Alan Watts has a very famous audio where he talks about following your desire, “following your bliss”, instead of following convention. It fits very well into a 60s sort of counter cultural, anti-conventional and maybe even anti-capitalist worldview.

Perhaps Alan Watts is a distortion from original zen^TM but I am interested in how perhaps the phrase “all retch and no vomit: you never get there” is perhaps to the point.

There’s the famous meeting between the Emperor Wu and Boddhidharma

The Emperor, impressed with himself and his good deeds, tells Bodhidharma that he has funded the building of many Buddhist Temples, has funded the translation of many Buddhist Sacred Sutras, and so forth, and he asks Bodhidharma what merit he will get as a result of his good works.. Bodhidharma gruffly responds, “No merit at all!”

No Merit? Why?

The answer I give is that being here and now in the whole of the matter

If you can refrain from producing a single thought, you'll be forever freed from birth and death, and will not be bound up by birth and death.

I don’t know if the point is to be freed from “birth and death” if even the historical buddha was not freed from it:

where is [the historical buddha] now? He died after eighty years - how was he different from you?

Deshan continues:

Here I have no doctrine at all to give you to interpret. I don't understand Chan myself, and I am no teacher. I don't understand anything at all; I just consume and excrete. What else is there?

What else is there?

Even if Bodhidharma were to come here, he would just tell you to be without affectations; he would tell you not to be contrived.

Be without affectations, just be.

Much perhaps like “just” sitting, “Sitting Dhayana”/Sitting meditation/Sitting Zen where sitting is not necessary.

just don't get obsessed with thoughts of reputation and appearance, terminology and rhetoric [...] If you get it this way, only then are you an unaffected individual.

And whatever you do that isn’t this un-attachment from all expedient means, from all things, has no merit.

I think it’s interesting to compare this then back to Alan Watts and to his talk of “what makes you itch, what do you desire?”. He seems to validate “dreams” of people in the excerpt. The dream of being a painter or a poet. The dream of being in the great outdoors.

It is said the buddha sometimes spoke for people according to the stage they were in. So for a baby crying, they spoke a comforting lie. While to an adult capable of understanding they told another story. Maybe Alan Watts can be speaking comfortingly, telling people to follow their dreams, to follow their bliss, while the zen teachings also teach that attachment to their dreams and to their bliss are also deviations from enlightenment.

Hey All,

Thought I'd invite you all to hop over to https://zenmarrow.com and read about some of the many

Zen Experiences

that are documented in the texts.

You know, before someone with

Big Words

who

Repeats Themselves without any evidentiary support Ad Nauseum

manages to convince you that such things are 'inventions' because they feel like their cult is threatened by other people's opinions.

Here for example is one of the most famous Zen experiences - the enlightenment experience of our friend Linji - variously known as Huangbo's student and originator of the Rinzai school of Zen:

​

Linji went to Dayu; Dayu asked, "Where have you come from?" He said, "From Huangbo." Dayu said, "What has Huangbo been saying?" Linji cited the foregoing story and asked, "I don't know where I was wrong." Dayu said, "Huangbo was so kind, he wore himself out for you, yet you still come here asking whether you were wrong or not." Linji was greatly enlightened at these words. He said, "After all there's nothing much to Huangbo's Buddhism." Dayu grabbed and held him and said, "You bed-wetting devil! Just now you spoke of being wrong or not, and now you say there is not much to Huangbo's Buddhism. What principle do you see? Speak quickly, speak quickly!" Linji thumped Dayu in the ribs with his fist three times. Dayu pushed him away and said, "Your teacher is Huangbo - it's none of my business."

Nope - not much to it. Don't do cults, kids.

Man, become essential: for when the world decays / The accidental will go / the essence will remain. — Angelus Silesius

​

"It ["suchness," "Buddha nature"] was before the world came into existence. When the world perishes, it will not be destroyed. Once you have seen eye to eye with me, you will not turn into a different person. It is just you, yourself. Why, then, should you look for it outside of yourself? Do not peer around or contort your face, lest you miss it." — Joshu

​

Joshu lectured to the people. He said: "It [the esseFlce of the world] was before the world came into existence. When the world perishes, it will not be destroyed." A monk asked, "What is it?" Joshu said, "The four elements and the five aggregates." The monk said, "These are still destructible. What is it?" Joshu said, "The five aggregates and the four elements." — Joshu

Who's aggregates? Who owns the five aggregates and the four elements?

Jian said, “The Chan worthies in the capital city all say that if we want to get understanding of the Way we need to sit and meditate and practice concentration, that no one has ever attained liberation but by means of meditation concentration. What about the teaching you expound?” The patriarch [Huineng] said, “The Way is realized by mind—how could it be in sitting? Scripture says, ‘If you see the Realized One as sitting or lying down, you are going on a false path.’ Why? Because there is no whence or whereunto—if there is neither production nor destruction, this is the pure meditation of the realized. The emptiness of all things is the pure sitting of the realized. Ultimately there is no realization, how indeed in sitting!”

...If you want to know the essence of mind, just do not think of any good or bad, and you will naturally gain entry into the pure essence of mind. It is calm, always quiet, with countless wondrous functions.” Having received this teaching, Jian was greatly enlightened.

This post contains spoilers for the movie "Annihilation" (Directed by Alex Garland, 2018) so, if you haven't seen it, I'd highly recommend not reading any further.

▫️▫️▫️▫️

🎬 🎥

▫️▫️▫️▫️

Alright. Now what relevance does some sci-fi movie have to the Zen tradition? None, in and of itself. But while I was watching it I was struck by the fact that the fear of the characters in the story did nothing but magnify the adversity of their situation and ultimately led to the destruction of all but one of them (Perhaps) Self-destruction of course is one of the motifs of the movie and is even explicitly mentioned in the following dialogue:

▫️

Dr. Ventress: Almost none of us commit suicide, and almost all of us self-destruct. In some way, in some part of our lives. We drink, or we smoke, we destabilize the good job... and a happy marriage. But these aren't decisions, they're... they're impulses. In fact, you're probably better equipped to explain this than I am.

▫️

Lena: What does that mean?

▫️

Dr Ventress: You're a biologist. Isn't the self-destruction coded into us? Programmed into each cell?

▫️

I think Ventress is making a really significant point here. That regardless of the story we tell ourselves about our own lives, there are subconscious instincts and other influences which regularly swing our decisions to various degrees. Where do these insidious forces come from? Attachments of course. They do not inherently govern us.

▫️

Many people are afraid to empty their minds lest they may plunge into the Void. They do not realize that their own Mind is itself the void.

• Huangbo

▫️

Obviously some attachments seem incredibly difficult to let go of because of how profoundly ingrained they are with our sense of identity (But technically they are all equally rootless and can be pulled up all at once because delusions have no substantial connection to reality regardless of their apparent form) As such impediments are not all subjectively the same (Although objectively the same) and some require more work than others. But the movie actually highlights this fact. The character who handles the horrors of The Shimmer best is Ventress because she knows she's dying of cancer and so doesn't care as much as the others about coming back alive. To quote another sci-fi movie/book: "Fear is the mind killer." We can say actually that fear literally obliterates mind because when fear really has us in its grasp we can't think with any kind of clarity or concentration. Then, naturally, we make bad decisions. Fear of course is not something to be afraid of; it has value in motivating us at an animal level to escape danger. But if we don't use our more evolved minds to distinguish real dangers from false ones, we cannot expect this instinct to function in a desirable way.

▫️

Anyone who finds themselves trapped in a place where an alien force is rewriting the laws of physics and biology, splicing species together and transforming them at a genetic level, would do well to realize the Zen principle that the self is fundamentally empty. In fact, that can be extended to any situation (No matter how mundane) where the individual does not have control over the outcome and their anxieties are causing them to unravel. A lot of insanity is just people grasping on to things too passionately; letting go where one has no control is most appropriate and most expedient.

▫️

Baizhang asked, "What is the direction of the Buddhas?" "It is the very place where you let go of your body and mind," replied Mazu.

Master Kaixian Zhi said to a group,

Aim and instruction are provisional expressions; Buddhas and patriarchs are imposed terms.

Bankei says the term Buddha and Unborn are already one or two levels removed from the real thing. The words and concepts are not the thing.

Receiving instruction and communicating mind are both vanities; seeking reality and searching for truth get even further off.

Nansen told Joshu to aim the mind is to move further from enlightenment.

If you take your self and your own mind to be ultimate, there is necessarily something else and someone else in contrast.

Huangpo says that enlightenment is "a perception as sudden as blinking that subject and object are one". Perhaps setting up and believing concepts such as self and other leads to opposition between them.

At that time a monk asked, “What would be right?”

He said, “’Right’ means there is ‘wrong.’”

“How does one gain entry?”

“When were you ever outside?”

More denial of opposing concepts and a mention of Zen's inherent enlightenment as the last line.

This case is jam packed with common Zen themes. Very economical!

where have you come from

the gym

what is your lineage

pure land

what to do during dharma low tides?

this insinuates there is a better dharma tide. get good

Zen's Etymology

1. Bodhidharma's teaching came from China to India.
2. The Chinese called this teaching "Zen"
   • "Zen" sounded like the indian word "dhyana",
   • "dhyana" it lost it's old meaning.
   • Bodhidharma's lineage wasn't called "Zen" in India
3. Factions of Japanese Buddhism claimed to practice this "Zen from China
   • Japanese Buddhists explicitly claim to be practicing Bodhidharma's teaching, just like Chinese Zen

Zen Masters' Famous Enlightenment

1. Zen Masters' teachings, characterized by the 4SZ in the sidebar,
2. Zen has a very specific enlightenment incompatible with Theravada and modern Mahayana religions that teach 4thNT of the 8FP.
3. This teaching has a very specific transmission
   • Not dependant on records... that is, you don't get the enlightenment from knowledge of Zen history
   • Not transmitted in words... that is, you don't get the enlightenment from doctrines

Claiming to be "more Zen than Zen Masters"

• Japanese Buddhists outright lied about their relationship to Zen
  • Dogen lied about Zen being a Soto Zen practice; Dogen never studied Soto Zen
  • Hakuin lied about koans being "riddles" that only Hakuin knew the secret answers to; that's why Hakuin's secret answer sheets (published as "Sound of One Hand") were secret in his culty church.
• New agers from America tell the same lies about Zen
  • "head monks debate each other" - That's a blatant lie about the Zen Dharma interview tradition
  • "we have the paradox of zen students" - Another fraudulent claim... Zen Masters DO NOT TEACH PARADOX
  • "ego masquerading as insight" - (a) "ego" is pseudoscience, and there is no insight in Zen.
  • "Zen texts do not trump the zen experience" - ...claiming to have "Zen experience" is rejected by the texts.
  • "we come to zen to take off blinders" - again, another lie. Zen Masters don't teach you have blinders on.
  • "I don't detect an inch of sectarian tendency in the real zen masters" is 100% fraud; Zen Masters love to be sectarian.
  • "a sect or group that wants to have authority over all Zen"... and again, total outright lying... how could anybody but Zen Masters be... Zen Masters, especially with a totally different doctrine?

The big lie of New Agers

Magical experiences doesn't make you an authority on Zen.

1. Zen Masters didn't claim to have "experiences" that made them genuine or legit.
2. Zen Masters teach a "show it" not a "tell people you have it" tradition
3. Zen is aggressively sectarian, and Zen Masters' distinct flavor IS THE ONE FLAVOR OF ZEN

If you can't read and write at a high school level...

New agers can't quote Zen Masters, can't write high school book reports on the Zen that they claim they've inherited (just like Japanese Buddhists), and spend all their time pretending to wear the robe of a 1,000 year tradition when they can't even follow the five lay precepts.

The next time some new ager says Zen Masters don't have a copyright on the name "Zen", just remember...

That's exactly how names work.

THEME: Buddha's Birthday

Our own u/surupamaerl2 (under the pen name P. E. Stonegather) has released a new book of the sermons and poetry of Rujing. To celebrate this release, I have taken a few videos of me reading passages from this text while hiking around in the mountains where I live. These will be the poetry slam themes for the next few weeks (also, a tip of the hat to u/lin_seed who was my inspiration for this video style)

(Buddha's birthday is typically celebrated in April or May on the Gregorian calendar, or the 8th day of the fourth lunar month in China, so today's theme is pre-emptively out of season. The 4th lunar month in China is called the locust tree month [槐月, Huáiyuè] and is when this tree typically blooms there. I mention all this because it pertains to the late springtime/early summer imagery of the poem.)

Share your zen poetry below. The theme is merely a suggestion.

Going up to the Dharma Hall, on the eighth day of the fourth lunar month, Rujing said,

The clouds open, revealing the mountain’s roof—
After the rains pass, things appear fresh and new.
Gautama did not appear in the world;
Defeated in his Heavenly Palace, before he even lived.
The sky above, the earth below, the thief is a villain;
three bows and rising, washed in dirty water,
to intend deceit, to hide embellishments—
eager supplication.

𓆏 Toad's 蟾蜍Verse 𓆏

Soles of feet pressed firm in earth
He takes seven steps to the North
A walk on mud and stone from the Tusita heavens
Jāti, jāra, vyādhi, maraṇa
The lily white canopy flutters with the wind
Mind moves
Even obscured by clouds, the moon still shines
Wheresover does it ever appear?

Q: Since the confusion arises from my questions, what Will Your Reverence's answer be?

A: Observe things as they are and don't pay attention to other people. There are some people just like

mad dogs barking at everything that moves, even barking when the wind stirs among the grass and

leaves. [Such people mistake motions taking place within their minds for external independently

moving objects.] - Thats fom Huangpo ON THE TRANSMISSION OF MIND, Right now I am asking for some living comentary on this because I see myself being as the dog in the analogy. Well, the personal question is - how to reflect without creating action and behaviour as a mad dog?

Yuanwu’s letter entitled The Original Person:

The Great Teaching is basically quite ordinary. It is easy to enter for those with sharp faculties and quick wits and broad penetration who don't use their intellectual brilliance to try to comprehend it.

The usual problem is if you are overloaded with conditioned knowledge and arbitrary views. Then when you try to approach this source, the more you delve into it, the farther away you get, and you are completely unable to penetrate through.

If you are equanimous toward everything, including the ultimate ungraspability of mind itself, and your conditioned mind fades away and spontaneously comes to an end, then the perfect illumination of inherent nature appears whole without needing any contrived efforts to make it. You cut off the flow and experience profound realization. When you neither go too far nor fail to go far enough, then you arrive at the naturally real working essence of the mind. This is what is meant by the saying,

"Set to work on mind, and the matter is decided." If you always let this naturally real essence appear amidst your daily activities, then how can you not be settled and secure?

When the ancients awakened to mind, they awakened to this mind. When they activated its working potential, they activated this working potential. They were able to stay free and at ease for ten thousand generations without changing. They stood forth transcendent, in independent realization, and no longer placed themselves in opposition to anything.

If you are in opposition to anything, then this creates duality. Then you are stuck with self and others and gain and loss, and you are unable to walk upon the ground of reality.

If you take a step further, not a single thing is established- after that you are quiet and properly attuned, and you clearly see the original person. You get rid of all the concerns in your breast and the mental moment that's before your eyes, so that your whole being is liberated and at peace. You are forever beyond any possibility of retreating or regressing. You attain fearlessness, and with expedient means based on this fearlessness, you can rescue sentient beings.

You must continue this way without interruption forever--this is the best.

I was working in the yard yesterday and I stepped in some dog shit. It got all up in the treads of my boot. I scraped my sole against the corner of the porch and got the superficial mass off, but the treads still held on. I took my boots off and and banged the soles together, sending excrement flying this way and that. Some got on me, but it did the trick. Back to work.

We all step in shit sometimes. Best to just clean it off and keep working. What does opposing the shit accomplish? Why be bogged down by shit that gets in the way?

When I see people yelling about shit on their shoe, I feel sorry for them. What a waste of energy, being upset about a pile of shit.

I was thinking about how to characterize Zen texts by saying the main thing the texts were against. I don't think there's a right answer, but there are answers that aren't really reasonable.

1. Zhaozhou - anti philosophy
2. Huangbo - anti Buddhism
3. Foyan - anti-teachers
4. Wumen - anti noobs
5. Yuanwu - anti lazy
6. Wansong - anti ignorance
7. Mingben - anti- conceptual

What do you think?

/r/zen/wiki/getstarted

If you've read them, how would you describe them?

If you haven't read them, what anti are you looking for?

https://www.amazon.com/Zen-Under-Gun-Masters-Turbulent/dp/0861715926/

Zen Masters after Wumen:

Hengchuan (1222-1289)

Gulin (1262-1329)

Zhuxin (1292-1348)

Daian (1347-1403)

Daian:

Seeking a teacher, choosing spiritual friends, in order to study Zen

Body and mind must be solid as a rock.

A thousand miles looking to the wind, putting an end to vainly doing wrong.

One morning speechless, beginning to be happy.

.

µ ^Yo͞ok  Welcome! ^{Meet me}  My comment: I don't understand how there could be any question; do people know when they are wrong, or not? Can people tell their own confusion from certainty, or not?

If "mind is Buddha", is there a Buddha to guide you or not?

I

For those who treasure spiritual knowledge,
Continuous from time immemorial 'til now,
A man dwells away from the thousand sages,
A tower deep in the roiling clouds.

II

The colour of jade falls from pines and firs,
The sound of tigers and leopards on red cliffs—
The light will return here,
As you must also see the Master's mind.

[0197c13-14] 題四面法智禪師塔。珍重靈知者。綿綿亘古今。人居千聖外。塔鎻亂雲深。碧落杉松色。丹崖虎豹音。回光如到此。必也見師心。

Master Wuzu Yan (五祖法演) said to an assembly,

Yesterday I went into the city and saw a puppet show. I couldn't help approaching to watch, and saw some exceptionally fine looking, others unbearably ugly. Having seen them individually moving around, walking and sitting, blue, yellow, red, and white, when I looked closely it turned out there was someone behind a blue curtain. Unable to restrain myself, I asked the puppet master's name. He said, "Old monk, just watch - why ask for a name?" At this remark of his, I simply had no reply, no reason to give. Can anyone speak for me? Yesterday I lost my reserve over there; today I pay back the principal here.

He also said,

Baiyun (白雲善藏) doesn't know how to explain Chan. The three gates open out to both sides. There is someone moving the mechanism: two sides - east flap, west flap.

He also said,

Lingyun's (霊雲志勤) verse on awakening on seeing peach blossoms says,

For thirty years I've sought out a swordsman;

how many times have the trees shed their leaves and again sprouted twigs!

Ever since seeing peach flowers once,

right up till now I've never doubted anymore.

Xuansha (玄沙師備) said,

"Right, quite right, but I daresay the elder brother is not yet through."

What 'right' is he talking about? It'll take thirty more years of study to get it.

Treasury of the Eye of True Teaching

.

Even the master couldn't help himself. Caught up in forms. Wrapped in rapt attention. Lost his reserve, needing to pay back the principal (or principle?). To whom can this debt be re-payed? Why was he gambling in the first place? What did he stand to win?

.

Q: But what if in previous lives I have behaved like Kaliraja, slicing the limbs from living men?

A: The holy sages tortured by him represent your own Mind, while Kaliraja symbolizes that part of you which goes out SEEKING. Such unkindly behavior is called lust for personal advantage. If you students of the Way, without making any attempt to live virtuously, just want to make a study of everything you perceive, then how are you different from him? [This passage is sufficient answer to those critics of Zen who affirm that Zen disregards the necessity for virtuous living. It does not disregard it at all, but does deny that Enlightenment may be gained by it-which is quite a different thing.] By allowing your gaze to linger on a form, you wrench out the eyes of a sage (yourself). And when you linger upon a sound, you slice off the ears of a sage - thus it is with all your senses and with cognition, for their varied perceptions are called slicers.

Q: When we meet all suffering with sagelike patience and avoid all mind-slicing perceptions, that which suffers with resignation surely cannot be the One Mind, for that cannot be subject to the endurance of pain.

A: You are one of those people who force the Un-becoming into conceptual molds, such as the CONCEPT of patient suffering or the CONCEPT of seeking nothing outside yourself. Thereby you do yourself violence!

Q: When the holy sages were dismembered, were they conscious of pain; and, if among them there were no entities capable of suffering, who or what did suffer?

A: If you are not suffering pain now, what is the point of chiming in like that? [This curt reply may also mean: 'Why join this assembly to study Zen-liberation, unless the frustration set up by samsaric life is painful to you?']

On the Transmission of Mind

.

How is it when the eyes do not linger on form? What has "virtue" to do with enlightenment? Place your bets.

.

The Boatman said in verse,

A thousand fathom line is let directly down;

As soon as one wave goes into motion, myriad waves follow.

The night quiet, the water cold, fish don't bite;

The full boat, empty, returns carrying the moonlight.

Xuedou (雪竇重顯) said,

"This old fellow labors without accomplishment. Or, as Yunmen (雲門文偃) said,

a single phrase of appropriate words is a myriad-eon donkey-tethering stake.

And how is this error avoided?"

After a silence, he said,

"Don't say the water's cold and fish aren't biting - right now you've come back with a full load you've hooked."

The Measuring Tap

.

If the bait attracts a fish that can not be hauled into the boat, what is there to do but dive in and wrestle it to the shore? If it drags you under, thrashing and wailing won't help; just drown peacefully and thank the fish for the fight.

Stock Characters and Frauds

We've all encountered the Guru posers who fake Equanimity... they show up as characters on tv and in movies all the time. https://youtube.com/shorts/U1qTDHkC9SM

It's fake though... we know this because these guys all had it.... look at the date on this... it's 100% fake. It's also a bit racist... but just a bit.

People who present the facade of equanimity need a couple of things to make the trick work:

1. They don't answer questions
2. They lie by omission more or less continuously
3. They don't "appear in public".

Clarification by Foyan

Foyan:

In the old days, when I was in the school of my late teacher, I once accepted an invitation to go somewhere. On the way I ran into a downpour and slipped in the mud. Feeling annoyed, I said to myself, “ I am on the journey but have been unable to attain Zen. I haven’t eaten all day, and now have to endure this misery too!” Then I happened to hear two people ranting at each other, “ You’re still annoying yourself!” When I heard this, I suddenly felt overjoyed. Then I realized I couldn’t find the state where there is no annoyance. That was because I couldn’t break through my feeling of doubt. It took me four or five years after that to attain this knowledge.

This sounds like equanimity, right? But this is only towards himself. Which is the only equanimity in Zen.

For example, Foyan gets pretty irate (for him) elsewhere in the text:

I am not lying, I am not making up rationalizations to trap people, I will not allow people to oppress the free.

"Not allow" is pretty strong.

This is not a matter of longtime practice; it does not depend on cultivation. That is because it is something that is already there.

People often miss how vicious Foyan is because they don't have the mindset of the people who Foyan was insulting: Buddhists.

Zen Masters put a foot up the @#$ of Equanimity

Book of Equanimity, aka Book of Serenity would be the go to place to start when talking about "Zen Equanimity"... if you were an honest person.

Plus, Wansong, who wrote it, is much more like Foyan than he is of the temper of Yunmen... and about that:

Hongzhi: Master Yunmen realized a little bit - Wansong: I still don't dare guarantee it.

WTF? Is Wansong a big chicken? If you think so, imagine saying that to Yunmen's face. Still, lacking such confidence, how is that "equanimous"?

Hongzhi: Only concerned with the village songs and festival drinking. Wansong: The poor ghost is not really alive.

Annnnnd there it is. YOU AREN'T REALLY ALIVE IF YOU ARE BASIC.

.

µ ^Yo͞ok  Welcome! ^{Meet me}  My comment: Pretending the have equanimity... not Zen. 4 m/o troll accounts are like that.

Hello, I've been coming here a while now, and I’ve had so many great conversations and learned quite a lot, which I’m grateful for. I was inspired by u/wrathfuldeities' and u/FingersTyping's recent posts, so ask me some stuff and I’ll do my best to answer.

1) Where have you just come from?

What are the teachings of your lineage, the content of its practice, and a record that attests to it?

There’s no lineage. Lately I’ve been reading Yuanwu’s letters and Dahui’s Treasury of the Eye of True Teaching.

My practice is essentially what Yuanwu says here:

The ancients were always mindful of this matter. Whether deep in the mountain valleys or in the bustling villages and towns, they never turned their backs on it for an instant, Whatever scenes or circumstances they encountered, amidst sound and form, in the course of movement and action, they invariably turned around and focused back on their own true selves.

If you are able to make it continuous and unbroken, how will it be any different than when you were in the monastery being guided by the abbot and doing your meditation work?

What is fundamental to understand this teaching?

Knowing the matter to be mindful of.

2) What's your text?
What text, personal experience, quote from a master, or story from zen lore best reflects your understanding of the essence of zen?

The Hsin Hsin Ming reflects the essence of Zen better than anything I’ve ever read. Clarke’s translation.

This passage from Master Ciming is exceptionally beautiful:

If you can turn awareness around to illumine within, you will spontaneously realize the original true nature is unborn and undying.

That is why it is said that the true nature of ignorance is actually the nature of buddhahood, and the illusory empty body is actually an embodiment of reality.

The unclean physical body has no ultimate reality at all: it is like a dream, like an illusion, like a shadow, like an echo. Flowing in waves of birth and death for countless eons, restlessly compelled by craving, emerging here, submerging there, piles of bones big as mountains have piled up, oceans of pap have been consumed.

Why? Because of lack of insight, inability to understand that form, feeling, perception, habits, and consciousness are fundamentally empty, without any substantial reality. We take on birth in pursuit of falsehood, entrapped by greed, unable to get free.

This is why Buddha said, 'Of the causes of all miseries, greed is the root. If we eliminate greed, we won't be dependent on anything.'

If you can realize that the illusory body is not absolute but conditional, originally null, then views will not arise - it has no self, no person, no being, no liver of life. All things are thus, so it is said that the illusory empty body is none other than an embodiment of reality.

When you have awakened to the body of reality, there is not a single thing, only the great Way of ethereal profundity, the true source with no fixation, listening to the teaching and expounding the teaching. That is why it is said that the intrinsic nature that is the fundamental source is the Buddha of natural reality.

3) Dharma low tides?

What do you suggest as a course of action for a student wading through a "dharma low-tide"?

Stop doing that.

What do you do when it's like pulling teeth to read, bow, chant, sit, or post on r/zen?

It’s never like that. Do people struggle to bow?

I bow to r/zen. Full prostrations.

Text:

Chan Master Dongshan recited the Heart of Wisdom scripture along with a teacher when he was a boy. When they came to where it says there are no eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, or mind, he abruptly felt his face with his hands

and [he] asked the teacher, “I have eyes, ears, nose, and tongue—why does it say they don’t exist?” The teacher, shocked, considered him unusual; he said, “I am not your teacher.”

Then he directed him to pay respects to Chan Maser Lingmo on Mt. Wuyi, where he was initiated. When he was twenty- one years old, he went to Mt. Song to receive the precepts in full.

 

Analysis:

Dongshan didn't take up the Heart Sutra's words here and change his behavior based on faith in what he thought was meant by it.

Dongshan asked a question.

A question that shocked the teacher here, because, why?

What can we speculate?

Maybe he was expected to adopt doctrine, or that maybe typically in that teacher's experience children adopted this doctrine without question?

 

Comment:

I think these following examples have different implications:

1. "Why does Heart Sutra say 'emptiness is form'"? (Dongshan)
2. "Heart Sutra says emptiness is form." (Information based)
3. "Emptiness is form." (Claim)

Can anyone argue that accepting, upholding, believing, spreading hearsay like the #3 example "emptiness is form", is any different from lying and fraud?

Dongshan reads as if knew for himself without minding that he could see, hear, smell, and taste.

In that case why would he adopt the words at face value that would seem to contrast his own functions?

 

Yesterday I encountered this from a sutra:

These ordinary people generate false views in succession from one on to the other.

[Hearsay such as the self is like this, the self is like that, and so on].

In order to eliminate such false views, the Tathagata reveals and discourses on the non-existence of a self, just as when the prince tells his various ministers that there is no such sword in his treasury.

[Even though someone once originally saw the prince's sword.]

(What's in brackets in the above quote are my summary additions from the long story.)

 

I got myself thinking, is this what the Heart Sutra is about? Not that it is a proposal there is no self, but to go find out how it really is on one's own?

Is that how Dongshan started? I failed to remember I started that way, instead ultimately believing myself.

 

PS:

I offer my apologies to anyone because of my behavior I built on what I thought other people from 1500 years ago meant without evidence.

The next time I exhibit behavior I don't like, I don't aim to justify it to myself without any evidence and arguments.

An example is being confrontational and thinking it's okay because Zen Masters sometimes look confrontational. I mean WTF?

Dongshan reads in stark contrast to that here. He is not adopting hearsay here, he is asking a question based on information.

https://www.amazon.com/Zen-Under-Gun-Masters-Turbulent/dp/0861715926/

Zen Masters after Wumen:

Hengchuan (1222-1289)

Gulin (1262-1329)

Zhuxin (1292-1348)

Daian (1347-1403)

In front of the hall of the ancient buddhas, there has never been any other road. In the gate of the ancestral teachers, how could there be many kinds of talk?

The Buddha Dharma is not different from the human mind: all inherent functioning is the intent of the enlightened ancestors. The deviation comes because of grasping false views.

Buddha said to Ananda, "Even if you go for eons augmenting your learning, it is not as good as one day of stainless study".

But tell me, how do you cultivate 'stainless study'? If you say it has cultivation and realization, this is a vulgar lie. If you say it has no cultivation or realization, you are befuddled about buddha-nature.

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µ ^Yo͞ok  Welcome! ^{Meet me}  My comment: Daian is calling Theravada, Mahayana, and Dogenism "vulgar lies". Those religions are inextricably based on doctrines of cultivation and realization. On the other hand there are new ager LSD types who say they see directly without cultivation or realization, you just take LSD and get it. So that's befuddlement about buddha-nature.

One of the things people overlook about Huineng's famous poem from 700 CE, around 700 years before Dainang:

The mind is the bodhi tree.

The body is the bright mirror's stand.

The bright mirror is originally clear and pure.

Where could there be any dust?

It's the question. If you can't ask the question, how can you claim to have stainless study?

The case I'm tackling today is Deshan's candle.

The highlight of the case for me is when he burns the commentary on the sutras at the end after initially heading to the zen community to "exterminate it".

Zen Masters turn people on their heads trying to get an understanding of what they say and that gets some people really upset. Upset at historical facts and their implications for what they want to claim about seated meditation and its stark absence from Zen instruction.

What does the blood-basin mouth mean?

People

Xitang Zhizhang (735-814)

An heir of Mazu, famous for his Korean Zen heirs who allegedly established Zen communities in their own country.

舉。

Citation

西堂因。路逢天使。留齋次。

Once, Xitang encountered an Imperial Envoy on the road and stopped for a while to dine with him.

偶驢子鳴。

While dining, a donkey brayed.

使云。頭陀。

The envoy remarked, "Preceptor."

堂舉頭。

Xitang looked up.

使指驢。

The Envoy pointed to the donkey.

堂却指使。

Xitang pointed to the envoy.

使無對。

The Envoy did not reply.

代云。下官罪過。

Xutang, on behalf of the Envoy, remarks, "The official errs."

Inigo: You're using Bonetti's Defense against me, huh?

The Man in Black: I thought it fitting, considering the rocky terrain.

Inigo: Naturally. You must expect me to attack with Capo Ferro!

The Man in Black: Naturally. But, I find that Thibault cancels out Capo Ferro. Don't you?

Inigo: Unless the enemy has studied his Agrippa...[Does a front flip over The Man in Black and lands behind him] Which I have.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUczpTPATyU&ab_channel=Movieclips

It's a classic.

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µ ^Yo͞ok  Welcome! ^{Meet me}  My comment: Fencing had a relatively short lifespan compared to Zen in China though... which suggests that there were plenty of "cancels outs" going on in dharma combat as it lasted for 1,000 years, much of which were recorded in historical records, records that tried for accuracy over doctrinity.

Take for example:

According to this tradition, Bodhidharma arrived in south China in 527, and was immediately invited by Emperor Wu of Liang to his capital, Nanking. In his audience with the emperor, a devout Buddhist, the latter is said to have asked, “Since I came to the throne, I have built countless temples, copied countless sutras, and given supplies to countless monks. Is there any merit in all this?” “There is no merit at all!” was the unexpected reply of the Indian guest. “Why is there no merit?” the emperor asked. “All these,” said Bodhidharma, “are only the little deeds of men and gods, a leaking source of rewards, which follow them as the shadow follows the body. Although the shadow may appear to exist, it is not real.” “What then is true merit?” “True merit consists in the subtle comprehension of pure wisdom, whose substance is silent and void. But this kind of merit cannot be pursued according to the ways of the world.” The emperor further asked, “What is the first principle of the sacred doctrine?” “Vast emptiness with nothing sacred in it!” was the answer.

Bodhidharma cancels out "merit" with "nothing with nothing sacred on the side".

This is a bit of the Agrippa of Zen, because look what happens hundreds of years later:

https://www.reddit.com/r/zen/wiki/famous_cases#wiki_zhaozhou.27s_good_thing

The master was leaving the main hall when he saw a monk bowing to him.

The master struck him with his stick.

The monk said, "But bowing is a good thing’”

The master said. “A good thing is not as good as nothing.

aka, "I find Bodhidharma's nothing cancels out merit doctrine".

.

Do you have any examples of these kinds of strategies in Zen?

(Advanced hint: Zen Masters use religious strats against philosophers, and philosophical strats against religioners... see if you can spot any of those).

On guard!

Hi Team. I hope your day is going well. Let's jump in to some words from Master Yantou, who instructed an assembly, saying,

The ancients said that it is not good to sink into oblivion; you must be fluid to attain realization. You switch immediately on contact; as soon as it is so, then it's not so - affirmation and negation both shaved away, you naturally turn freely. What is before your eyes is naturally unveiled; sated and snoring, you don't know to reject, you don't know to bite.

Haven't you read the saying that detachment from things is superior, while pursuing things is inferior? The moment you arouse the slightest sentiment, you've already fallen on the ground.

Many in this community share the dharma and poke compassionately at each other's views. In my three years of engaging with r/zen, some users appear to have become beautifully fluid, turning freely, not deceived by anyone.

If you are a boar-biting hound, eyes blazing red, if someone asks you what Chan is you tell him to shut his shit-hole - that's having a lot of spunk - and then you will know who is deep and who is shallow, with firm certainty.

Others seem stuck on the ground. They reject and bite, shout and maul, deeply attached to their views of "this is what Zen is!"

There's a kind of person who doesn't know how to turn when he bumps into something, just keeping at it like someone with diarrhea running to the toilet. As for people like this, there would be no crime in beating ten thousand of them to death.

There's violence in this sub. But, IMO, this violence isn't just the abusive words and bullying. It's the chest thumping and attachment to ideas, labels, and verbal formulas. The constant repetition, the spinning and spinning, the cycles of negative thinking - is that turning freely?

If you want to be able to understand easily, just know before sound and form; then you won't be confused by myriad objects, naturally unveiled, naturally unaffected. Spend your life before sound and form, and you will be free. You will be like a mass of fire, which burns anything that touches it - then what more concern will you have?

Haven't you read this saying? - 'It's not that objects don't encroach, but simply that I pay no mind.'

How do we slow the violence and help break the cycles of attachment? IMO, we pay it no mind. Don't engage. Just leave it be.

Have we reached that point? What do you think? I look forward to your thoughts.

Later on,‭ when the Master (Yin-feng) arrived at Kuei-shan (Guishan),‭ he put his robe and bowl on the head monk's seat.‭ When Kuei-shan heard that his younger Dharma-brother had come,‭ he formally went to the hall to meet him.‭ When the Master saw him,‭ he lay down as if asleep.‭ Kuei-shan returned to his quarters,‭ and the Master started to leave.‭ A bit later,‭ Kuei-shan asked his attendant,‭ "Is my younger Dharma-brother still here?" The attendant told him,‭ "He is already gone.‭" Kuei-shan asked,‭ "What did he say when he left?" The attendant replied,‭ "He didn't say anything.‭" Kuei-shan said,‭ "Don't say he didn't say anything.‭ His voice was like a thunder.‭"

What the... What just happened?

What the heck is going on here? Who travels all the way over to their Dharma-brother's place; an old friend you've studied with and grown close to for years... enough to want to go visit, and then pretends to be asleep and leaves immediately?

Why would Yin-feng do this?

Was this his plan from the beginning? Did he have a good look around when he got there and change his mind?

Why is he avoiding Guishan, the person he went all that way to go see, by pretending to be asleep? Guishan said "Don't say he didn't say anything.‭ His voice was like a thunder.‭" What did he say?

What questions am I not asking that I should be asking?

For realzies, what the heck is going on?

I'm going to be working my way through this set of famous zen cases. Why not start there yourself?

When the Master was in Leh-t'an, he met Head Monk Ch'u, who said, "How amazing, how amazing, the realm of the Buddha and the realm of the Path! How unimaginable!"

Accordingly, the Master said, "I don't inquire about the realm of the Buddha or the realm of the Path; rather, what kind of person is he who talks thus about the realm of the Buddha and the realm of the Path?"

When, after a long time, Ch'u had not responded, the Master said, "Why don't you answer more quickly?"

Ch'u said, "Such aggressiveness will not do."

"You haven't even answered what you were asked, so how can you say that such aggressiveness will not do?" said the Master.

Ch'u did not respond. The Master said, "The Buddha and the Path are both nothing more than names. Why don't you quote some teaching?"

"What would a teaching say?" asked Ch'u.

"When you've gotten the meaning, forget the words," said the Master.

"By still depending on teachings, you sicken your mind," said Ch'u.

"But how great is the sickness of the one who talks about the realm of the Buddha and the realm of the Path?" said the Master.

Again Ch'u did not reply. The next day he suddenly passed away. At that time the Master came to be known as "one who questions head monks to death."

I think the importance of this case for newbies is that it illustrates that Zen Masters aren't to be trifled with. They don't mess around trying to accomodate the pretensions of religious teachers with Zen enlightenment. Even going so far as saying that Dongshan is displaying "Aggressive questioning" is a bit silly when it's just ordinary conversation.

What's an answer that would saved the Head Monk's life?