Great Doubt, or "The Question"

[galen]

After searching 3PZ that Nindo referenced for `the question or great doubt, i went to their index, and their vocabulary and Buddhist doctrine section (which is very good) and all i could come up with (i am sure it appears else where, as Stephanie can point out) was The Great Question, referred to a priest student who was having trouble with kensho in using koan MO. As it appears here `the great question is used to get away from MO (when that is not working for the student) to a different context of asking the question Who am I, What am I, or What is it that hears (or who). It seems all these `great this and that, point to the Great Way or the Way of the Buddha..... or in easier and simpler terms, our true nature. It seems they wanted the student to stay totally in that realm in zazen 24/7 until this could be more resolved. I used some of these for some period of time and they are helpful keeping present and asking, who is present here (small mind or Big Mind), but most significant while sitting, and not, and sitting again and again..... It was helpful through out my day to keep me reminded where and who I `really Am, but i realize here that Jundo and Taigo would look at this as a goal and unnecessary and i can also understand that more and more.

As Kojip seems to point to, its not some existential outer thing (of course) or some metaphysical concept needing to be grasped, its just our true nature/Buddha nature. So simple, but we seem to make it so hard with all the brain farts and letting the ego do its thing in its small mindedness that keeps us all stuck.

[alan.r]

Honest and insightful as always. Thank you Kojip, I loved reading that.

Gassho,
Pontus

Me too. Right on, Kojip. Though, maybe not the mystery part. But everything else. I think mystery is kind of like awe, or, I don't know. I'll let Cormac say it:

"Once there were brook trout in the streams in the mountains. You could see them standing in the amber current where the white edges of their fins wimpled softly in the flow. They smelled of moss in your hand. Polished and muscular and torsional. On their backs were vermiculate patterns that were maps of the world in its becoming. Maps and mazes. Of a thing which could not be put back. Not be made right again. In the deep glens where they lived all things were older than man and they hummed of mystery."

[Omoi Otoshi]

Another way of looking at doubt involved realizing that the problem was not a fundamental existential question, or mystery.... “mystery” is a mcguffin. The problem is the basic feeling of incompleteness holding sway. Existential doubt and mystery are just a mental production of that basic feeling, and that is basically the First, Second and Third Noble Truths. Looking at Doubt means looking at the feeling, the very basic sense of incompleteness, being it unconditionally. Then the feeling , the doubt, the question, the answer, the mystery,... all of it .....is resolved. Not answered, just resolved, like a knot, in just sitting. Doubt is done...when reaching is done.

Honest and insightful as always. Thank you Kojip, I loved reading that.

Gassho,
Pontus

[RichardH]

Tricky thread.

The whole subject of Great Doubt and Kensho, has changed a lot for me. I understood it as cornering your self absolutely, completely, until trapped in impossibility, you die, .....and that has happened on the cushion.. but then ...presto!, born again. Maybe that is not “great death” but I have yet to meet another human being who is not always being born again.

Another way of looking at doubt involved realizing that the problem was not a fundamental existential question, or mystery.... “mystery” is a mcguffin. The problem is the basic feeling of incompleteness holding sway. Existential doubt and mystery are just a mental production of that basic feeling, and that is basically the First, Second and Third Noble Truths. Looking at Doubt means looking at the feeling, the very basic sense of incompleteness, being it unconditionally. Then the feeling , the doubt, the question, the answer, the mystery,... all of it .....is resolved. Not answered, just resolved, like a knot, in just sitting. Doubt is done...when reaching is done.

Also , the “kapow!” one time Big Enlightenement idea is I believe a matter of framing. Practice has no end, and no final state, that much is clear to me. Practice goes on, and there are plenty of “Ah” moments, some big some small.

This is my honest experience and view.

[galen]

Jundo.... I thought before I had joined these forums to post, I was just observing at the time, that I had read something to this idea you did not approve of this book. I had been visiting the site www.zenguide.com (I no longer visit, Chon Tri has been gone for quite some time, last I checked, and it seems a little weird now) at the time, and even though I read much Buddhism over the years, was all of a sudden interested in Zen. So at the time I had asked Chon Tri on that site, what books would he recommend and he said ZMBM by Suzuki and TPZ by Kaplin. So when I had seen you post this none approval, I had not actually read TPZ yet, was just finishing ZMBM, but was some what taken back. So I sat on that for a while and then thought, well I will read it for myself and decide what it had for me. I have read many depth books over 40 some years, and maybe the timing hit me just right as Zen beginner, but it knocked my socks off, blew me away. I loved its historical sense of the two main Japanese Zen sects. It mentions Dogen a lot, Shikantaza throughout, but most of all I really enjoyed ‘real’ writing exchanges between Westerner Zen students and Yasutani-Roshi. And also the real letters exchanged between students and Bassui, and the enlightenment path of a long exchange by a bed ridden young women and Yaeko Iwasaki, brilliant!

So after reading it and thinking it was pretty profound, and was confused why any student of Zen would not read it, esp if they were from the West, I could only come to one conclusion why this site is against such, and I think there is only a couple paragraphs that warn of newer Zen teachings and not to trust all Priests. But that did not stop me from being even more interested in Treeleaf instead of less, or any lesser of you or Taigu. I realize here you are making the case for its different case studies for Kensho and the more forceful way to enlightenment, as I like to characterize it, the path to enlightenment, or Kensho, done on steroids (its real cool for those who choose this very robust path, and cool to read and witness as a reader). But still do not get some of your fear about that for new students. You guys do a great job here, even if I have contested some, on making your case for this Dogenized Soto Zen. I feel that to take such a hard line against this book, when not leaving it to the reader as just a historical look on Zen tradition, and not letting things fall as they may, is an injustice, and still do not get your paranoia around this very insightful read, other then those couple paragraphs that could relate to you and this site of the chance of some charlatanism. If what you bring to fore stands up on its own to feet, then so be it. Your stance kind of reminds of the take Mormonism takes on their teachers, and thus students, at BYU; if read, write books and transcripts or stand for something outside their doctrine (no opens minds in this church, don’t go there) you are excommunicated or treated very harshly in public. That is fear and paranoia on steroids, and why many look at it as shallow cult.

I apologize to all in this forum and this site, for my on going poor phrasing and sometimes poor spelling. My old shoolism. just missed most the english part !

[Dosho]

On Kapleau, a local newspaper did an article about his center (Rochester Zen Center) which is near to where I live. It was mostly case studies of local buddhists and in the almost all of them the person had started at RZC and ended up moving to different type of practice after a few years. That isn't meant to indite Kapleau or his center, but the fact that RZC folks had spread out into the other buddhist centers and temples was interesting. It definitely wasn't the flavor for me and I was glad to find the approach he at Treeleaf which, obviously, resonates with me. Different roads up the mountain indeed.

Gassho,
Dosho

[Jundo]

Galen, before you dismiss Great Doubt, you may want to read more about the three pillars of Zen: great doubt, great faith, great determination.

Hi Nindo,

If you are referring to the book entitled "Three Pillars of Zen", I have written a few times that I do not particularly recommend it for us "Zen Farmers", although it might be good for the "warriors" . Here's what I usually say about the book ...

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The book presented a view of "Kensho or Bust" that was very much present in corners of western Zen at one time, and has since come in for a large measure of criticism in many parts of the Zen world. I was recently reading a good book on the subject, and the culture surrounding the book in the 1960's. Here is a review of that other book, called "Zen Teaching, Zen Practice: Philip Kapleau and The Three Pillars of Zen" edited by Kenneth Kraft, a long time student of Kapleau Roshi ...

Kraft points out that Kapleau’s book is “in large measure a book about kensho” (p.14) which in itself is problematic as for many, including some of the authors of the essays, this led to “inflated expectations… [and] [t]he discrepancy between anticipatory visions of enlightenment and actual experiences of insight”. (p.15) This disjuncture between what Kapleau wrote and the actual experiences of Zen students has led to some criticisms of The Three Pillars of Zen as a book that gives an unrealistic picture of what to expect from zazen. ...

While this emphasis on and almost inevitability of kensho is, I think, a fair criticism of The Three Pillars of Zen, there is little doubt that Kapleau’s book brought many people to the study and practice of Zen Buddhism and for that we should be grateful. It is also necessary that we understand where and how Kapleau learned his Zen practice to better understand why he wrote and taught the way he did.

http://www.thezensite.com/ZenBookReviews/ZenteachingZenpractice.htm

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I am not being critical, and it is simply that our Soto way is different (same ... but different). I primarily provide this information because folks should know that there are very different approaches to Zen and Zazen, and not all "Zen" is of the same flavor (different ... but the same). Thus, folks go to the book store and pick up a "Zen" book, or listen to a talk, and wonder why the contents seem so different sometimes (same ... but different ) The following is an good background ...

As I have mentioned a few times, there is a relatively recent line that popped up within Soto-shu that actually is a hybrid with Rinzai Zen (their priests are also Rinzai priests) and, more importantly, largely split off from both to form an organization called Sanbokyodan. Those within the lineage that did not split from Soto are rather a breed all their own within it. That line is much much more influential outside Japan than in Japan, because it happens to be the source of such lineages as the Diamond Sangha (Aitken Roshi), Rochester Zen Center (Kapleau Roshi) and the White Plum (Maezumi Roshi). While the Sanbokyodan portion left Soto-shu, some of their people stayed within Soto-shu in name (including the priest who established the two temples you mention (Toshoji and Kannonji).

The Sanbôkyôdan (Three Treasures Association) is a contemporary Zen movement that was founded by Yasutani Hakuun (1885-1973) in 1954. The style of Zen propagated by Sanbôkyôdan teachers, noteworthy for its single-minded emphasis on the experience of kenshô, diverges markedly from more traditional models found in Sôtô, Rinzai, or Oobaku training halls. ... There is little in Kapleau's book to suggest that his teachers were anything but respected members of orthodox Zen monastic orders. Yet such was not the case, for in 1954 Yasutani Hakuun (1885-1973), the Zen priest whose teachings are featured in The Three Pillars of Zen, severed his formal ties to the Sôtô school in order to establish an independent Zen organization called the Sanbôkyôdan, or "Three Treasures Association." The influence exerted by this contemporary lay reform movement on American Zen is out of proportion to its relatively marginal status in Japan: modern Rinzai and Sôtô monks are generally unaware of, or indifferent to, the polemical attacks that Yasutani and his followers direct against the Zen priesthood. Orthodox priests are similarly unmoved by claims to the effect that the Sanbôkyôdan alone preserves the authentic teachings of Zen. ...

The only acceptable "solution" to the mu kôan in the Sanbôkyôdan is a credible report of a kenshô experience, and beginning students are subject to intense pressure during sesshin -- including the generous application of the "warning stick" (kyôsaku or keisaku) -- in order to expedite this experience. The unrelenting emphasis on kenshô and the vigorous tactics used to bring it about constitute the single most distinctive (and controversial) feature of the Sanbôkyôdan method. Eido Shimano, recalling Yasutani's first sesshin in Hawaii in 1962, writes:

The night before sesshin started, Yasutani Roshi said to the participants, "To experience kensho is crucial, but we are so lazy. Therefore, during sesshin we have to set up a special atmosphere so that all participants can go straight ahead toward the goal. First, absolute silence should be observed. Second, you must not look around. Third, forget about the usual courtesies and etiquette" . . . He also told the participants, and later told me privately as well, of the need for frequent use of the keisaku. That five-day sesshin was as hysterical as it was historical. It ended with what Yasutani Roshi considered five kenshô experiences.
(Nyogen et al. 1976, pp. 184-85)[28]

While Yasutani's successors are considerably more reserved in their use of the kyôsaku, the emphasis on kenshô has not diminished, prompting one student of Yamada to refer to the San'un Zendô as a "kenshô machine" (Levine 1992, p. 72).
Students who do succeed in passing mu, along with a number of kôans used specifically to test the veracity of the experience (such as the "sound of one hand"), are publicly recognized
...

The rôshi will remind the student, both in private interviews and in public talks, that kenshô is only the first small step along the path to full awakening. Be that as it may, the Sanbôkyôdan treats kenshô as a significant achievement. Upon attaining kenshô students are publicly lauded in the jahai ceremony, and encouraged to write a report of their experience for publication in Kyôshô. The names of post-kenshô students are clearly marked with a circle on sesshin seating plans, and as mentioned above, a second zendô may be provided allowing the post-kenshô group to practice apart from the others. Finally, pre- and post-kenshô students are often listed separately in the sesshin reports that appear in Kyôshô. (Note that each of these practices are Sanbôkyôdan innovations -- there are no public rites of passage marking the attainment of kenshô in Sôtô or Rinzai monasteries.)

Following the teacher's authentication of kenshô, Sanbôkyôdan students move through a program of 600 to 700 kôans following a format set by Harada based in part on traditional Rinzai models. The practitioner first tackles the "miscellaneous kôans," which consist of approximately twenty-two kôans in fifty-seven parts. He or she then moves through the Mumonkan, Hekiganroku, Shôyôroku, and Denkôroku [?MÆ] kôans, followed by Tôzan's five ranks (Tôzan goi), and three sets of precepts.[30]

Whereas passage through mu requires nothing short of kenshô, passage through the remaining kôans is relatively straightforward. After formally approaching and bowing to the rôshi the Sanbôkyôdan student recites his or her kôan, and then presents (or "demonstrates") his or her understanding. If the answer is deemed satisfactory, the teacher himself may supply a more "traditional" response. All of this is more-or-less typical of Rinzai practice today. However, Sanbôkyôdan teachers do not use jakugo (capping phrases) -- set phrases culled from classical Chinese literature used to test and refine a monk's understanding of a kôan.[31] Moreover, unlike Rinzai monks, Sanbôkyôdan practitioners are not required to compose written expositions of the kôans in the latter stages of their training.[32] The Sanbôkyôdan has, in short, sharply curtailed the explicitly "literary" aspects of kôan training.

As a result, once they have passed mu Sanbôkyôdan students tend to move through the remaining kôans at a relatively rapid pace, often completing one kôan per interview. With regular access to a teacher and frequent participation in sesshin, a practitioner can complete the entire course of post-kenshô kôans in approximately five years. At the same time, if the rôshi feels that there are inadequacies in the student's training, he may reassign certain kôans in dokusan (including mu), and Yamada led periodic study groups (kenshukai) for advanced students in which he reviewed the kôans in a more seminar-like setting.

Once the kôans are complete, students proceed through a series of higher certifications that allow them to teach and may eventually result in Dharma transmission. There is considerable ambiguity in this regard, however, in part because the Sanbôkyôdan draws simultaneously from Sôtô and Rinzai conceptions of transmission -- conceptions that are not always compatible with one another. This is responsible in part for the controversy over the teaching authority of Yamada's senior disciples that emerged following his death, an issue to which I will return below.


http://buddhiststudies.berkeley.edu/...anbokyodan.pdf

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Since the 1960's, I have the feeling (as an outsider) that they have generally softened or moved on from the "Kensho or Bust" and hard approach of the Harada-Yasutani tradition somewhat.

In fact, for all traditions ... Soto, Rinzai and the hybrids ... awakening and "seeing one's True Nature" are vital, but all one aspect of an ongoing practice of polishing the timeless jewel that needs no polishing (i.e., it is not "Kensho and that's the end" ... rather, all is always just the beginning). In all traditions, no matter how much they emphasize or deemphasize the "push" for "timeless Kensho moments", the bottom line is ... See one's True Nature (Kensho), and move on.

[galen]

Stephanie, I cannot imagine a better description of Great Doubt than this. I hope you can bring your experiences to the forum once more and encourage others to share their unsettledness, too.

Galen, before you dismiss Great Doubt, you may want to read more about the three pillars of Zen: great doubt, great faith, great determination.

Thank you, Nindo. I have read it, tremendous read, and will again. With that said, it could also miss the point of my post.

... A simple awareness/mindfulness/unyielding curiosity of the Question is just as OK (and would probably lead to less stomach ulcers!) It doesn't mean you are taking practice less seriously. It could mean you take your self less seriously... ...

Thank you Pontus, I too like this approach. This may be a bit of topic, but I will throw it out there. My brother loves golf and loves to play got with me ... me, I am not a huge golf fan, but love the fact I get to spend time with my brother. But funny creatures we are even though I am not a fan of the game and do not play it unless it is with my brother, I still get frustrated with it when I don't do well. Then I thought, "what am I doing"? Why am I getting frustrated? I don't play this game, so why would I be any good at it, or expect that I would be any good at it.

I found doing this questioning from the mind of what Pontus calls the "Zen Farmer" and not the "Zen Warrior" ... this worked great as it allowed me not to be so SERIOUS, to see that I am perfectly imperfect and consistently inconsistent when it comes to the game of golf. Now with the game of golf, I can just be with my brother and enjoy the time ... as it it.

Gassho
Michael

[Omoi Otoshi]

Of all human activities I think zazen is a human being's closest cousin to a cat's purr.

Hello Keishin! Good to see you!
Thank you for this post, full of wisdom as always!

Gassho,
Pontus

[Omoi Otoshi]

your comments are as consumed with self-importance as any other thus far

Anecdote:
A couple of weeks before starting my job in anesthesiology and intensive care, I was sitting around a table with some of my old colleages and the wife of one of the anesthesiology guys. I told her I was going to work with her husband and she said: "So you're going to work with that cocky bastard (her husband) and the rest of the cocky bastards!". "Yes, so it's a good thing I'm not so cocky." I said. *silence* "I'm not, am I..?" I said and looked at my former colleages. *silence* (moment of insight).

/Pontus

[Omoi Otoshi]

Pontus, not only are you deflecting, but you're doing it very passive aggressively.

Hmm... OK. Just trying to be helpful. If it's not and I'm perceived as being passive aggressive, then I apologize. I sure don't feel any aggression towards Stephanie. And I have just as many faults as the next person.

Gassho,
Pontus

Pontus, not only are you deflecting, but you're doing it very passive aggressively. No one is taking themselves so un-seriously as to refrain from comment, but your comments are as consumed with self-importance as any other thus far. Pretending otherwise seems curiously unconscious. Such unconsciousness, cute as it may sound in your head, disqualifies your comments from being seen in a genuine light. It's not that you don't have a legitimate point, it's the inability to drop that very legitimate point for long enough to consider another.

All the most powerful lessons I've learned on this path have come when I've taken criticism to heart and have had to acknowledge those parts of it that I'd rather not see. I don't know if that's universal, but I know it makes it very hard for me to relate to your post.

I think that a more proper description of what this Great Doubt looks like in practice might go further toward bridging the gap.


Chet

[Omoi Otoshi]

The Question that can ask, "What is all of this?" and sit with it rather than come to a snap judgment that it is good or bad to be in such a place or state. Without the Question, we may flee from the forces amassed on the horizon, rather than charge ahead with our battle cry.

Hi again Stephanie!

I'm not trying to pathologize you, but I do believe that the reason for your feeling uneasy/uncomfortable is to be found inside your own mind, more than externally, as an inherent quality of Treeleaf. Like most things, Treeleaf is perfectly imperfect. So instead of finding faults with Treeleaf, I would look inside and ask myself where this feeling is coming from. In the part I quoted above you say ask, "What is all of this?" and sit with it rather than come to a snap judgment that it is good or bad to be in such a place or state. I wholeheartedly agree. Sometimes we may ride the jade elephant backwards, confidently adapting to life as it evolves.

There are some practices at Treeleaf that don't particularly ring my bell and there have been things said and done that have sometimes disappointed me, but I honestly don't feel that uneasiness you're describing. It's your feeling, an emotion that should be taken seriously, but not a fact. I love this place, its teachers, members and the approach to practice. I'm very comfortable here and there's no place I'd rather be.

I also don't think it's necessary to be consumed by the Question at all times, feeling as if your hair is on fire, like you have a red hot iron ball in your throat that you can't swallow or spit out. That's warrior Zen and I'm a farmer at heart!
A simple awareness/mindfulness/unyielding curiosity of the Question is just as OK (and would probably lead to less stomach ulcers!) It doesn't mean you are taking practice less seriously. It could mean you take your self less seriously...

Gassho,
Pontus

[Jinyo]

Stephanie - it was good to read your post. I may not necessarily agree with everything
you write but thoughts that make me reflect are always welcome.
I would also agree that there is from time to time here a 'mixed' message regarding the degree of faith/doubt involved in practice.
I still haven't worked out if this is specific to Soto Zen.
I am learning and challenging my views on this all the time.

And sometimes it's just good to 'sit' with all there is and not challenge at all.

Gassho

Willow