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A Letter from Shohaku Okumura
Dear Friends,
When you read this issue of the newsletter, my family and I will be at our new home
and that of Sanshin Zen Community in Bloomington. Since leaving San Francisco in
April, I have been in Minneapolis with my family. Now it is early June. I had expected
to move to Bloomington sooner, but things have been going slower than “my” expectation.
My understanding is that everything is going at Buddha's pace, not mine.
Since I sent all my books and other things from San Francisco to Bloomington, I have
no books and no desk here in Minneapolis. Being without books is something very special
in my life. On one hand, it is like torture and on the other hand it is a release
from thinking--similar to what happens in sesshin. I have being trying to be lazy,
although I have been preparing for the move and sending e-mails.
One of the things I did during these lazy days was a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle. This
particular type of puzzle is called a photomosaic, consisting of numberless small
photos. When all the tiny pieces are put in position and connected with other pieces,
a larger picture as a whole appears. The larger image was a wolf. In a similar puzzle
I did several years ago the image was a world atlas.
My son, Masaki, bought the puzzle and we started together, but he soon dropped out.
When it was about 70% finished, my wife started to help me because she wanted me
to do something else. Masaki helped us finish the final 100 pieces.
I worked on this puzzle almost ten hours a day and it took me almost one week. Once
I started I could not stop until it was done. It was similar to a sesshin. Only a
lazy person who is not interested in other business can do such a thing. To me the
idea of this puzzle is very interesting. Each piece of photo has it own world and
meaning. And when all the pieces are assembled, something larger than each one of
them appears.
I think a sangha is the same. Each one of us has our own strong and weak points,
our unique karma, personality, and agenda. But when we put all these traits together,
the larger picture of the buddha-dharma appears. Recently, my friend from Antaiji,
Arthur Braverman published a book entitled, Living and Dying in Zazen: Five Zen
Masters of Modern Japan (Weatherhill, New York, Tokyo). As well as his own personal
experiences in Japan and at Antaiji in 1970s, he wrote about the lives and teachings
of five Zen masters connected with Antaiji: Kodo Sawaki Roshi, Kosho Uchiyama Roshi,
Sodo Yokoyama Roshi (one of Uchiyama Roshi's dharma brothers), Kozan Kato Roshi (a
Rinzai Zen Master and Sawaki Roshi's close friend) and Ms. Motoko Ikebe (lay woman
Zen teacher).
Arthur's point is that these people did not practice zazen as a part of their life-and-death;
they lived and died in zazen. Each of them was very unique, but within the collection
of their life stories the picture of zazen as buddha dharma clearly appears. I recommend
all Sanshin practitioners to read the book.
The book does an excellent job of revealing both my roots as well as the direction
I would like us to be headed.
Sincerely,
Shohaku Okumura
Dharma Inquiry
Genjo-Koan: Actualization of Reality, Part 3
This is the last in a series of three lectures given by Rev. Shohaku Okumura on the
first chapter of Dogen Zenji's Shobogenzo during Stillpoint's April 2000
sesshin in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It is being reprinted here from Stillpoint's
newsletter.
In the following section, Dogen discusses delusion and realization/enlightenment,
and buddhas and living beings as a relationship, the way we relate or connect with
all beings.
“Therefore, flowers fall even though we love them; weeds grow even though we dislike them. Conveying
oneself toward all things to carry out practice/enlightenment is delusion. All things coming and carrying
out practice/enlightenment through the self is realization. Those who greatly realize delusion are buddhas.
Those who are greatly deluded in realization are living beings. Furthermore, there are those who attain
realization beyond realization and those who are deluded within delusion.”
There are things we like and things we don't like. Here, Dogen uses two examples
- flowers and weeds. The flower is a symbol of something we like. The weed is something
we don't like. Flowers and weeds are not so different: They are all plants. We pick
weeds and we try to grow vegetables. We need vegetables to eat. They support our
life. There are some things we have to grow, and some things we have to pull out
and throw away. That is our human condition. We cannot eat weeds, so we have to pull
the weeds.
When I was in Massachusetts, since I had grown up in the city, growing vegetables
was a new experience for me. In the beginning, I couldn't tell which were vegetables
and which were weeds. We have to make a distinction. We need wisdom to discriminate
between which we grow and which we don't need. And we have to pull the weeds. That
is our practice when we take care of a green garden.
But somehow, I felt guilty pulling the weeds, because vegetables and weeds are not
so different. But because we need vegetables, we hate weeds. We don't hate weeds
or dislike weeds when they grow in the mountains or in the meadow, but when they
disturb our purpose - that is, growing vegetables to keep us alive - weeds become
something we dislike. Because we hate weeds, it seems they grow more quickly, and
almost always are stronger than vegetables.
In the case of our practice, weeds are like delusion, and flowers or vegetables are
enlightenment. We love enlightenment. We dislike delusion. So we try to weed or pick
out delusion or deluded ideas. But the more we try to take them away, the more they
grow.
So Dogen said, "Therefore, flowers fall even though we love them; weeds grow
even though we dislike them." This is the reality we are living in. When I lived
in Massachusetts, the first year we cut the trees and took out the stumps, and made
the piece of land into our vegetable gardens. The very first year, even weeds didn't
grow. We had only a little spinach. The soil was not so rich. At that time I found
that weeds are also a crop. When we pulled weeds to make them into compost and put
the compost back into the soil, the weeds made the soil rich. So actually, weeds
help the vegetables to grow if we work hard to make them into compost.
Our delusive ideas or desires, or poisonous mind, are like weeds. Poisonous mind
is not really poisonous. It's poisonous when we misuse it. The poisonous mind is
also part of our life force. If we know how to take care of it, the poisonous mind
can also help us to live in a healthy way. But in order to do so, we need to work
hard.
When we sit in our zazen, our greed and anger/hatred come up. Each time we try to
let go. If we try to pick them up and put them into compost, our three poisonous
minds - greed, anger and ignorance - makes our life sweet, rich and healthy. I've
talked about the sweet persimmon and astringent persimmon. Astringent persimmon is
like a weed or delusion or poisonous mind. But in order to make sweet persimmon,
we need astringent persimmon. Weeds and vegetables are the same.
Menzan Zuiho, one of the Japanese Soto Zen masters (1683-1769), said when we use
greed as an energy to practice, greed becomes a vow of saving all beings, or studying
the dharma, doing good things. We use greed to do good things. Anger becomes the
vow to avoid bad things, or evil karma. Ignorance functions as nondiscrimination
between self and others and embracing all living beings.
Our practice is not to eliminate or kill those three poisonous minds, but pick them
and put them in the compost, and those things will enrich our life. When we spray,
the weed dies, and it destroys the environment. If we kill the three poisonous minds,
there's no way to live. We should think and practice how we can use three poisonous
minds as nutrition in our life.
Anyway, there are flowers or vegetables, things we can eat, things we love, and things
we don't like, things we can't eat, things which are not valuable. That is our life.
Our life is in relationship with all beings. When we talk about all beings, often
we forget we are included in that "all beings." We think we are subject
and all beings are objects. That is one cause of the problem. We think "This
is flower; we love them. And this is weed; we don't like them." We separate
or categorize ten thousand dharmas into two categories. We forget we ourselves are
part of ten thousand dharmas. We are not separated from these things. Ten thousand
dharmas are not outside. We are part of the network of ten thousand dharmas.
In the next sentence, Dogen says, "Conveying oneself toward all things to carry
out practice/enlightenment is delusion. All things coming and carrying out practice/enlightenment
through the self is realization." This is Dogen's definition of delusion and
realization. He defined delusion and enlightenment as the relationship between self
and all beings. Self is not subject, and all beings are not objects.
That expression "practice/enlightenment is a translation of "
shu-sho". "Shu" is "practice" and "sho" is "enlightenment" or "realization," or
in Japanese, satori. "Sho" as a Chinese character, means evidence
or proof. "
Shu-sho" is an abbreviation of a longer expression, a compound of four
Chinese characters; "mon-shi-shu-sho
", that mean "to hear,"
"to think,"
"to practice" and "to verify." That means when you hear someone's teaching, you think
about it. And if you think it might be true, you trust the teaching and try to put into practice. This
is intellectual understanding.
When we hear the Buddha's teaching, we try to understand it intellectually and if
we think it might be true, we put it into practice. And through practice, we find
what Buddha taught is really true. That is enlightenment or verification. To believe
in the teaching as a verbal expression is not needed anymore, because we know it's
true through our own experience.
That means practice is a cause and enlightenment is a result. When Dogen says practice
and enlightenment are one, that means within our practice there is verification.
We don't need verification from some other person. Practice is itself verification.
But somehow we think our practice is not enlightenment. We think that after a certain
period of practice, we attain something called enlightenment. We separate practice
and attainment of enlightenment. We feel practice is difficult and often so painful
but we have to go through it.
When we practice in the way we convey oneself toward all beings, there's a separation
between things and us. We try to carry this person, the self, toward the object,
all other things, the rest of the world, and try to figure out what things are. We
are a kind of observer, and try to see the truth or reality as a kind of object.
There is a separation between subject and object. We try to get something from outside.
When we study dharma, we often have this attitude. We want to find the truth and
make it our possession, and become an enlightened person. That is how we usually
think about our practice. When we know nothing about Buddhism, our goal is to become
an enlightened person. That is how we usually understand the process of step-by-step
practice toward enlightenment.
It's like when we get our driving license. First we study how the car works and how
to operate it. And we start to drive. We practice. We get used to driving, and we
get a license. Then we can drive. We think our practice of dharma is something like
that. But according to Dogen, our practice is not like getting a driving license.
Based on such an attitude, our practice is nothing other than delusion.
That is his basic definition of delusion. We think there is some kind of truth or
reality objectively, and since we are deluded, we ought to get to that reality. In
order to do so, we have to study and get rid of our delusion. Then we can get that
reality or truth. Such a practice is based on our basic delusion of separation between
self and all beings. We try to control all beings, and we try to control this person.
Dogen said, "All things coming and carrying out practice/enlightenment through
the self is realization." In this case, the self is a part of all beings. In
that network of interdependent origination, we are supported by all beings, we are
produced by all beings. Since we human beings are born in a very immature state,
we cannot survive the first years without protection from our parents or our community.
We need to learn many things. We learn how to think, how to express our feelings,
how to understand things. This is kind of a present from all beings. We can live
as human beings only as a part of the network of interdependent origination. We are
produced by all beings, and we become part of all beings, and we maintain the network
of all beings. Whether we understand that reality of interdependent origination or
not, we are part of it.
When we study dharma, as Dogen said, we need to forget the view of separation between
self and others. That means our way of thinking and feeling is created by all beings.
So our practice is actually done by all things. We are part of the universe. When
we see the universe, the universe sees the universal itself. When we see all beings,
all beings see all beings. We are a part of all beings, like eyes are part of our
body or mind is a part of our being. The way we see is the way the universe sees
things. Our practice is done by all things, not done by this one individual person.
The subject of our practice is not this person, but all beings. Our sitting practice
is not my personal practice in order to make this person better, but all beings allowing
this person to practice. The subject of the sitting is not this person. The subject
of this practice is all beings. Sitting is not for the sake of this person getting
something better, but within this sitting practice, we are open to all beings, and
we let go of whatever comes up in our mind.
When we grasp, I am Shohaku and I am a Buddhist priest. But when we let go, I am
not a Buddhist, I'm not a priest, I am not Shohaku. When we sit facing the wall,
without comparing ourselves with anything else, then I'm really nothing. By sitting
in this posture, I'm letting go of whatever thought comes up. We become part of the
network of interdependent origination, of all ten thousand dharmas. So our practice
in a sense allows us to actively participate in the network of interdependent origination.
There's no attainment, no gain, but just be there, one hundred percent. That is the
meaning of being mindful.
The Chinese character for mindfulness has two parts: The lower part of the character
means "mind," and the upper part means "present moment." So,
mind within present moment. Our minds can be sometimes in the past or sometimes in
the future. I think about something I did yesterday and I think what I should do
tomorrow. To be mindful means we are a hundred percent right now, right here. When
we sit, we just sit a hundred percent. When we eat, we just eat. When we work, just
work. When we sit, we can let go of everything and really just sit. When we work
in our daily lives, we can't let go of everything. But we should think only about
what we are doing: so we let go of distractions and focus on what we are doing. That
is mindfulness in our day-to-day activities.
In zazen, to be mindful means to sit one hundred percent and let go of whatever comes
up in our mind, even our aspiration to become enlightened. Just be there. According
to Dogen, that is enlightenment. This action - sitting in the zendo - is not my personal
action, but through this person's sitting or practice, all beings sit zazen. We are
sitting together with all beings. That's why Dogen Zenji used the analogy of moon
within a dewdrop. Within the tiny dewdrop, the vast moonlight is reflected. It's
not a matter of us attaining the moonlight. The moonlight is reflected by itself,
because we are part of the moonlight from the beginning.
The next two sentences are Dogen's definition of Buddha. He said, "Those who
greatly realize delusion are buddhas. Those who are greatly deluded in realization
are living beings." When he says the buddhas are those who greatly realize delusion,
that means they see delusion as delusion in practice. He is talking about the buddha
way we are practicing. So here, Buddha is not some group of people who have already
finished practice and become enlightened and are living in buddha-land. When we see
delusion as delusion, that is realization. Our realization does not eliminate the
delusion. Enlightenment is not like spraying and killing the weeds. We pick up the
weeds and put them into compost, and the weeds help us to enrich our life. We don't
kill delusion. We need that delusion. We need our aspiration, we need our desire
to study dharma. But he said buddhas are those who greatly realize delusion. When
we see that is delusion, that doesn't mean we stop doing it. We realize that delusion
and keep practicing. In order to keep practicing, we need our motivation. Our mind
is also a part of all beings: it came from the universal life. If we personalize
it and grasp it as my individual possession, then we are deluded. When we realize
that is delusion, then we are buddhas - not we, but our practice. Those who greatly
realize delusion are buddhas.
The relationship between self and all beings becomes complicated. When we are deluded
within realization, when we understand that we are part of all beings, we study and
practice the way all beings are and participate with it: that is realization. But
we are deluded within this realization and we think, "I have to practice, I
have to study. I want to be enlightened or attain something." That is delusion.
But this delusion is also within the buddha way. So by using the words such as realization
and delusion, or living beings and buddhas, Dogen tries to see the relationship between
self and all beings in more detail, in a more complex way. Basically, whether we
understand it or not, we are part of the interconnected origination. Even when we
act against that, still we are within the interconnection. But when we act in that
way and live in the selfish way, somehow we feel our life is not OK. So we try to
find the way of life based on that reality. That is our motivation to study not only
Buddhism or Zen, but to study some kind of spiritual or philosophical teachings.
That is the way we convey ourselves into all beings. According to Dogen, that is
delusion. But without this delusion, we can't really start to practice. We need it.
And when we see that is delusion, he said, that is realization.
When we start to study and we think we understand what Buddha says, when we see the
reality of interconnectedness of all beings, then we feel we've found the truth and
we want to practice. When we think in that way, and grasp that this is a wonderful
way of life, then Dogen cautions us and says, "that is delusion". But without
this delusion, we cannot practice.
So we should keep practicing without grasping that this is enlightenment or this
is buddha. We should keep studying, deepening our understanding, and participate
in this relationship. When we think this is good or true or I am doing a good thing,
then we are already in the trap of self-centeredness. What Dogen wanted to show us
is - keep practicing moment by moment, without grasping. We don't need to say we
are deluded. Keep practicing without evaluation. Keep practicing, making an effort
to follow the Buddha's teachings. Then our path becomes the buddha way.
And Dogen says, "Furthermore, there are those who attain realization and those
are deluded within delusion." There are so many different conditions within
our practice. Each moment, we have to really let go of even our understanding or
our aspiration to practice, or to become buddhas, and become this moment, right now,
in which we are really living together with all beings. That is enlightenment or
realization and that is buddha. When we practice with such an attitude, we are buddha,
or our practice is buddha. But when we think this is buddha, then we miss it. So
what we do is keep opening the hand, or letting go of whatever thought arises.
That is Dogen's definition of practice and enlightenment, and delusion and enlightenment,
and living beings and buddhas. What Dogen really wanted to say in Genjo-koan is that
those things are not something fixed, but are within our life, in which we have relationship
with all other beings and are part of.
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