Essays in Zen Buddhism · 50 of 66

Practical Methods of Zen Instruction, Part 7

In one of his sermons, Eckhart referring to the mutual relationship between God and man, says: “It is as if one stood before a high mountain and cried, ‘Art thou there?’ The echo comes back, ‘Art thou there?’ If one cries, ‘Come out!’ the echo answers, ‘Come out!’” Something like this is to be observed in the Zen masters’ answers now classified under “Repetition.” It may be found hard for the uninitiated to penetrate into the inner meaning of those parrot-like repetitions which sometimes sound like mimicry on the part of the master. In this case indeed the words themselves are mere sounds, and the inner sense is to be read in the echoing itself if anywhere. The understanding however must come out of one’s own inner life and what the echoing does is to give this chance of self-awakening to the earnest seekers of truth. When the mind is so timed as to be all ready to break into a certain note, the master turns the key and it sings out its own melody, not learned from anybody else but discovered within itself. And this turning the key in the form of repetition in this case is what interests us in the following quotations.

Chōsui (Ch‘ang-shui Tzu-hsüan) once asked Yekaku (Hui-chiao), of Mount Rōya (Lang-yeh), who lived in the first half of the eleventh century, “How is it that the Originally Pure has all of a sudden come to produce mountains and rivers and the great earth?” The question is taken from the Śūrangama-sūtra in which Purna asks of the Buddha how the Absolute came to evolve this phenomenal world. For this is a great philosophical problem that has perplexed the greatest minds of all ages. So far all the interpretations making up the history of thought have proved unsatisfactory in one way or another. Chōsui also being a student of philosophy in a way has now come to his teacher to be enlightened on the subject. But the teacher’s answer was no answer as we understand it, for he merely repeated the question, “How is it that the Originally Pure has all of a sudden come to produce mountains and rivers and the great earth?” Translated into English, this dialogue loses much of its zest. Let me write it down in Japanese-Chinese: Chōsui asked, “Shō-jō hon-nen un-ga kos-sho sen-ga dai-ji,” and the master echoed, “Shō-jō hon-nen un-ga kos-sho sen-ga dai-ji.”

This was not, however, enough. Later, in the thirteenth century another great Zen master, Kido (Hsü-t‘ang), commented on this in a still more mystifying manner. His sermon one day ran in this wise: “When Chōsui asked Yekaku, ‘Shō-jō hon-nen un-ga kos-sho sen-ga dai-ji,’ the question was echoed back to the questioner himself, and it is said that the spiritual eye of the disciple was then opened. I now want to ask you how this could have happened. Were not the question and the answer exactly the same? What reason did Chōsui find in this? Let me comment on it.” Whereupon he struck his chair with the hossu, and said, “Shō-jō hon-nen un-ga kos-sho sen-ga dai-ji.” His comment complicates the matter instead of simplifying it.

This has ever been a great question of philosophy—this question of unity and multiplicity, of mind and matter, of thought and reality. Zen, being neither idealism nor realism, proposes its own way of solution as is illustrated in the case of the Originally Pure. The following one solves the problem also in its own way. A monk asked Chōsa Keishin, “How do we, transforming (chuan) mountains and rivers and the earth, reduce them into the Self?” Replied the master, “How do we, transforming the Self, produce mountains and rivers and the earth?” The monk confessed ignorance, whereupon said the master:

“In this city south of the Lake, people are thriving well,— Cheap rice and plentiful fuel and prospering neighbourhood.”

Tōsu Daido (T‘ou-tzu Tai-t‘ung), of the T‘ang dynasty, who died in the year 914, answered “The Buddha,” when he was questioned, “What is the Buddha?” He said “Tao” when the question was, “What is Tao?” He answered “the Dharma” to the question, “What is the Dharma?”

When Jōshu asked Kwanchu (Tai-tz‘u Huan-chung) of the ninth century, “What is the being [or substance] of Prajñā?” Kwanchu without giving any answer simply echoed the question, “What is the being of Prajñā?” And this brought out a hearty laugh on the part of Jōshu. Prajñā may be translated supreme intelligence, and Mañjuśrī is regarded by the Mahayanists as the embodiment of Prajñā. But in this case Mañjuśrī has nothing to do with it. The question is concerned with the substantial conception of Prajñā, which, being a form of mental activity, requires something to abide in. According to Buddhist philosophy, there are three fundamental conceptions to explain the problem of existence: Substance or Being (bhāva), Appearance or Aspect (lakshaṇa), and Function or Activity (kṛitya). Or, to use the terms of the Mādhyamika, the three conceptions are actor, act, and acting. Prajñā being an intellectual acting, there must be an agent or substance back of it. Hence the question: What is the being or body of Prajñā? Now, the answer or echo given out by Kwanchu does not explain anything, we are at a loss as far as its conceptual signification goes. The Zen masters do not give us any literary clue to get around what we see on the surface. When we try to understand it intellectually, it slips away from us. It must be approached therefore from another plane of unconsciousness. Unless we move on to the same plane where the masters stand, or unless we abandon so-called common-sense way of reasoning, there is no possible bridge which will carry us over the chasm dividing our intellection from their apparently psittacine repetitions.

In this case, as in other cases, the idea of the masters is to show the way where the truth of Zen is to be experienced, but not in and through the language which they use and which we all use, as the means of communicating ideas. Language, in case they resort to words, serves as an expression of feelings or moods or inner states, but not of ideas, and therefore it becomes entirely incomprehensible when we search its meaning in the words of the masters as embodying ideas. Of course, words are not to be altogether disregarded inasmuch as they correspond to the feelings or experiences. To know this is more important in the understanding of Zen. Language is then with the Zen masters a kind of exclamation or ejaculation as directly coming out of their inner spiritual experience. No meaning is to be sought in the expression itself, but within ourselves, in our own minds, which are awakened to the same experience. Therefore, when we understand the language of the Zen masters, it is the understanding of ourselves and not the sense of the language which reflects ideas and not the experienced feelings themselves. Thus it is impossible to make those understand Zen who have not had any Zen experience yet, just as it is impossible for the people to realise the sweetness of honey who have never tasted it before. With such people, “sweet” honey will ever remain as an idea altogether devoid of sense, that is, the word has no life with them.

Goso Hōyen first studied the Yogācāra school of Buddhist philosophy and came across the following passage: “When the Bodhisattva enters on the path of knowledge, he finds that the discriminating intellect is identified with Reason, and that the objective world is fused with Intelligence, and there is no distinction to be made between the knowing and the known.” The anti-Yogācārians refuted this statement, saying that if the knowing is not distinguished from the known, how is knowledge at all possible? The Yogācārians could not answer this criticism, when Hsüan-chang who was at the time in India interposed and saved his brethren in faith from the quandary. His answer was: “It is like drinking water, one knows by oneself whether it is cold or not.” When Goso read this, he questioned himself, “What is this that makes one know thus by oneself?” This was the way he started on his Zen tour, for his Yogācāra friends being philosophers could not enlighten him, and he finally came to a Zen master for instruction.

Before we proceed to the next subject, let me cite another case of echoing. Hōgen Mon-yeki (Fa-yen Wen-i), the founder of the Hōgen branch of Zen Buddhism, flourished early in the tenth century. He asked one of his disciples, “What do you understand by this: ‘Let the difference be even a tenth of an inch, and it will grow as wide as heaven and earth’?” The disciple said, “Let the difference be even a tenth of an inch, and it will grow as wide as heaven and earth.” Hōgen however told him that such an answer will never do. Said the disciple, “I cannot do otherwise; how do you understand?” The master at once replied, “Let the difference be even a tenth of an inch, and it will grow as wide as heaven and earth.”

Hōgen was a great master of repetitions, and there is another interesting instance. After trying to understand the ultimate truth of Zen under fifty-four masters, Tokusho (Tê-shao, 907–971) finally came to Hōgen; but tired of making special efforts to master Zen, he simply fell in with the rest of the monks there. One day when the master ascended the platform, a monk asked, “What is one drop of water dripping from the source of So (Ts‘ao)?” Said the master, “That is one drop of water dripping from the source of So.” The monk failed to make anything out of the repetition and stood as if lost; while Tokusho who happened to be by him had for the first time his spiritual eye opened to the inner meaning of Zen, and all the doubts he had been cherishing secretly down in his heart were thoroughly dissolved. He was altogether another man after that.

Such cases as this conclusively show that Zen is not to be sought in ideas or words, but at the same time they also show that without ideas or words Zen cannot convey itself to others. To grasp the exquisite meaning of Zen as expressing itself in words and yet not in them, is a great art which is to be attained only after so many vain attempts. Tokusho who after such an experience finally came to realise the mystery of Zen, did his best later to give vent to his view which he had gained under Hōgen. It was while he was residing at the Monastery of Prajñā that he had the following “mondo” and sermon. When Tokusho came out into the Hall, a monk asked him, “I understand this was an ancient wise man’s saying: When a man sees Prajñā he is tied to it; when he sees it not he is also tied to it. Now I wish to know how it is that a man seeing Prajñā could be tied to it.” Said the master, “You tell me what it is that is seen by Prajñā.” Asked the monk, “When a man sees not Prajñā, how could he be tied to it?” “You tell me,” said the master, “if there is anything that is not seen by Prajñā.” The master then went on: “Prajñā seen is no Prajñā, nor is Prajñā unseen Prajñā: how could one apply the predicate, seen or unseen, to Prajñā? Therefore it is said of old that when one thing is missing the Dharmakāya is not complete; when one thing is superfluous the Dharmakāya is not complete: and again that when there is one thing to be asserted the Dharmakāya is not complete; when there is nothing to be asserted the Dharmakāya is not complete. This is indeed the essence of Prajñā.”

The “repetition” seen in this light may grow to be intelligible to a certain degree.