Unlocking the Koan with the Skeleton Key

Koans can be thought of as the adept facing the conditioned to realize the unconditioned.  The conditioned is also a barrier (関) that must be swept aside so the adept can intuit the unconditioned (that upon which the conditioned is based).  Koans in that regard are not answered in the sense of an interpretation because there is zero chance of getting the right answer.

The koan acts as a barrier to any and all conditioned approaches to its solution.  In a manner of speaking, there is no gate or a barrier for those who can see.  But coming to the direct intuition of the unconditioned is extremely difficult and subtle.  Few accomplish the journey.  This difficulty insures Zen’s eventual fall because the unconditioned goes deeper than any proof which only compels acceptance by what is inferior to truth itself. 

Koans exhaust the adept’s attempt to find a solution by conditioned means.  Yet koans are an allusion of the unconditioned.  They hint at it without revealing it.  The unconditioned hides in the conditioned.  The adept is forced to remove the veneer of the conditioned to arrive at the unconditioned.

“Knowing the end (khayaṁ) of the conditioned (saṅkhārānaṁ) you know the uncreated (akataññū) O Brahmin” (Dhammapada 383).

The willingness to transcend the conditioned is also to know that one is constantly being deceived by the conditioned.  Koans exploit our attachment and reliance on the conditioned in every way possible.  The adept is forced to meet the unconditioned on its own terms as it really is.