The Zennist

Trying to ignore the unconditioned (nirvana)

Everything we do in Buddhism, including Zen, has to do with transcending conditionality so that, more than likely, we will cognize the unconditioned in its own right—not through the veil of the conditioned.  What we perceive through the veil of the conditioned is never other than conditioned.  The words we read, even the Buddha’s discourses we read, fall within the distorted realm of conditionality.  In this regard, the role of deep meditation cannot be undervalued it getting us beyond the conditioned.

The forest monks in Thailand, for example, are far more successful at cognizing the unconditioned than the city monks.  Withdrawing from the madding crowd is not a bad thing to do.  At the right time it is necessary when one deeply understands the goal, the goal being to realize nirvana which is totally unconditioned.  This is the most critical part of our journey.  In my case, many years ago, I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I had to cognize pure Mind which was not an intellectual matter, so I went into retreat to see this pure Mind.  I couldn’t afford the distractions.   

The Buddha’s greatest triumph was fully realizing that the unconditioned is the only true reality; all else is appearance—a mere configuration of this supreme, unconditioned reality.   If the Buddha were like a radio, his deep meditation discovered the more subtle radio signal.  What he realized had nothing to do with the radio parts and the music coming out of the speaker.  But few today understand the subtlety of mind required that discovers the unconditioned.  Most followers of Buddhism, it seems to me, are more interested in using Buddhism as some kind of palliative for helping them cope with the conditioned world they are not yet ready to give up.

Many today, rather than look for the unconditioned Mind, which is what authentic meditation is all about, or the same, seek nirvana, all their effort goes towards learning how to live the life of a prithagjana (a worldling) Buddhist hoping, that when death comes, to be reborn in the Western Paradise.  At this point, it becomes almost a demand on the part of the prithagjana that the teaching of the Buddha be for their temporal benefit—not for their ultimate benefit.  Pretty soon, Buddhism becomes more like a psychiatric institution taking care of those who believed the temporal world was a refuge.

 

 

A dangerous duality

 The mind/matter dualism is probably unique to Western philosophy.  It comes in various forms such as substance dualism, that mind and matter are distinct and separate substances, or the soul/body dualism of Descartes to name just a few of the dualisms.  But these kinds of dualities are somewhat artificial, the most prominent being theological dualism (i.e., the duality of creator and creation).  In Buddhism, the most difficult to overcome is the dualism between thought and the substance from which it is composed or arises and sinks back into.

We are aware as conscious agents of the arising and discontinuance of our thoughts and other forms of mentation, including our emotions.  But we are absolutely clueless as to the source or whence of the arising of thoughts and into what, exactly, thoughts disappear or return.  The problem can be explained better by the analogy of the element of water and its waves.

Imagine we are the pure element of water, HOH.  Logically, we would see waves, both their beginning and their cessation, again and again.  But what we would not see is the element of water, itself.  Still, we would be correct to surmise that wave phenomena is somehow deeply related to us.   It would also follow from this that our connection with wave phenomena is not resonating sympathetically.  We, somehow, are out of kilter.  There is for us a disharmony: an incompleteness which leads to a kind of driving thirst.

This analogy is instructive.  It represents our inner duality.  There is for us the seeming duality between our self and the world into which we are thrown,  and the duality of our self and our thoughts.  If we were in phase with the perfect moment in which our thoughts stopped (nirodha) we would be in resonance with our true nature or self which is before the arising of thought.  Thought for us would then be merely a configuration of the absolute substance.  Duality would therefore be at an end.  On the other hand, to be always following thoughts, hence, being dependent upon them is to throw ourselves into the world of suffering—and a dangerous duality.

 

The magician's trick

 The Buddha is trying to teach us that we are blind to the illusion we are living in— this, our world of birth and death.  Oh sure, we can believe it is all an illusion but we don’t actually perceive the world this way.  This is really what enlightenment is all about.  Seeing the world as illusory from the standpoint of non-illusory ultimate reality.  In fact, there is no other way to see the world as being illusory except by seeing the non-illusory.  Only then is the bond of illusion actually cut off.  

What is seen after illusion as been successfully cut off is the conditioned world that cannot ever again be taken as real.  What is truly real is what the illusion is composed of which becomes outshining; no longer concealed.  Our thoughts are the same way.  They are no longer ultimate.  It is what they are composed of that becomes outshining and foremost.  Does this mean the illusory disappears?  The simple answer is no.

The waves of the ocean, the rope made of hemp, or the pot made of clay—this doesn’t disappear.  It is kind of like knowing how the magician does his trick.  It’s no big deal anymore.  It is fun to watch him perform the trick.  But you’re not awed by it.  Not anymore.  You have mastery over the illusion.  You are the very stuff that, so to speak, dreams are made of.  

To reinterate, actually seeing the absolute substance configured as phenomena, in which no phenomenal thing is beyond this pristine substance from which it is composed, is not the same as believing everything is an illusion while still being unawakened.  Back to our magician—it is like seeing him do his tricks but being unable to figure out how it is done.  Even though we know that it is a trick we are still taken it by the magician's performance.  It is the same with the conditioned world and our conditioned bodies.  We are not awakened to the trick.  We are bewitched by appearances.  On the other hand, when we are awakened, phenomena still persist but in an entirely different way.

 

 

Doing things in the right order

Vipassana or insight meditation is not an unpopular form of meditation.  Most major cities have vipassana groups.  One of my friends just got back from a vipassana retreat of a few days.  Despite all the good things I hear from people who have done a vipassana retreat, there is something wrong with this picture.  Samatha comes before vipassana.  One has to do samatha before they can do vipassana since their goals are different.  I haven't heard anyone speak of a preliminary samatha retreat.  According to Bhikkhu Bodhi:

"In the Buddha's system of mental training the role of serenity [samatha] is subordinate to that of insight [vipassana] because the latter is the crucial instrument needed to uproot the ignorance at the bottom of samsaric bondage" (The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha, p. 38) (Brackets are mine.)

From somewhat of a psychological perspective unwholesome thoughts, mental barreness, etc., all boil down to the five hindrances or obstructions (nîvarana).  It is by samatha meditation that these hindrances are controlled and eventually set aside in order to purify the mind to we can proceed to vipassana.  The five are:

 1. Sensual desire (kamacchanda)

2. Ill-will (byapada)

3. Sloth and torpor (thina-middha)

4. Restlessness and remorse (uddhacca-kukkucca)

5. Skeptical doubt (vicikiccha)

Each of these obstructions has their specific cause. The cause of sensual desire is craving for beautiful and pleasing perceptions.  The cause of ill-will is annoyance, anger, and repugnance.  The cause of sloth and torpor is dislike, discontent or aversion.  The cause of restlessness and remorse is being unable to stop the mind from mental distraction or anxiety.  The cause of skeptical doubt is superficiality of thought. (For more on the five hindrances and their connection with samatha click here.

What is salient is that vipassana aims towards the transcendent whereas samatha aims only for the abandoning of lust which covers up the essence of mind.  Indeed, by vipassana ignorance is removed which is about distinguishing the conditioned from the unconditioned (nirvana).  In fact the Buddha says:

"When insight (vipassana) is developed, what purpose does it serve?  Prajñâ (discernment) is developed. And when prajñâ is developed, what purpose does it serve? Ignorance (avidya) is abandoned" (A. i. 61).

I can't imagine my friend during another retreat, who still has a lot of five hindrance problems, telling me she's removed ignorance and she is no longer a victim of the 12-nidanas or fetters, being finally off of the wheel of birth and death!  Properly, we have to begin with samatha followed by vipassana.

The truth of suffering

It bears repeating that the first noble or aryan truth is suffering—but what in particular is suffering?  The correct answer to this question is the five skandhas or aggregates are what is suffering.  When the Buddha says all things are suffering he is referring to the five skandhas consisting of physical shape, feeling, perception, volitional formations and consciousness.  This is the aryan truth of suffering.

Now we come to the origin or etiology of suffering.  We understand that it is clinging.  But what exactly are we cling to that is making us suffer?  The answer is the five skandhas.  They are the source of all this pain which we can't let go of.  This is the aryan truth of the origin of suffering.

The truth of the origin of suffering is very important.  According to the Buddha, the truth of the origin of suffering is to be abandoned (S. v. 422) only then, in the Buddha's words, did vision, knowledge, wisdom, true knowledge, and light arise in him.  This as we, rightly, guess is the truth of the cessation (nirodha) of suffering.

Next we ask, what made such cessation an actual fact whereby the cause of suffering, which is clinging to the five skandhas, stopped?  We would not be wrong to guess, the aryan eightfold path beginning with right view, or the same, the right view of insight (vipassana-sammâditthi) which is without defilements, supramundane, etc., (M. iii. 72); which clears the way by contemplating the aggregates as impermanent, etc.  Nothing in this composite world is to be taken as being permanent for one who has right view (M. iii. 64).  Nor does one with right view approach a finite thing as being the self.  Nothing in this world can protect one from suffering.  This is why the Buddha taught us to transcend this world with its suffering.

Whipping the cart

The present day exercise of zazen in a Zen center and even a Tibetan center seems to be more of a discipline related to docile bodies, docile in the sense of submission and obedience.  The emphasis is much more on the za (坐) of zazen, which is sitting, than zen (禅) which is contemplation that aims at awakening or satori.  

The physical za is easy to see and to do for most people.  It is a body sitting very still with legs crossed with the hands in a particular mudra.  But such docility does not necessarily carry over to the zen side of zazen.  I would argue, in some respects, both are quite different.

Making the body docile in the practice of zazen reaches its apex in Japan with Dogen Zenji's shikan-taza which, literally, means just tend to sitting (只管打坐).  In Chinese Zen or Ch'an it refers to those who didn't have responsibilities in the large public monasteries.  In other words, they just sat (只管打坐 ) and drank tea and basically did nothing.  This might be called spiritual laziness since the most active Zen practice in China, at one time, was seeking encounters with enlightened masters.

Dogen's shikan-taza might well be described as a misunderstanding on his part or a clever invention of his to market his own brand of Soto Zen in Japan which would fall under the expression of "selective" (senjaku) Buddhism.

"This term, taken especially from Pure Land theology, refers first to the selection  from a multiplicity of spiritual exercises (shogyô) of one practice for exclusive cultivation (senju).  In Pure Land itself, of course, this practice was the recitation of Amitabha's name (nenbutsu); for Nichiren, it was "discerning the mind" (kanjin), understood now in its esoteric sense as the recitation of the title of the Lotus Sutra (daimoku).  For Dogen, it was just sitting.  In one obvious sense the selection can be seen as a simplification of Buddhism and a reduction of its practice to a single, uncomplicated exercise accessible to all" (Carl Bielefeldt, Dogen's Manuals of Zen Meditation, p. 165).

There is enough grist for the mill to permit specialists of Soto Zen to find a reasonable explanation as to why Dogen focused so much on the za and very little on the zen side of zazen.  Nothing that I have seen from Chinese Zen can justify Dogen's shikan-taza practice.  The docile body is not a proper vehicle.  Mind is.  Sitting for long stretches of time is not a spiritual activity so much as it is a crude attempt at calming the Five Aggregates which as we all know belong to Mara, the Buddhist devil.  We are not whipping the horse (mind) but, instead, whipping the cart.

 

Being deceived

Presently, the modern will to unconditional truth seems to be: I don’t want to be deceived by others, which is not quite the same as, I don’t wish to deceive myself.  So that I don’t become deceived by others, I can be skeptical of everything outside of me.  For example, what I read and what someone tells me.  I can become an agnostic or an atheist.  I can refuse to believe in metaphysics and religion.

But in the everyday sense (samvritya), nevertheless, I allow myself to be deceived, that is, I accept the possibility of deception.  I believe that there are everyday, conventional truths or samvriti-satya which might be true one day or for a few years, then become false.  I accept the fact that I am open to being deceived although I find it painful to admit such.

When it comes to Buddhism, itself,  I believe I am being deceived when someone like The Zennist says the Buddha taught rebirth, karma, and a self.  I also believe I am being deceived when The Zennist says the Buddha taught the unconditioned truth beyond conventional truth.  In other words, for me,  paramartha-satya, or ultimate truth is deceptive but not samvriti-satya.  At this  point, I am unknowingly deceiving myself into believing there is no ultimate reality or paramartha.  My supposed will to unconditional truth is a lie.

The modern will to unconditional truth only wants a particular kind of truth.  It doesn’t want the truth of ultimate reality or paramartha-satya.  It is quite willing to accept being deceived, again and again, because being deceived—not facing the truth of things—is far more pleasant.  It is better to lead a soporific life than to awaken (sambodhi).

Solo climbing

The path laid out in Buddhism is transcendent; not worldly. Logically, it leads to a transcendent state or Dharma (P., lokuttardhamma) this being nirvana which is also ultimate reality.  This, I need to emphasize, is a first-person science.  

What I mean by the term first-person science is that ultimate reality can only be directly experienced in one's self.  There are, however, not a few beginners (not in terms of time but in terms of depth) who believe an enlightened person has visible and discernible marks.  Enlightenment is something third-person (what is outside one's self), in other words.  I know this is an exaggeration, but it is like believing that an enlightened person has a crown on their head or shoots out golden rays.  But this is foolishness.  Such people will never awaken with this kind of attitude.

Such people (let me be blunt, they are foolish people) also believe a well qualified teacher can purify them of their defilements or the five obstructions, for example, 1) Drowsiness; 2) Doubt; 3) Ill-will; 4) Restlessness; and 5) Sensual Desire.  They also believe that they can come to realize nirvana with the help of their teacher's own penetration and power.

But to get to the transcendent state is more like solo climbing a great mountain.  In this respect, a very good teacher can show you many helpful things that you must master to become a skilled climber.  He or she can even tell you stories of their own adventures.  But during this perilous climb you are strictly on your own.  Like the fog of war, there is the fog of awakening to nirvana.  When you are on your own trying to awaken to ultimate reality the path is much different.  There is more confusion.  At the same time you much be more concentrated than ever before.  There can be no backsliding.  It takes everything a person has and much more.

 

Its own ontology

Buddhism has its own ontology.  It's not a speculative attempt to describe ultimate being or the one true reality (e.g., the One Mind as the perfect eternal form) but, instead, an invitation to realize true reality in our very self (pratyatma).  This means also that the realization of true reality is a subject beyond the efforts of philosophical speculation to represent.   It is also beyond the ken of sensory consciousness.  This subject, in addition, is not a phenomenon.  Nor does it exist within time.

As far as being anything reachable by the senses by which they might be gratified, such an ontology is not.  Realizing nirvana or the One Mind in the very self is not meant to bring happiness to our conditioned, worldly existence which inevitably ends in death.  Such a world of transformation and change is never other than degrees of suffering: a kind of disharmony (duhkha) which never comes into complete harmony with itself.  

Ultimate or true reality, on the other hand, does not change or transform.  It is in perfect harmony with itself; but such a harmony is not apparent in our temporal world which is constantly changing and transforming.  This seeming duality is reflected in the analogy of the water element (self-identity) and the waves (change) or the clay and the vessels made from it, or gold and the objects made from it.  The artifacts or objects we perceive are maya which literally means 'not that'.  Logically, illusion or maya must appear (a non-appearing illusion is absurd). Phenomena, therefore, are never other than illusory—they are not the absolute.  In addition, there is no real duality.

Our conditioned, illusory world is like a huge veil which is empty (shunya); which has no existence of its own (svabhâva) because there is nothing ever stable within it.  This veil is also avidya, that is non-knowledge.  For us, to be more precise, avidya is the inability to distinguish between this dazzling, illusory veil in which we are entrapped, and ultimate reality.  As an example, we can't distinguish between our various thoughts and the substance from which they are composed, so powerful is the illusion.  This powerful illusion cloaks our true nature.  The depth and degree of avidya is almost overwhelming.  Penetrating such a veil is no easy task.  A half-hearted endeavor will always fail.

 

The great intoxication

Many Buddhists are sound asleep to the real genius of the Mahayana Mahaparinirvana Sutra (hereafter MPS) and the astonishing implications it has within it.  That all beings have the Buddha-nature is just not a simplistic observation.  There is more to this than meets the eye.  What we are supposed to understand is that most primordially we are the awakened (buddha) element which is the same as the âtman.  For us, this is the criterion by which we can become actual Buddhas.  Now, here comes the major problem in the face of this astonishing fact.  We don’t as yet recognize this element in the compositions we see as the world of birth and death.  The Buddha says in the MPS:

"Every being has Buddha-Nature. This is the Self [âtman]. Such Self has, from the very beginning, been under cover of innumerable defilements. That is why man cannot see it."

One can only say of the defilements that they hide what we truly are.  The MPS says: *All these beings are reigned over by innumerable defilements and thus do not know the whereabouts of the Buddha-Nature.”  Ironically, we cuddle our defilements which come from the world of appearance in which we were, not too long ago, born and will surely die.  At the same time we want the easy solution which means that we are susceptible to being constantly bamboozled by appearances.  It is as if our mantra is:  I don’t want to give up my defilements but I want enlightenment.  Well, it ain’t going to happen.

In a way, our suffering or duhkha arises because we are attached to countless defilements which do not resonate with our Buddha-nature.  On the other hand, if we were able to realize our Buddha-nature, first hand, it would be like vibrating sympathetically with all things, although there are no things really present from the standpoint of our Buddha-nature which is absolute.  This vibration, if we can call it that for now, is self-generating which at once reveals the emptiness and illusory quality of all conditioned things and, at the same time, reveals the Buddha-nature, the true reality, which was formally hidden.  

The MPS tells us in so many words that the Buddha’s highest teaching begins with the Buddha-nature as the absolute, sole criterion then, subsequently, discloses how this nature is hidden by mistaking what is illusory for the absolute.  It can only be described as a form of intoxication.  As a result of this intoxication, according to the MPS, “the mind turns upside down and takes Self for non-Self, Eternal for non-Eternal, Purity as non-Pure, and Bliss as sorrow” (according to the MPS, “The Self’ signifies the Buddha; ’the Eternal’ signifies the Dharmakaya; ’Bliss’ signifies Nirvana, and ’the Pure’ signifies Dharma”).