Living the fictional life

The study of a transcendent religion like Buddhism, including its scion Zen, can be a dangerous undertaking for some.  This is not because Buddhism or Zen are, inherently, dangerous but rather that many people have never stepped out of their fictional life.

Here is what I mean.  Most people believe, for example, that if you’ve convinced yourself that you are awakened to the teachings of the Buddha and the Zen masters, then it is a fact that you are awakened. This is to say in other words, I live "as if" I have awakened to the truth even though it is otherwise.

But unbeknownst to this person, they are still living in a fictional world. It might be a dangerous journey to have to leave this fictional world with it fictional certitude and awaken to true reality.

The painful truth is this: the "as if" condition is always a fiction.  This fiction the average person constructs.  It is not real even in the form of a model or an actual world like Disneyland or a major city. Sure, we will be able to feel at home and at peace in this fiction for a while.  But that is no evidence that our life isn’t a fictional life giving its apparent finitude. 

Turning to Buddhism and Zen, the institution is also a fiction.  It is, you might say, an artistic representation of the enlightened life.  Still, there is no realization here.  It is a world of actors acting.

In Wúménguān’s book of koans, we learn that the barrier or checkpoint 関, which is in front of the no-gate 無門, has no mercy.  If you wish to pass through it to the non-fictional world of true reality, you must let go of all that is conditioned.  Cling to just one thing, you don’t pass through.

Buddhist and Zen training should really be aimed at reducing the “as if” life which our current behavior is tied to so that some of us can actually pass through the checkpoint and enter the no-gate.  In other words, the formalism of the Zen institution, which is largely a fiction, gives the false impression of being fully capable of enlightening people.  It can only instruct people how to shed what is not germane to the path and have the singleminded faith that the Buddha-nature can be realized, personally, in the very self.

 

Comments

[smith]

you just described, outlined, stated the absolute truth of the 'no-gate'. In our current post-modern, neo-marxist, cultural-marxist, relativistic, leftist-fascist, pc, anti-freedom, socialist-authoritarian-control dominated world, absolutes are completely intolerable. Therefore you have committed an offensive thought/speech crime and are certainly risking punishment, persecution, or forced 're-programming' to conform to the dominant paradigm of the marxists. Beware.