The case
Whenever Bǎizhàng gave a dharma talk, an old man attended and left with the rest. One day he remained. Bǎizhàng asked who he was. "I am not human. In the time of Kāśyapa Buddha [the buddha before Śākyamuni, many eons ago], I was a teacher of this mountain. A student asked me: 'Does one of great cultivation fall into cause and effect or not?' I answered: 'Does not fall into cause and effect' (不落因果, bù luò yīnguǒ). For this answer I was reborn 500 lifetimes as a wild fox. Now I ask the master to give me a turning phrase to release me from this fox-body." "Ask," said Bǎizhàng. The old man: "Does one of great cultivation fall into cause and effect?" Bǎizhàng: "Does not obscure cause and effect" (不昧因果, bù mèi yīnguǒ). At these words the old man had realization. He bowed, saying: "I am released from the fox-body. Behind the mountain there is a fox-corpse; please perform the funeral for a dead monk." Bǎizhàng had the monks find the body behind the mountain and performed the funeral.
The one-character difference
不落 (bù luò, "does not fall into") vs. 不昧 (bù mèi, "does not obscure / is not dim about"). One character changes and 500 lifetimes turn on it. This feels disproportionate until you see what the difference actually is. "Does not fall into cause and effect" (不落因果) claims an exemption from the causal order. An awakened being, the old teacher said, is outside karma. This is a category error: the claim is either (a) false (awakened beings still operate within dependent origination) or (b) correct in a sense that makes the question empty. Either way, the answer misrepresents what cultivation produces. "Does not obscure cause and effect" (不昧因果) claims clear-eyed recognition of the causal order. An awakened being sees cause and effect clearly, is no longer confused by it, but is not outside it. This is the tradition's actual position, and it is incompatible with the exemption-claim. The difference matters because claim (a) turns realization into magic — a trick that lifts you out of ordinary causality. Claim (b) keeps realization tethered to actual reality — you still age, still die, still answer for your actions, but you are not confused about what's happening.
Why the old teacher became a fox
In Chinese folklore, foxes are cunning, ambiguous, spiritually-gifted but not fully trustworthy. The fox-form is not a random punishment. It is a precise fit for a teacher who taught Buddhism in a way that had spiritual savor without genuine clarity — who gave students the feeling of receiving the deep teaching while handing them a distortion. The fox-form persists for 500 lifetimes because the particular distortion the old teacher delivered is sticky. "Cultivated people transcend karma" is satisfying. It is also false. A teacher who gives this answer gives students the motivation to practice but also the expectation that practice will eventually exempt them. When practice does not deliver exemption — because it cannot — students either deepen their delusion or become disillusioned. Either outcome is a product of the original wrong answer. Teaching carries this kind of karmic weight. The case is specifically a warning to teachers: a small verbal shift, repeated across generations of students, compounds.
What "does not obscure cause and effect" actually names
The awakened being sees: - Their own actions producing their results, in detail, in ordinary time - Other people's actions producing other people's results, including what appears as suffering and what appears as fortune - The conditioned arising of every event without separating it into an "objective" external world and a "subjective" internal reaction - The continuous production of new karma by every present action What drops is the confusion that used to surround all this — the belief that karma was a rule imposed from outside, that one could cheat it with cleverness, that awakening would provide an exemption. Seeing cause and effect clearly does not release the practitioner from participating in it. It releases them from being bewildered by it. This is sobering, and is supposed to be.
A working implication for modern practitioners
Notice which of your practice-related beliefs function as exemption-claims: - "After enough practice, I won't be triggered by X" - "Awakened people don't suffer" - "My practice will protect me from Y life outcome" - "Truly realized beings are immune to Z ordinary human weakness" Each of these is an "does not fall into" claim. Each is functionally what condemned the old teacher to 500 fox lifetimes — they promise exemption rather than clarity. The corrected version for each: - "After enough practice, I will see what's arising without being lost in it" - "Awakened people still feel the full weight of what is present; they are not immune; they are clear" - "My practice will let me see my life clearly, including the parts that are not changing" - "Realized beings still die, still age, still have blind spots; they're no longer confused that this is what life is" The substitution is not a matter of vocabulary. It changes what you're doing when you sit.