Hmmm ... Case 99 Tozan's Bowl and Pail ...
Commentators are varied on this Koan, and I am not confident of the exact meaning. Sometimes, the author's intended meaning of the Koan is lost to time. I will venture a guess that a part of the general meaning is that one is not to argue or intellectually ask for oral explanation of something like "speck of dust samadhi," but is to experience such.
At the risk of falling into the intellectual trap that the Koan seems to warn against (that explanation is not sufficient), I believe that "speck of dust samadhi" refers to a state in which one has a sense that onself and the whole universe is held within each single and every grain of dust, and each grain of dust contains the whole universe. In the Main Case, Yunmen/Ummon is asked by a student to explain it. His response ("Rice in the bowl, water in the pail") may mean, according to some commentators, that the individual things are naturally held in the absolute, and the absolute naturally holds the relative things. However, other commentators seem to say that, in the face of such an abstract question, Yunmen/Ummon just points to the mundane and ordinary.
Okumura Roshi says this:
Yamada Koun says, however:
Each grain and drop of water holds the whole universe, and all the other grains and drops comfortably within. Hmmm.
I take the Preface to the Assembly to be (maybe) saying something like, someone can be smart or clever, and that is great, but don't be too clever and pig headed by your asking overly intellectual questions about something that cannot be understood in such way.
The Appreciatory Verse may mean something like that Yunmen really succeeded in expressing his inner understanding of this right down to his guts, but few people can understand. If you try to overly intellectualize this, you add two, three more layers of complexity to separate you from the answer, and if you treat this as some object to think about, you are miles away. However, Yunmen cut threw all this like a razor, with an answer as sold as a rock.
Hmmm. Maybe something like that. Hmmm.
And it is not only some Koans which are hard to get: Our song today is a modern Chinese song, also about a grain of dust, which song seems to play similar word games (I don't think that it is just a matter of bad translation) and may be even harder to understand than this Koan. Can you get what these lyrics are on about?
Sorry, I am not clever enough for this Koan or this song. I admit defeat. Hey, can't win em all!
I believe, however, that the main point of the Koan is that the whole universe, you and me, pour in and out of every atom of this universe. Don't overly think about it ... rather, be it down to the guts! The water in the pail, the rice in the bowl, means that everything is in its balanced place.
Gassho, J
stlah
Commentators are varied on this Koan, and I am not confident of the exact meaning. Sometimes, the author's intended meaning of the Koan is lost to time. I will venture a guess that a part of the general meaning is that one is not to argue or intellectually ask for oral explanation of something like "speck of dust samadhi," but is to experience such.
At the risk of falling into the intellectual trap that the Koan seems to warn against (that explanation is not sufficient), I believe that "speck of dust samadhi" refers to a state in which one has a sense that onself and the whole universe is held within each single and every grain of dust, and each grain of dust contains the whole universe. In the Main Case, Yunmen/Ummon is asked by a student to explain it. His response ("Rice in the bowl, water in the pail") may mean, according to some commentators, that the individual things are naturally held in the absolute, and the absolute naturally holds the relative things. However, other commentators seem to say that, in the face of such an abstract question, Yunmen/Ummon just points to the mundane and ordinary.
Okumura Roshi says this:
“Every atom samadhi” is ... jinjin-zanmai (塵塵三昧). The name of this samadhi came from the Avataṃsaka Sūtra:
They enter concentration on one atom
And accomplish concentration on all atoms,
And yet that particle doesn’t increase:
In one are manifests inconceivable lands.
In the Chinese translation of The Avataṃsaka Sūtra, jin (塵) is an abbreviation of mijin (微塵). According to a Japanese Buddhist dictionary, mijin is a translation of the Sanskrit word anu, the smallest particle we can see with our eyes. ... The [Flower Ornament] Sutra says that a Buddha can enter one atom in samadhi, and at the same time, the Buddha is in all atoms. This is an expression of the idea of interconnectedness: one part and all things within the entirety of Indra’s Net interpenetrate each other. ...
A monk asked Yunmen, what is this samadhi in which a buddha can be in one particle and at the same time in all particles. Yunmen’s answer is simple, “Rice in the bowl, water in the bucket.” He picked day-to-day, concrete examples from daily monastic life.
https://dogeninstitute.wordpress.com...arma/#_ftnref6
They enter concentration on one atom
And accomplish concentration on all atoms,
And yet that particle doesn’t increase:
In one are manifests inconceivable lands.
In the Chinese translation of The Avataṃsaka Sūtra, jin (塵) is an abbreviation of mijin (微塵). According to a Japanese Buddhist dictionary, mijin is a translation of the Sanskrit word anu, the smallest particle we can see with our eyes. ... The [Flower Ornament] Sutra says that a Buddha can enter one atom in samadhi, and at the same time, the Buddha is in all atoms. This is an expression of the idea of interconnectedness: one part and all things within the entirety of Indra’s Net interpenetrate each other. ...
A monk asked Yunmen, what is this samadhi in which a buddha can be in one particle and at the same time in all particles. Yunmen’s answer is simple, “Rice in the bowl, water in the bucket.” He picked day-to-day, concrete examples from daily monastic life.
https://dogeninstitute.wordpress.com...arma/#_ftnref6
In reply, Unmon says, “Rice in the bowl, water in the pail” (Japanese: hatsurihan tsurisui). I feel this reply of Unmon to be quite wonderful. ... Each single thing is the whole. One is all, all is one. For us, it’s a matter of grasping the world of emptiness acting as the basis for that oneness. Without that experience, it is not real oneness. ... When you say “rice in the bowl,” that is the actual universe itself. It is the true form or true aspect (shinjissō). When you say “water in the pail,” that is the true universe in its entirety. It is not the phenomenal universe, but rather the true universe, which we could also call the essential world. Your true self is known as essential nature. If you take the back of your hand to be the world of phenomena, we could say that most people are only familiar with that world. But there is also the world of the palm of the hand, the world of emptiness. Moreover, the back of the hand and palm of the hand are the same single hand. When I move my hand like this, the back of my hand and palm of my hand move as one. This is just an example and cannot be said to be the fact itself. Nevertheless, for the sake of explanation it could be represented in this way. When say “rice in the pail,” you can see this single point as a spot. But this is at the same time the entire universe. When you first realize this world you experience boundless joy. And then you tend to cling to that world of oneness, the world of emptiness. That is an error. After all, the phenomenal world and the essential world are one.
I take the Preface to the Assembly to be (maybe) saying something like, someone can be smart or clever, and that is great, but don't be too clever and pig headed by your asking overly intellectual questions about something that cannot be understood in such way.
The Appreciatory Verse may mean something like that Yunmen really succeeded in expressing his inner understanding of this right down to his guts, but few people can understand. If you try to overly intellectualize this, you add two, three more layers of complexity to separate you from the answer, and if you treat this as some object to think about, you are miles away. However, Yunmen cut threw all this like a razor, with an answer as sold as a rock.
Hmmm. Maybe something like that. Hmmm.
And it is not only some Koans which are hard to get: Our song today is a modern Chinese song, also about a grain of dust, which song seems to play similar word games (I don't think that it is just a matter of bad translation) and may be even harder to understand than this Koan. Can you get what these lyrics are on about?
Sorry, I am not clever enough for this Koan or this song. I admit defeat. Hey, can't win em all!
I believe, however, that the main point of the Koan is that the whole universe, you and me, pour in and out of every atom of this universe. Don't overly think about it ... rather, be it down to the guts! The water in the pail, the rice in the bowl, means that everything is in its balanced place.
Gassho, J
stlah
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