗(Angulimala)的故事。当盎掘摩罗听到佛陀口中发出“止”字时，他正确了解了这个字的意思，当下把“人”一一杀死而成为阿罗汉。
　　有些人由于误解，尝试解释佛陀所说“止”的意思是——停止杀人了，停止追求杀人了，而盎掘摩罗却未停止，仍继续杀人，这样的解释是不正确的。
　　当佛陀说“我停止了”，他的意思是“我已经停止做‘人’，彻底止息做‘人’了”。盎掘摩罗正确地领悟停止做“人”的意义，同时他也一样地停止做“人”，这就是说他能杀掉“自我”，由于这么“杀人”，盎掘摩罗于是像佛陀一样成为阿罗汉。

Then there is the story of Angulimala, a notorious killer. Angulimala became an arahant when he killed off the person. When he heard the word “stop” from the Buddha, he understood it in its right sense. Some people, through misunderstanding, try to explain that the Buddha, in saying that he had stopped, meant that he had stopped killing people as Angulimala was still doing when they met. That is, they explain that the Buddha had stopped, whereas Angulimala had not but was still going about killing people. This is not the right explanation. When the Buddha said “I have stopped,” he meant “I have stopped being ‘the person’, have completely ceased being ‘the person’.” Angulimala understood it rightly as completely ceasing to be the person, with the result that he too was able to kill off the person, to kill the idea of being this individual. Thus Angulimala became an arahant like the Buddha.

　　即如故事中这么简单的一个“止”字，也被大多数人完全误解，它被错误地解释、讨论、教导，以至自相矛盾。假如说只要停止杀人就可以成为阿罗汉，那真是太谎谬了！

Even the simple word “stop” in this story has been completely misunderstood by most people. It has been wrongly understood, wrongly explained, wrongly discussed, and wrongly taught, so that the account becomes self-contradictory. To say that one could become an arahant by merely ceasing to kill people is ridiculous.

　　所以，必须要停止做“人”，杀死对“人”、“自我”、“我”、“你”、“他”、“众生”等的执着，才可以成为阿罗汉。换句话说，杀“人”以成为阿罗汉。

So one has to stop being the person and kill the firm belief in individuals, selves, “I”, and “they”, before one can be an arahant. In other words, to become an arahant, kill “the person”.