Mindfulness of Sangha is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] attainment of the truth is steadfast. 念是法明門、得道堅牢故。 We’ve arrived at the third of the three treasures, so let’s consider first what sangha is, and then what it means to be mindful of or remember sangha. The Sanskrit word sangha means a group of people who are unified by something—in our case, the dharma. Laying this out across the three kinds of three treasures from Dogen’s Kyojukaimon;
After his awakening, the Buddha went looking for someone to whom he could teach the dharma, someone who would actually understand it. He first goes in search of the five monks with whom he had practiced just before he left the group and sat down under the bodhi tree. The Buddha established a sangha so people could practice without the distractions and responsibilities of householder life in the world, and so that the teachings would be preserved and provide support for all practitioners. Members of the ordained sangha were traditionally responsible for translating and spreading the teachings. Because they were practicing in an upright, knowledgeable, proper way, they were worthy of receiving gifts, hospitality, offerings and respect from the laity. The nature of that upright way was defined by 227 main rules of conduct, the pratimoksha. Today in the Mahayana tradition we use “sangha” to refer to all practitioners, as in “the Western Buddhist sangha.” In the Theravada tradition, sangha refers only to the ordained sangha or to people who have a certain level of attainment. These are not the same thing—there can be ordained people who don’t have much understanding and laypeople who do. In Zen, the word we use for sangha is sōrin 叢林, which indicates a group of different kinds of trees. In the forest, all kinds of plants and trees grow together with different shapes, colors, lifespan, seeds, fruits and flowers. They are interdependent and living one life together. Sangha is made up of all different kinds of people practicing together peacefully and harmoniously, using their various gifts, skills and experiences for the benefit of everyone. Now that we know what sangha is, what about mindfulness of sangha? As we’ve seen, mindfulness in our tradition is about something that is remembered—in essence, not forgetting to practice. It’s about bearing something in mind—in this case, sangha—and not forgetting what sangha really is. Mindfulness of sangha means remembering that we are not alone. There are two sides to that. One is that we have support because we can rely on dharma friends when we need to, and the other is that what we do affects others. When we are deeply aware that we are not alone, we and others can remain steadfast in our practice. We’re reliable, solid and committed to awakening. North Americans sometimes don’t want to find a sangha when they begin their practice; it feels much safer to just stay home and read dharma books and maybe watch a video on how to sit. We don’t want someone else telling us what to do. Usually, in my experience, one of two things happens: people give up because it’s hard to practice alone, or they realizes they need to find a sangha in some form. When we join a sangha, our initial exploration stops being a philosophical exercise and starts being a real practice. Dharma is right here and now in people’s practice, not somewhere “out there.” It becomes very apparent that we are not alone, whether we initially believe it or not. During my first trip to Japan as a layperson with a rakusu, I thought sitting zazen in a Japanese temple would be really special. I would be sitting in a “real” temple, where people had been sitting for centuries, surrounded by cinematic scenery. Surely something extraordinary would happen—this would be “real” zazen! Following my fantasy-filled zazen period, I went to a service, which of course was all in Japanese. I didn’t understand any of it, but the bells were the same and my body knew what to do. I could have been practicing with my home sangha. I really felt that Japanese and Western practitioners were all practicing steadfastly together despite the different languages and places. The whole idea of being special was extra, because we were really all one sangha. When we join a sangha, at first we come to practice for our own support. Someone lights the candle, rings the bells and offers a talk, and we come to benefit from those things. Then we go home! After awhile, we start to become aware of the issues and questions facing the sangha. We start looking behind the scenes. Wait, there’s an annual budget. There are various kinds of volunteer rotations, and questions about how to maintain the facilties. Some people are managing retreats or teaching zazen to beginners or coming up with zendo guidelines. There’s a whole community of things going on here that includes me but is bigger than just me and what I’m doing. I’d only been practicing for about six months when I was recruited as a board member for the dharma center I was attending. What an eye-opening! There was so much more going on than just Sunday zazen and dharma talks! One of my early mentors used to say to me and others when we came to practice that it was good we were there to “lend our spirit.” Yeah, yeah, I thought, hearts and flowers stuff. It wasn’t until some time later that I started to understand that actually, that’s really important. Seido Roshi, the head of the temple where I trained in Japan, said: I don’t think there were so many practitioners at Koshoji [Dōgen’s temple]; it was a small group. Dōgen Zenji mentioned that we should not call a sōrin big or small depending on how many monks are practicing there. It’s not a matter of number. Daisōrin 大叢林 ( “great sōrin“) means that there is even a small number of people who have the real authentic spirit of the Way. This spirit is the most important thing. (1) This all really came home to me when I was running the Milwaukee Zen Center. Attendance at evening zazen was notoriously low. People said, “I’d come if more people were there.” So wait, everyone is at home waiting for someone else to make the first move? I had to point out that if you come, others will come and practice with you. Someone has to break that cycle of hesitation so that everyone can practice in a steadfast way. As members of the sangha, we have some responsibility simply to show up occasionally. We don’t have to ring bells, make tea or clean the zendo, though those things are really beneficial action for ourselves and others. This is not about doing volunteer work. We just have to be present to support the network of practice. We all know that the energy is quite different in a zendo full of people sitting or chanting than in a zendo with only a few. As much as Dogen Zenji said that it doesn’t matter whether there are a lot of monks or only a few, the reality is that if you arrive in a zendo day after day and it’s just you and the teacher and maybe a jikido, it can feel sort of forlorn and lonely. It’s a little harder to take refuge in a sangha that’s kind of invisible. Of course, it’s a two-way street. We have some responsibility to the sangha, but also it provides the container for our own practice. I would argue it supports our development in several ways.
We’ve talked about the manifesting and maintaining aspects of the sangha treasure; we also need to talk about the absolute aspect: all beings functioning together in peace and harmony. We’ve seen previously that the absolute three treasures can’t be separated. In this case, the absolute sangha treasure is the harmony of the awakened nature of all beings and the way they function according to the laws of this one unified reality. We can see that the sangha or the universe is one body and also many beings, one big self and also many small selves. Just as the body is made up of cells, the absolute sangha is made up of all beings, and yet it’s still one entity. If we don’t have a deep understanding that there is no fixed and permanent self nature that persists through time, and if we don’t have a deep understanding of dependent arising (that everything arises because of causes and conditions), then we think we can do whatever we want. We can take as many resources and as much space as we want because we don’t see that we’re affecting others. If one cell in the body does that, starts co-opting resources for itself and growing out of control, we call that cancer, and the whole body can die. Sila (ethics/morality) are closely tied to sangha practice. When we see the truth to which Buddha awakened, ethical behavior arises naturally and we don’t create disruption in the universe. The result is non-violence, non-harming, self-restraint, and harmony in the sangha. Sila is not something imposed from outside, but a sort of ethical compass within ourselves. We pose no threat to another person’s life, property, family, rights, or well-being. We simply do wholesome actions, avoid unwholesome actions, and try to benefit other beings. If we can embody the precepts as individual bodhisattvas, chances are we will build and maintain a wholesome sangha. Then we can take that practice out into the world and try to help create other wholesome organizations, which is not easy. The absolute aspect of the sangha treasure might seem like something abstract, but the reality is that it’s all about our moment by moment conduct in this life. All sentient and insentient beings are awakened and they function according to the dharma, and it’s our job to see that and not get in the way, and then as bodhisattvas, to help others not to get in the way. Buddhism is full of teachings about cultivating virtues that lead to skillful, ethical action, for example, the six paramitas, or perfections. (We’ll take a much closer look at these at Gates 87 - 92.)
Cultivating these things gives us a basis for seeing all beings as our sangha and seeing the interconnectedness of how they function. Can we see all beings as awakened? Can we see how they are interdependent, and if we do something there, there’s an effect across space and time? If we forget about sangha, we forget about truth. We can’t separate sangha from the truth of the reality of all beings. If we do, we make a mistake and create suffering and dissonance in the larger organism. In the Vimalakirti Sutra, Manjusri asks about the nature of Vimalakirti’s sickness. He says: From ignorance we hold attachment, and my sickness is thus caused. Since all beings are sick, I am sick. If they are no more sick then my sickness would cease. And why? A bodhisattva eters a life of birth and death for the sake of all beings; where there are birth and death, there is always sickness. If all beings were free from sickness, then there would be no more sickness with a bodhisattva. Just as when the only son of a wealthy merchant becomes sick, then his parents from their anxiety become sick also, and when he is restored to health, then they also recover their health; even so, a bodhisattva loves all beings as parents love an only sone. As long as all beings are sick he is sick, when they recover their health, he also recovers his health. Again you have asked about the cause of my sickness. The sickness of a bodhisattva is caused only by his great compassion. (1) If we can cultivate the wisdom to see that all sentient and insentient beings are our sangha, we have the compassion to acknowledge their suffering and try to help. That means remaining steadfast in our practice: steadfast when we encounter incivility, short sightedness, divisiveness, false speech, misconduct, and a host of other sicknesses in our universal sangha. The sangha is a group that is unified by something, and no matter whether we understand it or like it or not, we are all one absolute sangha treasure. Questions for reflection and discussion
Notes (1) “Living in the Sodo,” article by Seido Suzuki at Ancient Way. (2) Vimalakirti Sutra quoted in Eternal Legacy: Wisdom Beyond Words by Sangharakshita For further reading:
Mindfulness of Dharma is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] reflection of the Dharma is pure. 念法是法明門、觀法淨故。 Let’s consider first what dharma is, and then what it means to be mindful of or remember dharma. The root of the Sanskrit word dharma has a meaning like “something that is established” or “something that is firm,” the connotation being of something that supports or bears up. Dharma as a term predates the Buddha in India; in Hinduism, dharma is the religious and moral law governing individual conduct. There’s a broad dharma that applies to everyone and includes virtues like truthfulness, non-injury, and generosity, and there is also a specific dharma to be followed according to one’s class, status, and station in life. The word dharma has two other important meanings: the Buddha’s teaching and the reality of all beings. In Buddhism, the plural “dharmas” means all the interconnected elements of this phenomenal world, as in all the myriad dharmas. These two aspects of dharma make up the Buddha’s dharma body or dharmakaya. It means the Buddha is still here even though his physical body died 2500 years ago. As we saw last week, there are three kinds of three treasures: manifesting, maintaining and absolute. This is the dharma as one of the absolute three treasures; it has no boundary and can’t be separated from buddha and sangha or from anything else. The dharma existed before Shakyamuni—he didn’t create it but he’s not separate from it. The historical or real-world manifestation of the dharma is the teachings of Shakyamuni, what he saw and helped his followers to understand. This is the dharma as one of the manifesting three treasures. There is also the dharma as the sutras, Buddha’s teachings that were written down and that we can still find in books today. This is the dharma as one of the maintaining three treasures.
Last week we saw what Dogen had to say about the three kinds of Buddha treasure in the Kyojukaimon. This week, the dharma treasure:
After six years of various ascetic practices with various teachers, Shakyamuni sat down under the bodhi tree and experienced awakening at the age of thirty-five. Then he had a talk with himself. What do I do now? The dharma is difficult for anyone else to understand! Well, there will be some who are not completely hopeless and will be able to accept and understand it, so I shouldn’t keep this to myself, but should teach others so they can benefit as well. He goes and finds five monks with whom he’d been doing ascetic practice before, thinking they might be able to get it. They don’t welcome him back, because they know he’s given up those harsh practices and been eating some food and resting, and they think he’s taking it easy. However, they notice that he’s become calm and steady, and eventually they agree to listen to him. He teaches them about the four noble truths and the eightfold fold path, and this is the first turning of the dharma wheel, the first manifestation of dharma as Buddha’s teaching. (1) After teaching these five monks, Shakyamuni traveled and taught for the rest of his life, and showed others how to practice. Sutras and sutra books are the maintaining dharma treasure, something we can physically encounter in this world today. Buddha’s teachings were not written down until after he died; before that, they were only transmitted orally. His disciples were concerned about the gradual changes in the contents of the teaching, and they gathered in a council to collect, organize, and correct the oral record of the Buddha’s teachings. A number of disciples participated in putting the records together, checking each other and verifying what they heard as Buddha’s teaching. Today the canon includes some sutras that are particularly important for in the Soto Zen tradition, like the Vimalakirti Sutra, the Lotus Sutra, and the Prajna Paramita literature, including the Heart Sutra. We can read these things in books that we can pick up and hold, and these days we can also hear recordings or see talks about them or read them online. We can continue to encounter them ourselves today as the maintaining dharma treasure. Now that we know what dharma is, what about this mindfulness of dharma? Mindfulness in our tradition is about something that is remembered. As we saw last week, mindfulness is not about focusing on one thing to the exclusion of all else, or about engaging in contemplation of a deity. It’s about bearing something in mind—in this case, dharma—and not forgetting what dharma really is (and perhaps what dharmas really are). Mindfulness of dharma or dharmas means we have to pay attention to our relationship with the phenominal world. If our relationship is clear and not muddy or cloudy, then the reflection of the dharma is pure. If we create a gap between ourselves and all beings and then toss all kinds of misperception and delusion into that gap, the reflection is distorted. Now on the one hand, if dharma is the true reality of all beings, or the way the universe works beyond whatever we may think about it, it’s not possible for us to reflect dharma in an impure way. We do something with body, speech and mind that creates causes and conditions for something else to arise, and it arises because that’s the working of the universe. That’s beyond our limited position as a human being. On the other hand, it would be good to reflect dharma in a way that moves ourselves and all beings away from unwholesomeness and toward wholesomeness. If we’re not paying attention to our relationship with the phenomenal world and the way it works, we’re acting based on our concepts or ideas about things work. In other words, we’re taking action based on stories we’ve made up, not on actual reality. That’s a recipe for creating and perpetuating suffering, because what we’re doing is not a true reflection of the nature of reality and the way the world actually works. Some time ago, one of our sangha members introduced me to the idea of aspirational recycling. She pointed out that when we really, really want something to be recyclable, or we think it really should be recyclable, we may put it in the bin even though it’s not actually recyclable. What do we think is going to happen to that object? Will our wishing make it recyclable? No, someone else at the recycling facility will have to find it and take it out of the stream and do something else with it. It’s a great metaphor for our lives and practice. Putting a nonrecyclable object in the bin is not mindfulness of dharma. It’s action that has no relation to what’s actually going on in the phenomenal world. It’s action taken based on something we wish was true. I wish the good things in my life will never change, so I cling to them even though, because of impermanence, they will certainly disappear. I wish this or that pretty thing was mine, so I help myself even though I’m breaking a precept about not stealing. I wish I had a solid and permanent self because I’m afraid of annihilation, so I become defensive and ego driven even though Buddha taught that there is no self I can grasp. In each case, I’m completely forgetting Buddha’s teaching, forgetting the nature of reality, and not paying attention to whether my relationship with the phenomenal world is wholesome or unwholesome, creating suffering or ameliorating suffering. So what can I do to clean up my relationship? In zazen, we have the opportunity to notice our responses to the sensory phenomena that give us information about the world. Zazen is not the time to do analysis about this, just to pay attention and see what happens. When I was running the Milwaukee Zen Center, in the summer I had all the windows open on the first floor, where the zendo was. Every evening just as zazen was starting, the shrieking would start from next door—parents playing outside with their kids after they got home from work and before the sun went down and the kids had to go to bed. I’d spend the whole period wishing those kids would go inside and be quiet, and at the same time I was genuinely thinking it was great that the parents were taking time with their kids. The important activity wasn’t taking place next door in the yard; it was in my own mind, my own perception of what was happening and my own response. Rather than just sound coming and going in my awareness, I watched both positive and negative feelings arise: there was unpleasant noise, but a nice family. I wrote a whole story about how this happens every night, maybe I should close the windows, wondering whether others are being disturbed, and guessing how much longer the shrieking would go on. Paying attention to my relationship with the workings of the universe means I can try to respond skillfully rather than falling into habituated thinking, and perhaps getting angry or impatient that “my” zazen was being disturbed instead of seeing that sound was just sound. Rather than radiating suffering caused by my delusion, I can maintain equanimity because there’s no real cause for upset. The original nature of everything is tranquility, and the disturbance happens when we poke our heads in and add our own material. To reflect the dharma in a pure way is to be in alignment with reality. Suffering is about dis-integration: we’re not integrated with what’s really going on. Instead we’re living in our own world that we’ve created in our own heads. We need to see that we’ve never actually been separate and in that way reintegrate ourselves. That’s when wholeness and wholesomeness happens and the dharma reflection is pure. When it comes to mindfulness of dharma as our effort not to forget what Buddha taught, of course dharma study is important in our practice. Zazen, work and study are the three core elements of our practice here at Sanshin. Probably you’ve encountered the argument that Zen or the dharma is beyond words and letters and therefore study is useless. Is the dharma beyond words and letters? Absolutely. Do we all completely understand that and live in that place? No, we don’t. We need to use words to go beyond words. To read teachings from someone like Buddha who’s farther along this path than we are gives us the chance to get into his head and share his experience and the reality to which he woke up. We need to approach a dharma text with an open mind and flexibility. We might not agree with what we read and that’s OK, but at that point we also need to see from where our reactions are really coming. If this teaching was true, I’d have to change how I see myself, or my habits, or the world, and that would be scary and uncomfortable. We need to be free from fixed views, and dharma teachings can point out where we’re stuck. Dharma study is one of the ways we traditionally cultivate wisdom from seeing and hearing, then thinking and reflecting. We need to learn at least the basics of the dharma that Buddha taught: the four noble truths, the eightrold path, the three marks of existence, etc. as the basis for further study and discussion, and also as the basis for our lives. Dharma study might initially be an intellectual investigation of the teachings by reading or hearing a talk, but we don’t stop there because next we have to do some reflection. What does this mean for me in my own life? What does it say about my own day to day experience in 21st century North America? We gradually move from learning concepts from “out there” to expressing the dharma naturally in our own ways. We understand what it means in a non-intellectual way, and then teachings become really real for us. This is sometimes not so easy. Impermanence is scary. It’s about death, separation and loss. We get it intellectually, but when someone actually dies, it becomes real. We have to completely digest the dharma or else it’s just someone else’s ideas that we’ve heard about somewhere. Zazen is one of the ways that we study dharma; by sitting down and just inhabiting ourselves, we can have some direct experience of the complete working of reality. This isn’t dharma we memorize from a book, but dharma we find ourselves right in the middle of and just settle into. Thus we need the intellectual structure and conceptual understanding to lay the groundwork—otherwise we may have no direction in our practice. However, if we only have the book learning without actual practice, we can’t really completely enter into the teachings. When we’ve completely taken in and digested the dharma, we can function smoothly as a part of this one unified reality, without being bottlenecks or the things that gum up the works. We’re still ourselves, with all our personality, and we’re also seamless with everything around us, reflecting dharma in a pure way. Questions for reflection and discussion
Notes (1) The eight-spoke wheel has come to symbolize the dharma in our tradition because it represents the continuous spreading of the teachings to help people toward awakening. For instance, the eight-spoke wheel is the insignia for Buddhist chaplains in the US military. For further reading:
Mindfulness of Buddha is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] reflection of [the state of] Buddha is pure. 念佛是法明門、觀佛淨故. This week we move into a new section of the 108 gates: the six kinds of mindfulness, according to the Dīrghâgama, one of the four Āgamas, or divisions of the early Indian scriptures. The first of these is mindfulness of meritorious virtues of the Buddha. The Buddha was said to have nine virtues:
We can consider how Shakyamuni moved through the world and interacted with others, and take that as a model or inspiration for our own practice. To be free from defilements is to liberate ourselves from the things that cause suffering, beginning with the three poisons. Discovering and thoroughly understanding the four noble truths shows us the nature of suffering and how we can avoid it. Practicing our understanding and understanding our practice, as Sawaki Roshi used to say, means we know why we’re doing what we’re doing. Focusing our effort on liberation without distraction and paying attention to what we do with the information that comes in through the senses keeps us on the path. When our own practice and our own wisdom and compassion are well-grounded, we’re good teachers and leaders. Arising at the same time are the paramitas, things like generosity, truthfulness, loving kindness and equanimity. Who wouldn’t be inspired by meeting and practicing with someone who exhibited all of these virtues? Shakyamuni isn’t the only kind of Buddha we include in our tradition, and we ought to look at the nature of all three aspects of Buddha and see what else we can learn. As we know, the root of the word Buddha is “awake” and a Buddha is an awakened being. One is Shakyamuni Buddha, the historical figure that lived and taught in India 2500 years ago. However, once Shakyamuni died, his students had a problem. He was their only teacher, and they thought no one could become a second Buddha—but they remembered that he had taught them that whoever sees the dharma sees the Buddha. In the Vakkali Sutra, the Buddha has gone to visit a sick monk who says “For a long time I have wanted to come and set eyes on the Blessed One, but I had not the strength in this body.” Buddha says, “Enough, Vakkali! What is there to see in this vile body? He who sees the Dharma, Vakkali, sees me; he who sees me sees the Dharma. Truly seeing the Dharma, one sees me; seeing me one sees the Dharma.” (1) The Buddha would still be there as the teachings and as this one unified reality. After Shakyamuni’s death, his relics were enshrined in eight different sites in India. Eventually, figures and statues were made to represent him, and people made pilgrimages to important Buddhist sites to pay homage. Now the Buddha had three bodies: the physical body of Shakyamuni who died, the ongoing body of teachings and reality, and a continuing body as represented by statues and relics. Ultimately, however, the conclusion is that these three treasures can’t be separated—they’re all one reality. We call that view of the three treasures itai sanbou (一体三寳 one body, three treasures or absolute three treasures). Thus there’s an absolute Buddha that has no boundary and can’t be separated from anything else, but there’s also a historical or real-world manifestation (genzen sanbou 現前三寳; manifesting three treasures). This gen is the same as the character in genjokoan, meaning something that appears. In the case of Buddha, the manifesting treasure is Shakyamuni as a physical person that appeared in the world. Then there are the maintaining three treasures (juuji sanbou 住持三寶); again, in the case of Buddha, the images, statues or relics that symbolize him and that we can see and touch and practice with today—a maintained presence in this world.
If you’ve taken precepts or attended a precepts ceremony or the monthly ryaku fusatsu ceremony at Sanshin, you’ve heard Okumura Roshi or me read the Kyojukaimon, Dogen’s instructions on the precepts. Because we take refuge in the three treasures as part of those ceremonies, Dogen says a bit about them.
Let’s consider each of these kinds of Buddha. Shakyamuni, the person who lived in the world, was born a prince in the Shakya tribe about 2,500 years ago in a town called Lumbini, which is located in present-day Nepal. His family name was Gautama, and his given name was Siddhartha. He lived a rich and luxurious life as a prince, but was deeply troubled by the problem of suffering. Leaving home at the age of twenty-nine to become a monk, after six years of various ascetic practices with various teachers, he experienced awakening at the age of thirty-five. At that time, he became the “Buddha” (Awakened One). From that time on, he expounded various teachings, including the law of causality, or dependent origination, the impermanence of all things and, by extension, that all things are without fixed self-nature, and the four noble truths. The Buddha traveled and taught for the rest of his life, and it’s because he manifested his meritorious virtues, showed others how to practice, and taught the dharma that we’re still able to encounter these things today. That’s the manifesting Buddha treasure. Buddha’s relics and images are the maintaining Buddha treasure, things we can physically encounter in this world today. Relics are typically bones, hair or flesh, but when Shakyamuni died and was cremated, there were reportedly jewels among the remains. These were to go to the Shakya clan, but eight different kings demanded relics; they were then divided into portions and enshrined in stupas around India. There are many tales about how relics were dug up, moved around and enshrined in new places, about supernatural powers, and how when its time for the future Buddha, Maitreya, to appear, all the relics will gather under the bodhi tree and form themselves into his body. When that body disappears, then Maitreya will arrive. We’re more likely to encounter images or statues of Buddha than relics, but these didn’t exist until the 1st century CE. Artists didn’t want to show Buddha, someone who had completely crossed over to nirvana, in anthropomorphic form, so they used symbols like feet, a wheel, or a tree of life. Under Greek influence, artists started to make sculptures in the style of Greek portrayals of their gods: draped robes, wavy hair, sandals, leaf patterns, etc. mixed with Indian styles. These were realistic depictions in terms of form and proportion, and showed Buddha as divine human. Thereafter Buddha sculptures, as well as paintings and carvings, were subject to all the influences of the Silk Road and Asian cultures as Buddhism spread. We can include important Buddhist pilgrimage sites in this maintaining Buddha treasure. People go on pilgrimage to these places because they want to feel some physical proximity or contact with the Buddha. Venerating relics, viewing art, and visiting important places are all ways of maintaining contact. The absolute Buddha treasure is unsurpassible awakening. In the Heart Sutra we chant: With nothing to attain, a bodhisattva relies on prajna paramita and attains unsurpassed complete perfect enlightenment. Dogen Zenji called it shinjin datsuraku, dropping off body and mind. Suffice it to say here that unsurpassable awakening might be clearly seeing and understanding how things really are in this one unified reality. and at the same time not actually being a separate entity having some separate experience of that reality. We drop off body and mind in that we are no longer bound, constricted or cut off by our karmic conditioning and yet our karmic conditions don’t go away. We’re still humans with bodies and minds, but we see through our delusions and concepts and really get what that means. This is liberating all beings, or liberating self and others. Now that we know what Buddha is, what about this mindfulness of Buddha? The sense of this word mindfulness goes all the way back to the Pali smrti and makes its way through to the Japanese nen 念, “something that is remembered.” Mindfulness is not about focusing on one thing to the exclusion of all else and therefore somehow suppressing or blocking things we don’t want to think about. It’s about bearing something in mind—in this case, Buddha and his virtues—and not forgetting what Buddha is. There are many practices from around the Buddhist tradition for doing this, particularly related to the maintaining Buddha treasure. However, starting with the manifesting Buddha treasure, or Shakyamuni who lived in the world, there are stories of his life and written accounts of his teachings that we can read today and from which we can learn. What’s important is not only his explanation of the dharma, but the example of his life: how he lived, what he did, and how he interacted with others. He didn’t invent the dharma, because reality already existed and would have even if he hadn’t awakened to it, but he’s the one who made it possible for us to encounter the dharma today because he taught others who carried it on. We have three particular opportunities in a year to remember Shakyamuni. One is his birthday, which we celebrate at Sanshin on the Sunday closest to April 8. The second is his enlightenment day, on the Sunday closest to December 8 and which we lead up to with a weeklong sesshin. The third is the day he died, Nirvana Day, the Sunday closest to February 8. As for the maintaining Buddha treasure, the relics and figures, for example we chant the Shariraimon, the verse of homage to Buddha’s relics, at funerals. In Japan we did it when when we went to a person’s house right after he or she died and the family was doing the vigil, and we also did it at the gravesite, either when ashes were being interred or when we were holding memorial services later on. Verse of Homage to Buddha’s Relics (Shariraimon 舍利禮文) With wholehearted reverence we bow to the relics of the true body of the Tathagata, who is fully endowed with myriad virtues; to the dharma body which is the fundamental ground; and to his stupa, which is the whole universe. With deep respect we venerate the one who manifested a body for our sake. Through the sustaining power of the Buddha, which enters us even as we enter it, we verify awakening. By means of the Buddha’s spiritual power, we benefit living beings, arouse the thought of awakening, cultivate bodhisattva practice, and together enter perfect peace, the knowledge of the equality of all things. Now let us reverently bow. It’s interesting that while this is about the Buddha’s relics, we chant it for ordinary people. Ejo, Dogen’s main disciple and second abbot of Eiheiji, chanted it at Dogen’s funeral. There are supposed relics of Buddha all over the world. Here, we’re more likely to encounter statues or figures, particularly on altars. We make offerings and bow to these things, and it can look worshipful—and it can be, if that’s your practice. In North America, it’s more likely that these figures represent our aspiration and inspiration. When we have them around in our temples, Zen centers or homes, we remember to practice. We’re reminded that we’ve chosen and vowed to be on this path and to emulate the qualities of the Buddha. We’re reminded to set aside the small self and manifest our Buddha-nature. For some people, the creation of Buddha images is in itself a practice, but caring for them can also be a practice; we carry them with two hands, we don’t stack things on top of them, and we clean and dust them regularly with cloths dedicated to the purpose. We also recognize sutras as relics of Buddha—something he left behind when he died—and to treat them the same way by not putting them on the floor, for instance. In this way, we remain mindful of Buddha This eighth gate is telling us that if we bear in mind what buddha really is, we can more clearly reflect our own buddha nature, and we can maintain our aspiration to practice, to manifest awakening and not be sidetracked by the hindrances and delusions of our everyday samsaric life. It also helps us to remember that our zazen and our practice is not all about us, not purely for our own enjoyment or benefit. We can have a little gratitude for Shakyamuni and for all of the teachers and practitioners who came before us and made it possible for us to move towards awakening. It’s also not for our short-term gain or solely to help us get rid of pesky problems in our lives. Those things may happen, but this practice is about awakening to the same reality as Buddha and realizing (making real) our buddha nature as we move through the world, just as he did. Mindfulness of Buddha and what he awakened to can help keep us on the path. Our zazen is a reenactment of what Buddha did and the conditions into which he put himself in order to enable awakening. We sit this way because Buddha sat this way. We’re putting ourselves directly into the middle of Buddha’s awakening and carrying on Buddha’s practice, and in that way, zazen is the ultimate mindfulness of Buddha. Questions for reflection and discussion
For further reading
Pure conduct of the actions of the mind is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it eliminates the three poisons. 意行淨行是法明門、斷三毒故. This is the third gate related to the places we create karma. When we looked at actions of the mouth we saw that speech can lead to action, so it’s important to be careful about what we say. Likewise, thought can lead to speech that can lead to action, so the origin of this whole chain of events starts with the mind. If our thoughts are wholesome, we have magnanimous mind, nurturing mind and joyful mind, the three minds or sanshin 三心. In the Tenzo Kyokun, Dogen Zenji recommended that a person working to benefit all beings should maintain three mental attitudes: magnanimous mind (daishin 大心), nurturing mind (roushin 老心 ), and joyful mind (kishin 喜心). Magnanimous mind is like an ocean or a mountain: calm and steady, yet accepting and nourishing countless beings and situations without differentiation. The ocean is serene because it accepts the many rivers without resisting. Nurturing mind, literally “old mind,” is akin to the attitude of a kindly grandmother or parent who delights in caring for others. It is the spirit of the bodhisattva, the fully mature person. Joyful mind is the joy that comes from deep in our hearts even in the midst of difficulty. It arises from the insight of zazen, that we live together with all beings and are not separate. If our thoughts are unwholesome we have greed, anger and ignorance, the three poisons or sandoku 三毒, the opposite of sanshin. Greed, desire or craving (貪欲) is more than simply wanting what we want. It includes coveteousness, getting what we want at the expense of others, and continuing to be dissatisfied even after we have what we think we want. Hatred, anger or aversion (瞋恚) is about being angry at whatever we find disagreeable and ranges from minor irritation to outright hostility and malice. It’s considered to be one of the most powerful and fundamental afflictions that disturbs the human mind and brings about unwholesome states. Finally, ignorance (愚癡) is our condition when we lack the wisdom to see reality as it is and we make mistakes based on our delusion and preconceptions. These three poisons are a central element in Buddhist teaching; they lead to the craving that is the basis of suffering. In the Buddhist Wheel of Life, they’re right at the very center. The hub of the wheel shows a pig (ignorance), a bird (greed), and a snake (anger) each biting the tail of the one before. These three are not separate and can give rise to each other. Ignorance in particular is seen as the root of greed and anger. Right at the center of the human experience is the strong tendency of the three poisons to arise in our minds. This is the very root of our suffering and our being trapped in samsara. Okumura Roshi has written that zazen is like an acupuncture needle to heal the sickness caused by the three poisonous minds. In zazen, we stop creating karma with the three forms of behavior. We take the posture with the body and don’t take action based on our delusion or craving or aversion We don’t do any talking, so we can’t get into trouble there. We let go of thought and don’t get into a relationship with it that creates a subject (me) and object (my thought). We can see that zazen is way to purify body, speech and thought and although our karma is playing out while we sit, our intention is not to create any more. Okumura Roshi also warns us about creating another kind of poison with our zazen. If our motivation to practise is influenced by the three poisons, that is, if we practice for the sake of making this person more important, more powerful, more enlightened or for anything else, then it is motivated by greed: “I want to get this or that.” It may not be for wealth or power that we practice, but for something spiritual. If we practice in order to get something desirable, however, our zazen is generated by greed. It’s really hard to avoid this, isn’t it? We all came to practice because we wanted something for ourselves—and this stubborn clinging doesn’t mean we shouldn’t practice! Also, if we practise in order to escape from our present condition, then the practice is motivated by anger/hatred toward this condition. . . . We often call this “way-seeking mind”. But our way-seeking mind can be very deeply influenced by the three poisonous states. This is a strange contradiction. In order to practice to be free from the three poisonous states of mind, we need the three poisonous states of mind. (1) This is why we sometimes say that suffering is our friend, or suffering is necessary to practice. Of the six realms of samsara (gods, giants, humans, animals, hungry ghosts and hells), it’s said that the human realm is the only one in which we can practice, so we’re fortunate to be born in this form. If we were in a heavenly realm and believed that we were perfectly happy all the time, we would have no motivation to practice and see clearly. We have to use the three poisons to transcend the three poisons. This is enough of a challenge when it comes to ourselves as individuals. What about the potential for institutionalizing the three poisons in ways we don’t even realize? We can think of societies and institutions as our collective selves. If we are deluded and take action based on that delusion, we create causes and conditions for the perpetuation of that delusion. This is how karma keeps unfolding. David Loy has written a lot about this and he always points to three areas. He says the economic system is institutionalized greed. the military is institutionalized ill will, and mainstream media are institutionalized ignorance because their purpose is to profit from advertising rather than to educate and inform. (3) The whole question is really complicated and we can’t just decide to do away with these things and start over. To take this on, we have to look deeply into the meaning of well-being. What do we and all beings really need in order to be healthy and whole? Is that different than what we think we need? In a book called Blue Zones of Happiness (4), Dan Buettner outlines where in the world people are happiest and why, using various measures of life satisfaction. For instance, one finding is that more money does equal more happiness up to a point—but once basic needs are covered, plus enough to be comfortable, you’re not more happy with more money. You just have more stuff. There was a report in 1999 that said that the percentage of Americans who considered themselves happy peaked in 1957, even though consumption per person had more than doubled since then. Yet our economy is driven by production and consumption. If I make stuff, then I need to create a demand for it. If my job is to make widgets, then I need people to buy them if I’m going to keep my job and feed my family. This quickly becomes a discussion about right livelihood. Are my widgets contributing to quality of life for others? If they’re not but this is the job I can get, is that OK? When I make widgets, I buy supplies from other vendors, so I’m supporting their employees too. Because of interdepenence, these are tough questions. There are those who say that the legal system is institutionalized ill will because it incarcerates more people of color than whites, or that the military needs to justify its spending, so there always needs to be an enemy out there. It’s not only institutionalized ill will but reinforces the idea of separation—me and you, win and lose—that is at the heart of delusion. Of course, institutions are simply extensions of our own mindstate. If our intentions as individuals are wholesome, we tend to create wholesome institutions. If we are deluded, we can’t help but poison our institutions with our delusion. Again, these issues are not simple, but very complex. Environmental destruction is about both greed and ignorance, and discrimination is about all three. At the root of it all is fear—fear that our small selves are not enough as they are and are going to disappear in the shadow of someone else. So what do we do about all this? At the beginning of these comments, I made the point that the three poisons were part of the human condition, and that if we were somehow to be without the them then we couldn’t take this human form and we couldn’t practice. Rather than eliminating or eradicating the three poisons, our practice is to be free from the three poisons. Uchiyama roshi wrote, Since desires and cravings existing in human life are the cause of suffering, [we may] struggle to extinguish them and attain the bliss of nirvana. But isn’t seeking to get rid of pain and to attain the bliss of nirvana itself a desire or craving? Actually, this too is craving and precisely because of that the practitioner is caught in self-contradiction and can’t escape suffering. Since desires and cravings are actually a manifestation of the life force, there is no reason to hate them and try to extinguish them. And yet, if we become dragged around by them and chase after them, then our life becomes fogged over. It is not a matter of making great effort not to be dragged around by desires. It’s just waking up and returning to the reality of life that is essential. (1) Because of their vow to save all beings, bodhisattvas are not pulled by their karma and they don’t transmigrate through the realms of samsara based on three poisonous minds. As ordinary bodhisattvas, our job is to continue to function right in the middle of three poisons. After all, both samsara and nirvana are right here and there’s nowhere else to go. Three poisons come up because of our beginningless karma, but still we try not to create more. Pure conduct of the actions of the mind is seeing these three poisons come up and letting go of them moment after moment, rather than engaging with and perpetuating them. These three poisons are all self-centered or self-involved. Giving up the opportunity to do something that inflates the ego is one of the biggest bodhisattva activities there is. Job One is to see the urge to self-involvement coming up in the mind: sitting in the breakroom with your coworkers and looking for the chance to engage in name-dropping, humble-bragging, or subtly drawing attention to your expensive new phone. It starts with the thought and then goes on to speech and action. Passing up that opportunity for self-aggrandizement is a gift to other beings. Not doing something is sometimes as important as doing something when we’re working to save all beings. Okumura Roshi says, Letting go of our self-centered views in practice, we are freed from the three poisonous minds, supporting the entire network of interdependent origination as it supports us. If we’re not stuck in the delusion that there is a fixed self that needs defending, then three poisonous minds don’t arise. We can give up our self-involvement, and in that moment we heal the separation. However, this isn’t a linear process. Not giving rise to three poisonous minds means we don’t create separation between subject and object, but also, when we don’t create separation there’s no contact between subject and object that gives rise to the three poisonous minds. Separation and poison arise together because they’re dependent on each other. Questions for reflection and discussion
Further reading
Notes
(1) See Zazenshin: Acupuncture Needle of Zazen, article by Shohaku Okumura (2) See The Great Awakening by David Loy, Wisdom Publications, 1997. (3) Learn more at Blue Zones of Happiness. (4) Opening the Hand of Thought by Kosho Uchiyama. Wisdom Publications (2004) p. 76 Pure conduct of the actions of the mouth is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it eliminates the four evils. 口行淨行是法明門、斷四惡故. Last week we noted that harmful speech can also lead to unskillful action. Suffering leads to more suffering and the creation of more harmful karma for ourselves and others. Actions of the mouth are really a critical part of our practice and are connected to nearly everything else we do. This is not just about saying nice things to each other. The four evils (四惡 shiaku) to which this gate is pointing are lying, suppression of speech, abusive speech and duplicitous speech. These come from the traditional larger set of ten evils, in which the second is not suppression of speech but idle talk. Rather than lying, suppression of speech, abusive speech and duplicitous speech, the more frequent list is lying, idle or frivolous speech, harsh or abusive speech and divisive speech, like backbiting or malicious gossip. Not doing these four evils is what Right Speech means in the Eightfold Path. You might recognize this 悪 (aku, bad or evil) from the Shoaku Makusa fascicle of the Shobogenzo. Shoaku makusa is “not doing evil” and it’s the first line of a poem from the Dhammapada: Not doing of any evil / 諸悪莫作 / Shōaku makusa Doing of all good deeds / 衆善奉行 / Shu zen bu gyō Purification of one’s own mind / 自淨其意 Ji jō go i This is the teaching of all buddhas. / 是諸佛教 / Ze sho butsu kyō (1) When Okumura Roshi has talked about this poem, he has said that it contains two levels of teaching: we should do good and not do evil; and we should go beyond good and evil. What does that mean for these four evils related to actions of the mouth, or right speech? The first one is lying. On the surface, this seems pretty straightforward. The fourth precept tells us to abstain from speaking falsehood, and lying is about deceiving somebody, so that can’t be good, right? The most obvious way to interpret this teaching is to tell the truth and not use words to trick people or get something for yourself that you don’t really deserve. The precept came into being because food became scarce after a natural disaster, and some monks started telling people they were enlightened so they could get something to eat. Buddha put a stop to that behavior. However, we all know that there are times when the compassionate thing to do is not to express what we’re really seeing or feeling. What do you do when your loved one asks, “Do these pants make me look fat?” When little Bobby was expecting a new bike for his birthday, isn’t the kind thing to say, “Of course, Aunt Zelda, he loved the sweater you knit him for his birthday!”? Are those lies doing evil? They’re not true. At the same time, they completely express our reality in that moment, which is that we’re saying something not quite true because we’re trying to be compassionate. This gets us to the second kind of teaching Okumura Roshi is talking about when he says the Dhammapada verse is about both not doing evil and going beyond good and evil. Words are symbols for other things, not the things themselves, and in that way, all words are false. The only way to make sure you’re telling the truth is not to say anything. Words are how we poke our heads into stuff. It’s what we layer on top of the reality of this moment. By their nature, words carry our interpretations, ideas, delusions and confusions. Whether our speech is intended as a lie or not, on the one hand it’s a reflection of our own stuff. On the other hand, our speech can’t be separate from this one unified reality—it’s part of the reality or truth of this moment. Paying attention to what we’re saying and getting down to some insight about the real nature of lying is a gate of dharma illumination. The second evil, according to the older tradition, is idle talk, so let’s consider that. This is the kind of speech that just doesn’t really have any purpose. Maybe we notice men and women talking about each other—isn’t she pretty, and how about that guy? Perhaps there’s a classmate or coworker that just can’t keep from saying whatever comes into his head and seems to be engaged in conversation all the time. These folks could be talking just to make noise, or pass the time, or get noticed somehow. My mother used to call this "talking to hear your head roar." You might say that none of these things is really harmful, but they’re not really helpful, either. There’s some potential to stop paying attention and drift into something less wholesome, like gossip, exaggerating one’s own importance, or making fun of people. I would distinguish this from small talk designed to build relationships. Chatting with your friend as a way to enjoy being together and get caught up on what you’re doing and what you’re thinking about is not necessarily idle talk. When you meet someone for the first time and you start talking about the weather, you’re looking for common ground and a shared experience so you can get to know each other. On the other hand, idle talk doesn’t really care about the effect it’s having on the listener—it’s kind of selfish and all about me. We can ask ourselves, Is what I’m saying at all beneficial to the other person? Am I doing this with benevolence, or talking to hear my head roar? The second evil according to Dogen’s 108 Gates is suppression of speech. In a country like the US, where the First Amendment is a sacred document, this feels pretty relevant to us. Suppressing speech is usually an attempt to make something go away or to ignore some part of our reality. It’s just another way to create separation that doesn’t actually exist. The bottom line here, as always, is wholesomeness. What course of action leads to the amelioration of suffering or prevents it from arising? There are certain kinds of speech that have to be restricted for the benefit of people’s privacy, national security, or because slandering somebody is harmful. We don’t want to encourage people to say things that lead others to take unwholesome action. Curtailing this kind of speech can be said to lead to healthy circumstances or to prevent injury. However, suppressing speech because we don’t agree with the opinions being expressed allows us not to take responsibility for what happens when feel challenged. It’s a way to abrogate responsibility either for our own response to that speech or for engaging with the speaker. The speaker and the speech go away, my reaction goes away, and I can escape from those parts of reality. I can perpetuate my idea that my view is the one true way and I can have things just the way I want. Of course, this can happen on a national scale or in our own personal interactions. It’s a thorny thicket, deciding what kind of speech should be allowed in a healthy society or a healthy relationship—there’s no one good answer. Sometimes the best we can do is be aware that its tricky, and not assume that everyone has the same values, the same approach or the same idea about what’s dangerous. We can make effort to actually listen to what’s being said and acknowledge the person saying it, but we need to do that skillfully, without any idea of our own small self. It’s easy to convince ourselves that “I’m the bigger person, so I’m going to listen to this crackpot because I’m doing him or her a favor, or I’m trying to be nice.” That’s just about our own ego, and not so much about the reality of nonseparation. It’s really difficult sometimes not to engage in suppression of speech. No one wants to get hijacked and triggered. No one wants to be in a toxic situation. And what about suppressing our own speech? It’s also really difficult sometimes to say what needs to be said, but if these things are said with good-will, they’re helpful and it makes them a little easier to say. The third evil is abusive speech. The abuse being referred to here is slander, saying things about people that you know are not true in order to achieve your own ends. In other words, you’re misusing somebody for your own purposes. It would be pretty hard to think of a case where slander would not be harmful, certainly to the person being abused and also to the person doing the slandering, This is another of those cases where committing unwholesome acts brings the unwholesomeness right back home. Slander is about ill will, harmful intent, lying, self-involvement, and a whole raft of issues. It’s really not the work of a bodhisattva. We might engage in idle talk without realizing it in the moment if we’re not paying attention, but lying, slander and divisive speech are sins of intention. If we’re doing this stuff, we’re out to get our own way at all costs, no matter the effect on other beings. All of these intentional acts are based in fear—the fear that somehow we are not enough just as we are and we’re going to disappear. Fear is where suffering starts, so slander arises from suffering and results in suffering. I’m afraid of you, so I say something untrue about you. I’m angry at you for something you did to me that makes me feel weak and powerless, so I perpetuate some public lie about you so that I feel strong and powerful. Now you have to spend a lot of time cleaning up the mess, and if I’m found out as the one that started the rumors, then I have all of that mess to deal with myself. It’s an endless cycle, and even if there’s a short term gain, ultimately it’s not a stable, positive outcome. The fourth evil is duplicitous speech, the kind of speech intended to cause division. In a sangha, this is the kiss of death. Causing a schism is a major offense according to the Vinaya and gets one expelled from the sangha. This is not the same as a case where there is a real and legitimate difference of opinion about something among sangha members. If someone honestly suggests the sangha buy a new building and half the sangha agrees and the other half doesn’t, that’s not a problem. That’s a community carefully and skillfully considering its options. Duplicitous speech is aimed at getting people to fight with each other and break up the community, the team, the family or some other group. In the Vinaya, the examples are about arguments over interpretations of the teachings and practice. If two groups of monks are in honest disagreement about the dharma and are going along in good faith, it’s OK even if it results in a group splitting off and starting a new sangha. If the split happens because someone has knowingly misrepresented Buddha’s teaching just to create dissent, that’s unwholesome action. Slandering the Three Treasures also breaks the tenth precept. Duplicitous speech is clearly aimed at creating separation. We already know that separation is just our idea, so clearly things like malicious gossip are just aiding and abetting our delusion, trying to create separation where ultimately none really exists, and probably for some kind of personal gain for the small self. No good can come of it. Interestingly, the Buddha said that even in the event of a real schism, each side is still to treat the other with care and respect, even while there may be some investigation into what’s really happening. He even taught about how to choose sides—he said we should always be on the side of the dharma. Which side is acting on behalf of the dharma? That’s not always clear in any disagreement. Which side is working for wholesomeness? Both might actually intend to do good. In the case of someone actively sowing dissention with his or her speech with the intent to cause harm, our job is to be on the side of ameliorating suffering for the largest possible number of beings, not leaving out ourselves and the person creating the division. When we sit down on the cushion and don’t say anything, we are not able to commit these four evils. The challenge is, how do we avoid them once we get up? We think of zazen as connected to awakening, but can our speech really be a gate of dharma illumination? As bodhisattvas, our speech can lead people to awakening or hold them back. Questions for reflection and discussion
Right conduct of the actions of the body is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] the three forms of behavior are pure. 身行正行是法明門、三業淨故. It would be easy to think that Zen practice is mainly about what goes on in our heads. We put so much emphasis on zazen and opening the hand of thought that we can forget that our existence in the human realm includes a human body. What we do with this body isn’t an afterthought, or a poor cousin to what we do with our brains. It’s a crucial element of our practice. First we need to understand what we mean by the body in Buddhism. It’s said that this thing we call “I” is made up of five skandhas, or aggregates: form, feeling, perception, formation and consciousness. The first four are elements of the body (Skt. rupa), while the fifth is an element of the mind (Skt. nama). We can see that within this namarupa, body and mind are not really separate, though we can provisionally talk about them individually. However, body and self are not the same; the self is created when somehow the five skandhas begin clinging to themselves and writing a story about a “me” that is independent and permanent, even though the five skandhas, like all conditioned things, are impermanent and constantly changing. Early Buddhists rejected the body as the source of distraction and defilement. Human beings tend to cling to or avoid what comes in through the senses, and that desire is the basis for suffering. Being free from the body meant being free from the ongoing transmigration through the realms of samsara, leaping off of the wheel of birth and death and arriving in Nirvana. Soto Zen, on the other hand, sees the body as the ground of our practice and not as something to be rejected. We still need to deal with what comes in through the senses, but not by detaching from them. Instead, we make effort to see clearly what’s arising, without judgement or attachment, and make good decisions about the actions we take based on what we feel and perceive. Carrying out bodily activities without defilement is one of the ten kinds of karmic activity described in the Avatamsaka Sutra. (1) This sutra provides extensive guidance to the conduct of the bodhisattva and also includes a lovely section called the Vows of Good Conduct (Bhadracaripraṇidhāna). These are the preaching of Samantabhadra (sometimes known as Bodhisattva Universal Worthy), who is the bodhisattva of practice activity and an important figure in Zen; you may recognize him from the names of buddhas and bodhisattvas we chant at the beginning of ryaku fusatsu or during formal meals. Samantabhadra’s ten vows of good conduct are:
All of these are actions of the body that are done without defilement. In other words, when carried out sincerely and based on wisdom and compassion rather than on greed, anger and ignorance, these vows are completely fulfilled. However, humans being what we are, we will make mistakes despite our best intentions. That’s why repentence partners with vow as an important part of our practice. In fact, our repentance verse also comes from Samantabhadra’s teachings in this sutra: For all the evil deeds I have done in the past Created by my body, mouth, and mind, From beginningless greed, anger, and delusion, I now know shame and repent of them all. (2) That brings us to the second part of this week’s gate statement, the three forms of behavior. These are the actions of body, speech and thought, or sangō 三業, the three things we use to create karma. (The next two gates take up actions of the mouth and actions of the mind.) A lot of our sticky, knotted-up karma comes from stuff we do without paying attention. It’s our habituated thinking, speaking and action. Nonetheless, we have to take responsibility for it and try to do something different and more wholesome in the next moment. Ultimately, right conduct of the actions of the body means that all three—body, speech and mind—are wholesome and without defilement. That’s because, when we create karma, that process starts with thought. We have some deluded thought that arises because of our ignorance about the true nature of reality, We think we need to get something, or get away from something, because we don’t understand the real nature of the self. Based on that deluded thought, we may engage in some kind of harmful speech; we get angry and we say something unkind or not quite true, or designed to get something for ourselves at the expense of someone else. That harmful speech can also lead to unskillful action. Conflict can escalate from just words to physical violence. I tell a lie, and then I have to take more and more steps to cover it up. The whole thing starts to spiral, and suffering leads to more suffering and the creation of more harmful karma for myself and others. At the root of this whole process is intention or volition. The Sanskrit word is cetana. Intention is what bridges the gap between craving or aversion and actually carrying out the actions of getting that thing we want or escaping from that thing we don’t want. I see you have a piece of cherry pie. I think I want it. Based on that craving, I intend on some level to do something about getting the pie. I tell you that your teacher wants to see you in his study, and when you’re out of the room, I help myself to your pie. Some argument probably happens when you find out what I did. After that, who knows? This small internal personal craving has passed through mind and speech to become a harmful action of the body with consequences and suffering for others. Along with the wisdom and compassion that arise from the pure mind, we’re guided away from carrying out harmful actions of body, speech and mind by Buddhism’s system of ethics or moral codes. The elements of the Eightfold Path form three groupings: wisdom (prajna), ethics (sila) and concentration (samadhi). Under ethics or morality, we find Right Speech, Right Action and Right Livelihood. In the early teachings, Right Action was mainly about not killing, not stealing and not engaging in sexual misconduct. Likewise, Right Speech and Right Livelihood are related to the way we use the body to carry out activity in the world. All of these are about not using the body to break precepts. Of course not harming others with our own delusion-based conduct is a good thing, but we’re also saving ourselves from harm. One potential outcome of our unwholesome action for ourselves is that we’re setting up a karmic pattern in which we may be predisposed to repeat the action. We can build harmful habits that make unskillful action the default. If I steal once, it’s easier to steal again. If I cheat on my partner once, it’s easier to do it again. It’s harder to break a longstanding chain of improper conduct, even when we see the process and what’s arising. Better by far to keep new bad habits from forming. The body is the ground of our practice and our life. There’s nowhere else we can practice and nowhere else we can live. Our practice is not about ignoring or subjugating the body in order to reach a purified state; as we’ve seen at previous gates, there is nothing inherently pure or impure about any conditioned thing we encounter. The issue is our response to it. It’s important to strike a balance between taking care of the body in a healthy way and becoming attached to it as a way to satisfy the cravings of the small self. We can either make wholesome choices with the body that lead to awakening and to a lessening of suffering in the world, or we can make unwholesome choices that lead to more delusion and suffering. What we do with the body is our last chance to head off the chain of unskillfulness that begins with thought. Deluded thoughts arise, but if we don’t turn them into harmful speech or harmful action and spill them onto others, they remain our own delusion. Right conduct of the body at least can serve as a firewall, keeping our delusion from leaking out into the world quite so much. In that way, actions of body, speech and mind don’t result in so much additional suffering and unfortunate karma. One of the patterns that we notice in our practice is that there are often teachings about what not to do, but refraining from these unwholesome things isn’t enough; we also have to actively cultivate their opposites, as Samantabhadra vows to do. Because the body is the ground of practice, it can play a positive role in making awakening possible and alleviating suffering for ourselves and others. Keeping the precepts means we’re no threat to anyone else’s life, property or well-being and builds trust, respect and security. Buddhist ethics are about heading off negative karma by restraining ourselves and creating positive conditions that bring harmony to everyone to avoid violence and harm. And, it’s not enough just to do good ourselves; we are to encourage others toward right conduct as well. Buddha said that it’s not enough just for us not to kill or steal; we’re to encourage others not to kill or steal. It’s also not enough to encourage others toward right conduct and then not practice it ourselves. As the sutra says, that would be like a blind person painting a picture for others that he can’t see for himself. All of our actions become practice and are embodiments of our Buddha nature. That’s right conduct of the body in its purest form, where body speech and mind are free from defilement. Right conduct isn’t only a manifestation of Buddha nature; it can also help prepare the ground for our expression of that True Self. When we keep precepts, we create a settled, safe and stable atmosphere for ourselves and others. Once we can settle down and open the hand of thought, we can start to see through our delusions. When we begin to loosen the grip of craving, aversion and small self, we’re much better able to act skillfully in the world. That skillful action perpetuates trust and stability and enables further practice. Questions for reflection and discussion
Further reading The Avatamsaka Sutra. Another translation of selected sections is here. More on Samantabhadra. Notes
(1) The other nine are carrying out activities of speech and mind without defilement, being reborn as one intends, knowing the many different desires, understandings, boundaries and karmic activities of sentient beings, knowing the formation and disintegration of the world, and mastery of oneʼs own spiritual footing so that what is practiced is unobstructed. These are from Chapter 15, section 5.8 of the Avatamsaka Sutra. (2) Chapter 40 of the Avatamsaka (or Flower Garland) Sutra. Love and cheerfulness are a gate of Dharma illumination; for they make the mind pure. 愛樂是法明門、令心淨故. While the first two kanji can indeed be translated “love” and “cheerfulness,” respectively, taken together they mean to delight in or enjoy something. Although the kanji translated “delight” in the last gate statement are different ones (歡喜), we can see how this week’s gate carries on the conversation. However, the particular feeling of 愛樂 in a Buddhist context is a love of the good or wholesome, so this gate is not validating our inclination to indulge in anything and everything that takes our fancy. It’s encouraging us to enjoy the things born not from delusion and the three poisons but from wisdom and compassion. For instance, in the Ariyapariyesanā-sutta, Shakyamuni has left his early teachers and continued his search for the truth of suffering when he comes upon a patch of ground that he later describes as delightful, using the same terms as our gate statement. He finds the grove charming and the river clear with smooth banks, and notes that there’s a village nearby where he can collect alms. He decides that this is a place that can support his practice in a good and wholesome way. Thus his very real enjoyment of the spot is not based on clinging and self-indulgence, but on recognizing what’s needed to enable him to cultivate wisdom and compassion. It might be hard to imagine an enjoyment that is not about self-indulgence. So much of our pleasure comes from gratifying our desires. How can we be happy in a way that’s not about chasing and getting what we personally want? How can we take delight in what’s already here rather than pushing all of our hopes of happiness into the future, when this or that will happen or appear or resolve? Certainly, it’s satisfying to work toward a goal and achieve it, and there’s nothing wrong with that. But what’s going on in our lives in the meantime? Is there any contentment there, and from where does it come? There is indeed a joy to be had in our day to day samsaric world that recognizes the fulfillment of jijuyu zammai, the totally interpenetrated functioning of the universe as it is. This kind of joy doesn’t discount or negate the pleasure we feel as human beings in getting an award, relaxing with a good cup of coffee, watching an exciting movie with friends or sucessfully finishing a home improvement project. Those feelings and experiences are real and fine. It’s just that that’s not the only kind of enjoyment there is. There is also the stable and ever-present joy that comes from deeply understanding that we and all beings are supported by the entire universe, and that we have something of value to offer in return. This is the selfless sort of enjoyment that goes with the pure mind. This might sound like a lot of Pollyanna, hearts-and-flowers stuff that doesn’t have its feet in the real world. Yeah, sure, everything’s fine. I should be enjoying shoveling snow and missing the bus and having a sore throat. Who are you kidding? Just as this gate doesn’t deny us the fun of pleasant experiences, it doesn’t deny the aggravation and downright unpleasantness of some things we encounter. It does ask us to look underneath those affronts to our expectations and see whether this moment is truly and completely irredeemable. Yes, the human experience is characterized by suffering. Is that all? My dharma grandfather, Kosho Uchiyama Roshi, told a story about a Buddhist clergyman who had to have both legs amputated at the knee as a result of several tragedies. Somehow he was ultimately able to see that in reality there was no before and after, no way to compare his situation at that moment with his previous life with two healthy legs or with his future as an amputee. “The pivotal point for him was that he chose to think: ‘Today, at this moment, I am born.’ One could think, ‘I was born with both legs, then I was drafted and forced to go to war. Because we lost the war, I was set to Siberia as a prisoner. On the way, my legs got frostbitten and I had to have both of them amputated.’ If we think of this sequence of events, it’s too painful even to cry. We will be infinitely vexed and miserable. However, Reverend Ozawa chose to think that he was born today, this moment, without legs. That was the the turning point for him, to live with a bright and cheerful attitude. This is not a idealistic story but his own actual experience. Reverend Ozawa’s saying, ‘Today, this moment, I am born,’ carries infinite weight.” (1) Being born moment after moment, can we fully enjoy this moment in its entirety? The past has gone and the future has not yet come. Certainly, our karmic past has shaped this moment, but we can’t reach back and change anything. We can only act in this moment; this is the only position from which we can work. Clinging to regrets about the past or apprehensions about the future can lead to dissatisfaction with present because we can’t see and appreciate it in its entirety. Confronting life-changing circumstances isn’t our only opportunity to consider the nature of real enjoyment. At Sanshin, we sometimes eat breakfast in the formal way used in training temples (senmon sodo) in Japan. The bowl sets we use are called oryoki, which means a container that holds an appropriate amount. We handle the bowls, utensils and food according to a prescribed set of forms while chanting several verses. The food offering verse says, “This morning meal of ten benefits nourishes us in our practice. Its rewards are boundless, filling us with ease and joy.” (Se jiki ge shu yu jiri nyoi an jin kohō buhen kyu kin jo ra. 施食偈 粥有十利 饒益行人 果報生天 究竟常樂.) The tenzo, or cook, has made an effort to serve foods of five colors and six flavors that have been cooked in a variety of ways. In addition to appreciating the visually appealing, delicious and nutritious meal for the enjoyment it gives us, we can also take delight in its ability to enable our practice—even if one of those dishes is something we would not choose to eat elsewhere. This is particularly true during sesshin, or intensive retreats. Sesshin at Sanshin consist only of fourteen 50-minute periods of zazen, three formal silent meals, and a moderate night’s sleep. It’s very easy to turn meals into entertainment when they are one of the few sources of sensory input we encounter in the zendo, but the tenzo’s job is to feed our bodies so we can practice, rather than our imaginations so that we can spend the next few hours of zazen writing stories about our relationship with the food. Meals should certainly be appealing, but they also have to be easy to manage using oryoki and not cause discomfort and distraction for practitioners during zazen. Tenzos need the wisdom and compassion to take care of our practice. This mind of ease and joy continues to permeate our activity as we return to zazen. Zazen seems to be a very simple practice in we do only four things: take the posture, breathe softly and deeply through the nose, keep the eyes open, and open the hand of thought. When you tell your family and friends that you’re off to the zendo for practice, they (and you, for their benefit) may describe that activity as “meditation.” However, in Soto Zen, of course, zazen is not meditation. We are not cogitating on some topic or seeking to remedy a problem, which are the oldest meanings of the word. We’re also not engaged in a mental exercise designed to bring about a special state of spiritual attainment. We’re simply resting in this moment and taking delight in things as they are. As Dogen wrote in the Fukanzazengi (Universally Recommended Instructions for Zazen), “The zazen I speak of is not meditation practice. It is simply the Dharma-gate of joyful ease (唯是安樂之法門也), the practice-realization of totally culminated enlightenment.” Back at Gate 2 we considered the nature of pure mind, and we saw that we cultivate purity when we’re guided by wisdom and let go of our delusions and attachments. In general, defilement is what happens when we don’t see the universe clearly and we take action based on greed, anger and ignorance that creates suffering for ourselves and others. This gate intersects that pure mind with enjoyment of that which is good and wholesome. How are these two things connected? Let’s look again at our examples of formal meals and zazen. Just as we may do with money, alcohol, sex, technology, or power, we can form either healthy or unhealthy attachments to food and our ideas about it, even though the food itself is neither pure nor impure. The tenzo can try to position himself as the culinary hero, providing extravagant impressive meals under the guise of creating a compassionate, wonderful experience for practitioners. Recipients can sniff appealing aromas coming from the kitchen and fantasize about what will be on offer, recall how good Grandma’s version of that dish always was, and begin planning next Thanksgiving’s dinner menu. On the other hand, they may disagree with the tenzo’s notion of what an appealing or appropriate meal is and start criticizing even before the food is served. All of these extra activities take people away from the here and now and perpetuate deluded, habituated thinking. If pure mind is the mind guided by generosity, kindness and wisdom—the flip sides of the three poisons—then the mind attached to food in an unwholesome way is not it, and is not in a position to take delight in that which is healthy and good. Yet this happens all the time, and it’s based on misunderstanding the nature of self and what it really needs. What about zazen? Is it really possible to enjoy long periods of time sitting on a cushion and looking at a wall? If my practice is driven by trying to satisfy the desires of the small self, possibly not, because every period will be taken up with the need to outshine other sangha members, have a peak experience, become someone I like better, or otherwise get some personal reward. If my sitting is driven simply by my aspiration to sit, then there’s no question of meeting or not meeting a goal. I can simply settle down into the ease and joy Dogen describes. “Zazen is good for nothing” is Okumura Roshi’s famous translation of an expression (“beyond gain and beyond satori” mushotoku-mushogo 無所得 – 無所悟]) used frequently by his dharma grandfather, Kodo Sawaki. This simple phrase is a distillation of the essence of shikantaza, and all of our dharma study comes back to “zazen is good for nothing” in some way. Our problems begin when we follow our natural human tendency to look for meaning in our activities. We usually don’t do anything, or enjoy anything, without knowing the point of that action, so it seems counterintuitive to engage in sitting just for its own sake and take delight in it just because it’s wholesome. We can say “Zazen is good for nothing,” but we can also just stop at “Zazen is good.” Good is good enough. It doesn’t need anything else. Questions for reflection and discussion
Further reading and watching
Notes (1) Kosho Uchiyama, “Uchiyama Roshi’s Teisho on Genjo koan,” Dogen’s Genjo Koan: Three Commentaries. Counterpoint, 2013. P. 194 Delight is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it is the mind of peace and tranquility. 歡喜是法明門、安穩心故。 Joy, happiness or delight—what a satisfying result for which to aim in our practice! Surely practice can fix all the things that make us unhappy and point us toward a pure paradise where life is beautiful all the time. Isn’t that what it means to liberate ourselves and all beings from suffering? First, we need to ask ourselves what happiness is, exactly. Having an abundance of chocolate cake or social media likes? Getting rid of the noisy neighbors? Knowing that we’ve paid our income taxes for this year and we don’t have to worry about them for another twelve months? Indeed, if and when those things happen, we’ll probably feel pretty good—at least, for awhile. But soon we’ll be off on a quest for the next thing that will bring delight when it either shows up in our lives or exits stage right. Somehow, we always want things to be different from the way they are. This, of course, is Buddha’s first and second noble truth: human life is charactized by the suffering that comes with chasing after things and running away from things. So, from where does deep and sustainable delight really come, and how do we get our hands on it? The good news is that it’s already here, if we know how to find it. Practice is about knowing how to find delight here and now, not about getting better at acquiring things from somewhere else. Being able to experience delight is a good indication that we’re also experiencing peace and tranquility. The Sanskrit word at the basis of these elements means that the body and mind are at ease or at rest, and things are stable and safe. It’s the opposite of agitation and anxiety. We need to be tranquil in order to experience real delight. Thrill-seeking might seem fun or rewarding for the moment, but doesn’t lead to lasting happiness. Also, of course, if we’re agitated because we’re angry or fearful we can’t experience delight either. We might characterize all of these things as disturbance. Peace and tranquility is freedom from disturbance. That doesn’t mean we remain perfectly still and silent all the time, or that we can’t dance or sing or cry or engage in whatever is happening in this moment. It means we can do all of those things and yet not be disturbed. When we’re not disturbed we have peace, and when we have peace, then delight can arise. How do we keep from being disturbed? We avoid grasping and judging. As soon as I grab something, give it a name, decide whether it’s a good or bad thing for me, I have disturbance. Can we encounter each thing as it is, engage with it appropriately and let go of it and move on? If so, we can be delighted with whatever we’re doing and whatever circumstance we’re in. Avoiding disturbance is not becoming inert or passive. It’s not about separating ourselves from what’s happening or protecting our equanimity by being stand-off-ish. We’re wholeheartedly entering into this moment and this reality, and everything that it presents. We can be Jizo Bodhisattvas going into hell, and still we can stand up straight, and still delight can arise. Balancing the cultivation of tranquility with the need to carry out our activities in the world—in other words, experiencing delight without disturbance—is a key point of practice at Sanshin. It comes to us directly from Uchiyama Roshi’s life experience as a Japanese who was born at the beginning of the Taisho era (1912). In the Tokugawa era (1600-1868), Japan was closed to outside influences, social classes were fixed, a centralized government held power, the size of the population was stable and there was little change. Fixed social classes meant that there was no competition or freedom of choice. A stable population required no advances in agriculture to feed a growing number of people. Without competition, there was peace of mind. Instead of going toward development and progress, energy went into refining the culture, increasing sophistication and elevating its aesthetics. During the Meiji era (1868-1912), Japan began to be influenced by Western ideas about organization and government as well as science and technology. It had to study and adopt these Western forms of progress so that it wouldn’t be left behind or swallowed up as a Western colony, but peace of mind was lost as a result. Uchiyama Roshi witnessed the effects of this change, and this experience prompted his question: how do we find a balance between progress and peace of mind? He considered how Japan was to integrate its serene traditional culture with more driven Western development. He studied Western philosophy and Christianity as well as Buddhism in an effort to come to an understanding, and he concluded that the bodhisattva path and working hard for all beings rather than oneself was the answer. The exploration of this question of balance is the topic of his well-known book Opening the Hand of Thought. Progress can encourage competition, and the result of competition is a few winners and many losers. Winners have power and money and sit at the top of the pyramid. However, Uchiyama Roshi says that there are no real winners because achieving power and money leads to disturbance and suffering: fear of loss and no peace of mind. If we turn our efforts to working for all beings’ benefit and development rather than competing for our own gain, we harness the energy of our discovery, innovation and building for the creation of wholesomeness and liberation from suffering. We experience delight. We live with a day-to-day tension between chasing after or escaping from things and avoiding taking any action at all in order to remain calm. Uchiyama Roshi points out that this same tension exists in our practice of zazen. While we’re aiming for nonthinking, we are usually wobbling between sleeping and thinking or, as Dogen puts it in the Fukanzazengi, dullness and distraction. Shikantaza gives us the opportunity to put ourselves into the intersection of peace and progress and see what’s there. We can do this not only during zazen but also in the midst of work and study. One of my dharma teacher friends once asked her sangha to consider what makes up a skillful attitude toward work. “If I can’t have fun vaccuuming,” she asked, ”when will I have fun?” If we can just vaccuum without grumbling, delight can arise, and it’s not delight at having a clean carpet. That kind of response is still based on attachment. There’s no need to look for the silver lining or to make things OK, to convince ourselves of the virtues or qualities of our circumstances in order to justify our activity. That’s just another place to get stuck. The term translated as delight in the gate statement is 歓喜 kanki. Both kanji mean joy or delight. A related term is 随喜 zuiki, the delight of participating in practice. 随 Zui means through or during, so the feeling of this term is delight while engaged in something. It comes from Chapter 18 of the Lotus Sutra, “The Merit of Appropriate Joy.” This section describes various incidences of someone hearing the dharma, experiencing delight, and then sharing the dharma with others: the delight of participating in practice. Traditionally, there are four ways to engage with the dharma: hearing, teaching, reading and reciting or chanting. When we hear the dharma and start to practice, we can begin to see how we create suffering in ourselves and others with our greed, anger and ignorance, and over time we may get better at heading off this kind of disturbance. We may become more peaceful and tranquil, and more likely to respond to dharma practice by experiencing delight. Whether we’re hearing a talk, helping others with their practice, reading a dharma book or participating in a service, delight can arise naturally. When there’s a lot of static in our lives, it’s harder to take in the teachings and really be aware of what’s happening in our bodies and minds. On the other hand, when we aren’t agitated, the dharma can get in, it can help us calm down and experience delight, we can practice, and continue to take in more dharma. The more dharma, the more delight! This delight is not about our personal happiness, so we’re able to take it into the world for the benefit of others. For instance, in Dogen Zenji’s Tenzo Kyokun, we find, “When tenzos are engaged in cooking, although they encounter coarse [ingredients] they should not arouse negligence; although they encounter delicacies they should be all the more diligent. Therefore, to fulfill these duties for one day and one night is to delight in participating in practice.” (1) To not judge ingredients, to have equanimity while working in the kitchen or anywhere in our lives, is to delight in participating in practice and to be able to benefit others. Okumura Roshi explains this unselfish delight in Chapter 1 of Living by Vow when he writes about the informal meal chant: “As we take food and drink, I vow with all beings to rejoice in zazen, being filled with delight in the dharma.” In Japanese, we say Nyaku onjiki ji tougan shujou, zennetsu ijiki houki juman. Delight in the dharma is houki (法喜), literally dharma delight. Yup, it’s the same ki as kanki and zuiki. Okumura Roshi wrotes, “When we eat, we should be happy. This happiness is the enjoyment of dharma. We consider the taste of food to be the taste of dharma. When we receive or eat a meal, we shouldn’t grasp the taste. Usually when we eat, we encounter our food with our desires. These desires are the cause of delusion or samsara. The Buddha and Dogen Zenji teach us to become free from desires caused by objects. This is Dogen’s teaching of shinjin datsuraku, or dropping off body and mind. Our joy when we receive food is not the fulfillment of our desire. It is the joy of dharma and zazen. I think this is the most essential teaching about food and eating.” (2) In zazen we just observe our desires and delusions coming up without acting on them. It’s a great chance to create the conditions for delight to arise because the heart and mind settle down. A genuine selfless delight is an indication of some degree of tranquility and an encouragement to our practice—thus it becomes a gate of dharma illumination. Questions for reflection and discussion
Further reading and listening
Notes (1) Dogen’s Pure Standards for the Zen Community, translated by Shohaku Okumura and Taigen Leighton. State University of New York Press; Annotated edition (1995). (2) Living by Vow by Shohaku Okumura, Wisdom Publications (2012), p. 106. Pure Mind is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] there is no defilement. 淨心是法明門、無濁穢故。 In the last gate we considered the role of faith in our practice. In fact, faith is one of the elements that purifies the mind. Okumura Roshi explains that in the Abhidharmakośa, one word for faith is 心澄淨, shin chojo, the heart/mind that is pure or clear. “According to that text, shin [heart/mind] is like a jewel. It’s said that in India when monks travelled and had to drink water from rivers or ponds— I don’t know if this is true or not— there were certain jewels which when put in the muddy water, settled the mud down and then the surface of the water became pure. This mud is our doubt or delusions. If there is faith, our delusions or our doubts go down and our life becomes clear and pure, and we can drink. Faith is not a belief in some kind of a system of belief or a doctrine we have to accept, like in many religions. Faith is something which makes our minds pure and clear.” (1) This gate introduces two very important words in the Buddhist tradition: pure and mind. 淨 is clean or pure, with a connotation of being untainted or undefiled. 心 is mind, but not the usual intellectual mind that functions in the brain. Both of these words have several important layers of meaning. First we need to understand what purity is, and we need to understand it from the perspective of both the concrete world of our human practice and the world of emptiness. In general, defilement is what happens when we don’t see the universe clearly and we take action based on greed, anger and ignorance that creates suffering for ourselves and others. On the other hand, we cultivate purity when we’re guided by wisdom and let go of our delusions and attachments. Our tradition includes things like the Three Pure Precepts and the Pure Standards for the Zen Community. These are guidelines for behavior that move us toward being in the world in a way that’s based on letting go of clinging, treating others with benevolence, and seeing clearly that the universe is characterized by interconnectedness, impermanence, and the lack of a fixed and independent self-nature. We can see that purity can be found in the everyday things and situations we encounter. We don’t need to go somewhere else and leave the dusty world behind in search of a paradise. Simply letting go of the three poisons here and now is itself purity. Some practitioners have the idea that money, for instance, is tainted and if the dharma center is concerned with it then somehow the practice is defiled. Money itself is neither pure nor defiled, but our response to and relationship with money can certainly be a problem if we greet and treat it with craving or aversion. The same is true, of course, for anything: alcohol, sex, technology, power, or other items that bring up strong feelings. These encounters give us important opportunities to observe our habituated thinking and do some discernment about how the three poisons arise, lead to delusion and defilement, and perpetuate suffering. Purity from the perspective of emptiness, on the other hand, is not about individual objects or circumstances. In the world of the absolute, there is only this one unified reality, and nothing can step outside of it and be separate. If everything is interconnected, then there’s no way to separate things that are pure from things that are defiled. This is going beyond purity and defilement, or wholesomeness or unwholesomeness, or good and bad. Much as we may not want this or that element in our lives, as beings who live in this one unified reality, there’s no escaping from things we don’t like. If we see with the eyes of Buddha, there’s no way to cut ourselves off from anything or, indeed, to make any distinction between good and bad or like and dislike. It can be easy to decide that this is where we really want to live: in a place where everything is always OK and we don’t need to do anything because there’s no defilement—but that doesn’t mean that there’s no suffering. The first noble truth says that life is characteized by suffering. That means that as bodhisattvas, we can’t ignore the dusty world and our vow to liberate beings, and live only for ourselves in paradise. Falling into either the world of form or the world of emptiness is seeing only part of the story of reality. You may know about the well-known image of the pure lotus that blooms in muddy water. Although the lovely flower lifts itself up to bloom at the surface of the pond, its roots are deep in the mud. It’s an image of the Buddha, who overcame the delusions of the world but continued to exist in the world without being defiled himself. It’s an example for us as we carry out our daily activities with wisdom and compassion. No task or object is itself unclean if we can do that task or handle that object with a skillful attitude. Now we have to take a look at Mind. There’s no one word in English that serves as a good translation for 心 shin (Ch. xin), so it’s often called the heart-mind. When the Chinese began translating sutras from Sanskrit, they used xin for Sanskrit terms like citta, manas, and vijnana. All of these refer to various consciousnesses in the Yogacara tradition, from which Zen can be said to descend, and in that way xin/shin takes on a psychological association. However, xin/shin was also used for the Sanskrit hrdaya, which can mean heart, center, or essence. Xin/shin as citta is in the realm of subject and object and making distinctions, while xin/shin as hrdaya means all dharmas in this one unified reality. No wonder we have some confusion over what exactly our ancestors are talking about. Mind is not a “thing” that can be grasped or completely and accurately described because as soon as one conceives of it, one is dealing with a copy of Mind itself. Mind is the action of experiencing this moment in the most simple, direct, pure and authentic way, completely without the covering of the individual perspective and before the personal thinking apparatus begins to color and shape that experience. Mind has no starting point or frame of reference—it’s living in the highest degree of non-attachment. As Dogen described it in Shobogenzo Bukkyo, it’s the characters of the sutra without the paper on which they’re written. Uchiyama Roshi explained that “mind” in the context of the dharma should be understood as “the mind that has been directly transmitted from buddha to buddha [and which] extends throughout all phenomena, and [thus] all phenomena are inseparable from that mind. My personal life experience is at the same time the world of reality. Conversely, the world of reality constitutes my mind. Hence, the use of the word ‘mind’ in this case goes far beyond having only a mental or psychological meaning. In our age, perhaps ‘pure life’ would be a clearer expression than mind. In the daily course of things I encounter a world of phenomena, and it is through those encounters and my experience of them that I live out my life.” (2) We can see how mind in this context encompasses the functioning of the entire universe in this moment. We use the psychological mind to make sense of what’s coming in through the six sense gates, but we don’t get tangled up in the idea that there are separate elements “out there” living a life unconnected to our own. The reality of life experience is just one thing and can’t be divided, even though it contains myriad objects. Uchiyama Roshi’s “pure life” and our gate statement’s “pure Mind” are two ways of expressing the same thing. The universe functions as it functions, without hindrance, and we see it clearly, both from the point of view of individual elements with characteristics and the point of view of emptiness and going beyond distinction. When Dogen wrote about the mind in Shobogenzo Sokushinzebutsu (The Mind Itself is Buddha), he wrote about shin as hrdaya. “The mind that has been correctly transmitted is the one mind… and all dharmas are one mind. The mind is mountains, rivers, and the great earth; the sun, the moon, and stars.” Clearly, this is not about the small, personal, psychological mind. It’s about the essential interconnectedness of all dharmas, with nothing left out and nothing arising and existing on its own. If there is nothing outside of this one unified reality, and the nature of dharmas is to be interpenetrated, then our usual ideas about purity and defilement don’t hold water. One thing cannot be separated into good and bad, tainted and stainless, pure and defiled. There can be neither a pure mind nor an impure mind. Yet, since the earliest days of Buddhist practice, teachers have been urging us to remove mental defilements and instructing us in how to do it. What’s going on? In the Simile of the Cloth, the Buddha explained that a human mind tainted with defilements was unable to fully assimilate his teachings and realize the larger pure Mind. He used the illustration of someone dying cloth, asking his monks what would happen if the cloth was stained and dirty as opposed to clean and bright. Of course, the dirty cloth would take the dye badly and be impure in color, while the clean cloth would take the dye well and be pure in color. (3) Engaging in our concrete practices of zazen, work and study helps us to unwind ourselves from the three poisons and the delusion and unwholesomeness that follow. We’re ready to settle down to hear and assimilate dharma teachings and deeply understand the nature of the pure Mind of emptiness. Questions for reflection and discussion
Notes
(1) "The Pure Water of Faith," article by Shohaku Okumura for the Dogen Institute, 2020 (2) How to Cook Your Life: From the Zen Kitchen to Enlightenment, Kosho Uchiyama, Shambala, 2005. p. 27-28 (3) Vatthupama Sutta: The Simile of the Cloth translated from the Pali by Nyanaponika Thera. 1998 Further reading:
Right belief is a gate of Dharma illumination; for [with it] the steadfast mind is not broken. 正信是法明門、不破堅牢心故。 Practitioners in North America may have some discomfort with the very first words in the very first gate: right belief. I don’t want someone telling me what to believe, or judging whether or not what I believe is right. I came to Buddhism because I heard that we’re supposed to try out the teachings for ourselves before deciding whether or not they were true. I’ll think for myself, thank you very much. My steadfast mind is my own business. “Belief” here is sometimes translated “faith,” a word which might be just as problematic. Fortunately, this gate statement is not directing us to blindly accept the doctrine of a tradition or to give up the practice of inquiring into the dharma. In fact, it’s encouraging us to do just the opposite and it’s pointing us to a specific text and teaching. In this case, faith is not accepting something that cannot be proved or experienced. It’s having enough interest and confidence in the Three Treasures—Buddha, dharma and sangha—to investigate further, begin to practice, and see what happens. After all, even though our Zen ancestors and teachers point out that buddha nature or awakening are already here, we still fall prey to the three poisons of greed, anger and ignorance. We still create suffering for ourselves because of craving and aversion. We still think we can solve our problems with a suitable application of chocolate cake or physical perfection or public acclaim. It’s a pretty big stretch to accept for a few moments that there is no independent, fixed “self” that needs these things to survive, and that real contentment lies elsewhere. If I think chocolate cake is my lifeline, letting go of it is a risk. I need at least some assurance that the risk is worth it. Interestingly, faith and awakening move in a circle. If I can muster up enough faith to give Zen practice a try, my experience bolsters my faith, which bolsters my practice, and so on. When I prime the pump and set activity in motion, practice takes over and I can fold into the universe as it does what it does, not losing my individuality but seeing through and beyond it. This is the point of a very important sixth-century Chinese text called the Dasheng qixin lun (大乘起信論), or the Treatise on Awakening Mahāyāna Faith, by Asvagosa. This text has been a major influence on East Asian philosophy and religion through the years, including the Huayuan and Chan/Zen schools as well as Tientai and Pure Land. It discusses how beginning practitioners, or those not yet committed to Mahayana Buddhism, can get a foothold and cultivate the faith necessary for becoming a bodhisattva. Early Buddhism lays out ten stages in the journey to bodhisattvahood, and the Awakening of Faith is designed to put new practitioners on that path. Embarking on it takes enough belief or faith to take the first faltering steps, but once the newcomer begins to practice, faith is gradually replaced with personal experience and knowledge. What began as a story or concept of the dharma becomes one’s own belief based on one’s own verification. Having verified the initial hypothesis, if you will, the baby bodhisattva arouses the aspiration to continue on the path to practice and liberate all beings. The Awakening of Faith opens with a lovely prayer of homage, which reads in part, “I wish to have sentient beings / Eliminate doubts and abandon wrongly-held views / And give rise to correct Mahāyāna faith, / Leaving the buddha-lineage uninterrupted.” It seems we need to consider right belief or correct faith from two perspectives: resolving our doubts about the value of teachings and practice, and seeing through our delusions about what the self is and how the universe operates. In helping us make a start on the first perspective, Asvagosa sets out four kinds of commitment to faith related to suchness plus the Three Treasures. First, he says, we have faith in the most basic reality, that of suchness or emptiness, and we take pleasure in being mindful of it. Next we are mindful of the Buddha’s many virtues; we make offerings to him and try to emulate his practice and good qualities. Our third faith is that the dharma is wholesome, and we verify that by cultivating the six perfections, or paramitas—generosity, morality, patience, diligence, concentration, and wisdom. Finally we have faith that the sangha is able to practice as a healthy and meaningful community because we spend time in the midst of it, learning about practice that accords with reality. We can see that the right belief we encounter in our gate statement has nothing to do with abandoning our personal discernment. On the contrary, according to Asvagosa, the way to reinforce faith and ease our doubts is to have our own moment by moment direct encounters with reality, Buddha, dharma and sangha. This leads us to the second perspective mentioned above: a deep understanding of the true nature of the self. “True” is important here, because it is to this that the “right” in “right belief” is pointing. 正 can be translated as right, correct, true or upright, among other meanings. Thus the statement is not setting up a competition between “right” and “wrong.” It’s distinguishing between belief based on ignorance and delusion and belief based on an understanding and experience of true reality. In brief, if we look closely at the nature of self, we will see that there is nothing there that’s fixed or independent, nothing that we can grasp and hang onto. If we think otherwise, that’s delusion. In fact, not understanding no-self is one of the most basic delusions we have, and it’s at the root of a lot of our suffering. If I think this self is permanent and unchanging, I need to make sure it’s as good as or better than all the other selves around, and this fiction of a self becomes a yardstick for measuring my life —but that makes no sense, because there really is no yardstick and nothing to measure. When I deeply see the interdependent and impermanent nature of this thing called “me,” I can loosen my attachment to it, and my need to defend it at others’ expense begins to diminish. (We’ll look more closely at the true nature of the self at Gate 20: Reflection on there being no self.) Next. let’s turn to the second part of the gate statement and the steadfast mind that is not broken. 堅牢心 is the mind that is firm and stable, like the earth. We need to understand that this is not a mind that is inflexible and closed, or which feels the need to hold its ground against all opposing opinions, but one that functions with equanimity and settledness. When new information or insights arise, the steadfast mind is happy to consider and accommodate them, adjusting its worldview toward an ever-sharpening awareness of what’s actually going on. It maintains its stability because it knows what its underlying beliefs are and from where they come. This is one of the five elements of spiritual health. (2) 不破, not broken, can also mean not disproved or negated. With our right faith established, our doubts and delusions may occasionally assail us in our practice and cause us to step back and do some discernment, but they can’t completely negate our own experience of the dharma. Once we begin to see this one unified reality, we can’t not see it. Once we know something about universal functioning from our own experience, we can’t not know it. We can’t regress to the kind of ignorance we had when we first stood on the threshold of practice, even if we may forget sometimes to practice what the Buddha taught. Right belief or correct faith makes it possible for us all to realize awakening even if we’re not scholars of Buddhism or mystical monks. In the Bendowa, Dogen cites three stories of people who were afflicted with various kinds of hindrances but manifested awakening anyway because of their right belief. In the first instance, the story goes that Buddha’s order included both a stupid old monk and a young monk who wanted to play a trick on him. The youngster led the old monk into a dark room and hit him with a ball, saying, “You have got the first effect” (stream-entry). Again he hit the old monk with a ball and said, “You have got the second effect” (being subject to returning only once more). The third time he said, “You have got the third effect” (not being subject to returning at all), and finally, with the fourth ball, he said “You have got the fourth effect” (arhatship). Because of the old monk’s belief in anuttara samyak sambodhi, unsurpassed perfect awakening, he emerged from the darkened room having actually experienced the fourth effect and attained nirvana. The joke was on the youngster! (1) In Shobogenzo Arakan, Dogen writes, "[T]hose who have faith in unsurpassable complete awakening are arhats. 'Definitely believing in this Dharma' means 'conferring this Dharma,' 'singularly transmitting this Dharma,' and 'practicing and verifying this Dharma.'" (3) The second story to which Dogen refers in the Bendowa is that of a courtesan who put on a nun’s robe as a joke. He tells the story fully in Shobogenzo Kesa Kudoku. The nun Utpalavarna recalls that in a past life she was a vain and greedy courtesan, and when she died she fell into hell as a result of her unwholesome ways. However, in that lifetime she once put on an okesa as a joke, and on the merit of that alone she eventually achieved awakening in a subsequent rebirth. "Now the Bhiksuni Utpalavarna put on kashāya simply for the sake of entertainment; still she had attained the Way within her third lifetime. Much more, having aroused the pure heart of faith for the sake of unsurpassable awakening, if we wear kashāya, {or okesa} this virtue will be completed without failure." (4) Of these first two characters, Dogen writes, “[B]oth were dull people, stupid and silly creatures. But aided by right belief, they had the means to escape their delusion.” Finally, Dogen’s third story is about a devout woman who prepared and offered food to a rather dull monk, expecting to hear a dharma teaching in return. The monk, however, could think of nothing to say and ran away. Nonetheless, she experienced awakening thanks to her belief. She found the monk and thanked him, upon which he himself was awakened. “This did not derive from her wisdom, did not derive from writings, did not depend on words, and did not depend on talk; she was aided only by her right belief.” Dogen goes on to make the point that Shakyamuni’s teachings have spread far and wide, and had awakening required that all hearers possess intelligence, wisdom and clarity, with no element of right belief, this could not have happened. “When people just practice with right belief, the clever and the stupid alike will attain the truth. Just because our country is not a nation of benevolence or wisdom and the people are dullwitted, do not think that it is impossible for us to grasp the Buddha-Dharma.” Faith is the on-ramp for new practitioners and it keeps the established ones moving forward. Sanghas need to offer ways for beginners to cultivate enough faith to establish their practice, especially since long periods of zazen and intensive sesshin can seem daunting. Okumura Roshi recalls, "Once Uchiyama Roshi criticized the way some Pure-land Buddhist teachers preached to their believers. He said that their teachings are wonderful but what they say was meaningful only to the people who already have a deep faith in Pure-land Buddhist teachings. They don’t discuss how people who have no faith in Buddhism yet can understand and attain the same faith in that teaching of Amitabha’s power of vow to save all living beings and accept them to his Pure-land. Uchiyama Roshi said it was like a lofty building from the second floor but without a stairway to get to the second floor from the first floor." (5) Right belief helps us climb and keep on climbing. Questions for reflection and discussion
Notes
(1) All stories referred to here are from Volume 1 of the Shobogenzo translated by Nishijima and Cross, p. 20. (2) The other four are a balance between or integration of individual and universe, or self and whole; a feeling of hope or optimism that one is capable of getting through tough times and an understanding of where to turn for help; an underlying sense of peace and wellbeing; and a sense of purpose in life and that life has meaning. (3) Shohaku Okumura's unpublished translation of Shobogenzo Arakan, 2017 (4) Shohaku Okumura's unpublished translation of Shobogenzo Kesa Kudoku, 2006 (5) From Sanshin's January 2003 newsletter, reproduced at Cuke.com. Further reading and listening:
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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 elements of bodhi [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 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 |