Behaving our way to enlightenment

 One cannot, so to speak, behave their way to enlightenment in the example of trying to suppress thoughts or concepts.  This includes trying to live in the moment or just sitting, doing zazen.  Such attempts are ways of behaving. This is not the same as seeing the pure Mind, directly.

This brings us to an interesting problem when we read Zen literature.  Much of it, indirectly, teaches or suggests behavior while other parts of it teach that the Zen adept has to aim for seeing, directly, the pure Mind in the way one might see an object.  When Zen master Bankei says,

But the unborn Buddha-mind has no connection with those sticks of incense. It's just being at home in the Buddha-mind, not straying into illusion, and not seeking enlightenment beyond that. Just sit in the Buddha-mind, stand in the Buddha-mind, sleep in the Buddha-mind, awake in the Buddha-mind, do everything in the Buddha-mind—then you'll be functioning as a living Buddha in all that you do in your daily life. There's nothing further.

Bankei’s words seem to suggest behaving in a certain way.  One, first of all, cannot be in the Buddha-mind without realizing it, directly.  Then one is at home with it.  How can one miss a mountain, or miss a vein of gold once they’ve actually seen it?  What distinguishes a Buddha from an ordinary being is the fact that they’ve realized their Buddha-nature as an object—they see it.  And ordinary being doesn’t see it.  He looks into his mind and sees only thoughts and feelings.  Nothing else.

When Zen master Huang-po says, “If only you will avoid concepts of existence and non-existence in regard to absolutely everything, you will then perceive the Dharma.”  But this is not quite true.  Avoiding concepts of existence and non-existence is not the same as seeing the pure Mind, directly, which is beyond concepts of existence and non-existence!  Here Huang-po seems to stray into that territory where behaving a certain way seems the appropriate path, at least for a beginner.

If you would only rid yourselves of the concepts of ordinary and Enlightened, you wouldfind that there is no other Buddha than the Buddha in your own Mind.

It’s true to say that awakening to Mind there are no longer any concepts of ordinary and Enlightened.  Everywhere you look the reality you saw before  has suddenly changed from the inside out.  Now everything is just a phenomenalization of the One Mind.  But key to achieving this is, directly, seeing the pure Mind or the same, the One Mind.  One can’t simply behave their way to the Buddha-mind.  

Comments

[Om nom nom]

Behaviour will take you to the gate. Then you must step through it.

Why would anyone write "The four foundations of mindfulness" or the badly named "Tibetan book of the Dead" unless this were so?

Behaviour is in the first instance the physical manifestation of an actor. In the final instance the actor is not there.

Is this ever about thinking the right thoughts in the right way? Will intellect ever grasp the path.

This is the path that puts the intellect to rest. It doesn't want to rest. It fears silence.