The tailless foxes of Zen

In Aesop’s Fables there is a fable about a fox who lost his tail in a trap.  Rather than face the embarrassment and shame of having no tail, the fox tried to convince his fellow foxes to give up their tails which wisely they wouldn’t do.  As far as Soto Zen is concerned, I would call it “tailless fox Zen” in which modern day Soto Zen masters are trying to convince the public, just do zazen, that’s all there is to Buddhism.  

Dogen Zenji, the founder of Japanese Soto Zen, is like the fox who lost his tail who has convinced others to cut off their tails.  Being unable to grasp the real meaning of the Buddha’s enlightenment he invented a teaching which essentially says that doing zazen is enlightenment, although the Buddha never said this, nor was zazen ever transmitted (in Zen it is Mind that is transmitted, not zazen). 

Here are three examples where Dogen Zenji’s claims about zazen are patently false insofar as there is no convincing canonical evidence from the Buddha’s discourses to back up the importance Dogen ascribes to zazen.  (Quotations are from, Opening the Hand of Thought by Kosho Uchiyama Roshi et al.) 

"Zazen itself is satori.  Zazen is dropping off body and mind and is the Shôbôgenzô-nehanmyôshin [the spiritual wisdom and the true dharma].  Doing zazen is to practice, put into effect, and actualize this satori—here-and-now.  Only when we do zazen with this attitude can our practice of zazen be called shikantaza—just doing" (Shôbôgenzô: Zanmai ô Zamai).

"The correctly transmitted dharma from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch has always been just to sit...  This is very clear.  Zazen itself is already the ultimate posture of satori.  In other words, satori is just doing zazen" (Eihei Kôroku, vol. 4).

"When Bodhidharma came to China, he didn't engage himself in all sorts of so-called religious practices.  Nor did he give lectures on sutras.  He simply did zazen at Shôrinji for nine years just facing the wall.  Doing zazen, is just that, is the way of the Buddha, the shôbôgenzô-nehanmyôshin" (Eihei Kôroku, vol. 4).  

Dogen, in his works, hasn’t backed up his claims about zazen with supporting passages from the canon.  Where, in what Sutra, did the Buddha say that sitting dhyâna (zazen) is sambodhi or enlightenment?  Dogen, also, doesn’t seem to understand that Bodhidharma never sat in zazen facing a wall.  The term used for Bodhidharma’s meditation is pi-kuan (biguan) which means, lit., “wall-insight,” kuan being the Chinese translation of vipashyana which in Sanskrit means insight.  As it should be noted, vipashyana isn’t dhyâna or ch’an/zen.  In fine, Bodhidharma just had insight into the immovable.

For Zen teachers to ask students to sit in zazen, making this the main part of their Buddhist studies, amounts to the fox in Aesop’s Fables being successful in getting his fellow foxes to cut off their tails.  An equivalent example, would be for a Nyingmapa Lama to declare that just doing full prostrations is enlightenment—the more you do, the more enlightened you are.

While the tailless foxes of contemporary Zen, who are embarrassed by the fact that they don't really understand Buddhism, are working overtime to convince Buddhist practitioners and beginners that just sitting, or zazen, is sufficient—it solves all problems—the importance of actually realizing the Mind of the Buddha is all but ignored.  Perish the thought that many followers of the Zen school in China during the Sung denied that their school was a ‘meditation’ school.  Zen, they argued, was a synonym for Buddha Mind.

 

Comments

[Luis Ferreira]

I never practiced Zazen and I don't mean to reduce the value it may have as a tool. However, I dare to agree with you. Zazen cannot be equated with enlightenment, at least not Zazen in the sense you have just described.

However, having read "Moon in a dewdrop", I recognize Dogen as having an insight on Enlightenment way beyond equating it with Zazen.

Where the teaching of Dogen led to, I don't know, but describing his level of understanding as "being unable to grasp the real meaning of the Buddha’s enlightenment", in my opinion is not fair, as can be seen in one of his most famous quotes:

"As all things are buddha-dharma, there is delusion and realization, practice, and birth and death, and there are buddhas and sentient beings. As the myriad things are without an abiding self, there is no delusion, no realization, no buddha, no sentient being, no birth and death. The buddha way is, basically, leaping clear of the many of the one; thus there are birth and death, delusion and realization, sentient beings and buddhas. Yet in attachment blossoms fall, and in aversion weeds spread."

Having said this, I thank you for the generosity of sharing your thoughts.

[azanshi]

Predominantly, Zen in todays US is coping with with the same problems US itself does, with its current rapidly decling economic status. It is corrupt to the bone and infested with ignorance superstition and wild repackaging to fit the minds of dumb and dumber. If you ask the average american joe about zen he or she will probbaly think you are talking about a night club or even a new cool IPAD app. If you ask an american whom dwells in the obscure twilight zone of the mind called new age they will probably think of japanese monks staring into a wall swimming in seas of nirvana. Generally speaking it is close to impossible convincing an average american joe about the virtues of zen buddhism. He or she will instantly compare these named virtues to a nice afternoon by the pool, or watching the NHL finals with his buddies or a shopping orgy in shoes at the mall.

I recall a story about a zazen student visiting a rinzai tempel in Japan during the meiji era. The student ignorant of the abbots view on zen buddhism, sat down in the meditation hall and stareted his usual shikantaza as he was taught by his former sot teacher. After a wahile the abbot entered the hall and asked the student whqat he was doing. "I am practising the way", the student answered. "If you are practising the way, why are you sitting there like a heap of dry bones?", the teacher asked. "I am using my mind to be in the now as Buddha taught us. This practise will release me from suffering". Upon hearing this the abbot kicked the student on his side asking "Now tell me, is this pain you feel in your body as you barely are able to breath, the blissful nirvana as promised by your former teacher or is it a result by the wool pulled over your eyes by Mara?"

[azanshi]

Predominantly, Zen in todays US is coping with with the same problems US itself does, with its current rapidly decling economic status. It is corrupt to the bone and infested with ignorance superstition and wild repackaging to fit the minds of dumb and dummer. If you ask the average american joe about zen he or she will probbaly think you are talking about a night club or even a new cool IPAD app. If you ask an american whom dwells in the obscure twilight zone of the mind called new age they will probably think of japanese monks staring into a wall swimming in seas of nirvana. Generally speaking it is close to impossible convincing an average american joe about the virtues of zen buddhism. He or she will instantly compare these named virtues to a nice afternoon by the pool, or watching the NHL finals with his buddies or a shopping orgy in shoes at the mall.

I recall a story about a zazen student visiting a rinzai tempel in Japan during the meiji era. The student ignorant of the abbots view on zen buddhism, sat down in the meditation hall and stareted his usual shikantaza as he was taught by his former soto teacher. After a while the abbot entered the hall and asked the student what he was doing. "I am practising the way", the student answered. "If you are practising the way, why are you sitting there like a dead man frozen stiff by a sudden ice storm?", the teacher asked. "I am using my mind to be in the now as Buddha taught us. This practise will release me from suffering". Upon hearing this the abbot kicked the student on his side asking "Now tell me, is this pain you feel in your body as you barely are able to breath, the blissful nirvana as promised by your former teacher or is it a result by the wool pulled over your eyes by Mara?".