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[48] Hidden expedient means are a gate of Dharma illumination; for they are sensitive to many kinds of suffering. 色受想行識の五蘊の方便説を明らかにすることは法明門である。それによってすべての苦を知ることが出来るからである。 The kanji for this gate refer to the expedient means of the four great elements becoming the five skandhas of body and mind, ensuring we’re prepared to be aware of the entirety of suffering. The five skandhas are the components that come together to make up a sentient being. Back at Gate 45 we saw that the four elements are earth, air, fire and water, and that these make up form, or the body, the first of the five skandhas, as well as the other four skandhas which are are functions of the mind. Feeling is getting sense information from the body, perception is creating mental images and concepts out of that sense information, formation is the will that acts on those images and ideas. our motivation for action, and consciousness does the discernment and integrates the feeling, perception and formation. The coming together of the five skandhas results in a perception of a fixed and permanent self-nature. It’s an illusion, but immediately there is clinging and constructing a story about self. First we cling to the body and decide that “this is me;” then we take the feelings coming from our sense-organs and layer that on top. We decide we have to take some actions in order to gratify the body and the senses, getting stuff we want and running away from stuff we don’t want. This is where we get swept away by the three poisons of greed, anger and ignorance, and where we create karma with body, speech and mind. Consciousness pulls all this together and creates a complex and subtle picture of this thing we call self. In the Buddhist tradition there are four layers of consciousness. On the surface there is mind consciousness; this is our day to day thinking, planning, worrying mind. The next level down is sense consciousness: the physical senses come in contact with a sense-object and we have some experience of that contact. Next is the storehouse consciousness, or alaya. It stores and processes all kinds of information, seeds and experiences. It’s changing all the time, both because it’s always taking in information and because it’s processing and transforming that material. You see something or taste something, have an experience of that, and it goes into the storehouse consciousness. Storehouse consciousness operates at a deeper level than mind consciousness. It can drive actions by itself without the mind consciousness. You get cold in the night and pull up the blanket without really waking up. You need to choose between the birthday card with the puppy wearing glasses or the one with the sailboat scene and you’re drawn to one or the other, You’re walking along minding your own business and suddenly you see something fall over in front of you and you jump out of the way. Storehouse consciousness is very impressionable. It’s not mind consciousness that’s deciding what should get stored; there are all kinds of impressions in there, including what we pick up from other people, our culture, or our surroundings, and here’s where group stupidity can start to take hold. Out of the awareness of mind consciousness, decisions are being made. It’s the storehouse consciousness rather than the mind consciousness that decides that it’s a separate self. It’s not the day to day, thinking, worrying mind that’s writing that story at its most basic level. Finally there’s the manas consciousness. Its entire function is to cling to the storehouse consciousness as a separate self. The ignorance and fear present in the storehouse consciousness gives rise to manas, and manas turns around and clings to the storehouse and never lets go. Storehouse and manas never turn off. Mind consciousness stops when you go to sleep or fall into a coma, but these other two are always functioning as long as you’re alive. The gate statement says that these teachings about the five skandhas are an expedient means, and that when that’s clear, we are able to recognize many kinds of suffering. Something that moves ourselves and others toward awakening is what we call skillful or expedient means. The inference is that whatever it is doesn’t have to be literally true as long as it serves the purpose. We see various instances in the Pali Canon and the Lotus Sutra of the Buddha giving different teachings to different people depending on their circumstances and what they were ready to take in. When we’re in the grip of the manas consciousness clinging to the idea of self, we need to hear about the five skandhas. It’s the only way we’re going to understand that our suffering comes from wanting things to be different for this illusory self. Until you encountered Buddha’s teaching, chances are you didn’t understand how suffering is created and perpetuated. We’re not born with knowledge about the four noble truths and the five skandhas and the four layers of consciousness. We just think there’s a “me” that needs things, because we have no reason not to think that. Then one day we meet the Buddha and we start to see how the parts come together and create some energy that holds them together. We see that there’s a way to break the grip of our delusion and suffering. Hooray! Bodhicitta! Now we’re bodhisatvas practicing in the world, and we encounter the Heart Sutra that says there are no five skandhas. Suddenly we understand that the give skandhas were an expedient means. The point of the teachings about five skandhas is to show us that there is no self. But if there aren’t really five skandhas, why would Buddha teach that there are? The Lotus Sutra explains about expedient means in several places. In the second chapter, Buddha explains that the reason Buddhas appear in the world is to help move everyone toward the same awakening as themselves. However, not everyone has the capacity to take in and understand the teachings, so Buddhas devise skillful or expedient means to lead people on. Later on in the 25th chapter (Universal Gateway) the Buddha explains that Avalokitesvara takes any bodily form necessary in the moment to save beings. He becomes a layperson, an elder, a minister of state, somebody’s wife, a young person, or whatever is needed. In the standard Sotoshu morning service, we chant this chapter, known as the Fumonbonge, every day—it’s that important in our tradition. For Avalokitesvara, the five skandas can take on any number of forms as expedient means to allow him to see and help all kinds of suffering beings. The skandhas don’t make up a fixed self; they and the teachings about them are an expedient means. We can use these teachings to start letting go of our own clinging to self, and at some point we also let go of clinging to the teachings about the five skandas. We see that ultimately they’re empty. There’s an analogy that says that the average person’s view is like the sky obscured by clouds. The bodhisattva’s view doesn’t have the clouds but just a little haze. Buddha’s view is completely clear and he sees even the subtle haze that even the bodhisattva doesn’t see. The Heart Sutra says that the bodhisattva Avalokitesvara aroused his original wisdom and saw that the five skandhas are empty. In that moment, he was released from suffering, and not just some of it, but ALL suffering and distress, even the subtle, tricky stuff. Buddha’s method is that expedient means exist only for those who need them. When the need is gone, they should disappear like imaginary jewels or perhaps, as the gate statement says, they become hidden expedient means. The five skandhas being free from clinging to five skandhas on the basis of emptiness is the equivalent of Dogen Zenji’s shinjin datsuraku (dropping off body and mind). It’s Sawaki Roshi’s “zazen is good for nothing,” Uchiyama Roshi’s “opening the hand of thought,” and Okumura Roshi’s “1=0=∞ (infinity).” Getting clear on this puts us in the same position as Avalokitesvata in the sutra. Now we’re bodhisattvas able to help move other beings toward awakening. Avalokitesvara goes on to explain his understanding to Shariputra. What is that but expedient means, until Shariputra can see it all for himself? Then he can let go of the teachings about five skandhas too. Prajna is understanding expedient means and also understanding emptiness. On that basis, compassion for others arises, but we need this human form made up of five skandhas to carry that out. Sometimes this is called the two-fold expediency of the bodhisattva. He doesn’t fall into attachment to things because of wisdom, and he also doesn’t abandon people because of compassion. He’s interested in helping, but he doesn’t lose sight of impermanence, interconnectedness and the illusory nature of self. In other words, the bodhisattva sees the emptiness of five skandas so he’s free from clinging and attachment, but he still sees the suffering of beings made up of five skandas, has compassion for them, and carries out his vow to liberate them. He couldn’t do this without the five skandas that make up his form, so he doesn’t give them up completely and disappear; he makes use of them as expedient means, stays in this samsaric world, arouses compassion and works to save others. Because he also has the form of these five skandhas, he can see and understand all the myriad forms of unease that go with that. Thus the gate statement says that clearly understanding the expedient means of the five skandhas means the bodhisattva is prepared to see or be sensitive to all kinds of suffering. In order to see suffering, one has to use one’s eyes, which are dependent on the form of the five skandhas. According to the Diamond Sutra, there are five kinds of Buddha eyes: 1) physical eye: that we all commonly see with in this human form 2) heavenly eye: the broader perspective that comes with zazen 3) wisdom eye: seeing emptiness 4) dharma eye: seeing that form and emptiness are both real and doesn’t cling to either one; this is the eye of the bodhisattva 5) Buddha eye: eye and Buddha and the universe it sees are not separate; all-pervading sight/vision that can’t really be described The bodhisattva uses the dharma eye to see that the five skandhas are empty but are also real. That’s how he can use his karmic conditions to carry out his vows without getting stuck anywhere. In a way, the bodhisattva is himself an expedient means. The Buddha died and crossed over to Nirvana; he’s no longer in this world working concretely to save beings. That falls to the bodhisattva, who doesn’t use Buddha eye, doesn’t give up the five skandhas, and doesn’t disappear from this world. In Opening the Hand of Thought, Uchiyama quotes the Shodoka, a Chinese poem: The five skandhas are just floating clouds that aimlessly come and go, while the three poisons are but bubbles that appear and vanish. When reality is seen, neither subject nor object exists. And in a moment the avici karma [evil fate] is eradicated Avici is the lowest of all the hell realms. It’s supposed to be a cube 240-thousand to 300-thousand kilometers on a side and somehow buried underground. Suffering there is constant, with no periods or reprieve or respite. This is where you go when you die having committed the worst possible kinds of misdeeds, like killing a parent, killing an arhat, shedding the blood of a Buddha, slandering the Lotus sutra or causing a schism in the sangha. Avici hell is not a place you want to go, because you’ll be there for 3.4 quintillion years working off your bad karma. However, that means that being in avici hell is not permanent. Eventually, you can be released. When reality is seen, neither subject nor object exists. And in a moment the avici karma is eradicated. When we completely understand the five skandhas, we’re released from creating the evil karma that will land us in avici hell. Uchiyama Roshi goes on to make some comments: Truly, all thoughts, delusions, and cravings are like bubbles and are nothing but empty comings and goings that have no substance when we wake up to zazen. Even a hell like avici, developed by our own thoughts and fantasies, becomes eradicated in an instant. Zazen enables us to experience this as reality. I think there’s some parallel between what the bodhisattva is doing with the five skandas and what we’re doing with thoughts in zazen. The bodhisattva doesn’t give up embodying the five skandas and we don’t stop thinking in zazen. No one is even trying to do these things. No one is aiming for some perfect, immaculate state. Instead, we’re making use of our karmic conditions. In both cases, there is clear insight into what’s happening that allows for not getting stuck. The bodhisattva sees the emptiness of the five skandas but doesn’t reject them; in zazen, we see that our thoughts are just our thoughts, but we don’t try to turn them off. The bodhisattva doesn’t get hijacked by the experience of being made up of five skandas, and in zazen we don’t create karma, suffering and hell realms based on our thoughts. We just let them go by. We all get to experience the emptiness of the five skandhas in a very direct way Okumura Roshi gets the last word here: When we study Mahayana Buddhism we learn that our body is just a collection of five skandhas and that it is empty and does not really exist. Still, when we injure even a tiny part of it like our toe, we have terrible pain. If the body is empty, where does the pain come from? . . . No individual, independent, fixed entity is there. Still we have pain and the pain is so real, fresh and immediate that we need to take care of it somehow. Each pain comes from emptiness but each pain has its own causes and conditions. We need to figure out what is the cause of each particular pain and how to take care of it. Just seeing the emptiness or oneness of all beings does not work. [Within this one unified reality], there are many different kinds of pain that people suffer. Each pain has different cause and needs a different cure. We need to study each pain one by one. This gate statement is giving us our challenge as bodhisattvas: - how do we understand the five skandas as both the ground of our life and practice of liberating all beings? - how does our understanding prepare us to study each pain one by one? - how do we see the five skandas as an expedient means for seeing and working with emptiness? Questions for reflection and discussion:
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About the text The Ippyakuhachi Homyomon, or 108 Gates of Dharma Illumination, appears as the 11th fascicle of the 12 fascicle version of Dogen Zenji’s Shobogenzo. Dogen didn't compile the list himself; it's mostly a long quote from another text called the Sutra of Collected Past Deeds of the Buddha. Dogen wrote a final paragraph recommending that we investigate these gates thoroughly. Hoko has been talking about the gates one by one since 2016. She provides material here that can be used by weekly dharma discussion groups as well as for individual study. The 108 Gates of Dharma Illumination
[1] Right belief [2] Pure mind [3] Delight [4] Love and cheerfulness The three forms of behavior [5] Right conduct of the actions of the body [6] Pure conduct of the actions of the mouth [7] Pure conduct of the actions of the mind The six kinds of mindfulness [8] Mindfulness of Buddha [9] Mindfulness of Dharma [10] Mindfulness of Sangha [11] Mindfulness of generosity [12] Mindfulness of precepts [13] Mindfulness of the heavens The four Brahmaviharas [14] Benevolence [15] Compassion [16] Joy [17] Abandonment The four dharma seals [18] Reflection on inconstancy [19] Reflection on suffering [20] Reflection on there being no self [21] Reflection on stillness [22] Repentance [23] Humility [24] Veracity [25] Truth [26] Dharma conduct [27] The Three Devotions [28] Recognition of kindness [29] Repayment of kindness [30] No self-deception [31] To work for living beings [32] To work for the Dharma [33] Awareness of time [34] Inhibition of self-conceit [35] The nonarising of ill-will [36] Being without hindrances [37] Belief and understanding [38] Reflection on impurity [39] Not to quarrel [40] Not being foolish [41] Enjoyment of the meaning of the Dharma [42] Love of Dharma illumination [43] Pursuit of abundant knowledge [44] Right means [45] Knowledge of names and forms [46] The view to expiate causes [47] The mind without enmity and intimacy [48] Hidden expedient means [49] Equality of all elements [50] The sense organs [51] Realization of nonappearance The elements of bodhi: The four abodes of mindfulness [52] The body as an abode of mindfulness [53] Feeling as an abode of mindfulness [54] Mind as an abode of mindfulness [55] The Dharma as an abode of mindfulness [56] The four right exertions [57] The four bases of mystical power The five faculties [58] The faculty of belief [59] The faculty of effort [60] The faculty of mindfulness [61] The faculty of balance [62] The faculty of wisdom The five powers [63] The power of belief [64] The power of effort [65] The power of mindfulness [66] The power of balance [67] The power of wisdom [68] Mindfulness, as a part of the state of truth [69] Examination of Dharma, as a part of the state of truth [70] Effort, as a part of the state of truth [71] Enjoyment, as a part of the state of truth [72] Entrustment as a part of the state of truth [73] The balanced state, as a part of the state of truth [74] Abandonment, as a part of the state of truth The Eightfold Path [75] Right view [76] Right discrimination [77] Right speech [78] Right action [79] Right livelihood [80] Right practice [81] Right mindfulness [82] Right balanced state [83] The bodhi-mind [84] Reliance [85] Right belief [86] Development The six paramitas [87] The dāna pāramitā [88] The precepts pāramitā [89] The forbearance pāramitā. [90] The diligence pāramitā [91] The dhyāna pāramitā [92] The wisdom pāramitā [93] Expedient means [94] The four elements of sociability [95] To teach and guide living beings [96] Acceptance of the right Dharma [97] Accretion of happiness [98] The practice of the balanced state of dhyāna [99] Stillness [100] The wisdom view [101] Entry into the state of unrestricted speech [102] Entry into all conduct [103] Accomplishment of the state of dhāraṇī [104] Attainment of the state of unrestricted speech [105] Endurance of obedient following [106] Attainment of realization of the Dharma of nonappearance [107] The state beyond regressing and straying [108] The wisdom that leads us from one state to another state and, somehow, one more: [109] The state in which water is sprinkled on the head Archives
December 2024
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