More wondrous quotes from 'Homeless' Kodo Sawaki, this time on "satori." Although some of these quotes are found on the Antaiji website in alternative translation, I cannot find most there. They are said to come from an AZI journal published in the 90s. Here are some:
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You study, you do sports, you're interested in “satori” and you want to get rid off your delusion - thus even zazen becomes a marathon competition for you, with "satori" as the goal. But because you try to get a grip on it, you go astray. Stop playing around with it - only then your original, cosmic nature will manifest itself.
You are searching for the Way? Isn't it just your ego-desires that are "searching for the Way"?
Trying to reach satori and to get rid off delusion is just like trying to buy and sell the same product at the same time.
To try to “become a buddha” or “reach satori” by doing zazen means to chase something. True zazen means to stop trying to “become a buddha” or “reach satori”.
"Non-thinking" has nothing to do with looking for satisfaction. It means to be firmly settled in the here and now.
Buddha-Dharma can not be “attained” by human effort.
...
Buddha-Dharma does not mean individual liberation. That is why Shakyamuni Buddha said: "I and every living thing on this earth attain the Way simultaneously - the mountains, the rivers, the grasses and trees all become buddha.” Trying to have “your own personal satori” has nothing to do with Buddha-Dharma.
Buddha-Dharma means NO EGO. Each one of us has his own individual ego. But it is a mistake to try even in zazen to have “your own
individual satori". NO EGO isn't individual.
You want your own, personal satori - peace of mind only for yourself. Do you really think that the Buddha-Dharma exists only for someone like you?
Take care, or you'll start to think that your individual identity is the most important thing in the world. And thus, you'll forget about that which fills the whole universe.
When | say “satori," you will think that I am talking about some “personal satori”. So let me clarify: That what can't even be called “satori” is satori.
You want to become a buddha? You are wasting your efforts! Just let the present moment be the present moment, just allow yourself to be yourself. Where do you think you are going when you aren't even here, now!?
We do not practice to reach “satori". Satori is pulling us. Satori is spinning our practice around. Don't search for the Way. The Way is searching for you.
Trying to become a buddha by doing zazen reminds me of someone who is in a hurry to get back home: He is in such a hurry that he starts to run inside the train that is carrying him home.
...
We do not start to practice now to experience “satori" later. Each one of us has been a buddha since the eternal past, with nothing lacking at all. But for some reason people seem to have forgotten that, got lost in illusion, and now make a great fuss about their suffering.
When we practice, we have to practice as the buddhas that we have been since eternal times past, enlightened right from the start.
The practice of just sitting (shikantaza) that has been transmitted by buddhas and patriarchs means to do zazen without trying to make a buddha out of ourselves. If on the other hand you try to chase a “buddha” or “satori” outside of zazen, that is like your ego trying to become “God”. Buddhist practice is called “Buddhist practice” because we are practicing buddha. If that “buddha” would be something “over there’, we were just trying to deify ourselves by practice.
...
To practice the Buddha way means: The Buddha way - put into practice.
Zazen means to sit without even thinking of “Buddha”.
When you sit in zazen you attain the way without thinking at all about "attaining the way".
The Lotus-sutra is correctly called: “The sutra of the Lotus flower of the wondrous Dhamma’. Wondrous, unthinkable Dharma means that cause and effect are one. Practice and satori are one. To explain this, the metaphor of the Lotus flower is used: The Lotus flower contains seeds, and if you open the seeds you will already find the next leaves rolled up in them, And one stem without branches. That is just like the way of practicing zazen in accord with the Buddha-Dharma.
We do not practice to get closer to satori step by step. The practice is in itself satori - we are putting satori into practice, we are sitting the zazen of buddhas and patriarchs.
We don't experience satori because of our practice. The "practice" itself IS satori. Each single step we make is the goal.
Eternal satori is manifested in the practice of this single instant. In the Lotus-sutra this is called: “The infant father gives birth to an age-old baby" - that means that the young and fresh practice of this instant (infant father) manifests eternal satori (the old baby).
When we give our whole existence to practice, how could we possibly ask for some cash-back called “satori"?
...
Seigen Gyoshi asks the sixth patriarch: “What practice goes beyond ‘ranks and steps” In the mundane world, everything is about ranks and steps: The rich and the poor, the v.i.p’s and the ordinary folks ... Buddhadharma goes beyond those ranks and steps.
The sixth patriarch replies: "What have you been doing all this time!?"
Seigen answers: "| didn't even practice the noble truths” - that means: "| don’t even have ‘satori'
The sixth patriarch affirmed: "When someone doesn't even practice the noble truths, what kind of rank andsteps could there be?” (Keitoku Dentoroku, Chapter 5)
Inside zazen, there is no space for ranks and steps like “v.i.p's" or “ordinary folks’, Only when people do zazen in order to gain “satori”, they fall into ranks and steps.
An individual has his personal “satori’: That is true in the world of individual persons. What goes beyond the world of individual persons: That is zazen.
Dropping off body and mind means that our personal "practice" and "satori” disappear.
Some guys try to use the Buddha-Dharma for their own purposes: Just like some people try to use their education to appear more “important”, they will practice in order to show off their “satori”. Isn't it clear from the start that there can be no such thing like “dropping off body and mind” as long as we don't get rid off these human desires?
... When you recite Buddha's name or do zazen, don't do it like someone who tries to fabricate some product in his workshop.
Buddha-Dharma is ungraspable. Don't grab it, let it go! Once you grab it, you fall into hell, And even though you get a grip on it - that’s just like getting a grip on horse shit. But you try to make something out of it - and get lost in the labyrinth of transmigration.
Buddha-Dharma is ungraspable, without anything to gain. You, on the other hand, are looking for something - that's why you lose your way.
"Illusion" and "satori" aren't anything more than the gossip of the world. They are graspable. Buddha-Dharma is ungraspable - it is "not".
There is neither illusion nor satori when we practice the Buddha way. Both “illusion” and "satori" exist only in the realm of human beings. It's our human discrimination that creates "illusion" and "satori". Sensual awareness is just sensual awareness, intellectual discrimination is just intellectual discrimination - it's not the Buddha-Dharma. Buddha-Dharma does NOT mean to get rid of illusion and attain satori. Zazen means to stop chasing after this while we are running away from that.
Buddhism is boundless. Unless you understand this boundlessness, you won't understand Buddhism. By the way, when we talk about “understanding” or “not understanding” we completely miss the point of boundlessness. That is why there can be [no] illusion outside of satori, and no satori outside of illusion.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To you, fighting hard to reach "satori"
by Kodo Sawaki Roshi
by Kodo Sawaki Roshi
You study, you do sports, you're interested in “satori” and you want to get rid off your delusion - thus even zazen becomes a marathon competition for you, with "satori" as the goal. But because you try to get a grip on it, you go astray. Stop playing around with it - only then your original, cosmic nature will manifest itself.
You are searching for the Way? Isn't it just your ego-desires that are "searching for the Way"?
Trying to reach satori and to get rid off delusion is just like trying to buy and sell the same product at the same time.
To try to “become a buddha” or “reach satori” by doing zazen means to chase something. True zazen means to stop trying to “become a buddha” or “reach satori”.
"Non-thinking" has nothing to do with looking for satisfaction. It means to be firmly settled in the here and now.
Buddha-Dharma can not be “attained” by human effort.
...
Buddha-Dharma does not mean individual liberation. That is why Shakyamuni Buddha said: "I and every living thing on this earth attain the Way simultaneously - the mountains, the rivers, the grasses and trees all become buddha.” Trying to have “your own personal satori” has nothing to do with Buddha-Dharma.
Buddha-Dharma means NO EGO. Each one of us has his own individual ego. But it is a mistake to try even in zazen to have “your own
individual satori". NO EGO isn't individual.
You want your own, personal satori - peace of mind only for yourself. Do you really think that the Buddha-Dharma exists only for someone like you?
Take care, or you'll start to think that your individual identity is the most important thing in the world. And thus, you'll forget about that which fills the whole universe.
When | say “satori," you will think that I am talking about some “personal satori”. So let me clarify: That what can't even be called “satori” is satori.
You want to become a buddha? You are wasting your efforts! Just let the present moment be the present moment, just allow yourself to be yourself. Where do you think you are going when you aren't even here, now!?
We do not practice to reach “satori". Satori is pulling us. Satori is spinning our practice around. Don't search for the Way. The Way is searching for you.
Trying to become a buddha by doing zazen reminds me of someone who is in a hurry to get back home: He is in such a hurry that he starts to run inside the train that is carrying him home.
...
We do not start to practice now to experience “satori" later. Each one of us has been a buddha since the eternal past, with nothing lacking at all. But for some reason people seem to have forgotten that, got lost in illusion, and now make a great fuss about their suffering.
When we practice, we have to practice as the buddhas that we have been since eternal times past, enlightened right from the start.
The practice of just sitting (shikantaza) that has been transmitted by buddhas and patriarchs means to do zazen without trying to make a buddha out of ourselves. If on the other hand you try to chase a “buddha” or “satori” outside of zazen, that is like your ego trying to become “God”. Buddhist practice is called “Buddhist practice” because we are practicing buddha. If that “buddha” would be something “over there’, we were just trying to deify ourselves by practice.
...
To practice the Buddha way means: The Buddha way - put into practice.
Zazen means to sit without even thinking of “Buddha”.
When you sit in zazen you attain the way without thinking at all about "attaining the way".
The Lotus-sutra is correctly called: “The sutra of the Lotus flower of the wondrous Dhamma’. Wondrous, unthinkable Dharma means that cause and effect are one. Practice and satori are one. To explain this, the metaphor of the Lotus flower is used: The Lotus flower contains seeds, and if you open the seeds you will already find the next leaves rolled up in them, And one stem without branches. That is just like the way of practicing zazen in accord with the Buddha-Dharma.
We do not practice to get closer to satori step by step. The practice is in itself satori - we are putting satori into practice, we are sitting the zazen of buddhas and patriarchs.
We don't experience satori because of our practice. The "practice" itself IS satori. Each single step we make is the goal.
Eternal satori is manifested in the practice of this single instant. In the Lotus-sutra this is called: “The infant father gives birth to an age-old baby" - that means that the young and fresh practice of this instant (infant father) manifests eternal satori (the old baby).
When we give our whole existence to practice, how could we possibly ask for some cash-back called “satori"?
...
Seigen Gyoshi asks the sixth patriarch: “What practice goes beyond ‘ranks and steps” In the mundane world, everything is about ranks and steps: The rich and the poor, the v.i.p’s and the ordinary folks ... Buddhadharma goes beyond those ranks and steps.
The sixth patriarch replies: "What have you been doing all this time!?"
Seigen answers: "| didn't even practice the noble truths” - that means: "| don’t even have ‘satori'
The sixth patriarch affirmed: "When someone doesn't even practice the noble truths, what kind of rank andsteps could there be?” (Keitoku Dentoroku, Chapter 5)
Inside zazen, there is no space for ranks and steps like “v.i.p's" or “ordinary folks’, Only when people do zazen in order to gain “satori”, they fall into ranks and steps.
An individual has his personal “satori’: That is true in the world of individual persons. What goes beyond the world of individual persons: That is zazen.
Dropping off body and mind means that our personal "practice" and "satori” disappear.
Some guys try to use the Buddha-Dharma for their own purposes: Just like some people try to use their education to appear more “important”, they will practice in order to show off their “satori”. Isn't it clear from the start that there can be no such thing like “dropping off body and mind” as long as we don't get rid off these human desires?
... When you recite Buddha's name or do zazen, don't do it like someone who tries to fabricate some product in his workshop.
Buddha-Dharma is ungraspable. Don't grab it, let it go! Once you grab it, you fall into hell, And even though you get a grip on it - that’s just like getting a grip on horse shit. But you try to make something out of it - and get lost in the labyrinth of transmigration.
Buddha-Dharma is ungraspable, without anything to gain. You, on the other hand, are looking for something - that's why you lose your way.
"Illusion" and "satori" aren't anything more than the gossip of the world. They are graspable. Buddha-Dharma is ungraspable - it is "not".
There is neither illusion nor satori when we practice the Buddha way. Both “illusion” and "satori" exist only in the realm of human beings. It's our human discrimination that creates "illusion" and "satori". Sensual awareness is just sensual awareness, intellectual discrimination is just intellectual discrimination - it's not the Buddha-Dharma. Buddha-Dharma does NOT mean to get rid of illusion and attain satori. Zazen means to stop chasing after this while we are running away from that.
Buddhism is boundless. Unless you understand this boundlessness, you won't understand Buddhism. By the way, when we talk about “understanding” or “not understanding” we completely miss the point of boundlessness. That is why there can be [no] illusion outside of satori, and no satori outside of illusion.
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