Zen is a kind of revolutionary path?

In my old age I think I have met enough people to see that they harbor the not-so-apparen-belief that when they were born they were supposed to be born into a near perfect world which had no problems and no one would ever become poor, get sick or die. 

While they have physically grown into adulthood they've also grown in the amount of resentment they have as a result of their expectations not being true.  They are eager to do something about it while they are still young.

Some have decided to wage war against the more fortunate (the bourgeoisie?) on behalf of the world’s downtrodden. At the same time, they have failed to see that the only way to live in a world which is not of one’s dreams or fantasies, is to live open-eyed by compassion, which they can't do.

Affected by the same youthful egoism I decided to become a student of Zen Buddhism in 1965 rather than participate in the great leap forward, becoming a revolutionary on behalf of the downtrodden.  By that time I figured out that the human heart has both good and evil within it.  This means we can either choose to feed our heart the food of goodness or evil.  But we can also at the same time delude ourselves, eating at the trough of evil getting full on pleasures in the belief that all that feels good, is good.

The difficult thing for any youthful person to accept, wholeheartedly, is Buddhism’s noble truth of suffering.  And what exactly is suffering?  In practical terms it is our psycho-physical body that is suffering and will suffer greatly as we grow older.  The degree to which we cling to our psycho-physical body is the amount of suffering we will have to bear when it comes time to let go of it.  To refuse to let go is to fall back into the avidya of the womb. 

On the other hand, to have stopped clinging to our psycho-physical body, having transcended it by awakening to absolute spirit, is the end of suffering.  But this is almost impossible for any youthful person to realize.  Nevertheless, I took it upon myself to realize absolute spirit which is beyond the world of suffering.  But like most in my generation they chose to become, in someway, revolutionaries going so far has to rebel against everything (nihilism?).  Some, even believed that Zen was a kind of revolutionary path.  It is not.  It is a path of intuition that leads to where suffering no longer exists. 

Comments

[TheZennist]

Welcome to the club grand old dude! In my mid-70s I have suffered through two strokes. I am sitting here typing with a Foley catheter in me! But undaunted the spirit goes through all of this no matter how horrible it may seem. Our choice as sentient beings is to become awakened to this vital spirit or ignore it and try to deal with the pain and suffering of the fleshy body we are attached to. With a good injection of Hopium we are reborn to try it again: spirit buried in the fleshy body. Laying this aside, Zen is a profound voyage. We first have to give up our intellect (manas) for intuition (dhyana). This proves difficult for most of those curious about Buddhism which accounts for why so few make it to the end having kensho. Instead, they take the path of sitting believing that the physical body twisted up in the full lotus will take them to Siddhartha's awakening. Any all-too-human practice like sitting can be described as a vehicle which you are driving to a place called Kensho. But then the vehicle comes to a dead end with no signs or markers in which direction you should take. At some point the wise driver gets out of the car. This is when the path of Zen really begins. Now we are in dhyana/intuition.

[Graham Lawrence]

Given my own limitations/karmic obstructions, age of 76, and acceptance that enlightenment is not realizable in my lifetime, or possibly in future lifetimes, I fully accepted the Buddha gate offered by Amida, Pure Land and the practice of ‘Nembutsu’. With the onset of the Dharma Ending Age the path of sages (such as Chan or Zen) is effectively closed, except for perhaps the most exceptional individuals with good roots. Also, the Buddha himself said the Sutras would slowly disappear, the last remaining to be the Amida Sutra. Pure Land, easy to practice, with Vow and Faith is ideal for rich, poor, wise and ignorant etc. I would also add the following notes:
1. Appears that in China Chan and Pure Land were close siblings, but effectively split in Japan.
2. You very accurately comment the unwillingness of people to accept the notion of suffering and the First Noble Truth. Ageing persons I know are rooted to nihilism and are addicted to a persona of ‘happiness’. Nothing more can be said to such people . . . persons with incorrigible disbelieves, who lacking the aspiration for enlightenment are unable to reach Buddhahood.
3. I acknowledge and am very grateful to you ‘The Zennist’ for the uplifting thoughts you and your readers have provided over the years. Thank You.