The Zennist

Doing a retreat

The conditioned world including this body of ours is contrary to our true nature which is unconditioned.  By going into retreat we hope to lessen, somewhat, the temptation of desiring the conditioned.  Let’s call it a kind of spiritual ‘cold turkey’—an abrupt reduction of dependence upon the conditioned.  Some people are able to go into retreat, easily, while most people are not.  They are too addicted to the conditioned life.  But this addiction has a price.  Even frugality is better that over-dependence upon the conditioned.

I have always believed that Zen training is incomplete without the adept doing a retreat of some length, the goal of which is kensho (seeing our true nature).  I was lucky in this regard.  I lived for a while in an old house with no electricity or running water—my nearest neighbor, Tommy, was 7 miles away.  I had water wells and one natural spring whose water supplied me with plenty of wild watercress.  I also had a small mine in which to meditate.

This retreat not only taught be invaluable lessons about my self, especially, how I was constantly deceiving myself but it also allowed me to focus, directly, on trying to see pure Mind.  This retreat did not in anyway diminish my faith in such a Mind which was unconditioned.  It only made me doubt more the conditioned mind eventually losing all trust in it in which I came to my wits’ end where one faces Zen’s gateless barrier.

I think those who are new to Zen underrate the value of doing a retreat because they don’t understand Buddhism, that one must awaken to the unconditioned by setting aside the conditioned.  It should seem obvious that it is difficult to set aside the conditioned if one is caught up in the conditioned trying to make ends meet; living for non-edifying pleasures.  Let’s call this the spiritually immoral life that leads to no awakening.

What kind of enlightenment are you talking about?

The late Korean Zen master Seung Sahn said:

If you want enlightenment, this enlightenment is far, far away. If you don’t want enlightenment, you can see, you can hear, you can smell, everything is enlightenment. So put it all down—“I want something.” If you keep I-me-my mind and do zen in this way, for infinite time you cannot get enlightenment. If you make I-me mind disappear, then already you have enlightenment. O.K.?

Only go straight—don’t know. Don’t check your mind; don’t check your feelings; don’t check your understanding; don’t check something. Only go straight— don’t know; for 10,000 years try, try, try. That is very important.

This is much too simplistic (notice I didn’t say simple).  It can easily be read, incorrectly.  Some beginner might think, “I should practice not wanting enlightenment since everything is enlightenment!”

The problem is not our wanting enlightenment. The deeper problem is that we want a 'conditioned enlightenment'; something that fits with our various concepts of what enlightenment should be for us.  In other words, we want enlightenment to fit with our needs which, of course, fall under the rubric of conditionality which is really all about the samsaric life.

But truth be told, enlightenment is awakening to the unconditioned—not the conditioned which even includes our concepts which are just very subtle images. Only the unconditioned can pass through Zen’s gateless barrier 無門關 which even bars concepts of the unconditioned.

The best Zen teacher can only help us to unload, all at once, our vast hoard of concepts about enlightenment in which our always-stirring-concept-laden-mind stops for a split second!  The unloading  process might consist of a will timed shout or a well timed smack across our face when we are in the middle of conceptualizing about the unconditioned Mind.

To “go straight” means to seek enlightenment but to see that all concepts about enlightenment are conditioned.  They are the work of our imagination.  We must leave them behind and move on to authentic enlightenment which is awakening to the unconditioned.  It is somewhat like walking out of a deadly jungle.  There is nothing in this jungle except harm.  Tarry here and you will be devoured by some kind of wild beast.

Facing Islam

It seems to me that Europe has all but failed when it comes to facing the threat of Islam.  It almost seems to endorse Islam.  Unfortunately, Europe has little or no desire to better understand the deep religious zeal that drives Islam or its history.  It lives in a kind of dream world that doesn’t want to understand the threat Islam poses. 

Even before the influx of Muslims into Europe, Europe was steadily moving away from religion towards a culture of nihilism in which life has little meaning beyond biological fitness.  Also having an over skeptical attitude towards all religion in general and even the spiritual doesn’t help Europe to understand Islam. 

With nihilism also comes an almost complete disbelief in the power of evil in which one lives contrary to one’s true nature.  If, for example, man’s true nature is divine, then evil would be to live un-divinely desiring things that further the undivine life.   Even on a human level, to live contrary to human life is also evil.  One lives in an inhuman way by desiring—perhaps out of ignorance—things which make one more inhuman.  Such inhuman people can be cruel and heartless or greedy and ruthless, for example.   

Failing to understand evil, one is incapable of seeing the evil of Islam that it is neither divine nor human but rather a blind faith in what is undivine and inhuman.  It is a tree that is said to bear good fruit and make one peaceful but, instead, the fruit causes one to become insane and violent.   

In the U.S. there is still some organized resistance to the spread of Islam except among those who have subscribed to cultural Marxism which the old Soviet Union threw away only to be picked-up by the European intellectuals then shipped to American universities.

To rise up against Islam and hopefully to save Buddhism and Christianity and other faiths requires that we first see its evil which constitutes much of the history of Islam which in 1400 years managed to put some 270,000,000 humans to the sword including the fact that Islam was also the main supplier of slaves to Europe and the Americas.

 

The big decision

Zen is a self study.  Zennists do not awaken en masse.  Only individuals awaken.  The one who undertakes the study of Zen intends to plumb the depth of their being hopefully to reach the very core of reality. 

In order to get to this core each person has to make certain decisions.  Each decision will determine whether or not they make it.  In other words bad decisions are very real.  We can and do make bad decisions every day of our lives.  Part of the general decision making process is cultural which of course relates to certain ideas and beliefs besides other things such as customs and social behavior.

Zen taken as a religion doesn’t connect all that well with the Western idea of religion.  Zen is a cultural anomaly—an outsider.  When looked at through the lens of the Chinese history of religion, Zen finds its place.  But not so in the West.  In this regard, the various decisions the individual Zennist will make are more than likely decisions that will cause them to fall short of Zen’s real goal in order to stay within their culture.

There comes a time when we have to make a huge decision: to immerse our self in seeking our true nature (real Zen) or stay, more or less, within our culture.

The drill bit

It seems to me that in modern Zen its practitioners are never completely sure of what Zen is about .  I think this is due in part to being content with a shallow, non-penetrating hermeneutic. 

I think all of us would agree that in the case of Zen, to read and study Zen is to do hermeneutics, hopefully, to understand ourselves at a much deeper level than before so we can read Zen masters at a much deeper level than before and understand ourselves even more than previously.  As we might have already guessed, this is the hermeneutic circle. 

But maybe the hermeneutic circle is more like a drill bit that while going in circles nevertheless is able to penetrate through the thick and dense mass of confusion that obfuscates Zen and arrive at a clearer understanding of it—even kensho.  At the same time, this also means that we can stop the penetrating hermeneutic.  Our drill bit can just spin on the surface of the material; never pushing through or coming to any sort of resolution.

We can read books about Zen which consist of a very shallow interpretation of Zen, one missing its real content as if Zen is, supposedly, the apotheosis of the mundane life in the example of “washing a bowl” or being aware of “peeling an onion.”  There is really no hermeneutic circle going on and certainly no need of one since what is shallow assumes no depth at all and, therefore, nothing beyond the space/time moment.

Just because we take up the study of Zen there is no guarantee of success as if all those who study Zen attain proper kensho.  Many refuse to push the drill bit through the metal of their ignorance that stands before them; to penetrate through it to see spiritual light come through the empty hole they’ve made when finally the drill bit as gone through.

Between our unrealized true nature and its direct realization

A good question is with what do we attain kensho (i.e., seeing our true nature).  Is it through the instrument of our senses, which are limited, or is it through the intellect or some other means?  At this point we could say that any means we employ will not give us kensho.  The means we employ will only alter our true nature. 

The difficulty of answering this question lies in what is between our as yet unrealized true nature and its direct realization. 

Rather than Zen involving cognition or just physical meditation, in past blogs I have put forth “intuition” as the means, which I emphasize, is not an actual means.  You could say that intuition is more of a process of getting rid of all instruments or means, including cognition, that stands in between our unrealized true nature and its direct realization. 

For Zen master Sixin Wuxin (1044-1115) intuition or dhyana is the abandonment of the workings of natural or phenomenal consciousness (karma-vijnana) which for the Zen adept is also a path of doubt since the adept has to rid himself of all of his opinions and prejudices about actual kensho. 

One could even say that such abandonment is a kind of internal skepticism—more of a path of despair—directed against our very own natural consciousness which includes the entire cognition of its contents.  Only then are we on the right path, you might say, fully competent to behold our true nature cutting out the middleman (our natural consciousness) which has stood between our as yet unrealized true nature and its direct realization.

A few know of this light

Those whose karma is high quality (they have an aptitude to awaken) are far and few between.  For the huge unfortunate majority their karma is not so good.  Even if they went to the best teachers being immersed in their spiritual light thousands of times they would still miss it.  We should not forget that the Buddha talked about these kinds of people.  He called them pṛthagjana.

The pṛthagjana is the ordinary person—a worldling you could say.  They have worldly aspirations—more so than spiritual aspirations.  They have yet to attain the supermundane path of seeing, darśaṇa-mārga.

In the old days, where there might have been a teacher or two who had awakened to the One Mind; who was like a mini-sun radiating spiritual light, they dispensed the proper medicine to pṛthagjana in hopes that their karma would improve and they might lose their attraction for worldly ways and things.

Today, it is far worse.  Only a few know of this light while many more are still in the bad habit of misreading Zen and Buddhism in general.  According to Zen master Yuanwu these people, “are still wrapped up in making emotional interpretations and claim that there is no such thing as entry into enlightenment” (Cleary, Zen Letters, 48). 

When I was much younger I met these people all the time in Zen centers and even Tibetan Buddhist centers.  It was like they were suffering from a mysterious incurable disease.  They were even impossible to reason with.  When it came to Buddhism, they could read the translations but they had no idea what the translations were talking about.  At times such people reminded me of the walking dead in the movies—not quite has hideous looking—but they were soulless.

The mechanism of suffering

Our corporeal body is a conditioned mechanism of suffering (also frustration).  The more we run to it hoping to find in it release or a means of release from our suffering the more suffering we seem to end up with in the long run.  If we’ve studied Buddhism this should not seem all that surprising.  How is that so? 

Let’s not forget that the carnal body we inhabit, namely, the five skandhas (P., khandhas) which are conditioned, is never by the Buddha treated in a positive manner.  For example:

[He sees] the five skandhas/khandhas 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 atman, 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 (Patisambhidamagga II 238).

As I said earlier, the body is a conditioned mechanism of suffering.  Is is also the first noble truth of suffering.

The Zennist, in order to achieve enlightenment, must pass through the great illusion of the body and its suffering which is the result of past clinging to this conditioned, finite mechanism.  At the same time the Zennist must have true faith or trust that all this can be transcended, reaching the unconditioned or nirvana.

Such faith I hasten to add, understands that the five skandhas also act to conceal one's true nature making it seem almost totally absent or just a fiction.  It is when we believe that there is no real attainment of one's true nature that we come to our greatest danger.  This baseless skepticism portends an age of nihilism; a time of melancholy, with no obvious cause, and endless revolution.

Our habit of conceptualizing

Many of the old Zen masters are trying to tell us that the more we attempt to conceptualize the inconceivable (our Buddha-nature), in an effort to realize it, the more we stray from the path.  Zen master Foyan tells us:

Just detach from gross mental objects, and whatever subtle ones there are will naturally clear out, and eventually you will come to understand spontaneously; you don’t need to seek. This is called putting conceptualization to rest and forgetting mental objects, not being a partner to the dusts.

 Let me forewarn you, putting our habit of conceptualizing to rest is not easy to internally grasp because we’re conceptualizing, continually.  Its our norm.  We’ve never known a break from it.  Still, the moment or second conceptualizing stops, completely, we stand face to face with our Buddha-nature.  Figuratively speaking, the pure subject has met the pure object.  Both, in fact, are the same—the One Mind. 

Our unbroken habit of conceptualizing only acts to hide the inconceivable Buddha-nature.  In fact, those who have the strongest habit of conceptualizing declare there is no such thing as a Buddha-nature or the unconditioned!  These types of people are tough nuts to crack.

If we are lucky enough to instantly see our Buddha-nature the concepts which arise in our mind are not opposed to this luminous nature which we just realized, no more than the waves of the ocean actually oppose and obstruct the element of water.  They only seem to hide the water element.  Likewise, before our awakening, the concept of a Buddha-nature and the concept of always conceptualizing act to hide this inconceivable nature.  As I have mentioned before, we have to go to our wits’ end of conceptualizing.  Then one day or night, not expecting anything, in a split second conceptualizing halts.  We enter.

Walking in lockstep

What goes on in most internet chat rooms devoted to the subject of Zen Buddhism or just Zen minus Buddhism amounts to something like a peer-to-peer review of a particular book or maybe something like a peer-to-peer conversation about a subject. 

The dirty little secret here is that the conversation is closer to a peer-to-peer conversation which can easily fall into what the military calls “incestuous amplification” in which a particular, closed group of people repeat the same things to each other which also implies being in lockstep agreement with the group’s preconceptions which, naturally, opens the door to misunderstanding.

The belief that one understands the problem by walking in lockstep with the group’s various preconceptions and opinions is following a dangerous path.  This not only happens in the military but it happens in academe and science in spades.  But it happens in Zen Buddhism, too, especially in discussion forums.  The obvious danger in this is wrong opinions about Zen get spread around.  Once such pernicious opinion is that Zen is about living in the moment.  Actually, Zen is about seeing our true nature which is luminous.  This has nothing to do with living in the moment or the here and the now.

Not only in chat rooms but also in Zen centers wrong opinions about Zen get spread around.  I agree that the student of Zen should be open minded.  But they should also do their own course of study and learn to be somewhat critical of others and of their own assumptions about Zen.