The Ch'an Bums

[Simple_Jack]

The Transmission Of The Mind Outside The Teaching trans. by Charles Luk (Lu K'uan Yu)

 

The Fourth Generation After The Patriarch Hui Neng: Ch'an Master Huang Po, Also Called Hsi Yun and Tuan Chi

 

(One day) a monk asked the master, "What is Tao and how is it practiced?" The master asked back, "What Tao do you want to practice?" The monk said, "If so what is the purpose of Ch'an training and of the study of the Tao handed down from master to master of the Ch'an sect?" The master replied, "All this is to receive and guide men of dull roots and is not reliable." The monk asked, "If this is to receive and guide men of dull roots, what will you teach to men of superior roots?" The master replied. "If they are men of superior roots, what can you teach them to (help them) seek their own selves. If their own selves cannot be found, what is the Dharma which can match this (state)? Have you not read this in the sutra, 'What do the Dharmas look like?'" The monk said, "If so, there is no need to seek anything." The master said, "You can thus save your strength." The monk said, "If so, this is almost complete annihilation but does not show (its) non-existence." The master asked, "Who teaches its non-existence? What is it you want to seek?"

The monk asked back, " If you do not formulate the search for it, why do you say it should not be annihilated?" The master replied, "If you do not search for it, that is all; who teaches you its annihilation? You see (empty) space before you; how are you going to annihilate it?" The monk asked, "Is this Dharma identical with space?" The master replied, "Does space tell you day and night whether it is identical or different? As soon as I speak of it you immediately give rise to your (discriminative) interpretation." The monk asked, "Do you even forbid interpretation?" The master replied, "I have never hindered you. Besides interpretation pertains to feeling and feeling screens wisdom." The monk asked, "Is it correct that no feelings should arise?" The master asked back, "If no feelings arise, who says it is correct?" The monk said, "As soon as I speak, (you seem to) to call it a slip of the tongue." The master asked, "The truth is that you do not understand my words; what slip do you mean?" The monk said, "So far all your words are to contradict others but you have not taught the real Dharma." The master asked, "The real Dharma is not upside-down but your questions give rise to inversion. What real Dharma do you search for?"

The monk asked, "If my questions give rise to inversion, what about your answers to them?" The master said, "Just look into things that concern yourself but be unconcerned about other people's." He added, "This is like a mad dog barking when there is motion without even distinguishing between the wind in the grass and that among the trees." He further said, "This Ch'an sect of mine, inherited from past generations, has never taught people to seek knowledge amd interpretations. It formulates the study of Tao only to receive and guide beginners, but in reality Tao cannot be learned, for the study of it (is a passion that) screens the Tao. Tao has neither direction nor location, and is called the Mahayana-mind. This mind is neither within nor without nor in-between, and is beyond direction and location. The most important thing is to avoid knowing and interpreting. It is only said that the capacity of passion is where the Tao lies, and when this capacity is exhausted the mind is beyond direction and location. This Tao is the Bhutatathata and is nameless. Worldly men do not understand this and deceive themselves by staying in the midst of passions.

This is why the Buddha appeared in the world to bare this matter. In case people do not understand it, it is expediently called Tao but you should not cling to (the word) Tao thereby giving rise to interpretation. Hence the saying, 'When the fish is caught, forget all about the trap' and then your body and mind will attain to the Tao of themselves.

He who knows his mind and reaches its source is called a sramana. The sramana-fruit results from quieting passions but not from study. Now if you use the mind to seek mind, this is relying on the outside to learn (and copy) something from it; what then will you achieve? The ancients had sharp minds and as soon as they heard of a (teaching) word, they immediately stopped learning; hence they were called 'Men of Tao in their non-active and beyond learning states'. Nowadays, people want to widen their knowledge and interpretation by gathering meanings in the scriptures, and call this their practice without appreciating that wide knowledge and interpretation can turn into obstruction (to their realization of the Truth). This is like giving too much butter to a baby without knowing if it can digest it or not. Students of the Three Vehicles (of sravakas, pratyekabuddhas and Bodhisattvas) are all like this and are called those who do not digest what they eat.

Therefore, all knowledge and interpretation which are not assimilable, are poisons, for they drive people into the realm of birth and death. There is no such thing in the absolute state of suchness (Bhutatathata). Hence it is said that 'in my royal storehouse there is no such sword.'

You should banish from and empty yourself of all previous (knowledge and) interpretation; this is wiping out what is and means the Dharma-raja (the King of the Law or the Buddha) appearing in the world, which also means 'When the Tathagata was with Dipamkara, He did not obtain anything from the Dharma'. This last sentence serves to empty yourself of all passionate interpretation and knowing capacity, and by exhausting all feelings within and without so that nothing remains, you will become an unconcerned man.

The teaching of the Three-Vehicles are only medicines prescribed to responsive potentialities. all preachings according to circumstances and all temporary methods of teaching differ from one another. If you are clear about them, you are not deceived by them. The most important thing is not to cling to individual capability and special teaching words, in order to interpret the scriptures. Why so? Because 'there is no fixed Dharma the Tathagata can expound'.

This sect of mine does not discuss all this. It will suffice to know how to rest the mind (and nothing else), for there is no need to think of yesterday and to worry about the morrow." The monk asked, "It is always said that mind is Buddha but I do not know which mind is Buddha." The master asked back, "How many minds do you have?" The monk asked, "Is the worldly mind or the holy mind Buddha?" The master asked back, "Where are your worldly and holy minds?" The monk said, "The Three Vehicles speak of the worldly and holy minds; how can you say they are not?" The master said, "The Three Vehicles clearly say that both the worldly and holy minds are false. You do not understand the teaching and now regard both as existing. You take what is false for real, is this not wrong? Because you are wrong, your mind is deluded. But just banish both the worldly and holy states and there will be no other Buddha outside your mind.

The Patriarch came from the West to give direct indication that all men are wholly Buddhas. Now because you do not know this, you grasp the worldly and the holy and let your mind wander outside thereby deluding itself. Hence you are told that mind is identical with Buddha. As soon as a worldly thought arises, you immediately slip into heterodoxy. Since time without beginning, the mind has never differed from what it is today. Because there is no different Dharma, it is called supreme enlightenment (samyaksambodhi)."

The monk asked, "What is the reason for your use of (the word) identical?" The master replied, "What reason do you search for? As soon as there is some reason, your mind will differ (from what it fundamentally is)." The monk asked, "You have said that since time without beginning it has never differed from what it is today; what does this mean?" The master replied, "It is because of your search for it that you differ from it. If you do not search, what is the difference?" The monk asked, "If it has never differed, why did you say that it is identical?" The master replied, " If you do not hold on to the worldly and the holy (states) who will tell you about the identical? If the identical is no longer identical, the mind also will no longer be mind, thereby banishing both the identical and the mind, then where will you make your search?"

The monk asked, "As falsehood screens the self-mind, what should be used to wipe out falsehood?" The master replied, "The false (idea) of wiping out falsehood is also a falsehood. Falsehood is rootless and springs from discrimination. Now if you only cease discriminating between the worldly and the holy, falsehood will be no more. How then can you wipe it out? You should refrain from even the least clinging to it, and this is the meaning of the sentence, 'I give up my two arms and am bound to be a Buddha.'" The monk asked, "If there is no clinging, what then is to be transmitted (from master to pupil)?" The master replied, "The mind is used in this transmission (of mind)." The monk asked, "If the mind is used in the transmission of mind, then why did you say that there is no-mind?" The master replied, The non-acquisition of a single thing is called the transmission of mind. If you are clear about this mind, there is no-mind and also no-Dharma."

The monk asked, "If there be neither mind nor Dharma (thing) what does the transmission stand for?" The master replied, "When you hear about the transmission of mind, you wrongly think that there is something to be gained. Hence the Patriarch said:

 

Only when the nature of the mind is realized

Can one say that it cannot be conceived.

Nothing, clearly, can be realized

For if it be, there's no awareness of it.

 

How can this be taught fittingly to awaken worldly men?" The monk asked, "Is the space in front of us an object? Is it possible to perceive the mind without being shown its object?" The master said, "Which mind teaches you to perceive itself by means of its object? Even if you could perceive it, it would be a (subjective) mind which sees its object. This is like a man looking at his face in a mirror. Although he sees clearly his eyebrows and eyes, they are just an image. What connection does this image have with your mind?" The monk asked, "If its reflection does not come into play, when can the mind be perceived?" The master said, "If this implies a cause, which means that you must always rely on objects, when will you be awakened (to the absolute mind)? Have you not read these lines: 'Suddenly it resembles you but there is not a (real) thing. It is sterile to discuss it in several thousand ways.'

The monk asked, "When it is thoroughly known, is it true that there is nothing (that can be) reflected?" The master replied, "If there is nothing, what is the use of reflecting? Do not open your eyes while talking in your sleep....You will have only to keep from all that is and is not so that your mind will be solitary like the sun in midheaven, bright and shining by itself. Does not this save a great deal of vigour? When you reach this stage, there will be no fixed abode to stay at as you tread the BUddha path, which means 'developing a mind which does not abide in anything'. This is your pure and clean Dharmakaya which is called Anubodhi (Supreme Enlightenment). If you do not awaken to it, although you may gather wide knowledge and have done austerities by wearing clothing made of grass and by eating wild plants, your non-cognizance of the mind is called heresy and will join the retinue of heavenly demons. What advantage do you gain from such practice? Hence Ch'an master Pao Chih said, 'Buddha being basically the self-mind, how can it be found in books?'

Even if you succeed in learning the three virtuous stages, the four grades of Hinayana saintship, and the whole ten highest stages of Bodhisattva attainments your whole mind still remains within the worldly and holy realms. Have you not read this sentence: 'All phenomenal changes belong to the realm of birth and death' also (the following verses)

 

With force expended, a spent arrow is bound to fall and cause

Distasteful things to follow in the next incarnation.

How can it then compare with the wu-wei reality,

Which ensures a leap straight to the Tathagata stage?

 

Since you are not a man of such calibre you should follow the converting instruction devised by the ancients in order to widen your knowledge and interpretation. Ch'an master Pao Chih said, 'If you do not meet with an enlightened master appearing in the world, you will vainly take the Dharma-medicine of Mahayana.'"

Edited March 16, 2014 by Simple_Jack

[Simple_Jack]

Excerpts from The Record of Linji translated by Ruth Fuller Sasaki; edited by Thomas Yuho Kirchner:

At the evening gathering the master addressed the assembly, saying: "Sometimes I take away the person but do not take away the surroundings; sometimes I take away the surroundings but do not take away the person; sometimes I take away both the person and surroundings; sometimes I take away neither person nor surroundings." Then a monk asked, "What about 'to take away the person and not take away the surroundings'?" The master said:

The spring comes forth, covering the earth with brocade;
A child's hair hangs down, white as silken strands.

The monk asked, "What about 'to take away the surroundings and not take away the person?'" The master said:

The rule of the sovereign prevails throughout the land;
The general has laid to rest the dusts of battle beyond the frontiers.

Again the monk asked, "What about 'to take away both person and surroundings'?" The master said:

No news from Bing and Fen,
Isolated and away from everywhere.

The monk asked , "What about to take away neither person nor the surroundings'?" The master said:

The sovereign ascends into the jeweled palace;
Aged rustics sing songs.

Then the master said, "Nowadays, he who studies buddhadharma must seek true insight. Gaining true insight, he is not affected by birth-and-death, but freely goes or stays. He needn't seek the excellent -- that which is excellent will come of itself. Followers of the Way, our eminent predecessors from of old have all had their ways of saving people. As for me, what I want to make clear to you is that you must not accept the deluded views of others. If you want to act, then act. Don't hesitate."
...

"If you wish to differ in no way from the patriarch-buddha, just don't seek outside. The pure light in a single thought of yours -- this is the dharmakaya buddha within your own house. The nondiscriminating light in a single thought of yours -- this is the sambhogakaya buddha within your own house. The nondifferentiating light in a single thoughts of yours -- this is the nimanakaya buddha within your own house. This threefold body is you, listening to my discourse right now before my very eyes. It is precisely because you don't run around seeking outside that you have such meritorious activities."
...

"Followers of the Way, mind is without form and pervades the ten directions. In the eye it is called seeing, in the ear it is called hearing. In the nose it smells odors, in the mouth it holds converse. In the hands it grasps and seizes, in the feet it runs and carries. Fundamentally it is one pure radiance; divided it becomes the six harmoniously united spheres of sense. If the mind is void, wherever you are, you are emancipated."
...

"In my view there is no buddha, no sentient beings, no past, no present. Anything attained was already attained -- no time is needed. There is nothing to practice, nothing to realize, nothing to gain, nothing to lose. Throughout all time there is no other dharma than this. 'If one claims there's a dharma surpassing this, I say that it's like a dream, like a phantasm.' This is all I have to teach."
...

Someone asked, "What is 'true insight'?" The master said, "You have only to enter the secular, enter the sacred, enter the defiled, enter the pure, enter the lands of all the buddhas, enter the Tower of Maitreya, enter the dharma realm of Vairocana and all of the lands everywhere that manifest and come into being, exist, decay, and disappear."
...

"If you want to be free to live or to die, to go or to stay as you would put on or take off clothes, then right now recognize the one listening to my discourse, the one who has no form, no characteristics, no root, no source, no dwelling place, and yet is bright and vigorous. Of all his responsive activities, none leaves any traces."
...

Your single thought's nondifferentiating light -- this indeed is the true Samantabhadra. Your single thought that frees itself from bondage and brings emancipation everywhere -- this is the Avalokitesvara samadhi. Since these [three] alternately take the position of master and attendants, when they appear they appear at one and the same time, one in three, three in one. Gain understanding such as this, and then you can read the sutras."
...

Someone asked, "What about the 'Land of the Three Eyes'?" The master said, "When you and I together enter the Land of Pure Mystery we put on the robe of purity and preach as the dharmakaya buddha; when we enter the Land of Nondifferentiation we put on the robe of nondifferentiation and preach as the sambhogakaya buddha; when we enter the Land of Emancipation we put on the robe of brightness and preach as the nirmanakaya buddha. These Lands of the Three Eyes are all dependent transformations."
...

There are a bunch of blind shavepates who, having stuffed themselves with food, sit down to meditate and practice contemplation. Arresting the flow of thought they don't let it rise; they hate noise and seek stillness. This is the method of heretics. A patriarch said, 'If you stop the mind to look at stillness, arouse the mind to illumine outside, control the mind to clarify inside, concentrate the mind to enter samadhi -- all such [practices] as these are artificial striving.'"
...

Someone asked, "What about the state where 'mind and Mind do not differ'?" The master said, "The instant you ask the question they are already separate, and essence differs from its manifestations. Followers of the Way, make no mistake! All the dharmas of this world and of the worlds beyond are without self-nature. Also, they are without produced-nature. They are just empty names, and these names are also empty. All you are doing is taking these worthless names to be real. That's all wrong! Even if they do exist, they are nothing but states of dependent transformation, such as the dependent transformation of bodhi, nirvana, emancipation, the threefold body, the [objective] surroundings and [subjective] mind, buddhahood. What are you looking for in these lands of dependent transformations! All of these, up to and including the Three Vehicle' twelve divisions of teachings, are just so much waste paper to wipe off privy filth. The buddha is just a phantom body, the patriarch just old monks.
...

"Therefore, when it realized that these six -- color, sound, odor, taste, touch, and dharmas -- are all empty forms, they cannot bind the man of the Way, dependent on nothing.
...

Someone asked, "What about the true buddha, the true dharma, and the true Way? We beg of you to disclose this for us." The master said, "Buddha is the mind's purity; dharma is the mind's radiance; the Way is the pure light pervading everywhere without hindrance. The three are one, yet all are empty names and have no real existence. With the true man of the Way, from moment to moment, mind is not interrupted."

Edited March 15, 2014 by Simple_Jack

[Simple_Jack]

Sayings of Bankei, trans. by Thomas Cleary ["The Original Face: An Anthology of Rinzai Zen"; pg.112, pgs.116-117]:

 

A layman asked, "Though I'm grateful for your teaching of birthlessness, thoughts from constantly applied mental habits readily come up, and I get lost in them and have difficulty remaining continually unborn. How can I apply wholehearted faith?" The master replied, "If you try to stop arising thoughts, the stopping mind and the stopped mind become split in two and you never have any peace of mind. Just trust that thoughts are originally nonexistent but temporarily arise and cease conditioned by what is seen and heard, and have no real substance."

 

A monk asked, "All wild thoughts of mundane passions are hard to subdue; how can they be quited?" The master replied, "Thinking of trying to annihilate wild thoughts is also wild thought. Although wandering thoughts are originally nonexistent, they are produced by your own conception."

 

Someone asked, "Last year when I asked you how to stop the arising of mixed-up thoughts, you told me to let thoughts be as they arise and cease. Afterward, faithfully trying to put this into practice, it's hard to get to let them be as they arise and cease. The master replied, "It's hard to attain because you think there is a rule to let thoughts be as they arise and cease."

...

 

Originally there is no bodhi-tree
Nor any mirror-stand bright
Originally there is nothing at all
Where can the dust alight? - Dajian Huineng

 

The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch [Dunhuang cave edition] trans. by Philip Yampolsky:

 

"No-thought means not to be defiled by external objects. It is to free thought from external objects and not to arouse thoughts about dharmas. But do not stop thinking about things, nor eliminate all thoughts. [if you do so] as soon as a single thought stops you will be reborn in other realms. Take heed of this! Do not cease objective things nor subjective mind."

...

 

Chanzong Yongjia ji (Anthology of Yongjia of the Chan school), trans. by Ruth Fuller Sasaki ["The Record of Linji", pg. 222]:

 

"He who aspires to seek the great Way must first of all make pure the three acts [of body, word, and thought] through pure practice. Then, in the four forms of deameanor -- sitting, standing, walking, and lying -- he will enter the Way by degrees. When he has reached the state where the objects of the six roots have been thoroughly penetrated while conforming with conditions, and the objective world and the subjective mind both have been stilled, he will mysteriously meet with the marvelous principle."

...

 

Master Baizhang Huaihai, trans. by Ruth Fuller Sasaki ["The Record of Linji" pgs. 228-229]:

 

"His mind is completely empty of impurity and purity; he does not dwell in bondage nor does he dwell in emancipation. He is without any understanding of the conditioned or the unconditioned. His mind's measure being universal sameness, while abiding in samsara he is free. He does not make any relation whatsoever with false illusions, the worldly passions, the realm of the skandhas, birth and death, or any of the sense-entrances. Having transcended these, there is nothing he depends upon; he is bound to nothing at all. He leaves or stays without hindrance; he goes and comes in birth and death as through an open door."

[Mark Foote]

Not sure which of the four texts that Red Pine included in his Bodhidharma translation that is (above), but I think Bill noted that the first one has the best chance of having been uttered by Bodhidharma, and it is very different in character from the one cited.

 

I like this, from Denkoroku #41 "Huike" translated by T. Cleary:

 

'Once he asked the great teacher, "Can I hear about the seal of truth of the Buddhas?" Bodhidharma said, "The seal of truth of the Buddhas is not gotten from another." Another time he told Huike, "Outwardly cease all involvements, inwardly have no coughing or sighing in the mind-- with your mind like a wall you can enter the Way."

 

And if you bums will forgive me, here's part of a comment from my own site where I quote Bodhidharma (as I write about proprioception and equalibrioception):

 

 

"When you arrive at last at towering up like a wall miles high, you will finally know that there aren't so many things." (Yuanwu, "Zen Letters", translated by Thomas Cleary, pg 83)

The sense of location and the freedom of the sense of location to move are really a part of the movement of breath; if they are constricted, the breath is cut off. That is why Bodhidharma said, "have no coughing or sighing in the mind-- with your mind like a wall you can enter the way". Through his use of the words "coughing" and "sighing", Bodhidharma points to the intimate relationship between self-awareness, or mind, and continuity in the movement of breath; his direction only really makes sense when the exercise of equalibrioception and proprioception, the senses most identified with the physical awareness of self, is experienced as inherent in the movement of breath, as necessary to the continuity of breath.

Setting up a mindfulness of proprioception, or the freedom of awareness to move, in connection with equalibrioception, or the sense of balanced movement wherever my awareness is now, helps me to relax into my own experience, even if the only result is that I fall asleep.

Edited March 16, 2014 by Mark Foote

[Simple_Jack]

A Man of Zen: The Recorded Sayings of Layman P'ang trans. by Ruth Fuller Sasaki, Yoshitaka Iriya, and Dana Fraser:

 

At the beginning of the Chen-yuan era [785-804] of the T'ang dynasty, the Layman visited Ch'an Master Shih-t'ou. He asked the Master: "Who is the man who doesn't accompany the ten thousand dharmas?" Shih-t'ou covered the Layman's mouth with his hand. In a flash he realized!

...

 

One day Shih-t'ou said to the Layman: "Since seeing me, what have your daily activities been?" "When you ask me about my daily activities, I can't open my mouth," The Layman replied. "Just because I know you are thus I now ask you," said Shih-t'ou. Whereupon the Layman offered this verse:

 

My daily activities are not unusual,

I'm just naturally in harmony with them.

Grasping nothing, discarding nothing,

In every place, there's no hindrance, no

conflict,

Who assigns the ranks of vermilion and purple? --

The hills' and mountains' last speck of dust

Is extinguished.

Supernatural power and marvelous activity --

Drawing water and carrying firewood.

 

Shih-t'ou gave his assent. The he asked: "Will you put on black robes or will you continue wearing white?" "I want to do what I like," replied the Layman. So he did not shave his head or dye his clothing.

 

Later the Layman went to Chiang-shi to visit Ch'an Master Ma-tsu. he asked Ma-tsu: "Who is the man who doesn't accompany the ten thousand dharmas?" "Wait till you've swallowed in one swig all the water of the West River, then I'll tell you," replied Ma-tsu. At these words the Layman suddenly understood the Mysterious Principle. He offered the verse containing the phrase, "empty-minded having passed the exam." He remained with Ma-tsu two years, practicing and receiving instructions. He wrote a verse which says:

 

I've got a boy who has no bride.

I've got a girl who has no groom;

Forming a happy family circle,

We speak about the birthless.

...

 

Dialogue with the Hermit Ku-yin

 

The Layman visited the hermit Ku-yin. "Who are you?" asked Ku-yin. The Layman raised his staff. "Isn't that the highest activity?" asked Ku-yin. The Layman threw down his staff. Ku-yin said nothing. "You only know the highest activity; you're unaware of the highest matter," said the Layman. "What is the highest matter?" asked Ku-yin. The Layman picked up his staff. "Don't be so crude," said Ku-yin. "What a pity you strain to make yourself ruler?," returned the Layman. "A man of uniform activity has no need to pick up a mallet or raise a whisk; nor does he use wordy replies," said Ku-yin. "If you were to meet him, what would you do?" "Where would I meet him?" inquired the Layman. Ku-yin grabbed hold of him. "Is that what you'd do?" asked the Layman, and spat right into his face. Ku-yin said nothing. The Layman offered this verse:

 

You lowered your hook into flaming water

where there's no fish,

And nowhere to look for one neither -- I'm

laughing at your chagrin.

Ku-yin, the Ch'an elder Tzu, how pitiable you are;

You've been spat on, and now are ashamed

to look at me.

...

 

The Layman and the Lecture-Master

 

The layman was visiting a lecture hall, listening to a discourse on the Diamond Sutra. When the "no self, no person"line was reached, he asked: "Lecture-master, since there is no self and no person, who is he who's lecturing, who is he who's listening?" The Lecture-master had no reply. "though I'm just a commoner," said the Layman, "I know a little about faith." "What is your idea?" inquired the lecture-master. The Layman replied with a verse:

 

There's no self and no person,

How then kinfolk and stranger!

I beg you, cease going from lecture to

lecture;

It's better to seek truth directly.

The nature of Diamond Wisdom

Excludes even a speck of dust.

From "Thus have I heard" to "This I believe,"

All's but an array of unreal names.

 

When the lecture-master heard this verse, he sighed with admiration. Wherever the Layman dwelt there was much coming and going of venerable priests and many exchanges of questions. According to the capacity of each, the Layman responded as an echo to a sound. He was not a man to be categorized by any rule or measure.

...

 

Mrs. P'ang at the Temple

 

One day Mrs. Pang went into the Deer Gate Temple to make an offering of food. The temple priest asked her the purpose [of the offering] in order to transfer the merit. Mrs. P'ang took her comb and stuck it in the back of her hair. "Transference of merit is complete," she said, and walked out.

...

 

The Layman and His Daughter

 

The Layman was sitting in his his thatched cottage one day. "Difficult, difficult, difficult," he suddenly exclaimed, "[like trying] to scatter ten measures of sesame seed all over a tree!" "Easy, easy, easy," returned Mrs. P'ang, "just like touching your feet to the ground when you get out of bed." "Neither difficult nor easy," said Ling-chao, "On the hundred grass-tips, the Patriarchs' meaning."

...

 

During the Yuan-ho era [806-20] the Layman traveled northward to Hsiang-han. stopping here and there. Ling-chao sold bamboo baskets for their morning and evening meals. The Layman had these [three] verses, which say:

 

When the mind's as is, circumstances also are as is;

There's no real and also no unreal.

Giving no heed to existence,

And holding not to non-existence --

You're neither saint nor sage, just

An ordinary man who has settled his affairs.

 

Easy, so easy!

These very five skandhas make true wisdom.

The ten directions of the universe are the

same One Vehicle.

How can the formless Dharmakaya be two!

If you can cast off the passions to enter Bodhi,

Where will any Buddha-lands be?

 

To preserve your life you must destroy it;

Having completely destroyed it you dwell at

ease.

When you attain the inmost meaning of this,

An iron boat floats upon water.

...

 

As the Layman was sitting one day he questioned Ling-chao, saying: "A man of old said: 'Bright, bright, the hundred grass-tips; bright, bright, the Patriarchs' meaning.' How do you understand this?" "What a thing for you to say in your ripe old age," admonished Ling-chao. "Well, what would you say?" asked the Layman. "Bright, bright, the hundred grass-tips; bright, bright, the Patriarchs' meaning," replied Ling-chao. The Layman laughed.

...

 

Layman P'ang's Death

 

The Layman was about to die. He spoke to Ling-chao, saying: "See how the sun is and report to me when it's north." Ling-chao quickly retorted: "The sun has already reached the zenith, and there's an eclipse." While the Layman went to the door to look out, Ling-chao seated herself in her father's chair and, putting her palms together reverently, passed away. The Layman smiled and said: "My daughter has anticipated me." He postponed [his going] for seven days. The Prefect Yu Ti came to inquire about his illness. The Layman said to him: "I beg you just to regard as empty all that is existent and to beware of taking as real all that is non-existent. Fare you well in the world. All is like shadows and echoes." His words ended. He pillowed his head on Mr. Yu's knee and died.

His final request was that he be cremated and [the ashes] scattered over rivers and lakes. Monks and laity mourned him and said that the Ch'an adherent Layman P'ang was indeed a Vimalakirti. He left three hundred poems to the world.

...

 

Of a hut in the fields the elder.

I'm the poorest man on earth!

Inside the house there's not one thing;

When I open my mouth it say's "empty, empty."

In the past I had bad friends --

I saved them all, made them priests;

Sitting together in harmony,

I always have them hear of the Mahayana.

At mealtimes carrying bowls for them,

I serve the m one and all.

...

 

People have a one-scrolled sutra.

Without form and without name.

No man is able to unroll and read it,

And none of us can hear it.

When you are able to unroll and read it,

You enter the principle and accord with the

Birthless.

Not to speak of becoming a bodhisattva,

You don't even need to become Buddha.

...

 

White-robed, I don't adhere to appearances:

The true principle arises from Emptiness.

Because my mind's without obstruction

Wisdom goes forth to all directions.

I only consider the lion's roar --

I don't let wild jackels yap!

Bodhi is said to be most marvelous,

But I scold it for being a false name.

...

 

Traveling the path is easy,

Traveling the path is easy!

Within, without and in between I depend

upon innate Wisdom:

dharmas are not born;

Birthless, I enter the true Principle.

Not form, not mind, a single radiance

streams forth;

In the mind-ground appears the Udumbara

tree of Emptiness.

...

 

Without no other, within no self.

Not wielding spear and shield, I accord with

Buddha-wisdom.

Well-versed in the Buddha-way, I go the

non-Way.

Without abandoning my ordinary man's

affairs,

The conditioned and name-and-form all are

flowers in the sky.

Nameless and formless, I leave birth-and-

death.

...

 

Without any cause you lose your mind,

And run out the front gate seeking [it.]

Although you try to question old friends,

All's quiet, without any trace [of them].

But returning to the hall, when you carefully

consider it,

Transforming sentient beings, [in] accord with tranquility,

You cannot go outside and seek friends;

Of yourself, amidst your family, you enter

Nirvana.

...

 

Mind depends upon true Wisdom,

The Principle pursues activity of mind.

With the Principle and Wisdom unhindered

The mind is birthless.

Deluded, there is self;

Enlightened, there is no-sentience.

With great Wisdom penetrated,

All the dharmas do not arise.

The five skandhas are masterless,

The six lands are in repose,

The seven deaths are not encountered,

The eight mirrors are completely bright,

And excellent transformations fittingly occur

In accord with the Buddha's words.

...

 

Reading the sutras, you must understand

their meaning;

Understanding their meaning, you can practice.

When you depend upon the meaning of the

teachings

You enter the Palace of Nirvana.

When you don't understand their meaning,

With your myriad views you're worse than blind:

Congenial writings largely occupying your

[mind-] ground,

The mind-ox won't consent to cultivate it;

Fields all over are covered with grass --

Where then can the rice-plants grow?

...

 

Not wanting to discard greed and anger,

In vain you trouble to read Buddha's

teachings.

You see the prescription, but don't take the

medicine --

How then can you do away with your

illness!

Grasp emptiness, and emptiness is form;

Grasp form, and form is impermanent.

Emptiness and form are not mine --

Sitting erect, I see my native home.

[Simple_Jack]

As for “gradual cultivation,” although he has awakened to the fact that his original nature is no different from that of the buddhas, the beginningless proclivities of habit (vāsanā) are extremely difficult to remove suddenly. Therefore he must continue to cultivate while relying on this awakening so that this efficacy of gradual suffusion is perfected; he constantly nurtures the embryo of sanctity, and after a long, long time he becomes a sage. Hence it is called gradual cultivation.

 

(Moguja’s Secrets on Cultivating the Mind, in Collected Works of Korean Buddhism, vol 2, p 216-217)

[Simple_Jack]

http://www.zenforuminternational.org/viewtopic.php?f=64&t=7135

 

FIVE RANKS

This theoretical exploration of the interplay between absolute and relative is attributed to Dongshan Liangjie (807-869). In Japanese, the characters for the name Dongshan are read as Tozan, who is the To of Soto Zen.

In traditional Buddhist ways of seeing, there are two truths: absolute and relative. The teaching of the five ranks are a philosophical examination of the interplay between these two truths.

"absolute and relative" is also presented as "real and illusory," "noumenal and phenomenal," "true and partial," "upright and inclined," "straight and bent," "equal and diverse," and "empty and formed."

1. the relative in the absolute (Coming from within the absolute)
2. the absolute in the relative (Arriving within the Relative)
3. coming from within the absolute (The Relative within the absolute)
4. going within both absolute and relative (The absolute within the relative)
5. arriving within both together (Arrival in Both at Once)


Taigen Leighton is a respected Soto Zen Buddhist priest and scholar. Here's his assessment -- The five ranks are, first, "the relative in the absolute," seeing phenomena against the backdrop of ultimate void; second, "the absolute in the relative," seeing the ultimate universal in each or any one phenomenal event; third, "coming from within the absolute," emerging silent and shining from the experiential state of union with the ultimate; fourth, "going within both absolute and relative," using both particulars and the sense of the universal with familiarity; and fifth, "arriving within both together;" freely using either the phenomenal or the ineffable reality without attaching to either and without seeing them as separate. These five ranks represent ontological aspects of awakened mind more than stages of spiritual development.


Caoshan’s (Jap. Sozan, the So of Soto Zen ) assessment:

COMING FROM WITHIN THE ABSOLUTE:

The whole body revealed, unique, the root source of all things, in it there is neither praise nor
blame.

ARRIVING WITHIN THE RELATIVE:

Going along with things and beings without hindrance, a wood boat empty inside, getting through freely by being empty

THE RELATIVE WITHIN THE ABSOLUTE:

A piece of emptiness pervading everywhere, all senses silent.

THE ABSOLUTE WITHIN THE RELATIVE:

The moon in the water, the image in the mirror -- fundamentally without origin or extinction, how could any traces remain.

ARRIVAL IN BOTH AT ONCE

The absolute is not necessarily void, the relative is not necessary actual; there is neither turning away nor turning to.

When mental activity sinks away and both the material world and emptiness are forgotten, there is no more concealment -- the whole thing is revealed; this is the relative within the absolute.

Mountains are mountains, rivers are rivers -- no one establishes the names, nothing can be compared; this is the absolute within the relative.

Clean and naked, bare and free, the visage is in full majesty -- throughout all heaven and earth, the sole honored one, without any other; this is coming from the absolute.

Just as the emperor in his realm does not rely upon the ordinances of wise kings and emperors of the past, the eye sees and the ear hears without using any other power.

As the ear does not enter sound, and sound does not block up the ear, the moment you turn therein, there have never been any names fixed in the world. This is called arrival within both at once. This is not mind or objects, not phenomena or principle; it has always been beyond name or description. Naturally real, forgetting essence and appearance, this is called simultaneous realization of both relative and absolute.


Hongzhi’s (Jap. Wanshi Zenji) assessment:

The Partial within the True:
The blue sky clears and the River of Stars' cold flood dries up.
At midnight the wooden boy pounds on the moon's door.
In darkness the jade woman is startled from her sleep.

The True within the Partial:
Ocean and clouds rendezvous at the top of the spirit mountain.
The old woman returns with hair hanging down like white silk
And shyly faces the mirror coldly reflecting her image.

Coming from within the True:
In the moonlit night the huge sea monster sheds its scales.
Its great back rubs the heaven, and it scatters clouds with its wing feathers.
Soaring here and there along the bird's path -- it is difficult to classify.

Coming from within Both Together:
Meeting face to face we need not shun each other's names.
In the changing wind, no injury to the profound meaning.
In the light, a road to the natural differences.

Arriving within Both Together:
The Big Dipper slants across the sky before dawn.
In dewy cold the crane begins to wake from its dreams.
As it flies out of the old nest, the pine tree up in the clouds falls over.

[Simple_Jack]

http://books.google.com.sg/books?id=w70ASb2AZV0C&source=gbs_navlinks_s

 

From Bendowa, by Zen Master Dogen

Question Ten:

Some have said: Do not concern yourself about birth-and-death. There is a way to promptly rid yourself of birth-and-death. It is by grasping the reason for the eternal immutability of the 'mind-nature.' The gist of it is this: although once the body is born it proceeds inevitably to death, the mind-nature never perishes. Once you can realize that the mind-nature, which does not transmigrate in birth-and-death, exists in your own body, you make it your fundamental nature. Hence the body, being only a temporary form, dies here and is reborn there without end, yet the mind is immutable, unchanging throughout past, present, and future. To know this is to be free from birth-and-death. By realizing this truth, you put a final end to the transmigratory cycle in which you have been turning. When your body dies, you enter the ocean of the original nature. When you return to your origin in this ocean, you become endowed with the wondrous virtue of the Buddha-patriarchs. But even if you are able to grasp this in your present life, because your present physical existence embodies erroneous karma from prior lives, you are not the same as the sages.

"Those who fail to grasp this truth are destined to turn forever in the cycle of birth-and-death. What is necessary, then, is simply to know without delay the meaning of the mind-nature's immutability. What can you expect to gain from idling your entire life away in purposeless sitting?"

What do you think of this statement? Is it essentially in accord with the Way of the Buddhas and patriarchs?



Answer 10:

You have just expounded the view of the Senika heresy. It is certainly not the Buddha Dharma.

According to this heresy, there is in the body a spiritual intelligence. As occasions arise this intelligence readily discriminates likes and dislikes and pros and cons, feels pain and irritation, and experiences suffering and pleasure - it is all owing to this spiritual intelligence. But when the body perishes, this spiritual intelligence separates from the body and is reborn in another place. While it seems to perish here, it has life elsewhere, and thus is immutable and imperishable. Such is the standpoint of the Senika heresy.

But to learn this view and try to pass it off as the Buddha Dharma is more foolish than clutching a piece of broken roof tile supposing it to be a golden jewel. Nothing could compare with such a foolish, lamentable delusion. Hui-chung of the T'ang dynasty warned strongly against it. Is it not senseless to take this false view - that the mind abides and the form perishes - and equate it to the wondrous Dharma of the Buddhas; to think, while thus creating the fundamental cause of birth-and-death, that you are freed from birth-and-death? How deplorable! Just know it for a false, non-Buddhist view, and do not lend a ear to it.

I am compelled by the nature of the matter, and more by a sense of compassion, to try to deliver you from this false view. You must know that the Buddha Dharma preaches as a matter of course that body and mind are one and the same, that the essence and the form are not two. This is understood both in India and in China, so there can be no doubt about it. Need I add that the Buddhist doctrine of immutability teaches that all things are immutable, without any differentiation between body and mind. The Buddhist teaching of mutability states that all things are mutable, without any differentiation between essence and form. In view of this, how can anyone state that the body perishes and the mind abides? It would be contrary to the true Dharma.

Beyond this, you must also come to fully realize that birth-and-death is in and of itself nirvana. Buddhism never speaks of nirvana apart from birth-and-death. Indeed, when someone thinks that the mind, apart from the body, is immutable, not only does he mistake it for Buddha-wisdom, which is free from birth-and-death, but the very mind that makes such a discrimination is not immutable, is in fact even then turning in birth-and-death. A hopeless situation, is it not?

You should ponder this deeply: since the Buddha Dharma has always maintained the oneness of body and mind, why, if the body is born and perishes, would the mind alone, separated from the body, not be born and die as well? If at one time body and mind were one, and at another time not one, the preaching of the Buddha would be empty and untrue. Moreover, in thinking that birth-and-death is something we should turn from, you make the mistake of rejecting the Buddha Dharma itself. You must guard against such thinking.

Understand that what Buddhists call the Buddhist doctrine of the mind-nature, the great and universal aspect encompassing all phenomena, embraces the entire universe, without differentiating between essence and form, or concerning itself with birth or death. There is nothing - enlightenment and nirvana included - that is not the mind-nature. All dharmas, the "myriad forms dense and close" of the universe - are alike in being this one Mind. All are included without exception. All those dharmas, which serves as "gates" or entrances to the Way, are the same as one Mind. For a Buddhist to preach that there is no disparity between these dharma-gates indicates that he understands the mind-nature.

In this one Dharma [one Mind], how could there be any differentiate between body and mind, any separation of birth-and-death and nirvana? We are all originally children of the Buddha, we should not listen to madmen who spout non-Buddhist views.

[Simple_Jack]

From Working Toward Enlightenment by Nan Huaijin trans. by Thomas Cleary:

 

"The Source Mirror tells us what enlightenment means. In the book, ten questions are raised. There are no enlightened people who have not mastered the scriptural teachings. They know all the principles of the Buddhist scriptures at one glance. For them reading the scriptures is like reading a novel: They understand everything as soon as they read it, and they do not have to study them in depth. Zen master Yen-Shou's Source Mirror says this in Volume 1: Suppose there are people who stubbornly cling to their own views, who do not believe the words of the Buddha, who create attitudes that block them, and who cut off other routes of study. For their sake I will now discuss ten questions in order to firmly establish the guiding principles.

First question: When we completely see true nature as plainly as we see colors in broad daylight, are we the same as bodhisattvas like Manjushri?

Second question: When we can clearly understand the source in everything, as we encounter situations and face objects, as we see form and hear sound, as we raise and lower our feet, as we open and close our eyes, are we in accord with the path?

Third question: When we read through the teachings of Buddha for our era contained in the Buddhist canon, and the sayings of all the Zen masters since antiquity, and we hear their profundities without becoming afraid, do we always get accurate understanding and have no doubts?

Fourth question: When people pose difficult differentiating questins to us, and press us with all sorts of probing inquiries, are we able to respond with the four forms of eloquence, and resolve all their doubts?

Fifth question: Does your wisdom shine unhindered at all times in all places, with perfect penetration from moment to moment, not encountering any phenomenon that can obstruct it, and never being interrupted for even an instant?

Sixth question: When all kinds of adverse and favorable and good and evil realms appear before us, are we unobstructed by them, and can we see through them all?

Seventh question: In all the mental states in Treatise on the Gate for Illuminating the Hundred Phenomena, can we see for each and every one of them, their fine details, the essential nature, and their fundamental source and point of origin, and not be confused by birth and death and the sense faculties and sense organs?

Eighth question: Can we discern reality in the midst of all forms of conduct and activity, whether walking, standing, sitting, or lying down, whether receiving instructions or responding, whether dressing or eating?

Ninth question: Can we be singleminded and unmoved whether we hear there is a Buddha or we hear there is no Buddha, whether we hear ther are sentient beings or we hear there are no sentient beings, whether wea re praised or slandered or affirmed or denied?

Tenth question: Can we clearly comprehend all the differentiating knowledge we hear, and comprehend both true nature and apparent form, inner truth and phenomena, without hindrance, and discern the source of all phenomena, even including the appearance of the thousand sages in the world, without any doubts?

The preceding ten questions can provide definitive criteria for deciding whether or not a person is really enlightened. The first question deals with the realm of illuminating mind and seeing true nature, being totally clear at all times in all places about all things, just as you would be when seeing the colors of a painting in broad daylight, and being in the same realm as such exemplers of wisdom as the Bodhisattva Manjushri. Can you be this way?

The second question asks whether you can be in accord with the Path when you encounter poeple and situations, or when other people get in the way. The expression "encounter situations and face objects" is very broad. Can you see forms and hear sounds without your mind moving? In your daily life, even at night when you fall asleep, can you be in accord the the Path in all things? Can you do that?

The third question is about the Buddhist scriptures. Can you take The Lotus Sutra and The Surangama Sutra and read them and fully understand them? Can you hear the loftiest explanations of the Dharma without becoming afraid? Can you thoroughly understand understand them, without having any doubts? Can you do that?

The fourth question asks, when students bring to bear all sorts of learning to ask you questions, are you able to answer them with unobstructed eloquence? All of you can investigate the last six questions for yourselves.

The final passage of The Source Mirror presents the following information. If you cannot really do these things, you should not assume a proud, deceptive, lying attitude, or take a self-satisfied attitude. What you must do is make a wide-ranging study of the ultimate teaching, and broaden your learning of previous people of knowledge. Penetrate to the inherent nature that is the source of the enlightened teachers and Buddha, and reach the stage of freedom from doubt that is beyond study. Only at this point can you stop your studies and give your wandering mind a rest. Then you will handle yourself with concentration and contemplation in harmony, and act on behalf of others by teaching with skill in means.

If you cannot go everywhere in the universe to study, or make broad study of the multitude of scriptures, just make a careful reading of The Source Mirror, and you will naturally gain entry. This is the most important of all the teachings, the gate for moving toward the Path of enlightenment. It is like watching the mother to know the child, like finding the root to know the branches. When you pull the cloth, all the threads of the net are straight. When you pull the cloth, all the threads from which it is woven come along too.

If you cannot accomplish even one of the items mentioned in these ten questions, then you should not deceive yourself or others and think you are right. If you have any doubts at all, you must ask for instruction from enlightened teachers everywhere. You must certainly reach the realm of the Buddhas and the enlightened teachers. Only when you have accomplished all that the enlightened teachers awakened to, can you reach the level of freedom from doubt beyond study, where you no longer have to study. When you 'give your wandering mind a rest,' the mind of false thought totally stops. 'Then you will handle yourself with concentration and contemplation in harmony and act behalf of others by teaching with skill in means.' After you have attained great penetrating enlightenment, you either travel the Hinayana road, and further cultivate the four dhyanas and the eight samadhis and realize their fruit, and become fully equipped with the six spiritual powers and three Buddha-bodies and all the wondrous functions of the spiritual powers; or else you travel the Mahayana road, and sacrifice your own cultivation to help others, and appear in the world to propagate the Dharma.

'If you cannot go everywhere in the universe to study, or make a broad study of the multitude of scriptures," that is, if you think there are too many works in the Buddhist canon for you to be able to read them all, "just make a careful reading of The Source Mirror and you will naturally gain entry. This is the most important of all the teachings, the gate for moving toward the Path of enlightenment.'
Zen master Yen-Shou urges you to make a careful study of his The Source Mirror, because he has collected together in his book all the essential points of all the scriptures. 'It is like watching the mother to know the children, like finding the root to know the branches. When you pull the cloth, all the threads from which it is woven come along too.' How beautiful the language is here. This is the importance of this book as Zen master Yen-Shou explains it."

Edited March 23, 2014 by Simple_Jack

[Jeff]

Hi SJ,

 

 

Those are very cool and very profound questions. Thank you for the gift of sharing them.

 

 

Best regards,

Jeff

Edited March 17, 2014 by Jeff

[Simple_Jack]

http://www.sacred-texts.com/bud/zen/hz/hz.htm

 

Beware of seeking [the Truth] by others,

Further and further he retreats from you;

Alone I go now all by myself,

And I meet him everywhere I turn.

He is no other than myself,

And yet I am not he.

When thus understood,

I am face to face with Tathatâ. ~ Dongshan Liangjie

(Essays in Zen Buddhism – Third Series 238)

 

寶鏡三昧歌

The Song of the Jeweled Mirror Samadhi

Translated by Toshu John Neatrour, Sheng-yen, and Kazu Tanahashi

 

如是之法　佛祖密附 The teaching of suchness, is given directly, through all buddha ancestors,

汝今得之　宜能保護 Now that it's yours, keep it well.

銀碗盛雪　明月藏鷺 A serving of snow in a silver bowl, or herons concealed in the glare of the moon

類而不斉　混則知處 Apart, they seem similar, together, they're different.

意不在言　來機亦赴 Meaning cannot rest in words, it adapts itself to that which arises.

動成窠臼　差落顧佇 Tremble and you're lost in a trap, miss and there's always regrets.

背觸共非　如大火聚 Neither reject nor cling to words, both are wrong; like a ball of fire,

但形文彩　即屬染汚 Useful but dangerous. Merely expressed in fine language, the mirror will tarnish.

夜半正明　天曉不露 At midnight truly it's most bright, by daylight it cannot still be seen.

爲物作則　用抜諸苦 It is the principle that regulates all, relieving every suffering.

雖非有爲　不是無語 Though it doesn't act it is not without words.

如臨寶鏡　形影相覩 In the most precious mirror form meets reflection:

汝是非渠　渠正是汝 You are not It, but It is all you.

如世嬰児　五相完具 Just as a baby, five senses complete,

不去不來　不起不住 Neither going or coming, nor arising or staying,

婆婆和和　有句無句 Babbles and coos: speech without meaning,

終不得物　語未正故 No understanding, unclearly expressed.

重離六爻　偏正回互 Six lines make the double li trigram, where principle and appearances interact.

疊而成三　變盡爲五 Lines stacked in three pairs yet transform in five ways.

如茎草味　如金剛杵 Like the five flavors of the hyssop plant or the five branches of the diamond scepter,

正中妙挾　敲唱雙舉 Reality harmonizes subtly just as melody and rhythm, together make music.

通宗通途　挾帯挾路 Penetrate the root and you fathom the branches, grasping connections, one then finds the road.

錯然則吉　不可犯忤 To be wrong is auspicious, there's no contradiction.

天眞而妙　不屬迷悟 Naturally pure and profoundly subtle, it touches neither delusion nor awakening,

因縁時節　寂然昭著 At each time and condition it quietly shines.

細入無間　大絶方所 So fine it penetrates no space at all, so large its bounds can never be measured.

毫忽之差　不應律呂 But if you're off by a hair's breadth all harmony's lost in discord.

今有頓漸　縁立宗趣 Now there are sudden and gradual schools with principles, approaches so standards arise.

宗趣分矣　即是規矩 Penetrating the principle,

宗通趣極　眞常流注 Mastering the approach, the genuine constant continues outflowing.

外寂内搖　繋駒伏鼠 A tethered horse, a mouse frozen in fear, outwardly still but inwardly whirling:

先聖悲之　爲法檀度 Compassionate sages freed them with teaching.

隨其顛倒　以緇爲素 In upside down ways folks take black for white.

顛倒想滅　肯心自許 When inverted thinking falls away they realize mind without even trying.

要合古轍　請觀前古 If you want to follow the ancient path then consider the ancients:

佛道垂成　十劫觀樹 The buddha, completing the path, still sat for ten eons.

如虎之缺　如馬之馵 Like a tiger leaving a trace of the prey, like a horse missing the left hind shoe,

以有下劣　寶几珍御 For those whose ability is under the mark, a jeweled footrest and brocaded robe.

以有驚異　狸奴白牯 For others who still can manifest wonder there's a house cat and cow.

藝以巧力　射中百歩 Yi the archer shot nine of ten suns from the sky, saving parched crops, another bowman hit targets at hundreds of paces:

箭鋒相値　巧力何預 These skills are small to compare with that in which two arrow points meet head on in mid air.

木人方歌　石女起舞 The wooden man breaks into song, a stone maiden leaps up to dance,

非情識到　寧容思慮 They can't be known by mere thought or feelings, so how can they be analyzed?

臣奉於君　子順於父 The minister still serves his lord, the child obeys his parent.

不順不孝　不奉非輔 Not obeying is unfilial, not serving is a useless waste.

潛行密用　如愚如魯 Practicing inwardly, functioning in secret, playing the fool, seemingly stupid,

只能相續　名主中主 If you can only persist in this way, you will see the lord within the lord.

[adept]

http://www.blia.org/english/publications/booklet/pages/10.htm

[Simple_Jack]

http://www.kaihan.com/fives.htm

 

The Three Roads of Tung Shan

 

(The following explanation is taken from Shigetsu Ein's Funogo san ro, da, shi i rui, a 'Non-talk on the three roads, (three) falls, and four different kinds' (1761). Shigetsu was a Soto Zen master, a Japanese descendant of Ts'ao-Tung Ch'an.)

 

For innumerable aeons, since there has been self ' this stinking skinbag has been changed from time to time, transformed from place to place, in a thousand conditions, ten thousand forms; who can reach the realm of our fundamental quiescence?

 

If you get here, you must know this road. 'This road' means while dwelling in the present heap of sound and form, first getting rid of clinging to self, and attaining our former original state of selflessness. And furthermore, you must know that all things have no self. Once person and things are selfless, in your daily activities you walk in the void. This life basically has an undefiled practice and experience; thus would we practice and experience nondefilement. Today you must diligently walk in the void. Walking in the void is not some special art; each day when you go into the hall, you should not chew through a single grain of rice. Not chewing through a single grain of rice means that there is no breaking of the fast or violation of discipline by arousing mindfulness of tasting flavor. This is called traveling the bird's path.

 

Travel on the bird's path is trackless; when you don't leave your body in the realm of tracklessness, this is the turning point of an ascetic. After you have arrived here and settled here, there is still one road going beyond. This road is not in going or coming; it is what is called 'moss growing in the jade palace.' All the names of the Other Side are temporary names for this. In reality, it is the one road that cannot be touched upon. That is why we say 'hidden.' And 'hidden' is not a matter of giving a name as its meaning; the realm called the hidden road is the realm of no name or meaning. This is why it is said, 'He has no country; he does not abide, dwells in no home.'

 

To know this and yet be able to not remain here, to be an example for beings, to inspire and lead them, unify and teach them, is called 'extending the hands.' In extending the hands, there is no separate road; it does not transgress the bird's path. Traveling the bird's path by yourself, yet you extend your hands. In the bird's path there is no separate road; knowing the hidden road yourself, you still don't transgress it. Dwelling in the bird's path, you don't sprout horns on your head but always extend your hands.

 

Thus the three roads are the cause and effect of the great practice; and the cause and effect spreads vast and wide throughout the whole universe.

...

 

Fen Yang--Five States

 

Fen Yang Shan Chao, 947-1024, was one of the great ancestors of the Lin Chi house of Ch'an, noteworthy for his development of the kung an as a tool in Ch'an study; one of his points was to show the unity of the essence of Ch'an in the midst of the various methods which had evolved in the streams of Ch'an teaching over the preceding three hundred years.)

 

 

Coming from within the absolute

 

The jewel sword of the diamond king Sweeps the skies with a spiritual light; It shines freely throughout the world, like a crystal, Its clear radiance free of dust.

 

The relative within the absolute (biased within the true)

 

The thunderous roar of cutting dynamism- To watch for the sparks and lightning Is still dull thinking; Hesitate and you are a thousand mountains away.

 

The absolute within the relative (true within the biased)

 

See the wheel-turning king; Enforcing the true imperative, with seven regal treasures and a thousand sons. Everything accompanies him on the road, Still he seeks a golden mirror.

 

Arriving in both (in old tradition, this is arriving in the relative/biased)

 

A three year old golden lion; His teeth and claws are all there- All demons and apparitions Faint at the sound of his roar.

 

Simultaneous realization of both

 

Great glory is effortless; Quit making a wooden ox walk. The real one goes through the fire- The wonder of wonders of the King of Dharma.

 

Coming from within the absolute is lotus flowers blooming on parched ground--their golden calyxes and silver stems are bathed in jade dewdrops. The eminent monk does not sit on the phoenix pedestal. The relative within the absolute--the moon is bright at midnight, the sun must greet the dawn. The absolute within the relatives: hair tip becomes a huge tree, a drop of water becomes a river. Arriving in both-spirit does not come from heaven or earth; how can heroism depend on the four seasons for its impulse? Simultaneous realization-the jade woman casts the shuttle on the whirring loom, the stone man beats the drum, boom boom.

[Simple_Jack]

http://www.westernchanfellowship.org/lib/wcf////what-is-chan/

 

What Is Chan?

 

By Chan Master Sheng Yen

 

I wish to start by telling you that Chan is not the same as knowledge, yet knowledge is not completely apart from Chan. Chan is not just religion, yet the achievements of religion can be reached through Chan. Chan is not philosophy, yet philosophy can in no way exceed the scope of Chan. Chan is not science, yet the spirit of emphasising reality and experience is also required in Chan. Therefore, please do not try to explore the content of Chan motivated by mere curiosity, for Chan is not something new brought here [to the USA] by Orientals; Chan is present everywhere, in space without limit and time without end. However before the Buddhism of the East was propagated in the western world, the people of the West never knew of the existence of Chan. The Chan taught by Orientals in the West is not, in fact, the real Chan. It is the method to realise Chan. Chan was first discovered by a prince named Siddhartha Gautama (called Shakyamuni after his enlightenment), who was born in India about 2500 years ago. After he became enlightened and was called a Buddha, he taught us the method to know Chan. This method was transmitted from India to China, and then to Japan. In India it was called dhyana, which is pronounced 'Chan' in Chinese, and 'Zen' in Japanese. Actually, all three are identical.

 

Chan has universal and eternal existence. It has no need of any teacher to transmit it; what is transmitted by teachers is just the method by which one can personally experience this Chan.

Some people mistakenly understand Chan to be some kind of mysterious experience; others think that one can attain supernatural powers through the experience of Chan. Of course, the process of practising Chan meditation may cause various kinds of strange occurrences on the level of mental and physical sensation; and also, through the practice of unifying body and mind, one may be able to attain the mental power to control or alter external things. But such phenomena, which are looked upon as mysteries of religion, are not the aim of Chan practice, because they can only satisfy one's curiosity or megalomania, and cannot solve the actual problems of peoples lives.

 

Chan starts from the root of the problem. It does not start with the idea of conquering the external social and material environments, but starts with gaining thorough knowledge of one's own self. The moment you know what your self is, this 'I' that you now take to be yourself will simultaneously disappear. We call this new knowledge of the notion of self 'enlightenment' or 'seeing ones basic nature'. This is the beginning of helping you to thoroughly solve real problems. In the end, you will discover that you the individual, together with the whole of existence, are but one totality which cannot be divided.

 

Because you yourself have imperfections, you therefore feel the environment is imperfect. It is like a mirror with an uneven surface, the images reflected in it are also distorted. Or, it is like the surface of water disturbed by ripples, the moon reflected in it is irregular and unsettled. If the surface of the mirror is clear and smooth, or if the air on the surface of the water is still and the ripples calmed, then the reflection in the mirror and the moon in the water will be clear and exact. Therefore, from the point of view of Chan, the major cause of the pain and misfortune suffered by humanity is not the treacherous environment of the world in which we live, nor the dreadful society of humankind, but the fact that we have never been able to recognise our basic nature. So the method of Chan is not to direct us to evade reality, nor to shut our eyes like the African ostrich when enemies come, and bury our heads in the sand, thinking all problems are solved. Chan is not a self-hypnotising idealism.

 

By the practise of Chan one can eliminate the 'I'; not only the selfish, small 'I', but also the large 'I', which in philosophy is called 'Truth' or 'the Essence'. Only then is there absolute freedom. Thus an accomplished Chan practitioner never feels that any responsibility is a burden, nor does he feel the pressure that the conditions of life exert on people. He only feels that he is perpetually bringing the vitality of life into full activity. This is the expression of absolute freedom. Therefore the life of Chan is inevitably normal and positive, happy and open. The reason for this is that the practise of Chan will continually provide you with a means to excavate your precious mine of wisdom. The deeper the excavation, the higher the wisdom that is attained, until eventually you obtain all the wisdom of the entire universe. At that time, there is not a single thing in all of time and space that is not contained within the scope of your wisdom. At that stage wisdom becomes absolute; and since it is absolute, the term wisdom serves no further purpose. To be sure, at that stage the 'I' that motivated you to pursue such things as fame, wealth and power, or to escape from suffering and danger, has completely disappeared. What is more, even the wisdom which eliminated your 'I' becomes an unnecessary concept to you.

 

Of course, from the viewpoint of sudden enlightenment it is very easy for a Chan practitioner to reach this stage; nevertheless before reaching the gate of sudden enlightenment one must exert a great deal of effort on the journey. Otherwise the methods of Chan would be useless.

 

The Three Stages of Chan Meditation

 

At present [1977], the methods of meditation that I am teaching in the United States are divided into three stages.

 

Stage 1: To Balance the Development of Body and Mind in order to Attain Mental and Physical Health

 

With regard to the body, we stress the demonstration and correction of the postures of walking, standing, sitting and reclining. At the same time we teach various methods of physical exercise for walking, standing, sitting and reclining. They are unique exercise methods combining Indian Hatha Yoga and Chinese Tao-yin, and can bring physical health as well as results in meditation. Thus, one who practises Chan and has obtained good results will definitely have a strong body capable of enduring hardship. For the mind we emphasise the elimination of impatience, suspicion, anxiety, fear and frustration, so as to establish a state of self-confidence, determination, optimism, peace and stability.

 

A good student, after five or ten lessons here, will reach the first stage and be able to obtain results in the above two areas. One of our student's reports stated: "This kind of Chan class is especially good for someone like myself who, by profession or habit, has been used to having the brain functioning just about every minute of the day. I often find this Chan sitting very helpful as rest or relief. So even for no greater purpose, this Chan class has been very useful and should be highly recommended." [from Chan Magazine Vol.1; No.1]

 

In the first lesson of each class, I always ask each of the students individually his or her purpose in learning Chan whether he or she hoped to benefit the body, or sought help for the mind. The answers show that the latter were in the majority. This indicates that people living in American society today, under the strain and pressure of the present environment, suffer excessive tension, and many have lost their mental balance. Some are so severely tense that they have to consult a psychiatrist. Among those who come to learn Chan, I have one woman student, an outstanding lecturer in a well-known university, who asked me at the first meeting if I could help to relieve her from tense and uneasy moods. I told her that for a Chan practitioner this is a very simple matter. After five lessons she felt that Chan was a great blessing to her life.

 

The method of the first stage is very simple. Mainly it requires you to relax all the muscles and nerves of your entire body, and concentrate your attention on the method you have just learned. Because the tension of your muscles and nerves affects the activity of the brain, the key is therefore to reduce the burden on your brain. When your wandering thoughts and illusions decrease, your brain will gradually get a little rest. As its need of blood is reduced, more blood will circulate through the entire body. Meanwhile, because of the relaxation of the brain, all the muscles also relax; thus your blood vessels expand, you feel comfortable all over, your spirit feels fresh and alert, and your mental responses are naturally lighter and more lively.

 

If one's object of study is just to acquire physical and mental balance, and not to study meditation proper, then one will probably feel that the completion of the first stage is enough; but many students are not content with this, and indeed, some from the outset are looking for the goal of the second stage.

 

Stage 2: From the Sense of the Small 'I'

 

The first stage only helps to bring concentration to your confused mind; but when you practise concentration, other scattered thoughts continue to appear in your mind - sometimes many, sometimes a few. The concept of your purpose in practising Chan is for mental and physical benefits. This is a stage where your concept is purely self-centred. There is no mention of philosophical ideals or religious experience. When you reach the second stage, it will enable you to liberate yourself from the narrow view of the 'I'. In the second stage you begin to enter the stage of meditation. When you practise the method of cultivation taught by your teacher, you will enlarge the sphere of the outlook of the small 'I' until it coincides with time and space. The small 'I' merges into the entire universe, forming a unity. When you look inward, the depth is limitless; when you look outward, the breadth is limitless. Since you have joined and become one with universe, the world of your own body and mind no longer exists. What exists is the universe, which is infinite in depth and breadth. You yourself are not only a part of the universe, but also the totality of it.

 

When you achieve this experience in your Chan sitting, you will then understand what is meant in philosophy by principle or basic substance, and also what phenomenal existence is. All phenomena are the floating surface or perceptible layer of basic substance. From the shallow point of view, the phenomena have innumerable distinctions and each has different characteristics; in reality, the differences between the phenomena do not impair the totality of basic substance. For instance, on the planet on which we live, there are countless kinds of animals, plants, minerals, vapours, liquids and solids which incessantly arise, change and perish, constituting the phenomena of the earth. However, seen from another planet, the earth is just one body. When we have the opportunity to free ourselves from the bonds of self or subjective views, to assume the objective standpoint of the whole and observe all phenomena together, we can eliminate opposing and contradictory views. Take a tree as an example. From the standpoint of the individual leaves and branches, they are all distinct from one another, and can also be perceived to rub against one another. However, from the standpoint of the trunk and roots, all parts without exception are of one unified whole.

 

In the course of this second stage, you have realised that you not only have an independent individual existence, but you also have a universal existence together with this limitlessly deep and wide cosmos, and therefore the confrontation between you and the surrounding environment exists no more. Discontent, hatred, love, desire - in other words dispositions of rejecting and grasping disappear naturally, and you sense a feeling of peace and satisfaction. Because you have eliminated the selfish small 'I', you are able to look upon all people and all things as if they were phenomena produced from your own substance, and so you will love all people and all things in the same way you loved and watched over your small 'I'. This is the mind of a great philosopher.

 

Naturally, all great religious figures must have gone through the experiences of this second stage, where they free themselves from the confines of the small 'I', and discover that their own basic substance is none other than the existence of the entire universe, and that there is no difference between themselves and everything in the universe. All phenomena are manifestations of their own nature. They have the duty to love and watch over all things, and also have the right to manage them; just as we have the duty to love our own children and the right to manage the property that belongs to us This is the formation of the relationship between the deity and the multitude of things he created. Such people personify the basic substance of the universe which they experience through meditation, and create the belief in God. They substantiate this idea of a large 'I' the self-love of God and formulate the mission of being a saviour of the world or an emissary of God. They unify all phenomena and look upon them as objects that were created and are to be saved. Consequently, some religious figures think that the basic nature of their souls is the same as that of the deity, and that they are human incarnations of the deity. In this way, they consider themselves to be saviours of the world. Others think that although the basic nature of their souls is not identical to and inseparable from that of the deity, the phenomenon of their incarnation shows that they were sent to this world by God as messengers to promulgate God's intention.

 

Generally, when philosophers or religious figures reach the height of the second stage, they feel that their wisdom is unlimited, their power is infinite, and their lives are eternal. When the scope of the 'I' enlarges, self-confidence accordingly gets stronger, but this stronger self-confidence is in fact merely the unlimited escalation of a sense of superiority and pride. It is therefore termed large 'I', and does not mean that absolute freedom from vexations has been achieved.

 

Stage 3: From the Large 'I' to No 'I'

 

When one reaches the height of the second stage, he realises that the concept of the 'I' does not exist. But he has only abandoned the small 'I' and has not negated the concept of basic substance or the existence of God; you may call it Truth, the one and only God, the Almighty, the Unchanging Principle, or even the Buddha of Buddhism. If you think that it is real, then you are still in the realm of the big 'I' and have not left the sphere of philosophy and religion.

 

I must emphasise that the content of Chan does not appear until the third stage. Chan is unimaginable. It is neither a concept nor a feeling. It is impossible to describe it in any terms abstract or concrete. Though meditation is ordinarily the proper path leading to Chan, once you have arrived at the door of Chan, even the method of meditation is rendered useless. It is like using various means of transportation on a long journey. When you reach the final destination, you find a steep cliff standing right in front of you. It is so high you cannot see its top, and so wide that its side cannot be found. At this time a person who has been to the other side of the cliff comes to tell you that on the other side lies the world of Chan. When you scale it you will enter Chan. And yet, he tells you not to depend on any means of transportation to fly over, bypass, or penetrate through it, because it is infinity itself, and there is no way to scale it.

 

Even an outstanding Chan master able to bring his student to this place will find himself unable to help any more. Although he has been to the other side, he cannot take you there with him, just as a mother's own eating and drinking cannot take the hunger away from the child who refuses to eat or drink. At that time, the only help he can give you is to tell you to discard all your experiences, your knowledge, and all the things and ideas that you think are the most reliable, most magnificent, and most real, even including your hope to get to the world of Chan. It is as if you were entering a sacred building. Before you do so, the guard tells you that you must not carry any weapon, that you must take off all your clothes, and that not only must you be completely naked you also have to leave your body and soul behind. Then you can enter.

 

Because Chan is a world where there is no self, if there is still any attachment at all in your mind, there is no way you can harmonise with Chan. Therefore, Chan is the territory of the wise, and the territory of the brave. Not being wise, one would not believe that after he has abandoned all attachments another world could appear before him. Not being brave, one would find it very hard to discard everything he has accumulated in this life - ideals and knowledge, spiritual and material things.

 

You may ask what benefit we would get after making such great sacrifices to enter the world of Chan. Let me tell you that you cannot enter the world of Chan while this question is still with you. Looking for benefit, either for self or for others, is in the 'I'-oriented stage. The sixth patriarch of the Chan sect in China taught people that the way to enter the enlightenment of the realm of Chan is: "Neither think of good, nor think of evil". That is, you eliminate such opposing views as self and other, inner and outer, being and non-being, large and small, good and bad, vexation and Bodhi, illusion and enlightenment, false and true, or suffering of birth and death and joy of emancipation. Only then can the realm of Chan or enlightenment appear and bring you a new life.

 

This new life you have had all along, and yet you have never discovered it. In the Chan sect we call it your original face before you were born. This is not the small 'I' of body and mind, nor the large 'I' of the world and universe. This is absolute freedom, free from the misery of all vexations and bonds. To enter Chan as described above is not easy. Many people have studied and meditated for decades, and still have never gained entrance to the door of Chan. It will not be difficult, however, when your causes and conditions are mature, or if you happen to have a good Chan master who guides you with full attention. This Master may adopt various attitudes, actions and verbal expressions which may seem ridiculous to you, as indirect means of assisting you to achieve your goal speedily. And when the Master tells you that you have now entered the gate, you will suddenly realise that there is no gate to Chan. Before entering, you cannot see where the gate is, and after entering you find the gate non-existent. Otherwise there will be the distinction between inside and outside, the enlightened and the ignorant; and if there are such distinctions, then it is still not Chan.

 

When you are in the second stage, although you feel that the 'I' does not exist, the basic substance of the universe, or the Supreme Truth, still exists. Although you recognise that all the different phenomena are the extension of this basic substance or Supreme Truth, yet there still exists the opposition of basic substance versus external phenomena. Not until the distinctions of all phenomena disappear, and everything goes back to truth or Heaven, will you have absolute peace and unity. As long as the world of phenomena is still active, you cannot do away with conflict, calamity, suffering and crime. Therefore, although philosophers and religious figures perceive the peace of the original substance, they still have no way to get rid of the confusion of phenomena.

 

One who has entered Chan does not see basic substance and phenomena as two things standing in opposition to each other. They cannot even be illustrated as being the back and palm of a hand. This is because phenomena themselves are basic substance, and apart from phenomena there is no basic substance to be found. The reality of basic substance exists right in the unreality of phenomena, which change ceaselessly and have no constant form. This is the Truth. When you experience that phenomena are unreal, you will then be free from the concept of self and other, right and wrong, and free from the vexations of greed, hatred, worry and pride. You will not need to search for peace and purity, and you will not need to detest evil vexations and impurity. Although you live in the world of phenomenal reality, to you, any environment is a Buddha's Pure Land. To an unenlightened person, you are but an ordinary person. To you, all ordinary people are identical with Buddha. You will feel that your own self-nature is the same as that of all Buddhas, and the self-nature of Buddhas is universal throughout time and space. You will spontaneously apply your wisdom and wealth, giving to all sentient beings everywhere, throughout all time and space.

 

What I have said reveals a small part of the feeling of one who has entered the enlightened realm of Chan, and is also the course which one follows in order to depart from the small 'I' and arrive at the stage of no 'I'. Nevertheless, a newly enlightened person who has just entered the realm of Chan is still at the starting section of the entire passage of Chan. He is like one who has just had his first sip of port. He knows its taste now, but the wine will not remain in his mouth forever. The purpose of Chan is not just to let you take one sip, but to have your entire life merge with and dissolve in the wine, even, to the point that you forget the existence of yourself and the wine. After tasting the first sip of egolessness, how much farther must one travel?

 

What kinds of things remain to be seen?

 

I will tell you when I have the chance!

Edited March 24, 2014 by Simple_Jack

[Simple_Jack]

http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/search/label/Zen%20Master%20Sheng-yen

 

Ch'an Newsletter - No. 52 February 1986

Four Views of Ch'an

 

(Lecture given by Master Sheng-Yen at the Great Taoist Center in Washington, D.C., November 22, 1985)

Let me begin with a koan. In the T'ang dynasty there was a Ch'an patriarch named Yao-shan Wei-yen. A disciple once asked him, "Before Bodhidharma came to China, was there Ch'an in China?" The Master replied, "Ch'an originally existed in China." "In that case," the disciple continued, "Why did Bodhidharma come to China?" The Master said, "It is precisely because there was Ch'an in China that Bodhidharma came to China."

So you see I've come to Washington today because there is Ch'an in Washington. I've come here because all of you know about Ch'an. Those of you who know something about Ch'an, please raise your hands... Those of you who didn't raise your hands probably know more than those who did!

Tonight I will talk about Ch'an from four points of view. These topics should help you to raise some questions about Ch'an: the theory of Ch'an, the experience of Ch'an, the goal of Ch'an, and the training and practice of Ch'an.

1. There is really no theory in Ch'an. If we theorize about Ch'an -- that is not Ch'an. Ch'an cannot be understood by any logical reasoning. It can't be explained in words. Nevertheless, I will use some theoretical description in my talk.

There are two basic concepts associated with Ch'an. One is causes and conditions. The other is emptiness. These two concepts are linked; they cannot be separated. When we talk about causes and conditions and emptiness, we are really talking about the nature of existence, which is temporary and impermanent. All phenomena arise because of the coming together of the proper causes and conditions. All phenomena perish because of change in the causes and conditions.

Chinese Taoism and Confucianism use a text called the "I Ching." "I" means change. This is continual, constant change. It is called "arising." Constant arising means that causes and conditions change continually -- all phenomena are ever-changing. Ordinary sentient beings see things as arising and perishing. In the "I Ching" there is no perishing, only constant arising. Seeing something disappear, you miss seeing something else arise.

In the Buddhist view, when causes and conditions change, phenomena arise. But because this arising is rooted in temporary, constantly changing causes and conditions, the phenomena which arise can be nothing more than temporary themselves. Because they only have temporary existence, they are said to have no real existence. Hence these phenomena are called empty. Emptiness only means that there is no unchanging eternal existence; it doesn't mean that nothing exists at all.

All phenomena and existence can arise only because they are empty. It is because they are empty that there is nothing permanent or unchanging about them. If things never changed, there would be no arising. If nothing changed in our present configuration, it would mean that this lecture would go on indefinitely. But when this talk ends, the configuration changes. If everything were unchanging and solid, if there were no emptiness, then this lecture would go on forever. It is because of the present situation -- this particular configuration of constantly changing causes and conditions -- that we are all gathered in this room.

Therefore when we ask about Ch'an, we find that Ch'an is just a word, a bit of terminology. Very few people can say what it is. For over a thousand years masters and disciples in the Ch'an tradition have been asking questions such as, "What was it that Bodhidharma brought to China?" Many people have sought the answers to these questions. The masters never gave direct answers. Some simply ignored the questions. If they didn't ignore the question, they only would give very simple answers.

A T'ang dynasty master, Chao-chou once had a disciple who asked him, "Master, what are we really learning here?" Chao-chou said, "All. right, you can now go and have a cup of tea." Another disciple came and said that he had had a certain experience the day before, and he wanted to know it his experience was really Ch'an. Chao-chou said, "All right, you can have a cup of tea now." A third disciple was quite puzzled after he heard this exchange. He asked, "Master, you had two disciples ask you entirely different questions, and you simply told them to have a cup of tea. What did you mean by this?" The Master replied, "You can also have a cup of tea."

There is another story along the same lines involving Chao-chou. Two disciples were arguing. One said, "The Master said that men have Buddha nature, but dogs and cats don't." The other disciple said, "That's impossible, the Master could not have said anything like that." They both went to see Chao-chou. One said, "Master, you couldn't possibly have said anything like that." And the Master said, "You're right." But the other disciple said, "I'm positive that is what you said." And the Master said, "You re right." A third person, an attendant said, "But Master, only one of them can be right." And the Master said, "You're right."

These stories sound like meaningless exchanges, like nonsense, but the underlying implication is that existence or non-existence, or ideas of right or wrong, are things which only live in your own mind, your personal experience, your knowledge. These things can't be Ch'an.

2. The experience of Ch'an must be personal and direct. It cannot come from education or be arrived at by logical reasoning. In a retreat I will often try to help a student get an experience of Ch'an by telling him to bring himself to the state that existed before he was born. After birth, we begin to acquire experience, and we are trying to look beyond what we have learned.

Before your life began, who were you? What was your name? How would you answer these questions? There is a story of a Ch'an Master who told his disciple to wash charcoal until it was clean. The disciple complained that it was simply impossible. A somewhat dimwitted disciple took the charcoal and began to wash it. He didn't have a thought in his mind other than that his Master had told him to wash the charcoal. So he simply washed the charcoal. One day he asked the Master why the charcoal was still not white. The Master said, "Isn't it already white?" The disciple took another look at it and said, "Indeed it is white; it has always been white." When most of us look at charcoal, we see black, but the Master and disciple saw it as white.

In Ch'an we say that training and practice will make our discriminations disappear. These thoughts and feelings of liking or disliking come from our experience. If you can go back to the state before you were born, then you arrive at the point where discriminations do not exist. It no longer matters whether something is black or white. What is important is that your mind is free from discrimination and conceptualization.

In China between the fourth and sixth centuries, there was a period called the Northern and Southern Dynasties. At that time a famous Taoist, T'ao Hung-ching lived in the mountains. He was a well-known scholar, and the emperor had great respect for him, and wanted him to serve as his minister. But T'ao declined. The emperor asked him what it was in the mountains that attracted him so much that he preferred his hermitage to the glories of the court. T'ao wrote an answer to the emperor in the a four-line poem:

You ask me what I find in the mountains,
I say: white clouds are in the mountains,
This I alone can enjoy,
It is not something I can offer you.

The emperor read the poem and realized there was something that made no sense: white clouds can be seen anywhere, not just in the mountains. But the point is that the white clouds that T'ao Hung-ching saw were quite different from the ones the emperor could see. This is experience. A practitioner's experience of the Tao is quite different from that of a non-practitioner.

There was a famous monk, Han Shan, who was often asked, "What do you have?" He would say that he had everything: "The white clouds in the sky serve as my blanket, the earth is my bed, the mountains, my pillow. And the four seas are not big enough for a bath or a somersault."

That was his experience: oneness with nature. There was no separation between him and the world. But most people thought that he had nothing. His shoes were made from the bark of a tree; his pants, from the leaves of a tree.

It's only after you've put down everything that you've acquired since the time you were born, that a Ch'an experience can manifest. When I teach my students how to practice Ch'an, I tell them to first separate their thoughts into three categories: the past, the present, and the future. Then I tell them to discard the thoughts of the past, then the thoughts of the future. Only thoughts of the present moment are left. The next step is to let go of the present moment, because there is no such thing as the present moment. It is only a bridge between the past and the future. When you let go of the present moment, the Ch'an experience can manifest, but only at the most elementary level.

One question that might occur to you is: we have to discard our experiences until we reach the state we were in before we were born, so does this mean that a new born baby is closest to Ch'an? No, a new born baby does not know about Ch'an because a baby's mental faculties are hardly developed, and he is not in control of them. The control of mental functioning is necessary. When you have this control, then you can let go of knowledge and reasoning. Then there is a possibility that the Ch'an experience can manifest.

If you knock someone into unconsciousness, is this like Ch'an? This is nonsense. If you know nothing of the past or future, and your mind is a blank, that is also not Ch'an. A mind that is blank in this way is a very tired mind. Only a very clear, alert mind can experience Ch'an.

I can only describe the experience of Ch'an by using an analogy. Consider the surface of water and consider a mirror. The surface of water will move at the slightest touch, but a mirror is unmoving. A mirror can be obscured by dust, but remove the dust and it will reflect clearly. If water is agitated, it will not be able to reflect an image, only a distortion of the image. The movement in water is like the movement in our minds. Our minds move because of the knowledge we have and the experience we have acquired. Because of these things, we are constantly making judgments. Just as moving water cannot reflect well, so a moving mind cannot see clearly -- what we see or think we see is not real.

For example, there are about fifty people in the audience. You all have different backgrounds, different experiences, and different levels of education. Because of these differences, each of you will hear the same thing a little differently. Each of you judges this lecture in your own way. It may be one lecture, but it could also be fifty different lectures. That is not Ch'an. If it were, when one person spoke, it would be as if there were one person listening. And if that were the case, there would be no need for me to speak, because you would know what I was going to say before I said it.

This is illustrated by a story from the early days of the Ch'an sect. The emperor at the time asked a certain Ch'an Master to give a discourse. To make ready for the occasion, the emperor commanded his workmen to build an elaborate platform from which the Master would speak. When the time arrived, the Master mounted the platform, sat down, and then quickly left. The emperor was quite surprised. The Master said, "I've said everything I wanted to Say."

The unspoken Dharma and only the unspoken Dharma is the highest Dharma. Whatever can be said or described is not the real Dharma. Chan Masters have been talking about this for many, many years.

When we speak about reflection in water and in a mirror, note that a mirror that is perfectly clean will reflect better than water that is stable and unmoving. However, the Sixth Patriarch was opposed to using the analogy of the mirror. He pointed out that if there were a mirror, there would be a mind, and this would not be Ch'an. Nonetheless, we will use the mirror to a make a point. Later, we will throw out the mirror.

What is reflected by a mirror is outside the mirror. If a person is in a mirror-like state, everything that is reflected is on the outside. For such a person, there is no self involved. What he sees and feels is only the existence of phenomena -- when there is no self, there is no experience of discrimination, of liking or disliking.

This is not the ultimate state, because if you have nothing but awareness of the environment and there is no self apparent, there must still be a self to be aware of the environment. Someone who is in this state is certainly in a unified state, because there seems to be no self and only the environment seems to exist. This is called the state of "one mind," but still it is not Ch'an. There must be "no mind' if it is to be Ch'an.

A true Ch'an state should not be compared to an all-reflecting mirror. All things exists without the mirror. In this state everything is seen very clearly, but there is no concept of outside or inside, existing or not existing, having or not having.

3. What is the good of this kind of experience? This leads us to the third section, the goal of Ch'an practice. There are so many benefits to Ch'an practice -- for myself and many more for others. These benefits can be seen on three levels: First, there is physical benefit, then mental balance and good mental health, and last, the potential to become enlightened -- the spiritual benefit.

By helping a practitioner attain a more stable mind, Ch'an practice can improve mental health. And the reason for an unhealthy body is really psychological imbalance. Ch'an practice can strengthen mental power and capacity. Even with physical sickness, a practitioner will have a positive attitude and will not be hindered from doing what he needs to do. Good mental health is a fundamental aim of the practice, but in the beginning stages, physical strength is acquired through physical sitting. Practicing in this way helps maintain and focus the flow of energy known as "ch'i." Taoism and Yoga share this aspect of practice.

The highest benefit of practice is enlightenment, the genuine Ch'an experience. What good is this? I can only say this: before enlightenment, there are things that one needs and there are things that one would rather do without, there are things that are liked and things that are disliked. After enlightenment, there is no such thing as that which I need or don't need, what I like or don't like. Do you understand? That's why I said that all of you already know Ch'an. You see, before we are enlightened, we have many vexations, and there are many things that we have to do; there are many things that we don't want to do. We may seek and attain enlightenment, but once we have experienced it, there is no longer any such thing as enlightenment. At this point there is nothing that we have to do; there's nothing that we don't have to do.

Lin-chi Yi-hsuan, a famous Ch'an Master, was studying with his Master when he got enlightened, but his Master was not immediately aware of Lin-chi's enlightenment. One day the Master was making his rounds and checking to see that all of his students were practicing hard. He came upon Lin-chi lying on his mat, fast asleep. The Master woke him with his staff, and asked, "How can you be so lazy, when everyone around you is practicing diligently?" Lin-chi just looked up at his Master, picked up his blanket and cushion, and went to lie down in another place.

The Master watched Lin-chi move, and asked, "What are you doing now?" Lin-chi Yi-hsuan answered, "What else is there for me to do?" When the Master heard this, he walked over to a disciple who was practicing particularly hard. He took his staff, gave him several stiff blows, and said, "There's someone over there who's practicing very hard, what are you doing here, sleeping like this?" The Master's eldest disciple said to himself, "This old Master has really gone crazy." From that point on Lin-chi didn't remain sleeping -- he traveled spreading the Dharma. The lineage that evolved from him is called the Lin Chi sect; in Japanese it is known as the Rinzai sect.

The story of Lin-chi shows that after enlightenment, there is nothing, no practice or striving, that is needed for oneself. There are only other sentient beings to work for and to help.

4. The training and practice of Ch'an can be divided into three levels. First, to move from a scattered to a concentrated mind. Second, to move from a concentrated mind to one-mind. Finally, to let go of even one-mind, and reach no-mind.

The scattered mind is easy to see. We can all be aware of this state where thoughts come and go in a haphazard manner. Let's try an experiment. Everyone raise your index finger and look at it. Just look, and have no thoughts. Do this in a relaxed manner.

We did that for thirty seconds. Were you able to do it with no thoughts? If you couldn't do it, you had a scattered mind. When we do things with a scattered mind, we are not using our fullest capacity.

A Ch'an Master once told his disciples: Chan practice is very easy. When you eat, just eat; when you sleep, just sleep; when you walk, just walk." One disciple said, "I know how to eat, sleep, and walk. Everybody knows that, so is everybody practicing Ch'an?" The Master said, "That's not true: when you eat, your mind is not on eating; when you sleep your mind is either filled with dreams or lost in a muddled state of blankness; when you walk, you're just daydreaming."

Once in our Center in New York, we hired a carpenter to do some work for us. He was nailing a nail into a wall, when he looked out the window, and saw a pretty woman passing by. He hit his finger, and twisted the nail. He had to start all over again. What was he doing with his mind? It certainly wasn't on his work. Most of us function like this. We must use special methods to bring our scattered minds into a concentrated state. Do as the Master said: when you eat, eat; when you sleep; sleep; when you walk, walk. When you practice, keep your mind in a concentrated state. Then if you hear a sound, visualize or feel something -- whatever you do, you will be doing just that and nothing else. This is a concentrated mind.

When you expand this state further, you will eventually get to the point where the separation between self and environment disappears -- there is no distinction between you and the world. If you are repeating a mantra, then you and the mantra become one. There are many levels to this state. At the elementary level you and your method of practice become one. A deeper state is when you feel that whatever your senses encounter, what you see and hear, is the same as yourself. At this point there is no distinction between what you see and what you hear. The sense organs no longer have separate functions. This is an intermediate level. Deeper still is the state where you sense an unlimited universe within yourself. Still this is not the experience of Ch 'an.

From here we must use the methods of Ch'an -- the gung-an (koan) and the hua-t'ou -- to break apart the state of one-mind. In this way we can reach enlightenment, we can reach Ch'an.

[Simple_Jack]

Diamond Sutra Explained by Nan Huaijin, tr. by Hue En; pg. 293-295:

 

Perceiving Is Not-Seeing

 

"Subhuti, if a person says the Buddha speaks of the perception of self, person, being and life, what do you think? Does this person understand the meaning of what I say?"

The Buddha starts off asking Subhuti a supposition question. Is it correct to say that the Buddha speaks of perception of self, person, being and life. Up to now the Buddha had spoken in terms of the four "notions." Here there is a slight deviation in that the Buddha speaks of four perceptions. "Notion" has to do with phenomenal appearance; whereas, "perception" has to do with one's thoughts, perspectives and understanding. Perception is very much what we today would call one's perspective. In Ch'an, it is called one's ground of perception. It's not with one's eyes that one perceives the Tao. The Surangama Sutra has some famous lines about this:

 

When one sees the seer,

This seeing is not-seeing.

Seeing must still go beyond seeing,

For seeing cannot reach it.

 

Sometimes the wording in these sutras is enough to make you crazy! The first "see" is that which we do with or eyes; it is our mind and eyes working together to see. The second "see" is perceiving the Tao. In other words, the act of seeing and that which is seen; the second is that which can see. When we engage in the act of seeing, this is in the realm of phenomena. If we turn this around to look inward, one can perceive one's mind and original nature. This is not engaging in the act of seeing. It is not a phenomenon which the eyes can see, nor is it an alambana. Those are not Tao. "When one sees the seer," one turns around and perceives the Tao. "This seeing is not-seeing." This seeing is not the act of seeing phenomena. It is perceiving the Tao. So, of course, "this seeing is not-seeing." Could it be, though, that the seeing which perceives the Tao has an alambana? "Seeing must still go beyond seeing." When one's eyes are not-seeing, ears are not-hearing and all is empty, if one says I have perceived the Tao, there is still an object which is perceived. This must be thrown out. The "emptiness" must still be emptied. "For seeing cannot reach it." The real perceiving of the mind and original nature is not that which can be seen with the eyes; nor is it that which the mind can perceive. It is that which can perceive. We've gone in a large circle with this "seeing." It is very difficult to understand. It is not as simple as seeing the mountains not as mountains, seeing the water not as water. That's like the sound a frog makes when it jumps into a well. When there is no seer nor seen, when the mountains, the earth, all the phenomena in the universe and even emptiness have been smashed to fine powder, when all is level and deep and when the four notions have nothing on which to stand, then we can talk about Ch'an. There is a shadow of a perception of the nature of mind. Mind you, only just a shadow.

The Surangama Sutra also has some other lines which are also very important when talking about this. "Understanding and perceiving rely on knowing, this is originally ignorance. Understanding and perceiving without perception, this is nirvana."

Understanding and perceiving are terms used a lot in the later periods of Buddhism in China. Understanding is knowing and it refers to knowing and understanding the theory of Buddhist sutras. Perception is having actual experiences through meditation and cultivation of the phenomena and alambana of which are spoken in the sutras. For example, if one is meditating and everything becomes empty but one is still aware of sitting there in total peace, this is understanding and perceiving. This peace and purity still isn't correct, "understanding and perceiving rely on knowing, this is originally ignorance." To have a peace and purity implies that there is the strength of unpeaceful and impure hidden within. This is tantamount to affliction, and so it is said that "understanding and perceiving rely on knowing, this is originally ignorance." Only when, "understanding and perceiving without perception," finally to really perceive emptiness, "this is nirvana." This is the edge of perception.

 

Knowing Is Originally Ignorance

 

In the past, there have been some great masters who have practiced Ch'an through reading sutras and have had awakenings. Practicing Ch'an doesn't necessarily mean one only meditates or holds a koan or hua tou in mind. During the Sung Dynasty at Rui Lu Temple in Wezhou there was a famous Ch'an master named Yu-an. Every day he would read sutras and recite the name of the Buddha. Once, when he came upon the lines just mentioned, his heart started pounding. He suddenly saw it through different eyes and then changed the punctuation slightly so it read, "Understanding and perceiving rely. Knowing, this is originally ignorance. Understanding and perceiving without meaning (are not). Perception, this is nirvana." Upon doing this, he had a Great Awakening. From then on, he called himself the "Surangama Destroyer" because, by breaking apart the sutra's words, he suddenly became enlightened. "Understanding and perceiving rely." Having understanding, having perception, having calm purity are all feelings. "Knowing, this is originally ignorance." This "knowing" to begin with, is actually ignorance and affliction. "Understanding and perceiving without meaning (are not)." All is empty; theory is empty, thoughts are empty, emptiness is empty. "Perception, this is nirvana." Once one perceives this, one has awakened. This is that to which the master awakened when he broke apart the original sentence.

Edited April 11, 2014 by Simple_Jack

[Simple_Jack]

http://terebess.hu/zen/enjoyingtheway.pdf

Enjoying the Way, tr. by Jeff Shore

[Ledao ge/Rakudô-ka 樂道歌]

attributed to Nanyue Mingzan

[Nangaku Myôsan 南嶽明瓚 aka Lanzan 懶瓚; 8th c.]

I

1. Serenely carefree, nothing to change; 兀然無事無改換

2. Carefree, what need for words? 無事何須論一段

3. Real mind doesn’t scatter, 眞心無散亂

4. So no need to stop worldly cares. 他事不須斷

5. The past is already past, 過去已過去

6. The future can’t be reckoned. 未來更莫算

7. Sitting serenely carefree, 兀然無事坐

8. Why would anyone pay a call? 何曾有人喚

9. Seeking to work on things outside – 向外覓功夫

10. It’s all foolishness! 總是癡頑漢

II

11. As for provisions, not one grain; 糧不畜一粒

12. If a meal is offered, just gobble it up. 逢飯但知嗎

13. Worldly folk full of needless care, 世間多事人

14. Always chasing, they never get it. 相趁渾不及

III

15. I neither desire heavenly realms, 我不樂生天

16. Nor want blessings in this world. 亦不愛福田

17. When hungry, eat; 饑來即喫飯

18. Tired, sleep. 睡來即臥瞑

19. Fools laugh at me, 愚人笑我

20. But the wise know its wisdom. 智乃知賢

21. It’s not being stupid – 不是癡鈍

22. It’s what we originally are. 本體如然

IV

23. When you have to go, go; 要去即去

24. When you have to stay, stay. 要住即住

25. Over shoulders, a ragged robe; 身被一破納

26. Below, bare feet. 脚着嬢生袴

27. Talking, talking, more and more – 多言復多語

28. Always leads to mistakes. 由来反相誤

29. If you want to save others, 若欲度衆生

30. Better work on saving yourself! 無過且自度

V

31. Don’t rashly seek the true Buddha; 莫謾求眞佛

32. True Buddha can’t be found. 眞佛不可見

33. Does marvelous nature and spirit 妙性及靈臺

34. Need tempering or refinement? 何曾受勲鍊

35. Mind is this mind carefree; 心是無事心

36. This face, the face at birth. 面是孃生面

37. Even if the kalpa-rock is moved, 劫石可移動

38. It alone remains unchanged. 箇中難改變

VI

39. Carefree is just that – 無事本無事

40. What need to read the words? 何須讀文字

41. With the root of delusive self gone, 削除人我本

42. All falls into place right where it is. 冥合箇中意

VII

43. Rather than get worn out over this and that, 種種勞筋骨

44. In the woods, serene, just take a nap. 不如林間睡兀兀

45. Raise your head and the sun’s already high; 舉頭見日高

46. Scrounge for food, then wolf it down. 乞飯從頭喰

VIII

47. Intent on getting good results, 將功用功

48. You merely fall deeper into ignorance. 展轉冥朦

49. Try to grasp, it can’t be gotten; 取則不得

50. Let go and there it is. 不取自通

IX

51. I have one “word”; 吾有一言

52. With it, all concepts and relations gone. 絕慮忘緣

53. Clever explanations cannot get at this, 巧說不得

54. Only mind conveys it. 只用心傳

X

55. Again this single “word,” 更有一語

56. Directly expressed without medium. 無過直與

57. Smaller than small, 細如毫末

58. Originally without direction or place. 本無方所

59. Originally whole and complete – 本自圓成

60. Not something strung together with effort. 不勞機杼

XI

61. Lost in worldly cares 世事悠悠

62. Is far from mountain stillness. 不如山丘

63. Where pines obscure sunlight, 青松弊日

64. Clear green streams flow on and on. 碧澗長流

65. Lying down beneath wisteria vines, 臥藤蘿下

66. Head pillowed on smooth stone. 塊石枕頭

67. With mountain clouds as curtain 山雲當幕

68. And night moon as a hook. 夜月為鉤

69. Not rising for the emperor, 不朝天子

70. Why envy royalty? 豈羨王侯

71. Not even birth-death concerns me – 生死無慮

72. What remains to grieve over? 更須何憂

XII

73. Moon reflected in water has no fixed form; 水月無形

74. That’s the way I always am. 我常只寧

75. Each and every thing as it is, 万法皆爾

76. Originally unborn. 本自無生

77. Sitting serenely carefree: 兀然無事坐

78. Spring comes, the grass grows green of itself. 春來草自青

[流浪者]

Cold Mountain. The Poetry Of Han Shan

 

I enjoyed this. Thanks!

[Simple_Jack]

Diamond Sutra Explained by Nan Huai-Chin, pg. 231-232, translated by Hue En:

 

...There is an example of a Ch'an master like this whose image we frequently see, the Cloth Bag Monk. This monk was from Wenzhou, and it is said that he was an emanation of Maitreya Buddha. He expounded the Dharma by carrying a cloth bag. He always had this bag with him. If someone asked him what is the Dharma or the Buddha, he would put his bag down and just stand there without saying a word. If he saw that you understood, he would smile and laugh; if you didn't understand, he would pick up his bag and leave. We somehow just can't put down this "cloth bag" that our parents gave us. Dropping a cloth bag and standing there is the Buddha Dharma. He looks and sees that you don't understand, the bag gets shouldered once again, and the monk leaves. If you can't let it go, then pick it up. It's all the same. Buddhism is that simple. He didn't say a word, and that is the Buddha Dharma. Can sentient beings be saved by not expounding the Dharma? Not necessarily. Sentient beings still need many methods of teaching to be saved.

[Simple_Jack]

"A Man's Root"

Eight inches strong, it is my favourite thing;

If I'm alone at night, I embrace it fully -
A beautiful woman hasn't touched it for ages.
Within my fundoshi there is an entire universe!

 

"A Woman's Sex"

It has the original mouth but remains wordless;
It is surrounded by a magnificent mound of hair.
Sentient beings can get completely lost in it
But it is also the birthplace of all the Buddhas of the ten thousand worlds.

 

On the sea of death and life,

The diver's boat is frightened

With "Is" and "Is not";

But if the bottom is broken through,

"Is" and "Is not" disappear.

 

night plum blossoms spreading under a branch

between her thighs narcissus revolves smell it?

 

~ Ikkyu Sojun

 

http://terebess.hu/zen/mesterek/IkkyuSkeletons.html

 

Skeletons by Zen Master Ikkyu
Translated by Thomas F. Cleary
In: The Original Face: An Anthology of Rinzai Zen, Grove Press, 1978. pp. 79-92.

 

It is in the written word that all things can be seen
together.
In the beginning of mental evolution, one should
concentrate on sitting meditation.
Whatever is born in any land all becomes naught.

 

One's own body is not primary: not even the
original face of sky and earth and all nations and lands
is primary -- all come from emptiness. Because it has no
form, it is called Buddha, enlightened. Various names
such as enlightened mind, mental buddha, mind of
reality, buddhas, enlightened ancestors, spiritized
ones -- all come from this. Unless you realize this, you're
going right to hell.

 

Also, according to the teaching of good people, we
do not return after going separate ways into the lands of
darkness; those who are close and those who are
inconstant both revolve in the flow of the three realms --
feeling ever more weary of this, I left my native village,
going nowhere in particular.

 

Coming to an unfamiliar abandoned temple, even as
I wrung out my sleeves, I realized it was already
nightfall. With no way to get together even a grass
pillow for a nap, as I looked around here and there,
there were mossy graves at a distance from the path,
near the foot of the mountain, where the fields of
meditation were sparse. One especially miserable-looking
skeleton came out from behind the hall and said:

The autumn wind has risen in the world,

in the fields and mountains where you'll go

when the fall flowers beckon.

 

What can be done for the body,

as a black-dyed sleeve

in the heart of a man who wastes it? [1]

Everyone must sometime become naught. Becoming
naught is called "returning to the fundamental." When
you sit facing a wall, the thoughts which arise from
conditioning are all unreal. The Buddha's fifty years of
teachings are not real either. It's just to know people's
minds.

 

Wondering if there were anyone who understands
this suffering, I went into the hall and spent the night
there, even lonelier than usual, unable to sleep.

 

Around dawn, as I dozed off a bit, in a dream I went
out behind the hall, and saw a crowd of skeletons all
acting in different ways, just like people in the world.
As I watched with a sense of wonder, some skeletons
came up and said:

When it passes

without a memory,

this worthless body

becomes a dream.

 

If you divide the way of enlightenment

into buddhas and kami,

how can you enter the true path? [2]

 

As long as it travels the road of life

in the present for a while,

the corpse in the fields

seems elsewhere. [3]

Anyway, as I got familiar with them and relaxed, the
feeling l'd had of separation between myself and others
disappeared. What's more, my skeleton companions
wanted to give up the world and seek the truth; seeking
separation from excess, going from shallow to deep -- in
searching out the source of one's own mind, what fills
the ears is the sound of wind in the pines, what blocks
the eyes is left on the pillow under the moon.

 

When are we not in a dream, when are we not
skeletons, after all? Male and female forms exist only as
long as these skeletons are wrapped up and put to use
inside five-tone flesh; when life ends and the body bag
breaks, there are no such forms -- neither are high or low
distinguished. Under the flesh which you now care for
and enjoy, this skeleton is wrapped up and set in
motion; you should acquiesce to this idea -- in this there
is no difference between high and low, old and young.
Only when you awaken to the condition of the one
great matter will you know the imperishable truth.

If a stone is good enough

for an effigy after death,

hang a scrap of writing

on a monument of five elements --

 

What is it? Oh! A frightening figure of a man!

 

While you have the single cloudless moon

how have you come to the darkness

of the fleeting world?

You must think it true; when the breath stops and the
skin of the body comes apart, everyone turns out like
this -- your body cannot live forever.

A sign of how long is your time

are the pines of Sumiyoshi

planted before.

Give up the mind that thinks there is a self; just go
with the wind driving the floating cloud of the body,
and come this way. You want to live indefinitely, to the
same age; you would really think so -- this is the same
frame of mind.

Since the world is a sleepless dream,

in vain do people start awake

upon seeing this.

It is useless to pray for a definite lifespan. You
shouldn't keep anything on your mind except the One
Great Matter. Since life in the human world is uncertain,
it is not a matter of awakening to this just now for
the first time. Since it is a way to become detached, the
sorrow of the world is quite happy.

Why adorn a mere temporary form?

Didn't you know it had to be [temporary] like this?

 

The original body must return

to the original place;

don'T seek out where you won't go.

 

Nobody understands life;

there is no dwelling place --

when you return, you must become

the original earth.

 

Although there are many paths

up the base of the mountain,

we see the same moon on the high peak.

 

Since where you are going

you don't establish a home there,

there's not even a road to get lost on.

 

Having no beginning or end,

one's mind should not be thought of

as being born, or dying.

 

Left to do as it will,

the mind doesn't even think things through --

better to have controlled it

and given up the world.

 

Rain, sleet, snow, ice --

as such they may be different,

but when melted they're the same valley stream water.

 

Although the path of the liberated mind may change,

behold the same law

of the cloud dweller. [4]

 

A straight path buried under the fallen pine needles;

hardly do we realize it is a house where people dwell.

 

How hopeless, the trip to the funeral pyre -- [5]

as the fallen, they must stay.

[is it transitory, the trip to the burning pyre?

as the fallen, they must stay.]

 

Tired of the world,

how long will you see the evening smoke of the pyre

as another's sorrow?

 

How fleeting, the faces of the people

whom we saw only yesterday,

as they vanish into the smoky evening.

 

So sad, the evening smoke of the funeral pyres;

only the sky is left behind by the wind,

as it was before.

 

Of what becomes ash when burnt, earth when buried,

what could be left as sin?

 

The sins committed up till the age of three

all disappear together,

as does eventually the self.

This must be what is certain in the world. Thinking
how vain are those who do not realize that even today,
right now, there must be such helplessness and death,
and are startled by it, if asked how their lives should be,
some say that these days, unlike the past, they are
leaving the temples. In olden times, those who aspired
to the way would enter a monastery, but nowadays they
are all leaving the monasteries.

 

When you look at them, the monks have no
knowledge, they don't like to sit and meditate; without
making any efforts, they admire utensils, adorn
cushions -- full of conceit, they make their reputation
just by wearing the robe, but even wearing the robe of
monkhood, they are surely just lay people in disguise.
Even though they wear the robe and surplice, the robe
becomes a rope tying them up, and the surplice
becomes an iron rod thrashing them, so it seems.

 

If we look carefully into the meaning of the cycles of
birth and death, destroying life leads to hell, by greed
we become hungry ghosts, by ignorance we become
animals, by anger we become titans; by maintaining the
five precepts [6] we are born human, and by carrying out
the ten virtues [7] we are born divine. Above these state
are the four holy ones [8] -- added all together, they make
ten realms.

 

Looking at this single moment of thought, [9] it has no
shape, it abides nowhere for its duration, and there is
nothing in it to despise and reject. It is like clouds in the
vast sky, like bubbles on the water. Just because there
are no thoughts arising, there is nothing to do either.
Thoughts and things are one emptiness. I don't know
about people's doubts.

 

People's parents are like striking fire: the steel is the
father; the flint is the mother; the spark is the child.
Setting this to a wick, when the sustenance of fuel and
oil is exhausted, the fire goes out. When the father and
mother make love, that is like the fire coming forth;
since father and mother have no beginning, eventually
they fade away in the mind where the fire has gone out.
Openly embracing all things through emptiness, all
forms are produced. When you let go of all forms, this
is called the basic ground. All forms -- of plants, trees,
and land -- all come from emptiness, so as a temporary
metaphor it is called the fundamental ground.

When you break up a cherry tree and look,

there are no flowers at all;

the flowers are brought by the spring wind.

 

Even though you soar boundlessly

even beyond the clouds,

just don't rely on

the teachings of Gautama.

If, hearing the teachings spoken by Gautama over
fifty years, you want to try to put the teachings into
practice, what Gautama said at the end was that from
the beginning to the end he had not said a single word;
instead, he raised a flower in his hand, whereat Kasyapa
smiled faintly. Then Gautama said, "I have the straight-
forward heart of the true teaching," and put down the
flower. If you wonder what it means, Gautama said, in
effect, "What I have been teaching for some fifty years
is like when you're cuddling a baby pretending to be
holding something in your hand; my fifty-odd years of
teaching was like this call to Kasyapa."

 

Therefore the teachings which he transmitted were
like the cuddling of the baby. But this flower cannot be
known by means of the body, nor is it the mind; even
speaking of it, you cannot know it. You should understand
this body and mind thoroughly. Even if you are
called a knowledgeable person, you cannot [therefore]
be called a Buddhist. As for this flower, the teaching of
the one vehicle of all the buddhas of past, present, and
future appearing in the world refers to this flower. From
the twenty-eight patriarchs in India and six patriarchs in
China up till now, there has never been anything but
the fundamental ground. Because everything is beginningless,
it is called great; all modes of consciousness
are produced from emptiness.

 

Even the summer, fall, and winter of the flowers of
spring, the colors of the plants and trees, also are made
from emptiness.

 

Also, the so-called four gross elements are earth,
water, fire, and air. People hardly know what these are.
Breath is air, warmth is fire, body fluid is water; if you
burn or bury this, it becomes earth. There, too, because
there is no beginning, nothing remains at all.

Whatever it is

is nothing but the world of delusion

since even "death" does not turn out

to be a real vacation.

Everybody, everybody, in the eyes of illusion
though the body dies the spirit does not die -- this is a
great mistake. In the language of the enlightened, they
say that the body and the seed die as one. Even
"Buddha" means emptiness. You should return to the
basic ground of sky, earth, land, and everything.
Giving up the eighty thousand teachings of all the
scriptures, just understand this all rolled into one. You
will become people of great peace and happiness.

Even written down,

they're just marks made in a dream;

after waking up, there is no one else who asks.

4/8/1457 Ikkyu-shi Sojun, seventh generation after
Xutang, in Daitoku Temple before the eastern sea.

Notes to Ikkyu's Skeletons

 

1. The black-dyed sleeve symbolizes renunciation, as the robe of

the homeless. A verse of Saint Ippen (1239-1289), a pure land

sage of earlier Japan, says, "Giving up the body as well as the

idea of giving up, an unthinking black-dyed sleeve in the

world." Contained in homonymy and association is the sense

"You should live in the world after renunciation, giving up

even the idea 'I abandon.''' This is why Ikkyu still warns

against wasting it.

2. Kami are nature spirits associated with Japanese earth and life

consciousness; they were thought to protect, accept, and

uphold Buddhist teachings. The aforementioned Saint Ippen

received his major revelations through the mediumship of

kami, and later taught the fundamental meaning of prayer

underlying all forms of respect. Many eminent Buddhist

teachers also preached the nonduality of the spirit and

Buddha ways.

3. The corpse in the fields that seems elsewhere is the living body.

A verse of Saint Ippen says: "Is it meaningless? While the

corpse has not yet decayed, the meadow earth seemed to be

elsewhere." This he spoke at the ruins of his grandfather's

grave.

4. The law of the cloud dweller is impermanence; in ancient texts it

is sometimes used for absolute transcendence or absolute

indifference -- we might say, death, as the most personal and

cutting expression of impermanence. The great Zen master

Hakuin wrote that one who sees into death is safe.

5. The Japanese uses the name of a mountain where bodies were

taken to be burned. The variant English reading in parentheses

is to highlight the allusion to the sense of the permanence of

impermanence.

6. The five precepts are not to kill on purpose; not to steal in any

way, even indirectly; not to be greedy or overindulgent in the

course of human life; not to drink or sell liquor; and not to

lie.

7. "Ten virtues" can have several references. Commonly they refer

to the preceding five moral precepts, plus not talking about

people's faults, not praising yourself and degrading others,

not being stingy or predatory, not being angry without

shame, and not repudiating the three treasures of the

enlightened ones, their teaching and their communities. In

the most ancient teachings, it is said that the Buddha had

monks restrain useless mundane talk, but rather discourse on

the merits and virtues of ten things: effort, little desire and

being content, bravery, learning and the ability to explain the

teaching to others, being fearless and unawed, being impeccable

in conduct, being accomplished in meditation, wisdom

and knowledge, liberation, and the vision and knowledge of

liberation. In the esoteric teachings, in which terms Ikkyu

sometirnes wrote, there are two explanations: one is not

regressing from the determination for enlightenment; not

abandoning the three treasures to seek outside ways; not

slandering the three treasures and the scriptures of the three

vehicles; not doubting places in the very profound scriptures

of the great vehicle where you don't understand them; not

discouraging anyone determined on enlightenment or

causing them to tend to self-enlightenment; not causing

uninspired people to go into the lesser vehicles of self-

enlightenment; not speaking hastily about the great vehicle in

front of those following the lesser vehicles or wrong ideas;

not inspiring false ideas; not saying in the presence of

outsiders that you have the wonderful precepts of enlightenment;

not doing anything harmful or useless to sentient

beings. A second set: not abandoning the true teaching; not

giving up the spirit of enlightenment; not being stingy with

the teachings; not doing anything that is not beneficial to

sentient beings; not slandering any of the teachings of the

three vehicles; not begrudging teachings; not having false

views, like nihilism; encouraging people not to give up their

aspiration for enlightenment; not preaching unsuitable teachings

to people without consideration of their faculties; not giving

people anything that will harm them.

8. The four holy states are sainthood (arhat), self-enlightenment

(pratyeka-buddha), bodhisattva, and buddhahood.

9. The ten realms are born of a single moment of thought.

Edited June 12, 2014 by Simple_Jack

[Simple_Jack]

"Nonthought is to be without thought in the context of thoughts."
(Platform Sutra, ch 4; p 43; tr McRae)

"in wisdom’s contemplation both interior and exterior are clearly penetrated, and one recognizes one’s own fundamental mind. If you recognize your fundamental mind, this is the fundamental emancipation. And if you attain emancipation, this is the samādhi of prajñā, this is nonthought.
What is nonthought? If in seeing all the dharmas, the mind is not defiled or attached, this is nonthought. [The mind’s] functioning pervades all locations, yet it is not attached to all the locations.
...
to be enlightened to the Dharma of nonthought is for the myriad dharmas to be completely penetrated. To be enlightened to the Dharma of nonthought is to see the realms of [all] the buddhas. To be enlightened to the Dharma of nonthought is to arrive at the stage of buddhahood."
(ch 2; p 33, 34)

 

~ The Sixth Patriarch

[Simple_Jack]

From Master Nan Huaijin's "The Story of Chinese Zen" trans. by Thomas Cleary:

http://terebess.hu/zen/mesterek/The%20story%20of%20Chinese%20Zen.pdf

(pg.64-78)

The Zen school is a combination of the mental reality of Shakyamuni Buddha's teaching with the spirit of Chinese culture, forming Chinese Buddhism, blending the most refined and purified schools of ancient Indian Buddhist philosophy. In Buddhist study, "Zen concentration" is a method of cultivating realization practiced by both Hinayana and Mahayana, the Small Vehicle and the Great Vehicle. Although the Zen school is not other than the cultivation and realization of Zen concentration, it is not exactly the same thing as Zen concentration. Therefore, it is also called the Mind school, or the Prajna school. "Mind school" indicates that the Zen school is the transmission of the mental reality of Buddhist teachings. Prajna refers to the Zen schools from the Tang dynasty on, which placed emphasis on the scriptures on prajna (wisdom) and on seeking realization of the liberation of wisdom...In general, there are six large misunderstandings of what is presently called Zen...The second misunderstanding derives from the fondness of Oriental scholars for intellectualizing and philosophizing about the literature of Lao-tzu and Chuang-tzu, due to which they perpetuate the myth that Zen has been influenced by the philosophy of these men, or, to put it another way, that Zen is just Taoistic Buddhism amalgamating the philosophy of Lao-tzu and Chuang-tzu. In reality, although Zen and Buddhism have borrowed many terms and expressions from the technical languages of Lao-Chuang (Taoism) and Confucianism, nevertheless they are just borrowings; the spirit of Zen itself is not by any means to be considered a remake or remodeled form of Lao-Chuang or Taoist thought just because it borrows some of their terms and expressions....The third misunderstanding is picking up situational actions and pivotal words found in the method of transmitting Zen teaching and turning them into a distorted lofty silence or parody, always speaking ambiguously and cryptically, while considering this to be the state of Zen. This misleads people quite a bit....The so-called "special transmission" of Zen "outside of doctrine" does not mean that there is a secret or arcane transmission that basically does not need the scriptural teachings of Buddhism. The whole body of principles of Buddhist scriptural teachings is for the purpose of explaining the theory and methods of how to cultivate practice and seek realization. Therefore, people who cling to the principles of the scriptural teachings often turn them into philosophical thought, thereby producing the countereffect of increasing intellectual barriers and divisions. Thus they cannot achieve unity of knowledge and action and realize the effect of practice and vision advancing together simultaneously.

So the special transmission outside the doctrine just represents a variance from the usual method of transmission of Buddhism; it does not refer to a special extraordinary teaching outside of the principles of the Buddhist teachings....When one attains to real enlightenment and arrives at the actual truth, however, this naturally will merge with the basis of intellectual learning that one has, and one will clearly understand the ultimate principle. This is why the later Zen Master Kuei-shan Ling-yu said, "The noumenal ground of reality does not have a single atom in it, yet the avenues of myriad practices do not reject a single method."

....Besides transmitting the mind teaching, at the same time Great Master Bodhidharma still wanted Shen-kuang to seal the mind with the Lankavatara sutra. By this we can see that the Zen specially transmitted outside of the doctrine is not separate from the principles of the teachings at all. The Lankavatara sutra was, after all, handed on to Shen-kuang by Great Master Bodhidharma to be a valuable reference book for sealing the mind.....In sum, the doctrinal principles of the Lankavatara sutra lay greatest emphasis on analytic observation and insight, entering minutely into where there is no gap, penetrating completely through the substance and function of the nature of mind.

The method of Zen is to absorb the principles and concentrate on single-minded cultivation of realization in harmony with the principles of the teachings. Therefore, in later Zen there was a famous proverb that said, "If you master the source but not the teachings, whenever you open your mouth you will speak at random; if you master the teachings but not the source, you will be like a one-eyed dragon." In reality, this idea is just a rephrasing of the expressions used in the Lankavatara sutra itself referring to mastery of the source and mastery of the explanation.

Recently some people have presented the Zen school before the sixth patriarch under the rubric of the Lankavatara school, and have thereby treated Zen after the sixth patriarch as a separate domain. Actually, this is a result of not understanding the real Zen mind teaching. They did not avoid adding legs to a drawing of a snake, making an unnecessary step. When Great Master Bodhidharma was entrusting the transmission to the second patriarch Shen-kuang, he predicted, "Two hundred years after my death . . . those who understand the Way will be many, but those who travel the Way will be few. Those who talk about the principle will be many, but those who master the principle will be few."

...

(pg.131-135)

The public cases and sharp points of potential, as well as caning and shouting, belong to the domain of Zen teaching methods. It is imperative to know them, and it is furthermore essential to understand thoroughly where their function lies, as well as the conditions obtaining for the particular time, event, and person for which they were used. Outside of this, however, they are definitely not to be taken for the ultimate message and purpose of Zen as is happening today.

If you really and truly want to understand the essential Zen method of communicating mind, it is particularly necessary to pay attention to the sermons, lectures, informal meetings, evening meetings, and other such summaries of the teaching in the recorded sayings of Zen masters. That is Zen study on comparatively solid ground...The individual works of the great Zen masters, including their letters in reply to questions, are all very good sources for Zen study. If you neglect them and do not put them to use, instead just bringing up stories of sharp wit to generalize about Zen, that is running in the opposite direction from the Way. Do not under any circumstances fool people with such stories, for this is really more than a trivial misdeed...Zen is of course the peculiarly Chinese form of Chinese Buddhism, but from the point of view of the complete system of Buddhist studies founded by Shakyamuni, its basic message did not fundamentally change Shakyamuni's essential message after it was amalgamated with Chinese culture. What it produced was a form peculiar to Chinese culture in terms of its mode of teaching, its terminology, and its manner of expressing the highest truths, going so far as even absorbing, combining, and borrowing terms and modes from Confucianism and Taoism....In sum, we should not under any circumstances forget that Zen is based on the teaching of realizing the ineffable heart of nirvana, attaining freedom from birth and death, and transcending things. How could it just be vainly putting forward empty words divorced from the principles of Buddhism?

...

(pg.148-158)

Throughout the preceding discussions of the connections between Buddhism and Chinese history and culture, the simple introduction to the contents of Buddhism, and this last discussion of several important points about Zen, it can be generally understood that Zen is the mental reality of Buddhism, and that the main teaching of Buddhism lays emphasis on practical cultivation to seek realization, not on philosophical issues that are matters of purely theoretical discussion....After Zen was transmitted into China, even though it evolved further into a Chinese-style school, it gradually transformed the Buddhist teachings only in terms of instructional method and linguistic expression, substituting colloquial language and popular literature to express the lofty and profound principles of Buddhism. When it came to the heart and goal of Zen, it still was not apart from the original quest of Buddhism....as for the process of real Zen, if we reduce it to essentials there are two conditions, mental work and insight, which are like the two wings of a bird or the two wheels of a chariot -- it is necessary to have both....Then Ancestor Ma asked, "Does this have becoming and decay?" The Zen master answered, "If you see the Way in terms of becoming and decay, or in terms of assemblage and dissolution, then this is not the Way," after which he said in verse,

The mind ground contains all seeds;

When there is moisture, all of them sprout.

The flower of samadhi is formless;

What decays, and what becomes?

Hearing the master's instructions, Ancestor Ma gained access to enlightenment, and his mind soared to the freedom of liberation. After this he followed Great Master Huai-jang for nine years, making daily progress in penetrating the inner mysteries of the mental reality of Buddhism....even in his case, neither will it do to overlook the fact that he had certainly already gone through a long period of intense practice of meditation concentration before his enlightenment; only thus was he able to wake up to enlightenment suddenly on receiving the simple explanations of Great Master Huai-jang of Nan-yueh...How can we arbitrarily say that the Zen of sudden enlightenment at a word is such an easy thing?

Edited June 14, 2014 by Simple_Jack

[Tibetan_Ice]

Seems that anyone can write books, but living it is a different matter.

 

http://thetaobums.com/topic/26671-master-nan-huai-chin-dead-at-94/?p=418640

 

 

1. I've read your letters. You guys want to learn from me. I've never said I was enlightened. I've never believed I was spreading Buddhism. Furthermore, I've never had any sect or students. It's been like this for more than a few decades. Everything I know are the in the books. If you read into it and get any funny ideas about me and what I said, it's you who are responsible for being duped and tricked.

2. There is saying, "rely on the law but not on people. rely on wisdom, not knowledge." If you have questions, go read the classics. Why do you have to find a person to worship and rely on? I'm 90 years. I'm tired. I have no energy to deal with so many people.

3. The college I setup is to to investigate some knowledge and to do research together. We do not take any more new students. The students that we have are just to do research together, and they were selected with some basic criteria and good serendipity. Anyone who says they have taken classes and learned here -- well, those are their words, not mine.

4. You guys have read too many novels and fanciful stories. Breaking your arm to learn Buddhism? Jumping in the ice river or off the top floor when I don't meet you? Kneeling until I meet you? That is psychological blackmail. Is this reasonable to common sense? Are you really learning Buddhism? Why do you use such threatening measures? It's self deception. I'm a 90 year old man. Why do you have to threaten an old man to learn the Tao? You guys are cultivated intellectuals, how can you do something like this?

5. I've never wanted to be a master. I never wanted to take students. I have no organization called Nan sect. I opposed sects and religions my entire life. That's the business of society.

6. You think that once you have a teacher you will become a Buddha? If you experience the esoteric knowledge in person you will reach the Tao? That's ridiculous. You guys always talk about saving others and building merit. Your own life is a mess! Start from becoming a normal person. Get a real job. Be plain and simple and do things by the rules. Don't blame heaven or people. Only using self-reflection and living a honest life is the foundation of merit. Otherwise you will just become a slacker with fanciful dreams and a burden to society. Cultivation begins with changing your psychology and habits, with meditation as mere support. Merit is the beginning of wisdom.

7. You want to become a buddha after learning from me? I'm 90 already, and I still haven't seen a real Buddha or immortal yet. Stop being superstitious. All the books I wrote are only book knowledge and intellectual. Don't get tricked by those books. Lwen Yu Summary is my main effort. There are many places to learn Zen. Go over there to meditate. I've never promoted Buddhism. When I did have Zen classes, those were just organized by colleges, and the people were screened vigorously. We just did some research together. Afterwards, everyone still had to go back to live normal lives, to rub against the difficulties of life to strengthen their heart, and to improve their habits. Everyone must walk their own paths.

You want help from other people? Help yourself! If you really believe in cause and effect, start by using proper motivation and personal inspection is the intelligent way to begin. This is cultivation's heart. Your eyes are always looking outward, blaming heaven and earth, relying on gurus and saints and teachers to worship. This is self-deception and playing a joke on the world.

[Tibetan_Ice]

You are violating the copyright by posting this.

 

Edited June 16, 2014 by Tibetan_Ice

[Apech]

You are violating the copyright by posting this.

 

image.jpg

 

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