The Zennist

What is ultimately real?

According to the Buddha, the world we live in is transient.   Whether we refuse to admit this or not, nevertheless our world, including this temporal body of ours, is always changing and impermanent, passing away in time; ceasing to exist, eventually.  It could be either very slow change or a sudden change from one state to another. 

The Buddhist doctrine of a transient world is the most salient example of what is unreal; a position difficult to refute. Why is this so?  It is because every thing is nothing in itself when we begin to examine it.  This thing before us is dependent upon other things.  It is a creation, constructed from many different elements.  Because of this condition, it is something that is not real in itself.  For example, the human body consists of trillions of cells, and various organs including a bone structure, muscles, tendons, etc.  It has many parts, in other words.  In addition, it also depends upon other things outside of it such as water and air, not to mention food.

“But this body, Aggivessana, which has material shape, is made up of the four great elements, originating from mother and father, nourished on gruel and sour milk, of a nature to be constantly rubbed away, pounded away broken up and scattered, should be regarded as impermanent, suffering, a disease, an imposthume [a source of corruption], a dart, a misfortune, an affliction, as other, as decay, empty, not-self” (M. i. 500).

Buddhism, rather than abide in the transient, is interested in what is ultimately real which does not change; which lies beyond our ever changing fragile human body together with the sphere of the six senses, viz., the eye and objects, the ear and sound, the nose and odor, tongue and taste, body and touch, the mental states with their mental objects.  To reiterate, none of this is ultimately real because it is transient.  While for us this transient world dominates, still there is something hidden behind all this which is increate and unchanging which is also unconditioned.  But try as we might to get to it, we fail because we are using the transient as our tool.  Our words, thoughts, ideas and theories fall short and will always fall shot.  Still there is a way to the real even while we seem to be in bondage to the transient.  The Buddha found it as did many after him, even in other traditions like Vedanta.

 

 

The horns and the hairs in Buddhism

The Buddha divided people into two groups, those of noble character (arya) who were spiritually inclined, and those of a worldly character (prithagjana) who were attached to the conditioned world; who couldn’t conceive of a world beyond it if their life depended upon it; who also were like annihilationists who believe that when one dies, that’s it.  There is no rebirth.    

Those of a worldly character or disposition, over identify with the five aggregates of corporeality, feeling, perception, volition, and consciousness.  These aggregates which are never other than conditioned, constitute their life or in the Buddha's words, their dung-like happiness.  These are the same people that believe the Buddha taught that there is no self or atman.

Those who have a noble character, to use a modern analogy, are like someone who understands that the real source of the music from their radio is a radio wave which cannot be detected by the human senses.  Without it, the radio has no music to amplify and play.  On the same track, the great Zen master Bodhidharma said of these people:

Everyone wants to see this Mind, and those who move their hands and feet by its light are as many as the grains of the sand along the Ganges, but when you ask them, they can't explain it.

Those who have a noble character can look within their mind at high-resolution so to speak.  They know what their thoughts are, in addition to mentation, and mental activity.  If their teacher says that pure Mind is beyond thought, meaning it is totally empty of thought, those with a noble character understand and aim for this particular state which is kenshō.  They don’t keep their investigation at a metaphysical level which is still immersed in thought.  Those with a worldly character don’t get it.  They might even fantasize that the do which I dare say is not uncommon.

Buddhism and especially Zen are not so easily taught especially in group situations.  Once I went to a private lecture the Dalai Lama was giving on Dharmakīrti.  Needless to say it was uninteresting to the huge majority of people who attended the Dalai Lama's lecture.  He was more of a rock star to most people there, who just wanted to bathe in their fantasies about him.  To borrow a line from the sagely wisdom of India, the arya are like the horns of the bull whereas the prithagjana are like hairs on his hide, many.

What appears is empty and illusory

What appears is an illusion and also empty.  A non-appearing illusion is illogical.  The world we live in is an illusion but perfectly real for us because the illusion seems real and non-illusory from its own side.  But from the side of the absolute it is not only an illusion but empty of any substantiality which is why any of the five aggregates or skandha, like material shape, is said to be emptiness.  So now the problem is how do we break our attachment to what is insubstantial and empty even though it appears?

Presently, we take the five skandhas as the bedrock of existence, from our physical bodies (the first skandha) to consciousness (the fifth skandha).  This is what I meant earlier when I said that the illusion seems real from its own side, its criterion being always illusion or the same, appearance.  For example, relative to my physical body (the first skandha) of birth, the feeling (the second skandha) of either pleasure or pain doesn’t seem to be an illusion for me, yet it is an illusion, nevertheless.

Looking at the Heart Sutra, it is trying to tell us that appearances which make up our personhood, namely, the five skandhas, are empty and ultimately nonexistent from the side of buddhatā, i.e., the state of being a Buddha.  The fact that all appearances in our world are constantly changing indicates that they are devoid of inherent self-nature (svabhāva/ātman).

The reason that they are devoid of inherent self-nature is because they are dependent originations (pratītyasamutpāda).  Things appear in the way a pot appears from clay or a rope appears from the twisting of hemp.  In the pot there is no intrinsic absolute pot or pot nature, the same with the rope made of hemp.  In the same way, our thoughts which are constantly arising and changing are only configurations of pure Mind or the same the One Mind.  But let me ask you, “Is the thought of a house or a person you are in love with the One Mind?”  No, because they are different configurations or data streams of the One Mind.

But as long as we attach to appearances, for example, the five skandhas and even our most sublime thoughts, we remain trapped.  The only way we can overcome the hypnotic power of appearance, is to see or rather intuit our true nature (svabhāva). 

What makes this so difficult is that this nature is most intrinsic and fundamental—the supreme source and basis.  We can’t get behind it either.  At the same time, it is the ultimate criterion (the Buddha-nature) looking at all appearances to see if they match with the ultimate criterion, which is not an appearance (thoughts and concepts fall into the category of appearances).  When there is, so to speak, a perfect match as when the ultimate criterion meets the ultimate non-appearing tathatã (suchness) becoming one or single (eka), escape is finally realized—the Buddha's enlightenment.  One is awakened.  The reality that we adhered to and thought was not an illusion is unmasked for what it really is: empty and illusory.

 

Some wrong ideas about the Buddha’s teaching

It stands to reason that the Buddhism of Siddhartha Gautama is much different than the Buddhism of today.  What accounts for this is that over time wrong views eventually find their way into Buddhism when, in fact, they were never part of Buddhism.

Two such wrong views come to mind which are: the Buddha denied the self or the atman and there is no rebirth taught in Buddhism because there is no atman in Buddhism. 

As far as both are concerned there are no actual utterances made by the Buddha where he states, unambiguously, there is no atman or there is no rebirth which in Pali is punabhava. 

If, in fact, the Buddha had taught there is, ultimately, no permanent, unchanging ‘self’ or atman the Buddha then would be teaching the doctrine of annihilationism (ucchedavada).  This doctrine was taught during the Buddha’s time.  This doctrine believed there is no self which in Pali would be rendered natthattā meaning there is not a self.  This evident in the Ānandasutta (44:10) which if read in Pali is quite evident. 

When Vacchagotta asked me whether the self does not exist absolutely, if I had answered that ‘the self does not exist absolutely’ I would have been siding with the ascetics and brahmins who are annihilationists.

Ahañcānanda, vacchagottassa paribbājakassa ‘natthattā’ti puṭṭho samāno ‘natthattā’ti byākareyyaṃ, ye te, ānanda, samaṇabrāhmaṇā ucchedavādā tesametaṃ saddhiṃ abhavissa.

On the matter of self, the Buddha’s teaching was quite different.  He taught that the conditioned five aggregates are not the self or atman, and that we should regard each aggregate thusly: ‘This is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self.’  This is not a denial of self.  It is an implicit affirmation of self insofar as the five aggregates belong to Mara, the Buddhist equivalent of the devil.  A monk during the time of the Buddha would have been seen as being stark raving mad to deny the self by using the five aggregates as the criterion.

The Buddha taught that unenlightened people always regard what is not their self, namely, the five aggregates, as being their self.  They are never other than inverted.  The Buddha once taught a person named Radha to see the five aggregates as Mara, as the killer. This means that unenlightened people are unconsciously attached to evil.

How do many Buddhists today handle this problem?  From what I have personally witnessed, they double down and get really angry.  But never once have they provided a single word by the Buddha where he categorically declares there is no atman which in Pali is, natthattā.  As for the fact that the five aggregates are essentially evil their anger gets worse when they read this:

[He sees] the five aggregates as impermanent, as painful, as a disease, a boil, a dart, a calamity, an affliction, as alien, as disintegrating, as a plague, a disaster, a terror, a menace, as fickle, perishable, unenduring, as not protection, no shelter, no refuge, as empty, vain, void, not self, as a danger, as subject to change, as having no core, as the root of calamity, as murderous, as due to be annihilated, as subject to cankers, as formed, as Mara's bait, as connected with the idea of birth, connected with the idea of aging, connected with the idea of illness, connected with the idea of death, connected with the idea of sorrow, connected with the idea of lamentation, connected with the idea of despair, connected with the idea of defilement (Paṭisambhidāmagga II 238).

As for rebirth or punabhava many who take up the practice of either Buddhism or Zen Buddhism are uncomfortable with the idea of rebirth.  In their mind, they figure that since Buddhism denies the self, therefore, there is no transmigrant from this life to the next.  No self; no rebirth! No problem.  But this is not true.  The self is not the transmigrant in Buddhism that goes from one life to the next.  It is consciousness which in Sanskrit is vijnana which means something like 'dual knowing' in which a subject-object relation is implicit.  This is the transmigrant.  This is also the fifth aggregate after corporality, feeling, perception, and volitional formations.  The Buddha even likened consciousness to a magician’s illusion.  This is summed up quite well from this passage.

"Just as a silkworm makes a cocoon in which to wrap itself and then leaves the cocoon behind, so consciousness produces a body to envelop itself and then leaves that body to undergo other karmic results in a new body" (Maharatnakuta Sutra).

 

Today's Zen is not the Zen of Dahui

Dahui Zonggao (1089–1163) is a very important Zen master right after Sixth Patriarch Huineng for the reason that his awakening, which was profound, gave him what he needed to get to the nuts and bolts of how koans or cases were actually meant to work and how they should be used; that if used properly, can lead to an authentic enlightenment experience; which happened for many of his time. 

Besides his great advance as to how koans are to be used, Dahui was also very critical of the practice of silent illumination 默照 in which the adept sits in a rigid posture, not uttering a word; being totally still.  According to Dahui, these practitioners do not actually believe in enlightenment and call enlightenment “madness” being only secondary to sitting. According to Dahui:

“The say that enlightenment is a construct and only tell people to sit like mounds of dirt rigidly assigned in rows, and teach them “quietude” (jing 靜).  They call quietude the roots, and enlightenment the branches and leaves.”

Achieving such tranquility or quietude 靜 rested on maintaining a devout attentiveness durning the sitting posture until tranquility was achieved.  Tranquility  implied that the previous unmanageable emotions and desires had calmed down, sufficiently, that they could be said to be under the adept’s full control.

But in itself, such quietude 靜 is not enlightenment; certainly not the enlightenment of Siddhartha.  For Dahui, it acted more as a limit if not a dead end that fell short of seeing one’s true nature—Siddhartha's enlightenment.  What we see today which calls itself Zen is not the Zen of Dahui.  It's the Zen of silent illumination 默照 in which the adept sits ramrod straight on a black pillow or zafu trying to achieve tranquility which they believe is enlightenment.  To reiterate, this is not enlightenment or kenshō insofar as the emphasis is placed on the psychological side rather than on the Zen side which is direct intuition of one's true nature (kenshō).  

Minds already made up as what to expect from Zen

One of the biggest problems in Zen are with those people who want to study Zen but who have their minds already made up with respect to what they believe Zen is supposed to be.  In that regard, they only want to learn what reinforces their personal beliefs.  Nor could you say such people have an open mind either.  It is rather shut and limited.

I would not call such people beginners.  And the more I think about it, I don’t like the word “beginners” when applied to Zen although I have used it many times.

Of those people who have their minds already made up as what to expect from Zen most believe that Zen is about sitting crosslegged with their backs ramrod straight and their hands placed in a special way.  They also believe that the Zen teacher is enlightened and that what he or she says is true as regards Zen and also Buddhism.

The real problem with such people who have their minds made up already, who are either new to Zen or have been a member of a Zen community for many years, is the teaching of Zen wants the student to have an open mind which is not made up, and also a mind that is capable of opening itself up to something profound and mystical; which relies upon intuition rather than upon reason and physical practices. 

A student of Zen has to at least understand the right context of Zen which is about gaining enlightenment and not so much about sitting still as if enlightenment somehow grows out of prolonged sitting.

But I dare say, few want to go down the path of having to actualize enlightenment.  This is an intuitive path.  It was taught by such Zen masters as Yuanwu and Dahui going back to Bodhidharma.  Most people who want to study Zen believe it is safer to go with what is popular; what others are doing in the way of Zen practice which is zazen, literally, to sit in Zen in which the main emphasis is on sitting; not so much Zen or dhyāna which is the Sanskrit term that Zen is based upon which actually means “intuition”.  An interesting aside, the school of Zen 禪宗 is rendered as the Intuitional School or Mystic School according to the book, A Dictionary of Chinese Buddhist Terms.

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Our thoughts can easily become adversarial

So I was wondering what to blog.  I had no idea (yep, one of those days).  So up pops a text message from Cecil who has some schizoid type problems (I don’t want to get into what they are, specifically.  He lives next door to me). He texts:

Yeah from what I read it seemed like I just had to stop identifying myself as the thoughts etc

I texted back:

This is why Zen masters taught no-thought 無念. Think of thought as interference which hides their very source. So, if you want to intuit the source, thoughts/interference is blocking you.

To see the very source of thoughts also means transcending our thoughts which is very difficult to do. We are always aware of our thoughts not to mention the ‘head chatter’ and the emotions. So how can we ever see this mysterious source — the source of thoughts?

So far he hasn’t responded to my last text message.  What I have learned from Cecil is that he is almost a slave to his thoughts, his imagination and his impulses; maybe more so than the average person  but by and large nothing like a psychotic break (he had one a year or two ago).

From Zen’s point of view, our thoughts can easily become adversarial and almost harmful to the study and practice of Zen.  For some of us, it is almost like we are in a wagon being pulled by a team of horses, suddenly, we just lost hold of the reins!  Now we are at the mercy of these galloping horses.  Eventually, the horses stop, being tired, but for us humans thought, as being adversarial, can continue for what seems like a long time.

Zen, to be frank, is not well equipped to deal with problems like this.  The cause could be anything from psychological (terrible child rearing practices, etc.) to physiological causes.  Zen is really meant for those who are well put together who have not lost the reins; who in fact keep the reins tight and take good care of their horses and wagon!

The path to reaching great doubt for Zen beginners

Zen, for the mature student, is not so much a hunt for the right interpretation or meaning of Zen as it is a means by which to exhaust the student’s approach to Zen by thought (the process of thinking or conceptualizing Zen).  Only in that moment of great doubt when the student totally doubts the efficacy of their approach to Zen will they get near enough to Zen—enough so that it reveals itself to the student.

This doubt can’t be faked either.  A beginner just cannot say they’ve experienced great doubt just because they believe they have.  They haven’t even taken up the long journey to see their true nature or kenshō.  Beginners like this are living in a fantasy—something like their own movie in which they are the director.  This is all they know how to do.  They don’t seem to understand that, actually, walking seven miles alone on a dusty unpaved road is different from the fantasy of walking on this road.

Zen master Dahui’s great doubt paves the way for direct intuition which bypasses analysis, reasoning, speculation and inferring — all this under the heading of deluded thought.  Even skepticism is bypassed which tries to deconstruct Zen and even re-contextualize Zen into something it was never meant to be.

The literature of Zen is to be seen as more of an intrinsic analysis of the Buddha’s teaching which is quasi-metaphysical (quasi = ‘as if’).  But there is also something else the literature is doing.  It is summoning forth the student’s intuition which is the only means of approach to what lies hidden beneath thought.  Hence, the reason behind the call by Zen masters for no thought 無念.

Summoning forth one’s intuition is, in the beginning, just about trying to contextualize Zen; to see what the frame is that surrounds Zen’s literature to make sure the interpretations we come up with are going in the right direction.  But this proves a difficult task for today’s Zen beginners whose ability to contextualize Zen properly is, frankly, terrible.  The scholars who do the translations of Chinese text into readable English are a little better and understand that Zen is closer to Plotinus than Edmund Husserl.

Taking a chance with Zen the last great adventure

Zen is an adventure like no other albeit one which is within us; not outside of us.  What does this mean?  It means that chance is involved in Zen’s adventure as with any adventure. 

Chance in Zen consists of the likelihood of failure and, at the same time, the likelihood of completing the long and arduous search for our true nature.  Judging from the history of Zen, the likelihood of failure, not seeing/intuiting our true nature, is much greater.  The odds say the Zen adept will fail.

Let’s be honest, not all people today have what it takes to intuit their true nature.  It is a very difficult process and some of the tasks seem almost impossible to accomplish.  Making matters even worse Zen has, for some time, been sold to the public as simply seated meditation in which a rigid posture is taken by the practitioner who sits on a zafu for a certain length of time just watching their mental activity.  That’s basically it!

As I have repeated on this blog many times Zen is about intuition; not about sitting which is more of a preliminary practice for those who have a monkey mind that is constantly going from one thing to another which needs to be put back into harmony with the physical body.  I have seen people who can’t sit for more than five minutes.  They have to take a lot of baby steps before they can sit comfortably for about forty-five minutes.  But this is not authentic Zen!

Zen, let’s not forget is an adventure.  Ideally, we have to go into an extended retreat for several months or several years. But if intuiting our true nature takes one week, then our retreat is over.  Remember that the Sixth Patriarch Huineng was selling firewood when he awakened to his true nature.  He never went into any kind of retreat that historians know of.  Still want to take a chance—go on Zen's great adventure?

The unmindful people

Unmindful people allow their minds (more at 'thoughts') to almost always slip away into various kinds of diversions and imaginings.  This is a very bad habit that is difficult to get people who want to study Zen to break.

On a personal level, being mindful of things closest to you is difficult to master.  The simple act of opening and closing a door, for example, is done almost unconsciously by everyone without any kind of awareness or mindfulness. Working in the kitchen, too, is done almost unconsciously while one’s thoughts are engaged with something else unrelated to the task of making a cup of coffee, for example.  When the dishes are being washed the pots and pans are carelessly banged around.  One's thought are in some other world.

It is as if one is refusing to be engaged with what they are doing—living a half-ass life instead.  Such people—the unmindful ones—are certainly not like a skilled craftsman or someone like a great welder or a good automobile mechanic who, when they work, have their minds engaged on the task at hand.  The unmindful people have never been trained in mindfulness which if you have been in the military is taught to you in bootcamp in a most intense way. 

Zen practice or gongfu not only demands the adept’s mindfulness in doing the most mundane tasks but it also applies to being deeply engaged with trying to intuit pure Mind which lies within each of us.  This pure Mind hides in our mental activity—but we are unable to see it try as we might.  It is as if we are being mesmerized by our very own thoughts unable to let go of a single thought which hides pure Mind.  Also, we seem to be fighting against keeping our attention focused, when we should be saying to ourselves, “Where is the pure Mind? Keep looking!”