The Zennist

We are absolute spirit having a human life

Can we see or at least intuit true reality when we seem to be lost in illusory existence, including this body that came through our mother's birth canal?  Materialist say no but the Buddhas say yes.

According to the materialists we only have sensory knowledge to rely on.  But according to the Buddhists sensory knowledge, which includes mentation which is the 6th sense, can be transcended.

However mankind's science also falls within mentation, this includes his imagination, his fantasies, even his dreams.  From the six sense arise all kinds of fictions many of which are useful for staying alive in an illusory world in an illusory body.  Still, all sensory knowledge is relative knowledge not absolute.

Said differently, as we participate more and more in the illusory world through our illusory body we acquire relative knowledge.  But what lies beyond illusion and the relative knowledge that we depend upon?  We do not know because we have rejected absolute knowledge or the same, transcendent knowledge.

Man (S., manu) is a thinking creature who is immersed in a relativistic or illusory existence.  For man to transcend man requires that he go beyond himself:  beyond subject and object, beyond perceiver and perceiving, beyond thinker and thought, etc.  Transcendence itself cannot be imagined, to do so is to fall into the barrier of Mumon.

祖關不透心路不絶、盡是依草附木精靈。

If you do not pass the barrier, and do not cut off the way of thinking [all ways of knowing], then you will be like a ghost clinging to the bushes and weeds. (Brackets are mine.)

Foremost, Zen is about transcending this temporal life, intuiting at once the absolute before it is transformed into this illusory existence.  Echoing the words of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, we are absolute spirit having a human life. 

But to go back to spirit we must transcend all that is human.  As the reader may have noticed there is a subtle difference between letting go and transcendence.  Knowing this difference is crucial.

Meditation (dhyāna) is for those who practice transcendence.

How much we are deceived by her own ignorance and therefore have to rely on others based upon their authority is astonishing to say the least.  Add to this problem that we have come to believe that a hypothesis, like the sun and the stars revolve around the Earth.  But as Einstein pointed out it only takes one person to overthrow a hypothesis believed by many.

Suddenly we come to the problem of science by consensus.  We all agree this hypothesis must be true.  And then we come to Buddhism and the belief that the Buddha rejected any kind of absolute or ātman.  He was an agnostic and certainly not a mystic who transcended the thinking creature called man. 

But humans, especially, Buddhists have been deceived by their very ignorance.  The Buddha was a mystic who had transcended the thinking creature called man.

To come to the limit of man who is merely an instrument is to be absorbed, for an instant, in the absolute.  There is no man here or what man sought for.  It's all been transcended.  The barrier or stumbling block all along was man, this thinking creature, whose thinking is always dichotomous or dual.

It is impossible for a human being to return to the first principle by thinking dichotomously (vijñāna).  And this is what Zen is really about.  We have to let go of this two sided mind where there is a perceiver and perceiving which make up the fundamental part of the human being.

Meditation (dhyāna) is for those who practice transcendence.  This can mean:  what is most intrinsic in us seeks to go beyond what it faces in the way of being immersed in a temporal body with its imaginary thoughts (manas).

The practice of Zen or Buddhism, just going through rituals and the seated meditation, is not practice.  Nor is transcendence going on.  To get to dhyāna which is real transcendence, first involves exhausting dichotomous thinking (vijñāna); going to our wits’ end.

the doorway to Zen is to be found on the right side of the brain

There is a tendency in Western thinking to get too much into unrealities whether it's mathematical unrealities or social unrealities like gender dysphoria, etc. Graduates I have met over the years, you might say, all graduated from the university of Never Never Land. 

Put another way, there is a gross under use of the right hemisphere of the brain and an over reliance on the left hemisphere.  In our future, we may well slay the human race because we have prohibited the use of the right hemisphere of the brain.

"The more we rely on the left hemisphere alone, the more self-conscious we become; the intuitive, unconscious unspoken elements of experience are relatively discounted, and the interpreter begins to interpret — itself" (Iain McGilchrist, The Master and His Emissary).

Immersion into Zen Buddhism calls on us to turn to the right hemisphere of the brain for answers.  The left hemisphere of the brain will not help the adept.  It only keeps one in the great circle of samsara. However, the reliance on the right hemisphere is a difficult undertaking.  It is like waking up from a trance in which you had no idea that you were in. 

I can say about the 20th century that one of its greatest and most malevolent advances was in propagandizing the public, keeping them in a low level trance while feeding their brains with useless trivia and misinformation.  This way the hegemony of the left hemisphere is maintained while ignoring the right. But this also explains why Zen Buddhism when it came to the West confused the outer form with Zen's essence which led to its decline if not it's popularity.

Briefly, Zen offered a ray of light that pierced through the dark mantle that was thrown over the Western mind.  But it didn't last long because primarily the people who pushed Zen Buddhism in the West were charlatans.

Thou shall not have any all too human Gods before me

The mental concept of ‘God’ is inevitably limited to anthropomorphism in which the highest reality is more human than transcendent.  But the great minds throughout human history did not conceive of a God that was anthropomorphic.

We ourselves occasionally get glimpses of this reality but these glimpses are far and few between because we are located in a world of illusion in which our self is not itself but other than itself (anātman).  We have the sense of wanting to move to a higher reality, but never seem to arrive.  And if we imagine we have arrived it often turns out to be a delusion if not delusions of grandeur.

In light of these problems, which seem intractable at times, we have an odd hunch that we're going in a kind of bad circle, around and around, and getting no place.  Maybe this is the pattern of samsara.

With such a pattern, the atheistic mindset of denial can only pertain to mankind’s habit of inventing all too human Gods who cater to mankind's daily needs but only serve the purpose of keeping mankind in a circle.  This is what precisely atheism really intends: thou shall not have any all too human Gods before me.  However, the atheist cannot deny a base reality which is beyond man.  To do so it's going too far.  One, however, can say the base reality (superposition?) is transcendent after fully merging with this reality.

Each human being's secret dream is to go beyond the merely human. We are kind of like a ladder which is intended to take us beyond ourselves.  Still the great majority of us still fear to go too high.

The critical difference between Christianity and Buddhism

Perhaps the most significant difference between Buddhism and Christianity is that the former asks its followers to see what Siddhartha the Buddha saw, whereas in Christianity it asks its followers to believe so as to have faith in the divinity of Jesus Christ.

If Jesus Christ, on the other hand had said, “I have realized God and so can you,” the religion would've taken a different turn.  Instead, what we have is a religion strictly based on the firmness of one's belief in the divinity of Jesus Christ. That one may treat him as God’s equal.

Jesus Christ then becomes the intercession between man and God such that one need only faith.  He will take care of the rest, even forgives us of all of our sins so that in a way we don't really have to know God as Christ did. 

The critical difference between Christianity and Buddhism is that with Buddhism there is no salvation except that one attains Nirvana and becomes a Buddha.  Christianity essentially believes that Christ will take care of our problems since we have so much faith in him.

The immaturity of Christianity is evident in its teachings.  It's really looking for followers and will say just about anything to get the attention of the masses.

The sudden transcendence of presuppositions about the absolute

For us to have direct source knowledge or direct knowledge of the absolute, it demands that we become absorbed in the absolute, completely, so that there is nothing left of us.  Even our perception or consciousness (vijñāna) must go because it belongs to us. 

As strange as it sounds this is the way the absolute remains absolute.  As a thought experiment if, for example, the wave phenomenon wishes to know what pure water is then it must be absolutely waveless, in which case, no waviness can be detected in the water itself.  (The mere looking causes waviness.)

I think this helps to explain why enlightenment cannot really be transmitted, not in the way the average person imagines the process.  Let us imagine that A is absolute where B is the transmitter.  How is it to be transmitted to C?  The very act of transmission, itself, is non-absolute (anātman= wavy). 

The total and sudden transcendence of presuppositions about the absolute is extremely difficult to accomplish.  Without exception, people who take up Buddhism and with it Zen depend upon perception or consciousness.  This is their tool by which they hope to unearth enlightenment.  But they must also give up the tool. 

By the way, this is what koans (Hua Tou 話頭) are all about.  They are intended, in a way, to drive the student to their wits’ end.  To know the secret of the koan means that one has given up perception (vijñāna).  For a brief moment they became the absolute.

Superposition and the unconditioned

The so-called quantum world is very much a microscopic world.  Still, it is trying to rise up to a larger scale where the laws of physics become different.  The only thing missing is a religion which goes along perfectly well with this new world.  This is where Buddhism comes into the picture.

At the heart of Buddhism lies also the notion of superposition which is akin to Buddhism's unconditioned (asaṃskṛta).  Before anything becomes a quantum or a measurable amount, it emerges from the unconditioned.  From the Buddhist standpoint the measurable could be a mere thought but, nevertheless, something our perception (S. vijñāna, lit. in two parts knowing) can detect.  We can also think of superposition as analogous to clear light where not a scintilla of color exists.

Our every day reality is not made of clear light inasmuch as it is really darkness that is filled with color!  Not too long ago I wrote this note to myself.

Darkness was in the beginning, then we learned, eventually, to see in the darkness and make shapes from the darkness.  We lived our entire lives in darkness.  Only in great myths and legends were the bringers of light made known to us.  Such was mankind’s terrible fate. Today, mankind is still trapped in darkness which it believes is illumination!

Our modern hubris is astonishing to say the least.  We think of ourselves piously as masters of the universe when we still know little about where we truly came from and where we go after death.  We do not see the big picture but then we imagine that we do! 

From this framework we assume that what is measurable is real and what is immeasurable is unreal but this is not so.   While our sense perception is useful it is also deceptive.  It only takes us to what is useful but not to ultimate reality which transcends the domain of the six senses, the last one being the perception of mentation (S., manovijñāna).

Who you are

True reality is already here, in fact, it has never left.  However, as we approach it with our ideas of what we expect it to be like, we become more confused.  The first road eventually branches off many, many times.  At this point, we are more lost and confused than ever.

Then the Buddha’s teaching comes along.  It talks about awakening to something that even Māra, the Buddhist devil, couldn’t recognize.  Little did Māra know that the Buddha gave up perceiver and perceiving (dual knowing).  He entered a transcendent state in which there was no division or constructs.

Māra, was in a way, a god of the six senses which required a perceiver and perceiving whether it was visual, auditory or even mental (manas) which includes the imagination and intellect.

Even if we take a voyage into our own mind we are more like the people in Plato's Cave facing an artificially constructed world, while the true light is always behind them, in such a way that they are unable turn around and see it. 

Our inner thoughts and emotions arise as do our mental images and what our various senses perceive.  We are facing an illusion not true reality.  Even our fleshy body we inhabit is an illusion.  Transcending illusion is extremely difficult.  Most will be unable to transcend illusion.  Nevertheless, it is important to start the journey of transcendence, of going beyond all illusion where you realize, finally, who you are.

The amazing maze

Pure Mind or absolute spirit is invisible to the six senses, most notably to the sixth which is manas which includes our imagination and speculations.  Thus, what we seek in the way of enlightenment hides and eludes us even while we read about it or contemplate it.  It will not show itself to us no matter how hard we try. 

Still those who have actually mastered Zen behold this spirit singularly and straightforwardly.  It comes suddenly and unexpectedly.  Yes, it’s like seeing something that you never thought was possible.  Before kenshō all your pathways came to dead ends.  The truth which you sought nonstop exceeded your cunning powers.  Strangely, it will awaken you.

Even now we, the unawakened, realize that we may have entered into a maze (since our birth) with no exit.  Maybe we should call it the maze of samsara.  This maze might as well be darkness.  Little do we realize that we are creating this maze.  Every birth we have experienced brought us into this maze from which there was no escape, only to find ourselves in another maze.

Every Zen koan that you study asks you, fundamentally, who put you in this maze?  You draw a blank.  You have no answer but lots of diversions.  I remember those hopeless nights by the kerosene lamp stuck in this maze.  And I also remember the night I broke down and knew I could not obtain enlightenment. How hopeless it was.  (I've met deluded people who even fake this crisis.)  But, figuratively speaking, the door suddenly opens and there it is.

Same teaching just a different way of explaining it

God is SPIRIT or in Lakota "Wakan Tanka". Composite phenomena blindly arise from Spirit and return to Spirit, leaving their desire-seeds for a future composite life filled with pleasure, anxiety and suffering.  And still they have no true vision or even a vague understanding of Spirit.  It is mixed with their strong worldly imagination. 

Those spiritual warriors who abide with Wakan Tanka always in their hearts will enter heaven (S., svarga) when they leave their earthly vessels.  Long ago did they behold the incomposite seed of eternal life (S., tathāgatagarbha).  It was their lodestar; to it they gave their life energy.

When still in the flesh it is a wonderful event when Spirit meets you. It saw your incomposite seed and knew that you were its scion.