SPLIT TOPIC: Or I'll Eat My Zafu!

[Jundo]

Jundo,

Heh! If you were really a Zen teacher, you'd kill a cat. All the cool teachers are doing it.

Chet

Eating a Zafu is much more non-violent.

Anyway, as so many of the Old Great Teachers point out ... between their lecturing and talking about "True Self/small self, True Face, Dharmakhaya, Relative/Absolute, Mu, Emptiness, Shobogenzo, Big 'B' Buddha, Mirror Mind, Capital "M" Mind etc. " ...

... one had best also drop all ideas and images of some "True Self/small self, True Face, Dharmakhaya, Relative/Absolute, Mu, Emptiness, Shobogenzo, Big 'B' Buddha, Mirror Mind, Capital "M" Mind etc." ...

... thus to most immediately and Truly find "True Self/small self, True Face, Dharmakhaya, Relative/Absolute, Mu, Emptiness, Shobogenzo, Big 'B' Buddha, Mirror Mind, Capital "M" Mind etc. " ...

... a "True Self/small self, True Face, Dharmakhaya, Relative/Absolute, Mu, Emptiness, Shobogenzo, Big 'B' Buddha, Mirror Mind, Capital "M" Mind etc." living as ordinary folks, excrement, donkeys, enlightenment, delusion, dead cats and zafu stuffing.

Gassho, J

[Stephanie]

A monk asked, "Master, why do you say that Mind is Buddha?"
Mazu said, "To stop babies from crying."
The monk asked, "What do you say when they stop crying?"
Mazu said, "No Mind, no Buddha."
The monk asked, "Without using either of these teachings, how would you instruct someone?"
Mazu said, "I would say to him that it's not a thing."

[Saijun]

Tiantong addressed them, saying, "The great way has no gate! It jumps off the heads of you Zen worthies who have assembled from every direction. Emptiness is without a path. It goes in and out of the nostrils of the host of Qingliang Temple."

...

Thoughts in the mind are confused and scattered. How can they be controlled? In the story about Zhaozhou and whether or not a dog has buddha nature, there is an iron broom named 'Wu' (Mu). If you use it to sweep thoughts, they just become more numerous. Then you frantically sweep harder, trying to get rid of even more thoughts. Day and night you sweep with all your might, furiously working away. All of a sudden, the broom breaks into vast emptiness, and you instantly penetrate the myriad differences and thousand variations of the universe.

Hello Jundo,

This passage, in relation to Dogen's later writing, has always confused me. It seems like Nyojo is saying that meditating on Mu in the Kanna Zen style is permitted and encouraged in certain scenarios. Dogen, though, seems to be...less accepting of the practice. Could you clarify?

Metta and Gassho,

Saijun

[Jundo]

Hi Saijun,

(I have written on this before elsewhere, so the following is a bit of cut and paste)

I think a clue is in the first line. The original Chinese is ...

心念紛飛す、如何んが手を措かん。趙州の狗子仏性無。只箇の無の字、鉄掃帚。掃う処紛飛多し

心念紛飛、如何措手、趙#子佛性無、只篚焦字.鉄掃掃.掃處紛飛多。紛飛多處掃。転捅転多。掃不得棄命掃。 昼夜堅起梁。勇猛切莫放街。忽然掃破太虚空。


I translate the first part as basically saying "when the thoughts are flying about like flying dust, what's useful? Zhaozhou's dog buddha-nature "mu"." So, the emphasis does seem on being a tool when the mind is all aflutter. Here is Thomas Cleary's version ...

"When thoughts are flying around your mind in confusion, what do you do?

We might get a clue to how this was interpreted by Rujing, Dogen and those who closely followed him in near generation by looking at, for example, Keizan (in his Zazen Yojinki), which is very specific on when to hold the "Mu" Koan during Zazen ... ONLY when one is having trouble to settle down ...

If your mind is disturbed [during Zazen], rest it on the tip of the nose or below the navel and count your inhaled and exhaled breath. If your mind still is not calm, take a Koan and concentrate on it. For example consider these non-taste the stories: "Who is this that comes before me?" (Hui-neng); "Does a dog have Buddha nature?" (Chao-chou); Yun men's Mt Sumeru and Chao-chou's oak tree in the garden. These are available applications. If your mind is still disturbed, sit and concentrate on the moment your breath has stopped and both eyes have closed forever, or on the unborn state in your mother's womb or before one thought arises. If you do this, the two Sunyatas (non-ego) will emerge, and the disturbed mind will be put at rests.

When you arise from meditation and unconsciously take action, that action is itself a Koan. Without entering into relation, when you accomplish practice and enlightenment, the Koan manifests itself. State before the creation of heaven and earth, condition of empty kalpa, and wondrous functions and most important thing of Buddhas and patriarchs - all these are one thing, zazen.

We must quit thinking dualistically and put a stop to our delusive mind, cool our passions, transcend moment and eternity, make our mind like cold ashes and withered trees, unify meditation and wisdom like a censer in an old shrine, and purify body and mind like a single white strand. I sincerely hope that you will do all this.

http://www.zenki.com/Keizan01.htm

"Mu" is a treasure of the Soto way too. However, "Mu" as a subject of Koan introspection during Zazen, as a bridge toward a Kensho experience, is not a mainstream Soto practice ... and appears that it never was at or around the time of Dogen either.

One more point:

If one looks at where this is found within the entire 如淨和尚語錄 (Record of the Words of the Abbot Rujing), it is a not particularly prominent place in folio 2, among a whole mix of sayings on various topics ...

http://www.baus-ebs.org/sutra/fan-read/003/04-029.htm

... right next to a similar short "teaching in the hall" to mark the opening of the winter furnace heating system, in which (and granted, the opening and closing of the heating furnace is traditionally celebrated in Zen monasteries in China and Japan too, and was something very important in the cold cold mountains), Rujing waxes just as lyrical about furnaces ...

開爐上堂。只個柴頭煨火種。諸方聿起競開爐。天童直截超宗處。爐與柴頭盡底無。恁麼卻有暖氣。正好猛做工夫 。且道。如何驀忽雷霆轟烈焰。從教深夜雪饃糊

... containing lines comparing the furnace to "無" (MU) too, and that if one is fierce the flames will leap and the thunder roar!

So, the "MU" reference as being the doorway to "Emptiness" was used in many contexts, and did not necessarily refer only to sitting in Koan Introspection Zazen focused upon "MU".

Gassho, J

[Saijun]

Hello Jundo,

Thank you.

Metta and Gassho,

Saijun

[galen]

Per Dosho ... Keizan p. 42 (also from Transmission of the Light, actually quoting and commenting on Zen Patriarch Shanavasa) ...

"What kind of thing is the original unborn nature of all things?" Ananda pointed to a corner of Savanavasa'srobe. Again, he asked, "What kind of thing is the original nature of the Buddhas awakening?" Ananda then grasped a corner of Sanavasa's robe and pulled it. At that time, Sanavasa was greatly awakened.


Keizan comments ...

As a result of not penetrating this principle ... you will not only lose your human body, but you will not realize that the [human body] is the expression of the Self.

Any more?

In thanking you for this teaching, Jundo, from my limited perspective and maybe others, after posting a writing/teaching, please follow in your words how the intent is to teach or show Big Mind. Some or most I get, but instead of posting them and leaving it to `see, as in making your case, please explain in more laymen terms, if you will .

Sorry, i miss took this as a new thread, no worries here.

[Jundo]

Some or most I get, but instead of posting them and leaving it to `see, as in making your case, please explain in more laymen terms, if you will .

Hah! I can only explain so much, and only so much can be explained. The rest is a bit like my being a 3rd Base Pitching coach, and you the pitcher who must get on the mound and toss your own pitches. Find out for yourself ... and for your nonself.

Gassho, J

[galen]

Hah! I can only explain so much, and only so much can be explained. The rest is a bit like my being a 3rd Base Pitching coach, and you the pitcher who must get on the mound and toss your own pitches. Find out for yourself ... and for your nonself.

Gassho, J

Sure !!

Make me/us do the work. Just kidding... its like Chon Tri would say, your questions are for you, for you to figure out.... thanks.

[Jundo]

Domyo Burk has a wonderful essay up today about the dangers of thinking you understand ... and the dangers of thinking you don't understand ... and the importance of understanding in a way that is not usual understanding. The whole posting needs to be read, but here is a taste ...

------------------

Don’t think you understand It. On the other hand, don’t think you don’t understand It.

It? What is It, a pronoun capitalized this way? What is It, pronounced with the kind of emphasis that communicates great significance?

Alternatively It is called the Great Matter, Prajna Paramita, Enlightenment, Emptiness, Suchness. These are ways we refer to different aspects of It.

...

It is difficult to say which of these – a sense that we don’t understand, or a sense that we do understand – is more detrimental to spiritual practice.

Buddhist understanding – prajna paramita, the perfection of wisdom – is completely different from ordinary understanding. It is so different that even though it is here under our noses all the time, we miss It.

...

What is it that we see? A textbook answer would be something like, “we see that we, and all beings and things, are empty of inherent, enduring self-nature.” But this description is so inadequate to convey what we end up understanding.

We could also say “we see that things-just-as-they-are, without the filter of our self-concern, are precious.”

Or we could say “we see that there is only this moment, and this moment is free from suffering.”

Intellectual understanding of these descriptions, or faithful belief in these descriptions, do not convey the release from suffering that the Buddha found. They must be personally and directly experienced for that to occur. And once they are personally and directly experienced we are forever changed, but no experience in the past conveys lasting release from suffering either.

...

This is why Zen Masters through the ages have pulled out all the stops and done all kinds of strange things to try and wake their students up from their dreams. They yanked their students’ noses, offered riddles, put slippers on their heads. What is that about? Some kind of ridiculous code? A contest to see who was least inhibited?

No.

It says Right Here, Right Now, Do You See?

http://brightwayzen.org/dont-think-you-understand/

[Shugen]

Thank you for the link.

Gassho