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Right speech is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] concepts, voice, and words all are known as sound. 正語是法明門、一切名字、音聲語言、知如響故。 Speech is one of the actions that comes out of view and thinking, the first two elements of the eightfold path. First we perceive something, then we have some intention about it, and then we say or do something. This isn’t our first go-round with right speech. The last time we discussed it was at Gate 6, when we saw that paying attention to the actions of the mouth headed off a group of evils: lying, spreading rumors, slander, engaging in idle talk, and speaking in a way that causes problems between others. This is the traditional definition of right speech, and we don’t need to spend a lot of time on it again here. The more interesting wrinkle now is “concepts, voice and words are all known as sound.” The word translated here as sound can also be “echo” or “reverberation.” There’s an important text called The Treatise on the Great Prajñāpāramitā. It says it was written by Nagarjuna, but not actually clear who the author is. The text talks about ten illusions that can be metaphors for emptiness; bodhisattvas can see through these illusory things. That list includes things like magic tricks and reflections, and the circle that appears in the air if you put a light on the end of a string and whirl it around. Bodhisattvas understand that dharmas or forms are like echoes in that they seem to be a certain kind of real sound phenomenon, but what we might think they are isn’t the whole story. When you hear an echo, it sounds like someone on the other side of the valley is talking or yodeling or something, but that’s not what’s really happening—it’s a reflection. The Treatise on the Great Prajna Paramita says: Whether in a narrow valley in the deep mountains, or in a deep sheer ravine, or in an empty large building, whether the sound of a voice, or the sound of striking, there is sound from sound, named “echo.” Ignorant people claim that the sound is from the voice of a person; the wise think in their minds, “This sound is not made by a person, but merely by way of the contact of sound, there is therefore a further sound, named echo. The thing [named] echo is empty, able to deceive the ear faculty. An echo is something like the face in the mirror or the moon reflected in the water. There is the face or the moon, and they’re real, and there’s also the reflection. The reflection is real too, but we don’t see it for what it is and we take it to be the object that’s reflected. Later on this text shows how we get caught up in illusions and create suffering for ourselves. It uses the example of people who are searching for a city. They see a mirage in the distance and go rushing toward it. They’re hot and tired, and then they think the heat rising off the ground looks like water—another mirage. Then the text says: Exhausted and troubled, they reach the middle of a narrow valley in the deep mountains, and loudly shout and cry out. Hearing the responding echo, they claim that there are people living there. Searching for them, exhausted, they still see nothing at all. On contemplation, they realize for themselves, and put an end to their thirsty wishes. Ignorant people are likewise. With respect to the empty aggregates, elements, and senses, they see a me-self and dharmas, their minds grasping with lust and aversion, crazily running about around in the four directions, seeking pleasure to satisfy themselves, perverse and deceived, extremely frustrated and afflicted. If, by way of wisdom, one knows dharmas as being without self, without reality, at that time the perverted wishes will end. If we don’t understand that our ideas are echoes or reflections of reality and we try to grab hold of them, those desires create suffering for us. When we do see them for what they are, the desire ends. Here’s one more example of a teacher using an echo as an illustration of how our perception of things isn’t the same as the things themselves. This is from Daoxin or Doushin, a 4th century Zen master: Day and night, whether walking, standing still, sitting, or lying down, if you continuously contemplate things in this way you will know that your own body is like the moon in water, a reflection in a mirror, heat waves on a hot day, or an echo in an empty valley. You cannot say it has being (u) because even if you try to catch it you cannot see its substance. You also cannot say [it has no being] (mu) because it is clearly in front of your eyes. (1) Both of the texts are relating echoes to our perception of the five skandhas. People hear echoes and think they represent something solid that’s generating a sound. Likewise, we perceive a self and think it’s something other than an impermanent five aggregates. The point of all these things is that something comes in through our sense gates and we want to make something substantial out of it. Then we take that story to be solid reality and forget that it’s just our reflection of what we’ve encountered. What does this have to do with our gate statement? Words are reflections or symbols of whatever they describe. The word “fire” won’t burn anything. The word “spaghetti” won’t satisfy anyone’s hunger. If we understand speech and words correctly, we don’t cling to them. We need them and they’re useful because we have to communicate in language, but we understand that the words aren’t the things themselves just like a map is only a picture of the terrain. Concepts, voice and words are empty of any fixed and permanent self nature just like all other dharmas. However, in that very emptiness we can see (or hear) buddha nature or awakening. Illusions have a real existance, but we make mistakes about what that existance is. Echoes exist in reality just as they are, and they’re just as empty as anything else we encounter. We don’t need to hate them or get rid of them—or cling to them. After all, in the Sansuikyo, Dogen says that the colors of the mountain peak and the echoes of the valley stream are all nothing other than Śākyamuni’s voice and appearance. Let’s see what Dogen has to say about right speech: “Right speech as a branch of the path” is the mute self not being mute. Mutes among [ordinary] people have never been able to express the truth. People in the mute state are not mutes: they do not aspire to be saints,and do not add some thing spiritual onto themselves. [Right speech] is mastery of the state in which the mouth is hung on the wall; it is mastery of the state in which all mouths are hung on all walls; it is all mouths being hung on all walls. (2) He’s referring to at least two different texts here, so let’s start with beginning of his comment and then chase down the other two sources. While we might think that someone who doesn’t say anything isn’t communicating or transmitting anything, Dogen says that’s not the case. We’re manifesting awakening or buddha nature whether we’re talking or not, because we’re not separate from emptiness or thusness. People in the mute state don’t aspire to be saints and don’t add something spiritual onto themselves. They’re simply being 100% what they are, with no need to have ideas about whether that’s good or bad or samsara or nirvana. When we’re seeing with the eyes of Buddha or seeing from the point of view of emptiness, we’re not worrying about lying, rumors, slander, idle talk, or divisive speech. We’re not trying to prevent these things because the urge to commit them doesn’t arise when we see the world clearly. We can see that this stuff isn’t helpful and in fact causes harm. We don’t have to call right speech a “spiritual practice” or anything special. We don’t have to think of ourselves as bodhisattvas or virtuous people; we can let go of those ideas. What arises in this moment is a natural response to conditions. Whether we’re speaking or listening or reading or not, we’re not clinging to the self as the reference point. The next part of Dogen’s comment is: [Right speech] is mastery of the state in which the mouth is hung on the wall; it is mastery of the state in which all mouths are hung on all walls; it is all mouths being hung on all walls. This is connected with his poem 18 in a collection of 125 verses recorded at the end of the Eiheikōroku: Natural wondrous wisdom itself is true suchness. Why should we employ Confucian discourse or Buddhist texts? Rely on sitting at ease at your place, and hang your mouth on the wall. Friends arrive here and are released from emptiness. Natural wondrous wisdom itself is true suchness. When we see reality beyond human thinking or desires, we see emptiness. We don’t create or acquire this kind of wisdom by study. It’s just about seeing things as they are. This is our original condition, experiencing things without hindrance or delusion. Then our discriminative thinking kicks in and we start making judgements about what we like and don’t like, and on that basis we take some action and create some karma. We do this over and over and go around and around the wheel of samsara. If we can let go of the judging and labeling, we can return to clarity and see beyond distinctions to what this poem calls true suchness. That original wisdom doesn’t go away when it’s covered by delusion, but it’s not so easy to be in touch with it until we arouse bodhi mind and practice. Why should we employ Confucian discourse or Buddhist texts? This is a reminder that language is a problem! This natural wondrous wisdom isn’t something we can understand with our human brains, or something we can get by reading or listening to teachings, so anything expressed using words can’t be a direct expression of reality. Rely on sitting at ease at your place, and hang your mouth on the wall. This line of the poem sends us off in another direction, to a line in a koan story in the Book of Serenity: Great Master Yuanming of Deshan said to the assembly, “When you get to the ultimate end, you just find the buddhas of all times have their mouths ‘hung on the wall.’ “ To come back to thusness or reality, we have to stop processing everything with words and concepts, close our mouths and just sit down. We need to rely on zazen, “sitting at ease in our place.” Yuanming says that all those who fully manifest awakening do this. And finally: Friends arrive here and are released from emptiness. This kind of emptiness isn’t the “good” kind—it’s not suchness. It’s hollow or empty discussion that uses words and ideas, but doesn’t actually express reality directly, because it can’t. In zazen we let go of discriminative thinking, so we’re released from this kind of empty processing Putting the poem back together: Natural wondrous wisdom itself is true suchness. Why should we employ Confucian discourse or Buddhist texts? Rely on sitting at ease at your place, and hang your mouth on the wall. Friends arrive here and are released from emptiness. And then, putting Dogen’s comment back together: “Right speech as a branch of the path” is the mute self not being mute. Mutes among [ordinary] people have never been able to express the truth. People in the mute state are not mutes: they do not aspire to be saints,and do not add some thing spiritual onto themselves. [Right speech] is mastery of the state in which the mouth is hung on the wall; it is mastery of the state in which all mouths are hung on all walls; it is all mouths being hung on all walls. Right speech on the everyday level is speech that doesn’t create suffering for ourselves or others, and right speech at the absolute level is letting go of concepts, voice and words altogether, as the gate statement says, because we recognize them as echoes that can’t express reality directly. Even though language is a problem, we have to use it and try to express something, without an idea about “me” saying something special or grand. Even if we don’t say anything, we’re not really mute. The universe continues to express itself through us with its continuous functioning. Because of interconnectedness, we’re always transmitting something and receiving something in this moment. Dogen returns to this theme of going beyond words and seeing reality as it is many times in his writings. In one of his poems, Dogen says The ocean waves crash like thunder below the cliff. I strain my ears and see the face of Kanjizai. Kanjizai is Avalokiteshvara. When Dogen hears the crashing waves, he strains his ears and sees the face of the bodhisattva. If we’re really awake, all of this transmitting and receiving isn’t dependent on eyes or ears. Avalokiteshvara is the one who hears the cries of the world, but I’m guessing he’s not just hearing the sound of the cries. He’s getting it with his whole body in a way that doesn’t depend on words and language. Kanjizai means “seeing freely,” and another name for Avalokiteshvara is Kannon, “seeing the sound.” Kannon sees the reality of suffering even beyond our ability to communicate it in language. He sees what’s actually happening and responds to that, rather than only to our ideas or his own ideas about what’s going on. Those ideas are part of reality, but they’re not the whole story. Dogen wrote a fascicle of the Shobogenzo called Mujo Seppo or Insentient beings preach the dharma. That phrase was around before Dogen used it; it shows up in a poem by Dongshan from the 9th century and Dogen talks about this poem in his fascicle. Dongshan’s poem says: How wonderous! How wonderous! The expounding of the Dharma by insentient beings is unthinkable. If I tried to hear it with the ears, it would never be possible to understand. Only when I hear the voice with my eyes am I able to know it. Insentient beings are transmitting the dharma just like the people in a mute state in Dogen’s comment on right speech. If we listen for words coming from a rock or a chair, we’re going to be waiting a long time, and we’re not going to take in the dharma that’s being transmitted. If we see that rock or chair with the eyes of Buddha, we get what it’s transmitting. Words about the rock or the chair are echoes of its real being. If we encounter that thing directly, without thoughts that use the self as a reference point, then that transmission happens seamlessly. One of the points Dogen takes up in Mujo Seppo is what exactly we mean by “insentient.” We usually think it means something that doesn’t think or feel or maybe isn’t alive, but Dogen isn’t using it that way. He means something—including a person—who isn’t caught up in emotions, ideas and concepts, someone who sees clearly with the eyes of Buddha. Whether or not we’re not caught up in our delusion, we’re still preaching the dharma because we’re always manifesting thusness. However, when we’re not caught up in our delusion and we’re manifesting awakening, we’re also able to hear the dharma, whether it’s conveyed by language or not. So yes, if we encounter that rock or tree or waterfall directly, we can see the dharma in the way it functions in form and emptiness, but if we go beyond sentience and insentience and beyond sound and silence, the same thing happens when we encounter people or arhats or buddhas. In another fascicle called Dotoku or Being able to speak,” Dogen says: When we are able to speak of the speakable, we do not speak of the unspeakable. Even if we recognize that we are able to speak of the speakable, unless we do not penetrate the fact that the unspeakable is what we are not able to speak, we have not yet attained the face of the buddha-ancestors or the marrow of the buddha-ancestors. Sometimes we use words and language and concepts, recognizing that they can’t contain all of reality, but we express what we can within these limits and make effort to speak skillfully in ways that move people toward understanding cause and effect. At the same time, we know that unless we really get that there is something beyond language, we can’t completely manifest Buddha nature or awakening. We have to see one reality from two sides and express two sides in one action. Words are symbols for other things, not the things themselves; in that way, all words are false and the only way to make sure you’re telling the truth is to hang your mouth on the wall and not to say anything. However, this isn’t possible for us as bodhisattvas in the world, so everything we say misses the mark and also everything we say completely expresses the reality of emptiness. Somehow we function with both of these truths at the same time. Notes: (1) Okumura, S. (2010). Realizing Genjokoan: The Key to Dogen's Shobogenzo. United Kingdom: Wisdom Publications, p. 30. (2) Master Dogen's Shobogenzo, tr. Nishijima and Cross, vol 4. (2006). United Kingdom: Booksurge Publishing, p. 13. 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
June 2025
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