Talk on the Shobogenzo given by Eido Mike Luetchford. 13 th July 2001 Talk number 6 of Chapter 1 - Bendowa So we re on Bendowa, page 10, paragraph 37. We re onto another question: [Someone] asks, Among the three kinds of training there is training in the balanced state, and among the six paramitas there is the dhyana paramita, both of which all bodhisattvas learn from the outset and all bodhisattvas practice, regardless of whether they are clever or stupid. The Zazen [that you are discussing] now is surely [only] one of these. Why do you say that the Tathagata s right Dharma is concentrated in this [practice of Zazen]? So the question is of the position of Zazen among all the different kinds of Buddhist training. And the different kinds of Buddhist training mentioned are the three kinds of training, which are..this is from ancient Buddhism, and there are said to be the precepts, the balanced state, and wisdom. So in this old categorisation of different kinds of training, the balanced state or the practice of Zazen is only one of the three. And then the six paramitas are: giving, keeping the precepts, patience, diligence, dhyana, and real wisdom. So again it seems like it s only one of six practices. And these practices are learned by all the bodhisattvas and practiced by all the bodhisattvas, so why do you say that Zazen is the central one? is the question. I say: The question arises because this right-dharma-eye treasury, the supreme and great method, which is the one great matter of the Tathagata, has been called the Zen Sect. Remember that this title Zen Sect was established in China and the east; it is not heard in India. When the great Master Bodhidharma first stayed at Shaolin temple in the Sung-shan mountains, and faced the wall for nine years, monks and laymen were still ignorant of the Buddha s right Dharma, so they called [Master Bodhidharma] a Brahman who made a religion of Zazen. Thereafter, the patriarchs of successive generations all constantly devoted themselves to Zazen. So Master Dogen is saying that historically what happened when Buddhism came from India to China is that people started calling it something different - the Zen Sect. But he denies that this is anything different from original Buddhism. Monks and laymen were. ignorant of the Buddha s right Dharma, and they didn t know that Zazen, or dhyana is the centre of Buddhism. Stupid secular people who saw this, not knowing the reality, talked at random of a Zazen Sect. Nowadays, dropping the word Za, they talk of just the Zen Sect. This interpretation is clear from records of the patriarchs. [Zazen] should not be discussed as the balanced state of dhyana in the six paramitas and the three kinds of training. That this Buddha-Dharma is the legitimate intention of the one-to-one transmission has never been concealed through the ages. So Master Dogen says that it s a misunderstanding, it s a historical misunderstanding. First of all Zazen is not one practice among three or one practice among six paramitas, it s the centre of Buddhism; it s Buddhism itself. But historically, early categorisations were made and people misunderstood. And then when Buddhism came from India to China.Buddhism already existed in China in an esoteric form, so as scriptures and chanting and so on. So when Bodhidharma came, practicing Zazen, people said oh he s a Zazen Buddhist. P: So they didn t sit then? They didn t sit. They had sutras and chanting and other abstract and esoteric practices. And when they saw this monk who d come from India sitting and facing the wall, they said what s that?. Oh I m doing Zazen, oh so he s in a Zazen Sect, a different kind of Buddhism, Zazen Sect. So then they stopped saying Zazen and said it was a Zen Sect, or Ch an of course, a Ch an Sect, a new kind of Buddhism. But Master Dogen insists that it is Buddhism, the rest is not Buddhism. And this fact has never been concealed and it s true - if you look at the lineage, the list of masters from any Buddhist master backwards, you can trace it back to Gautama Buddha transmitted one to one. So he goes on:
In the order on Vulture Peak in ancient times, Vulture Peak was the name of the place mentioned in the early Pali sutras, where Gautama Buddha was said to have preached. when the Tathagata gave the Dharma to the venerable Mahakasyapa, transmitting the right-dharmaeye treasury and the fine mind of nirvana, the supreme and great method, only to him, the ceremony was witnessed directly by beings among the celestial throng which are present in the world above, so it must never be doubted. Master Dogen is talking about the fact that Gautama Buddha transmitted the right-dharma-eye treasury the right-dharma-eye treasury is Shobogenzo, the name of this book, and the fine mind of nirvana means balanced consciousness, or balanced body and mind, although nirvana is said to mean some special magical state, it refers to the state where we cease intellectual thinking. And in that state we have a simple natural state. So nirvana literally means snuffing out, or blowing out the flame, but it refers to snuffing out our discriminating mind, and just being ourselves in the present. And this transmission from Gautama Buddha to his disciple Mahakasyapa, Master Dogen said was witnessed by the celestial throng, and we mustn t doubt it. Witnessed by the celestial throng means..it s a kind of symbolic or idealistic record which is being passed down. So the gods witnessed it and they passed it down to us if you like. It is a universal rule that those celestial beings will guard and maintain the Buddha-Dharma eternally; their efforts have never faded. So Master Dogen asserts that these abstract gods or beings are guarding Buddhism. What he s referring to is the fact that because Buddhism is about reality, because Zazen is just sitting in reality, the whole of the Universe supports it because the whole of the Universe is reality. So from a spiritual or idealistic point of view we can say all the gods in heaven are supporting Buddhism. And from a materialistic point of view we can say all the things in the Universe are supporting Buddhism - trees, walls, fences, tiles, pebbles, seas, mountains. So this P: A lot of people think there are beings don t they? Beings which support and protect it. Literally, yes. Well we can t tell if Master Dogen means it literally, but we have to remember the four views. The four views are the way that human beings view the world, so we have a spiritual view and we have a materialistic view. So from the spiritual view we can say that god is the Universe, or all the gods are the Universe. And in that way we can say something in the Universe is helping Buddhism, or supporting Buddhism, and he calls that something the celestial throng. P: I suppose in a sense it s like saying Dogen is part of the celestial throng, he s supporting Buddhism by giving the truth now, although he s not here, he s passing it on. Yes, so we can t deny that part of reality, we can t deny that something although Master Dogen died in 1253, something is here about him, but that something is not some abstract being existing in a spiritual world, but the actual words in the Shobogenzo and our actual practice. Just remember that this [transmission of Zazen] is the whole truth of the Buddha s Dharma; nothing can be compared with it. So his answer in that paragraph is - no, you re wrong, Zazen isn t one kind of Buddhist training out of three, or one kind of special paramita out of six, it is the only and the essential centre of Buddhism, and this has always been the case. But there have been misunderstandings, and also there was a great misunderstanding when Buddhism came from India to China, people thought it was a Zazen Sect of Buddhism as opposed to other sects, so they called in the Zen Sect or the Ch an Sect. P: So what did they first call it in China? Somewhere I remember reading about Bodhidharma, it wasn t called Buddhism in India or something. Yes, that s an interesting question, I don t know what.. In Japan it s called Butsudo - the way of Buddha. I m sure that Butsudo came from China, it must have been called Butsudo in China but I don t know the pronunciation of those two characters. So in India it must have had some similar name, but I don t know what it was. So anyway, Master Dogen always insists that true Buddhism is centred around the practice.
[ Someone] asks, Why, in discussing entry into the state of experience, do Buddhists recommend us to practice the balanced state of dhyana solely by sitting, which is [only] one of the four forms of conduct? The four forms of conduct are walking, standing, sitting and lying down - the four postures. I m not sure where they came from but again there were these many categories, everything was categorised, that was the way to analyse things, that s what we do now. But the ancient categories always seem rather primitive. And the question is - the balanced state of dhyana, why can we only enter it when we sit in that posture rather then when we are walking, standing or lying down? So why do we need to sit on the cushion facing the wall, when there are four different postures. And Master Dogen s answer is this: I say: It is difficult to calculate all the ways that buddhas have successively practiced since ancient times to enter the state of real experience. So he doesn t insist that Zazen is the only way to enter the truth. If we want to find a reason, we should remember that what Buddhists practice is reason in itself. We should not look for [a reason] besides this. So the reason is, is that it s a tradition. So when somebody asks us why we practice Zazen sitting facing the wall, we say that s the way we were taught to do it, so that s the reason. Yoko: It s a historical fact. A historical fact yes. Yoko: And we shouldn t search for more reason than just it s a fact. We should not look for [a reason] besides this. But an ancestral master has praised [sitting] by saying, Sitting in Zazen is the peaceful and joyful gate of Dharma. So in conclusion the reason may be that, of the four forms of conduct, [sitting is the most] peaceful and joyful. Further more, [sitting] is not the way practiced by one or two buddhas; all the buddhas and all the patriarchs possess this way. So really it s an empirical reason - all the buddhas and all the patriarchs from Gautama Buddha have always sat in this posture, none of them have ended up choosing a different posture. All of them have accepted that this posture is the practice and an ancient master said it makes us peaceful and joyful, so that s a good enough reason, that s sufficient reason. So there s no mystical reason. We may in a few decades to come, we may be able to give more detailed physiological explanations. P: That s totally different to other forms of meditation isn t it, Hindu and so on, where they re contemplating Brahma and so on. As you say it s got no intention has it? No intention. And even other groups meditate by walking, some of them by walking through nature and so on. And that s their practice. Or they lie on their backs with their knees up, or visualising your body from top to bottom. But all those methods are different from the method which has been transmitted one to one, Master Dogen makes that very clear. Yoko: Nishijima Roshi says you can sit in seiza. Ah, seiza is with you knees under. Yoko: Bushido. Samurai started sitting with their knees under because you can get up more quickly and draw your sword. If you sit cross-legged you can t get up quick. P: Oh well I must have been a Samurai then in a previous life. Yoko: And also people in south Asian cultures sit like this. Yes, so there is a correct posture for Zazen which Master Dogen tells us about. But in this paragraph, Master Dogen doesn t deny that there are many ways to enter the state of real experience. So it s not a
question of saying the only way you can be in reality is by sitting on a cushion facing the wall, that s not what he says. What he says is, sitting on a cushion facing the wall in the Zazen posture is a standard way. And because it s a standard way, we can use it as our standard. So there are millions of ways to enter the balanced state, and we can see some of those millions of ways, but we have a standard way and we practice it every day, and it s the way of all the buddhas and patriarchs. Next question: [Someone] asks, In regard to this practice of Zazen, a person who has not yet experienced and understood the Buddha-Dharma may be able to acquire that experience by pursuing the truth in Zazen. [But] what can a person who has already clarified the Buddha s right Dharma expect to gain from Zazen? So this question is really - well it s OK for beginners, but what about people who already know what Buddhism is, surely they don t need to do Zazen? And I like this reply: I say: We do not tell our dreams before a fool, and it is difficult to put oars into the hands of a mountaineer, nevertheless I must bestow the teaching. So that sentence says your question is very foolish, but I m going to try and tell you the real situation. The thought that practice and experience are not one thing is just the idea of non-buddhists. Practice and experience are two words in Chinese and Japanese - shu sho. And the phrase shu sho was a very well known and much discussed phrase. And to say shu is one, or practice and experience is one thing, is the teaching of Buddhism. And it s a little difficult to understand what that means, but it means that the practice that we do and the result that we get from it are not different. So practice and result is another way to translate it. Some people translate it as Practice and enlightenment, but Nishijima Roshi doesn t like to use the word enlightenment. So some people say practice and enlightenment and in a way it makes it a bit clearer. Practice and enlightenment are not separate, in other words you can t get to know what Buddhism is then throw Zazen away, because Zazen is Buddhism, they are inseparable. So the practice and the result or the experience, that idea that they are not one thing, is non-buddhist. This means that all practices, even if they are sitting on a cushion, where the person is practicing in order to get a state in the future, to attain a state, are all not Buddhism. This is a very important point. It doesn t leave much room. So if we have any intention to separate what we re doing and the state what we get from what we re doing, or the experience that we get from what we re doing, or the result we get from what we re doing, if we have any intention to do that we lose the state of Zazen immediately. So even though we may be sitting cross legged on the floor, facing the wall, we re not practicing Zazen any more, we re pushing ourselves out of the state. In the Buddha-Dharma practice and experience are completely the same. [Practice] now is also practice in the state of experience; therefore, a beginner s pursuit of truth is just the whole body of the original state of experience. Now this sentence means the practice that we re doing now, at the present moment is always the state of experience, they re not separate. So even a beginner sitting for the first time is experiencing the state of Zazen completely. So there s no beginners state of Zazen and advanced state of Zazen, there s only one state of Zazen. And I think this is the reason why Shunryu Suzuki s book that he published in the 70s is called Zen Mind Beginner s Mind, because when we don t know, it s somehow simpler for us to sit without any intention. So often people say when they start to practice Zazen they had rather a simple state. I heard somebody say the other day, Peter from London was saying that when he sat recently he felt that that was what it used to be like. So many people who study Buddhism, when they first practice and they don t know anything, they can sit very simply without any intention - they don t know what their intention is, they re a bit puzzled and they can sit rather nicely. But many of these people then start reading all these Buddhist books and they lose that simple state. So the beginner s state is very important. This is why [the Buddhist patriarchs] teach, in the practical cautions they have handed down to us, not to expect any experience outside of practice. You can t get anything from Zazen. It s Zazen that you get not something from Zazen. And this is very difficult for us to understand, if we practice Zazen regularly for some time, we can notice it s true. But if we think about it, it sounds like a strange thing to do. If you say why am I doing this practice? The answer to the question why is usually because you can get this or you can become better. Hidden in the question why am I doing this? is that kind of feeling isn t there? What am I getting from this? So the answer is nothing, and we find that very difficult.
And the reason may be that [practice itself] is the directly accessible original state of experience. Because practice is just experience, the experience is endless; and because experience is practice has no beginning. This is one of those nice sentences where he turns both ways to capture a momentary yet eternal state. P: So it s like it used to be that I m now remembering it s still an experience isn t it? Yes where we remember is now, yes. P: Yes, so it s always going on. So it s endless. Yes so the strange thing is, it s impossible to we think that it s possible but actually it s impossible to describe the present moment, because we say it s just here, it s like the frame of a film, it s this frame, this frame, so there are lots of frames going through time. But it s not like that, the present never disappears, so it never ends, it never cuts, it s always here, and yet it doesn t progress through time, so it s a very unusual situation which we don t notice. And our way of looking at the world based on time is so strong and so helpful, that we become trapped in it. And of course it s helpful, so we can say it s true, but it s not reality, it s not the actual situation in reality. And the actual situation in reality is impossible to quite grasp. Something which is always here and therefore is eternal, so doesn t last any time, therefore is momentary, doesn t spread itself in a line from past to future, and doesn t come from anywhere and doesn t go to anywhere. It s a very strange situation. And this is why we call it by the word Dharma, which is difficult to understand and translate. This is how both the Tathagata Sakyamuni and the venerable patriarch Mahakasyapa were received and used by the practice that exists in the state of experience. Again we ve got this two faces, two views in received and used - the active and the passive. In English we have to put an and in between received and used, but in Japanese you can put receivedused, just put the two characters together, which gives a closer feeling. English is more logical so we separate even in the words. So then we think, received and used OK, so they must be a time when we receive, and then there s a time when we use, but it s not like that. It s Yoko: So we have an advantage in usage like shusho, honsho. All the kanji just you don t need a joining word. Yoko: Just we have both sides of a coin, two words. You can see both sides at once. So consequently, Chinese and Japanese culture mirrors the language. So they are not so discriminative in the sense that they don t get trapped into looking for when I m receiving and then looking for when I m using, because the language doesn t say that to them, it says So both Gautama Buddha, the Tathagata Sakyamuni.Tathagata means he who has come to this place or is here fully in the present, and Sakyamuni means the sage of the Sakya clan, and his disciple and successor Mahakasyapa were received and used by the practice that exists in the state of experience. So that sentence is putting together receiving and using, and also putting together practice in the state of experience, experience in the practice. So it s the opposite to deconstruction. What s the opposite of a deconstructionist? P: A constructionist I suppose. I ve never heard of the phrase, sometimes Master Dogen is a constructionist. The Great Master Bodhidharma and the founding Patriarch Daikan were similarly pulled and driven by the practice that exists in the state of experience. Pulled and driven, again two things together, there s no and in between them. Positive and negative, like and dislike, good and bad, forward and backward, pulled and driven, up and down, all of these opposites are one in the balanced state. The examples of all those who dwelt in and maintained the Buddha-Dharma are like this. So we should include ourselves in that
The practice that is never separate from experience exists already; So the practice that is never separate from experience is called in Buddhism action, although action doesn t sound like it describes it, we have to re-learn the meaning if you like. So the practice that is one with experience, exists already, means that it s just here when we sit, it means it doesn t come from somewhere, it appears in the moment. having fortunately received the one-to-one transmission of a share of the subtle practice, we who are beginners in pursuing the truth directly possess, in the state without intention, a share of original experience. So we have been very fortunate to receive a share of the subtle practice, we share it. And because we have a share of the practice he says we get a share of the original experience. And we who are beginners - Master Dogen includes himself. In the state without intention is very important, it s important for us to insist that Buddhism is a state without intention, because there are so many practices around which have an intention, an intention to visualise, and intention to concentrate on breathing or whatever. All those practices are different from Zazen. Remember, in order to prevent us from tainting the experience that is never separate from practice, the Buddhist patriarchs have repeatedly taught us no to be lax in practice. So the Buddhist patriarch urge us to keep practicing. When we forget the subtle practice, original experience has filled our hands; when the body leaves original experience behind, the subtle practice is operating throughout the body. That sentence refers to after we stop practicing Zazen. When we forget the subtle practice means when we ve stopped practicing and it leaves our consciousness, we are full of original experience. So when the body leaves original experience behind, the subtle practice is operating throughout the body, so after we stop practicing Zazen, original experience fills our body and mind. So we can never escape from Zazen, and there is nothing that we need to do intentionally to carry Zazen into our daily life. And this is the question lots of people have, they say that it s OK to practice but how can I carry it on into my life. Well, it s impossible not to, there s nothing you have to do, so do nothing is the best.there is nothing that you have to do to carry Zazen into your life, or do nothing to carry Zazen into your life, is the way to carry Zazen into your life. If we try and do something to carry Zazen into our life, we disturb the state that we already have. Yoko: Because we try intentionally. Intentionally, so if we practice Zazen then intentionally want to be mindful, or intentionally want to be aware, we are destroying the state of Zazen. So we can see from reading Bendowa, very clearly what Buddhism is, simply and we can also see what all these other groups are doing. It s obvious what they re doing. So we don t need to criticise them too strongly, but we can insist that no it s not true, it s not what Dogen taught, that s not what Buddhism is. But although we insist on it, we are very small voices, and people may not listen to us. P: I ve got a friend who is in the Friends of the western Buddhist Order, and he is very involved in these meditations on the five buddhas, the five buddha mandalas, and he has a particular one and he has to meditate on him and the colour of him, and the idea is to absorb the energy from that particular buddha. He s been doing it for ages, and I said, well what has it actually done for you? How would you say it s affected you? He seems to have got more confused. Well it s like a mental hobby, you know for a hobby you might learn to paint, or you might learn to play the harp or something, so we study it and we learn how to do this, to make something, So in the mental area that s what they re doing, it s a hobby. But Zazen is not like that at all. So it s impossible to meditate on the five buddhas. What we re doing is playing games with our mind, creating a hobby, and that can satisfy us if what we want is a hobby. So people can go on for many years. But if we want something which is true, then it will never satisfy us in the end. Yoko: Those activities don t help our life.
No, kazoo playing might be a bit better. Never help, but they occupy us, like running round in circles occupies us. But I think that physical activities like running round in circles, or joining a kazoo band, so those kind of physical activities are better for us than meditating on five buddhas. Because we re doing something very simple and acting, but meditating on five buddhas is just playing with our cells in our brain. It s misguided. So we have to keep saying. So shall I stop there? The Shobogenzo is quite difficult, but if we just study Bendowa only, we can see quite quickly.. P: That it kind of confirming all my what I kind of realised What you knew. P: What I knew yes. Being in the FWBO, always my argument with it now I see why I felt that was wrong, because I felt that meditating on five buddhas or Kara is too like Christianity, like saints, making these people special. I don t think that s anything to do with Buddhism. Taking all these qualities, we ve already got these qualities. That s right. End of talk