What This Concept Is Actually Saying
To get at "borrowing position to illuminate function," we have to start with the strange grammar it belongs to: the Five Ranks of Lord and Vassal (五位君臣, *wǔ wèi jūn chén*), the signature teaching structure of the Caodong (曹洞, *Cáodòng*) lineage of Chan Buddhism as developed by Dongshan Liangjie (洞山良价) and systematized by his disciple Caoshan Benji (曹山本寂), with major later elaboration by Hongzhi Zhengjue (宏智正覺) of the Tiantong (天童) line.
Before anything else, the most important thing to register—and the thing modern readers almost universally get wrong—is Caoshan's own opening declaration: the Five Ranks are *not* a ladder. They are not progressive stages of enlightenment. They are not "level one practitioner, level two practitioner." Caoshan says this bluntly in the *Recorded Sayings of Caoshan Yuanzheng*: his teacher Dongshan's scheme of the partial, the orthodox, and the inclusive is to be used "according to the original intent of the old master. It is *not* for the ranks of cultivating-merit-and-advancing." (不為明功進修之位兼涉教句). The whole apparatus is, in his words, "玄談" (xuántán) — "profound discourse," "transcendent talk" — aimed at nothing less than making "the primordial thing-body appear before us" and silently aligning with the way of the ancient sages.
So what *are* the Five Ranks, then? They are patterns in which awakened life shows up. They are a grammar, not a staircase. The material gives us the operative mapping directly:
"The lord is the orthodox position. The vassal is the partial position. The vassal facing the lord is the partial-within-the-orthodox. The lord regarding the vassal is the orthodox-within-the-partial. The union of lord and vassal is the language of the inclusive." (君為正位。臣為偏位。臣向君是偏中正。君視臣是正中偏。君臣道合是兼帶語。)
So we have five terms in play: *正位* (zhèng wèi, orthodox position), *偏位* (piān wèi, partial position), *正中偏* (zhèng zhōng piān, orthodox-within-partial), *偏中正* (piān zhōng zhèng, partial-within-orthodox), and *兼帶* (jiān dài, inclusive/combined). The first two name pure orientations: the silent, formless ground (*正位*), and the flowing, responsive world of phenomena (*偏位*). The next two name their mutual interpenetration—each "turning toward" the other. The last names their unseparated unity.
Now we can introduce our concept. "借位明功" is one half of a paired formula. The pair is "借功明位 / 借位明功" — "borrowing function to illuminate position" / "borrowing position to illuminate function." Both halves use the same two technical terms: *位* (wèi, position) and *功* (gōng, function/merit/work).
- 位 (Position) in this context means the underlying pattern, the station, the orientation one is "in" — the ground, the *tǐ* (體, substance). - 功 (Function) means the responsive, kairotic activity that meets beings according to their capacity — the actual work that shows up in the moment, the *yòng* (用, function).
The Chinese verb *jiè* (借, to borrow) is doing something more interesting than its everyday meaning of "temporarily use something that isn't yours." In Caodong usage it points to *mutual revealing*. To "borrow" position to illuminate function means: articulate the underlying pattern in order to awaken and reveal the living, responsive work. To "borrow" function to illuminate position means the reverse: let the actual responsive activity expose and clarify the underlying orientation.
These two are not sequential. They are not "first do A, then do B." They are the two directions of one movement, like inhaling and exhaling of the same breath. Hongzhi Zhengjue, in his *Extensive Record* (《宏智禪師廣錄》), crystallizes this into the most quoted formulation in the entire literature:
"Borrowing function to illuminate position: function is at the place of substance. Borrowing position to illuminate function: substance is at the place of function." (借功明位，用在體處；借位明功，體在用處。)
The Hongzhi poem that often accompanies this is worth dwelling on:
"Green mountains do not need white clouds to attend them, white clouds do not need green mountains to manage them. Clouds abide in the mountains, mountains abide in the clouds. The green mountains are at ease, the white clouds unhurried." (青山不用白雲朝，白雲不用青山管；雲常在山山在雲，青山自閑白雲自緩。)
This image shows substance and function mutually indwelling without hierarchy, without one dominating the other. The mountain is not "using" the cloud, the cloud is not "serving" the mountain. They are simply each other's condition, each other's expression.
Caoshan's Operational Approach
Caoshan, working directly from Dongshan's material, is less interested in philosophical architecture than in *case-by-case discrimination*. He wants to know: when a teacher says this or that in response to a student, what rank is it *really* coming from? And what teaching work is it *really* doing?
His core methodological statement is crucial: "There may be borrowing-position-to-illuminate-function, borrowing-function-to-illuminate-position. The threads are many; the function is decided in the moment. Watch the direction the words are coming from, don't fail the opportunity presented. The marvel lies in the apt." (於中或有借位明功借功明位。緣緒多端。功在臨時。看語來勢。不負來機。妙在佳致爾。)
Notice three things here: (1) "function is decided in the moment" — the *功* is not predetermined, it is responsive; (2) "watch the direction the words are coming from" — this is the *位* being read in real time; (3) "don't fail the opportunity presented" — the whole exercise is kairotic, meeting this person, this question, this hour.
Caoshan then gives three worked examples:
Example 1: Someone asks "What is the intention of the patriarchs?" The teacher answers, "I'll tell you when the pure ox gives birth." Caoshan's verdict: "This cannot be called as coming from the orthodox position. One may say it is an exchange on the road of profound learning." (不得呼為正位中來。可云玄學路中問答。)
Example 2: Someone asks "What is the profound meaning?" The teacher answers, "Like a dead man's tongue." Caoshan's verdict: "This cannot be called as coming from the partial position." (不得呼為偏位中來。)
Example 3: Someone asks, "What can you offer through all twelve hours of the day?" The teacher answers, "Nothing." Caoshan's verdict: "This can be counted as 'meritorious function.' It cannot be called partial position or inclusive." (可同於功勳也。不得呼為偏位及兼帶。)
Theological point: these answers *look* like they belong to one rank or another — the first seems cryptic/partial, the second seems to point to silence/orthodox, the third seems to function as instruction. But Caoshan is telling us they are operating *across* rank, *borrowing* the surface character of one position to do the actual teaching work of another. The case ends: "These two examples of speech both cannot be called partial position or inclusive. Already clarified above. *These are borrowing-function-to-illuminate-position, borrowing-position-to-illuminate-function.* The same applies here." (此二例語竝不得呼為偏位及兼帶也。前已明破了。是借功明位。借位明功。同於此也。)
In the "dark-inclusive" (暗頭兼帶) discussion, Caoshan extends the logic further: the borrowing-pattern is not only between position and function, but also between *功*, *物* (thing, *wù*), and *過* (passing/going-beyond, *guò*). Borrowing function to illuminate thing, borrowing thing to illuminate function, borrowing going-beyond to illuminate function, borrowing function to illuminate going-beyond (借功明物。借物明功。借過明功。借功明過。). The grammar of "borrowing" is more general than just the position/function pair; it is the fundamental structure of how awakening teaches itself.
And on the orthodox and partial ranks themselves, Caoshan insists that they already mutually illuminate: "The orthodox position turns partial—because it does not face things; though it does not face things, it is nevertheless complete." (正位却偏者。為不對物。雖不對物却具。) And "The partial position, though partial, is also complete." (偏位雖偏亦圓。) The movement of "borrowing" is therefore not an add-on or a clever device. It is what the Five Ranks *are*, all the way down.
Hongzhi's Philosophical Articulation
Hongzhi, writing a couple of centuries later in the Song dynasty, takes Caoshan's case-discriminating style and lifts it into a more systematic vocabulary of *體* (tǐ, substance) and *用* (yòng, function)—the same pair that Confucian metaphysics had been using for centuries. He is not changing the doctrine; he is restating it in a register more suited to a culture increasingly literate in Neo-Confucian philosophy.
His full formula reads: "Borrowing function to illuminate position: function is at the place of substance. Borrowing position to illuminate function: substance is at the place of function." And he pairs it with the verse-image: "In the midst of disturbance, ever quietly hidden; in the midst of noisy bustle, yet at leisure." (紛擾擾時常隱隱，鬧嘈嘈處却閑閑。)
The proposition is straightforward in one sense: when responsive activity (*功/用*) is doing its work of meeting beings, the underlying substance (*位/體*) is not somewhere else, behind or beneath; it is *right there in the function*. Conversely, when the underlying pattern is articulated, its articulation is itself the living function—not a static concept but a verb.
Hongzhi is emphatic that this is not "two things": "Substance and function without selfish partiality—only then can one sing the Way." (體用無私，方乃唱道。) He also connects it to the broader Chan formula "illumination and function simultaneous, person and environment both taken away" (照用同時，人境俱奪), and to the Caodong house-style of "laying eyes in the dark, hiding the body in the light" (暗中著眼，明裏藏身) — an instruction that the orthodox/empty ground is what directs the partial/responsive activity, while the responsive activity is where that ground actually lives.
In the practical sphere, Hongzhi paints the picture this way: a monastic who truly embodies this becomes "body and mind utterly free, movement and stillness both forgotten," arriving at "the clouds-and-water are the elder, the elder is the clouds-and-water" (雲水是闍黎，闍黎是雲水) — neither side dominating, neither dissolving into the other; identity itself becomes permeable, hospitable, mutually indwelling.
The Crucial Caveat: 不借借時
Here is where Caodong's spiritual seriousness reasserts itself, and where many casual students of the doctrine get stranded. Hongzhi warns: "Even if you practice this perfectly to the full, it is still the side-business of side-practices." (直饒恁麼履踐，得十成去，猶是傍參邊事。) And then he poses the question that cracks the whole apparatus open: "When there is no borrowing-borrowing, where do you fall?" (不借借時，落在甚麼處。)
This is not a polite epilogue. It is the doctrine's self-undermining. The whole framework of borrowing-position-to-illuminate-function, as illuminating as it is, is itself a *teaching device*. It is a skillful means (方便, *fāngbiàn*) for meeting certain conditions. When conditions change, when the moment no longer calls for it, what then? The question is not rhetorical. It is pointing toward a place where position and function are no longer two things being borrowed across, but where the very distinction between them has no work to do.
Caoshan's own closing counsel makes the same point in plainer language: "You must exert yourself diligently in practice so that in the time to come there is no break. This matter must not be carelessly leaked. If you meet someone of pure capacity, they are a rare vessel; you must not conceal it from them either." Both the urgency of transmission and the gravity of non-trivialization are signaled here.
Walking It Through Contemporary Life
Because 借位明功 / 借功明位 is a *teaching device* and not a metaphysical position, its home is the live encounter. Let us walk through several scenes the way Caoshan might have walked through his cases.
Scenario 1: The Burnout With a Mission Statement
A friend has been working for years at a nonprofit whose mission is "dignity for all people." She knows the mission; she could recite it. But three years in, she is depleted, snappy, and secretly wondering what any of it is for. Her position—the underlying orientation, the ground—is intact in her head. Her function—her actual responsive capacity, the day-to-day living work—has gone thin.
This is a classic *借位明功* situation. The position is sitting there waiting to do its work. She doesn't need a new mission statement. She needs to *let the position illuminate the function*: in this conversation, in this email, in this interaction with a difficult colleague, the principle of "dignity for all people" needs to actually *function* — to come alive in the way she listens, responds, makes space. The abstract orientation only matters insofar as it expresses itself in kairotic response.
The common mistake is the opposite move: she goes and re-reads the mission statement and tries to summon energy from the *position* alone. The principle can be correct and the function still dead. Borrowing position to illuminate function means letting the principle *do its work* through the responsive encounter, not just confirming the principle intellectually.
Scenario 2: The Person With All the Function and No Ground
A different friend is the opposite case. They are wonderfully responsive—always available, always attuned to others, always adjusting in the moment. Friends love them. But in the past year, they've started to notice that they don't know what they themselves believe, want, or stand for. They have lost their center. There is responsiveness everywhere, but no underlying orientation to organize the responsiveness.
This is the *借功明位* situation: borrowing function to illuminate position. The work is to *let the actual responsive activity reveal the underlying orientation*. Not by theorizing, not by retreating into introspection, but by attending carefully to what the responsiveness has actually been doing—what it has been serving, what it has been protecting, what it has implicitly valued. The function, honestly looked at, exposes the position. Often, in this kind of case, the function reveals a position the person was ashamed to claim (e.g., "I have been caring for everyone because I was terrified of being unloved"). The principle emerges from the practice, not the other way around.
The common mistake here is the standard self-help move of trying to "discover your core values" via questionnaires or vision-board exercises. Hongzhi would say: your values are already showing—in your responses, in your habits, in what you cannot stop caring about. The work is not to invent them but to read them off your function.
Scenario 3: A Relationship That Has Lost Its Grammar
Two partners have been together for many years. They know the deep structure of their bond—what they value, why they're together, what matters. But recently the conversations have become mechanical, the responsiveness automatic, the affection habitual. The position (the underlying why) is still articulated; the function (the actual living encounter) has gone flat.
Here, *借位明功* can be the medicine. Not in a forced "let's remember why we love each other" way (which usually makes things worse), but in the more subtle sense of letting the position *re-enter* the function as a fresh question: "What would it mean right now, in this exact exchange, for dignity to be at the center? What would it look like for tenderness to function in the way I'm about to speak?" The principle isn't a recollection; it is a presence waiting to be invited into the response.
Conversely, *借功明位* might also be needed: the relationship may have become all principle-talk ("we believe in X, we value Y") with no living responsiveness. The work is then to let the actual function remind the couple of the position: "Look at how we just met each other there. Look at what came through when we actually responded. That *is* the position; it was never elsewhere."
Scenario 4: The Rigid Ideologue and the Ungrounded Pragmatist
Two colleagues at an organization. One has airtight principles; they know the doctrine, the mission, the values, the bylaws. The other has no principles at all but is brilliant at "making things happen." The first person can give you a three-hour talk on why a decision is wrong, but cannot actually decide anything. The second can move a project forward but cannot tell you what it is for.
Caoshan's framework names what is happening in each. The first has *position without function*. The second has *function without position*. Neither alone is the awakened grammar; both are stuck on one side of the borrowed-pair. The teaching device called 借位明功 says: articulate your position so it shows up as responsive work. The teaching device called 借功明位 says: attend to your responsive work so your position becomes visible and operative.
The "Caodong cure" is not to add the missing piece from the outside but to let each side reveal the other from within. The ideologue's responsiveness will start to show what their principles actually protect. The pragmatist's actions will start to show what they actually value. The teaching is mutual uncovering, not supplementation.
Scenario 5: Parenting
A parent has a clear principle (or tries to): "I want my child to be free, to be themselves, to not feel crushed by my expectations." Good position. But in the moment of the Tuesday-morning battle over getting dressed for school, what *functions*? Yelling? Resignation? Cold withdrawal? The position is correct; the function is failing.
This is a *借位明功* moment. The position (the value of the child's freedom and personhood) is sitting right there waiting to illuminate the function. Not as a slogan, but as the actual question in the moment: *what would it look like right now to treat this child as a person, even while getting them dressed*? The principle is not a separate idea; it is what the response is asking for in real time.
A different parent has the inverse: they are wonderfully attuned to the child, responsive to the child's moods moment by moment, but has no underlying orientation. They are exhausted, because every micro-moment is being decided fresh, with no grammar. This is *借功明位*: let the actual responsiveness reveal the underlying orientation. The function, honestly watched, will begin to show what the parent actually values—and once that is visible, it can start to organize the responsiveness so it is not pure reactivity.
Scenario 6: Grief and the Function of a Worldview
After a loss, a person holds a worldview that says, "Everything changes; nothing is permanent; we are all passing through." The position is articulated. But in the weeks after the funeral, the *function* of that worldview has gone missing. The principle is there as an idea; it is not operative as comfort, as orientation, as something that can hold the actual grief.
Borrowing position to illuminate function: let the principle actually *function* in the broken hour. Not as a slogan, but as the place one actually sits when the wave comes. "Everything passes" can function as a cold dismissal, or it can function as a kind of slow permission—permission to not hold on, permission to let the wave move through, permission to let the loss be real without it becoming everything. The position is the same; the function is different. The work is to let the position do its kairotic work in the actual moment of grief, not as a thought but as a way of being with the loss.
A parallel *借功明位* moment may also come: in the midst of grief, when the bereaved person is doing the actual work of mourning—crying, attending the funeral, sorting belongings, telling stories—what position is the function revealing? Often, it is a position the person had not known they held: "I value presence over achievement," "I value being-with over having," "I value the body's knowledge over the mind's plans." The responsive work of mourning reveals the underlying orientation, sometimes for the first time.
Scenario 7: Creative Work
A writer has a vision for the book (the *position*). But on Tuesday afternoon at the desk, the *function* is not coming. The vision is correct; the responsive work is stuck. *借位明功*: let the vision actually function in the sentence-being-written. Not as a plan to be executed but as the orientation the sentence is asking for. "What would this chapter look like if my vision of it were actually operative right now, in this sentence?" The vision becomes the question, not the template.
A different writer has plenty of flow, plenty of responsive work, plenty of function. But there is no underlying orientation; the book is heading nowhere because nothing is being revealed by the writing. *借功明位*: attend to what the writing has actually been doing. What has it been caring about? What has it been unable to stop circling back to? What has it been refusing, despite every effort to let it in? The position is there in the function; the work is to read it off.
This is the kind of discipline that practitioners in many fields describe—musicians who discover what they actually play by playing, painters who find their subject by painting, therapists who discover their theory by sitting with the next client. The function, honestly attended to, reveals the position; the position, articulated, opens the function.
Why Contemporary People Need This
There are at least six reasons this teaching feels unusually relevant to the present moment.
1. Our culture is profoundly split between principle and practice. We live in a society saturated with frameworks, principles, value statements, mission documents, "core values" pinned to office walls—and simultaneously saturated with execution, hustle, productivity, output. We have abundant *positions* and abundant *functions*, but the borrowing between them has atrophied. People either lose themselves in frameworks or in execution; the integration that Caodong calls *借位明功* / *借功明位* is rare. The teaching names a disease almost everyone has.
2. The kairotic moment is what we have lost contact with. Caoshan's "功在臨時，看語來勢，不負來機" — "the function is decided in the moment, watch the direction of the words, don't fail the opportunity presented" — describes a capacity that has been systematically devalued in the modern world. We are taught to optimize for repeatable processes, scalable templates, abstracted metrics. The teaching of *借位明功* insists that the work of meeting this person, in this hour, in this exact situation, cannot be substituted for by the right framework. The framework may need to be deployed *in this hour*, but it is the hour that decides whether the framework is what is being asked for.
3. The teaching is structurally anti-ideological. Because the Five Ranks are not stages, and because the paired borrowing is mutual, Caodong's grammar has no room for the contemporary seductions of either dogmatism or pure pragmatism. The dogmatist (all *position*, no *function*) cannot survive the instruction to use the position kairotically. The pragmatist (all *function*, no *position*) cannot survive the instruction to let the function reveal what is being valued. Both are disciplined by the other. In a cultural moment where fundamentalism and nihilism are the two dominant pathologies, this is a piece of medical equipment from an older surgery that still works.
4. The "不借借時" pointing is an antidote to all conceptual fixation. Every Buddhist framework, however wise, becomes a new place to get stuck. Hongzhi's question — "When there is no borrowing-borrowing, where do you fall?" — is a built-in self-dissolving. It is not a denial of the framework, but a reminder that the framework is itself a raft: when the river is crossed, the raft is not carried on the head. This is structurally important for a contemporary readership that has access to dozens of sophisticated spiritual and therapeutic vocabularies, and needs to be reminded that the vocabulary is not the realization.
5. It models a way of talking that contemporary discourse has lost. The Caoshan cases — three different questioners, three different answers, three different rank-assessments — demonstrate a kind of responsive, context-sensitive, non-formulaic intelligence that is rare in our public discourse. We have a hard time speaking that is not either a slogan or a debate position. Caodong's model is a third thing: a speech that is at once principled *and* situation-specific, that does not abandon rigor in order to be warm and does not abandon warmth in order to be rigorous.
6. It offers a non-metaphysical account of integration. For readers who are allergic to metaphysics but still sense that something is missing in the prevailing picture of the self-as-collection-of-processes, the *位*/*功* grammar offers an account of how depth and responsiveness go together without invoking any mysterious substance. Position is not a metaphysical essence; it is the underlying orientation disclosed by the function. Function is not a behavioral output; it is the responsive activity in which the orientation becomes visible. The model is internally coherent without being spooky. (Though it should be noted: this is *not* the same as claiming that neuroscience or cognitive science has "discovered" what Caodong was pointing at. The analogy is suggestive, not a proof. We can note that contemporary research on *embodied cognition* and *enactivism* — which emphasize that cognition is not just information processing but is constituted through sensorimotor engagement with an environment — has convergences with the *位*/*功* structure: there is a real ongoing conversation to be had, but it would be intellectually dishonest to claim vindication either way.)
Common Misreadings and Clarifications
Misreading 1: The Five Ranks are a ladder
By far the most common mistake. Modern readers encounter the Five Ranks and assume: "Orthodox-within-partial, partial-within-orthodox, orthodox position, partial position, inclusive—that's level 1 through 5. Let me figure out which one I'm at." This is exactly what Caoshan says it is *not*. There is no "I'm at level 3" in Caodong. The Five Ranks are a grammar of how awakened life shows up, not a progress chart of a single meditator. Hongzhi's reminder that even perfect practice of the apparatus is still "side-business" is meant to break this very assumption.
Clarification: If someone tells you "you're at the orthodox-within-partial rank," the appropriate Chan response is something like Caoshan's verdict on the cases: "That cannot be called as coming from the orthodox position."
Misreading 2: *體用* (substance/function) is a metaphysical claim
It is tempting to read 體 as "substance" in the Aristotelian sense—a substrate beneath the accidents—and then to ask "is there really a substance?" or "isn't everything just process?" This is the wrong frame. In Caodong usage, *體* and *用* are not two metaphysical layers but two aspects of one indivisible happening. The "substance" is not underneath the function; it is what the function is *being*. The "function" is not above or below the substance; it is the substance *as kairotic work*. Hongzhi's poem makes this explicit: the mountain does not have the cloud "added on"; the cloud does not have the mountain "added on"; they are mutually constituting.
Clarification: A useful analogy might be how a song and its melody are not two things—the melody is what the song sounds like; the song is the melody having a shape. (But this is an analogy, not a proof; do not press it.) The point is that *體* and *用* are not the kind of things that could exist independently, and the question "is there really a substance beneath it?" is not the right question to ask.
Misreading 3: "Borrowing" implies something fake or temporary
In ordinary English, "borrowing" implies that what is borrowed isn't really mine. So "borrowing position to illuminate function" might be misheard as "using a fake position to perform a real function" or "temporarily invoking a position I don't actually hold." This is the opposite of what is meant. In Caodong usage, *借* is the verb of *mutual revealing*. The position is real; it is being deployed *as a vehicle* for something it inherently contains. The function is real; it is being revealed *through* something it inherently is. There is nothing fake, temporary, or performative about it. Caoshan's warning that "this matter must not be carelessly leaked" (此事不得慢洩) indicates exactly how serious the borrowing is.
Clarification: Think of how a lens "borrows" light. The light is not fake; the lens is not temporary; the borrowing is what *makes seeing possible*. (Analogy, again—not a proof.)
Misreading 4: The framework is something to be "applied" in life
A popular contemporary misreading: "Okay, I get it. When I feel stuck, I'll borrow my values (position) to illuminate my next action (function). Useful." This converts the framework into a self-help technique. But 借位明功 is not a technique. It is a description of how the awakened mind already operates. Treating it as a tool you deploy is itself the misreading Caoshan is warning against. The right relation to the teaching is closer to what we now sometimes call *second-order awareness*: noticing that this is already happening, and getting less in its way.
Clarification: The teaching is more like the instructions on a microscope than a recipe. The microscope is for *seeing what is already there*, not for adding something to the specimen. (Analogy, not proof.)
Misreading 5: The "不借借時" is a higher stage
Some readers will encounter Hongzhi's question "When there is no borrowing-borrowing, where do you fall?" and read it as: "Ah, that's the ultimate level—the one beyond the Five Ranks where you don't need the device anymore." This is again treating Caodong as a ladder. The 不借借時 pointing is not a higher rank; it is the *recognition that the rank-structure itself was never the point*. It is closer to what Wittgenstein meant by "the ladder that must be thrown away after the climbing." Or to what a Zen student is told when they finally "get" the koan: there is no further place to go, only the place you were always already in.
Clarification: The 不借借時 is not a destination; it is the recognition that the map is not the territory.
Misreading 6: Confusing 借位明功 with its colloquial sense
In modern Chinese, "借位" has a pejorative connotation: borrowing someone's position or authority for one's own ends, name-dropping, leveraging status that isn't really one's own. Some readers, encountering 借位明功, may hear it as "leveraging rank to claim credit," which sounds almost cynical. This is a complete inversion. In Caodong, the borrowing is the opposite of self-serving: it is the way awakened teaching moves through provisional forms, with no claim being made on anyone's behalf.
Clarification: The 五位 are not "positions" in the status sense; they are *orientations* in the existential sense. The "borrowing" is not self-promotion; it is mutual revealing.
A Final Note
If there is one thing to carry away from this teaching, it is the unusual pairing Caodong offers: a framework that is rigorous enough to be transmitted across centuries without dissolving into vagueness, and a self-undermining that refuses to let the framework become an idol. Hongzhi's two verses—*The green mountains do not need the white clouds to attend them; in the midst of disturbance, ever quietly hidden*—are the image and the promise of *借位明功*: substance and function indwelling without obstruction, position and function mutually revealing without one ever being able to claim priority over the other.
And then, quietly, in the corner: the question that breaks the whole picture open—*不借借時，落在甚麼處*—not as a dismissal of the picture but as the picture's own confession. This is what Chan teaching, at its best, does not let you forget: every device, however luminous, is a device. The position and the function are one. And what is one cannot be borrowed, because it was never two.
That last recognition is not an additional step. It is what the borrowing was always pointing toward, all along.