Enter the Dojo (Zendo)

CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly, Koan Case 41, The Book of Equanimity (PasaDharma.org)

Sangkhlaburi Temple, Thailand (SuperG28/flickr.com)

 

Start. It's easy. Enter the dojo.

What is Zen? It is that serene state of lucid awareness brought on when the heart is temporarily cleared of, or withdrawn from, all worries and defiling influences.

How to begin? Stop.

PREFACE TO THE ASSEMBLY

Heart of Zen group (loyola.edu)

Sometimes out of loyalty, one drives oneself to unspeakable hardship.

Sometimes when disaster befalls, others fail to get the point.

Humbly stooping down at the time of departure, his last moments are utterly kind.

Tears flowing forth from his tender heart are still more difficult to hide.

However, is there someone here with cool eyes?

MAIN CASE

Attention! On his deathbed, Rakuho addressed the assembly: "Now I have one matter to ask you about. If you approve this, you're putting another head on top of your own. If you disapprove this, you're seeking life by cutting off your head."

Thereupon the head monk said, "The green mountain always raises its leg [its tree-leg to the sky?]. In bright daylight, you don't raise a torch."

Rakuho scolded, "What occasion is this that you should say such a thing?"

The monk Genju stepped forward and said, "Leaving aside these two roads, please Master, don't question."

Rakuho replied, "Partly, but say some more."

Genju admitted, "I can't say it all."

Rakuho said, "I don't care if you say it all or not."

Genju said, "Being your attendant, Osho, it's hard for me to reply."

When evening came Rakuho summoned the monk Genju and said, "Your response today makes very good sense. You should experience what my late master said: "Before the eyes, no Dharma. Mind is before the eyes. This -- it's not Dharma before the eyes. It's something that ear and eye cannot reach. Which phrase is guest? Which phrase is host? If you can make the distinction, I'll hand over the bowl [thereby conferring the status of abbot on you as my successor]."

Genju said, "I don't know."

Rakuho said, "You should know."

Genju said, "I really don't know."

Rakuho said cuttingly, "Tough, isn't it? Tough, isn't it?"

The monk said, "Osho, how about you?"

Rakuho answered, "The boat of compassion is not poled over the waves of purity. In the rapids of the steep ravine one toils in vain to release the wooden goose." [A wooden goose was used to safely shoot rapids by following the path the goose took when released.]

APPRECIATORY VERSE

With clouds as bait and moon as hook, he fishes in pure water.

Burdened with years solitary and hard, and no fish yet.

After the tune "Riso" dies away,

On the river Bakira, a lone man awakens.

• CASE 41: Rakuho's Last Moments (The Hazy Moon)

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Delusions are inexhaustible; I vow to... (Zen)

Roshi Jeff Albrizze, Don, Ron, Richard, Pasadharma.org; Seven, Wisdom Quarterly

There are four traditional vows in Zen, a Mahayana Buddhist sect of the Ch'an school as it developed in Japan. They are customarily translated as:

1. Sentient beings are numberless; I vow to save them.
2. Desires are inexhaustible; I vow to put an end to them.
3. The Dharmas are boundless; I vow to master them.
4. The Buddha-Way is unsurpassable; I vow to attain it.

A practitioner at ZCLA (Zen Center of Los Angeles) recently called this translation into question hoping to change it to a new and improved four:

1. Sentient beings are numberless; I vow to serve them.
2. Delusions are inexhaustible; I vow to put an end to them.
3. The Dharmas are boundless; I vow to practice them.
4. The Buddha way is unsurpassable; I vow to embody it.

Why would anyone tamper with tradition? While Zen Buddhism as practiced in the US is iconoclastic and tends toward rebellion, is it any reason to make this gatha less of a conundrum?

  

Some Zen Buddhists are recovering fundamentalist Christians. And whenever they hear, "Desires are inexhaustible; I vow to put an end to them," they can only assume it refers to sex. Population control advocates (who seem to im0plicitly favor mass die offs helped along by government interventions) might be put off by the first vow. And similarly the remaining two vows present their own difficulties.

In thinking about these changes for a few weeks, it seems to me that there are several perspectives about this old Sanskrit hymn (gatha) to sit with.

The old version has always been a bit of a koan, an inscrutable riddle that might lead one to enlightenment when one breaks free or lets go of linear reasoning. 

   

Each vow is impossible to fulfill. Yet, many of us have chanted them daily for many years. They speak of a spiritual intention, a higher aspiration. They are a manifestation of attaining the unobtainable. In this way, "Zen" is bigger than I am, bigger than I can wrap my mind around.

  

Do we change them now to make them more accessible? Does making them more palatable by using a more devotional translation take away from the spirit intended?

Admittedly, the old translation is a bit cryptic, even clunky. There is a better flow, a clearer connection between the first state mentioned and the vow that flows from it.

What do folks think about this debate?

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Meeting Zen Baby Roshi (video)

Dhr. Seven and Ashley Wells, Wisdom Quarterly, PasaDharma Zen Group

Zen novice, a future roshi, in a Catholic cardinal's lap, South Korea (Zen Mirror)

 

Child's novice ordination (buddhism.about.com)

Wisdom Quarterly's go-to Zen resource got a surprise late in life -- a pregnancy. The tulku (incarnate lama on the way to being Maitreya the messiah) found its way to the womb of his young wife to become-again. That is how it is with rebirth. But what will s/he become? Isn't it the goal of every American man to mold a son in his image? It's the Mahayana-Judeo-Christian way. The Sky Father did it for his baby "Sun" (Sonny). And astrotheology be darned, the heavenly (Space) Father did it for his Superstar. But it is much funnier when it's a slacker son. That's the way it is with the cartoon saviors of today. Boy meets world in nine (lunar) months. Congratulations!

• The Buddha as Father and Husband
• FILM: Seattle's Jesse Conrad as "Little Buddha"

(IBTimesTV) Young Buddhist novices are usually seen mediating or doing chores for their monastery. However, instead of learning or meditating, these little "monks" played as 37 novices from across the country gathered in Seoul to attend the event at South Korea's biggest Buddhist order "Jogye." The religion with around 10 million followers is about a fifth of South Korea's population. After chanting, the game began, and the kids could not have been happier. A seven year old said he always dreamed of playing soccer. "I prayed to Buddha [actually Amitabha], hoping to play soccer well. And I am happy to score a goal," he said. Seongjin, a monk at Jogye Temple, said the soccer match encapsulated the true meaning of Buddha's birthday: "As we watch novice monks play innocently, we can feel their innocence and happiness as if we feel the heart of [the] Buddha. Also our novices can have fun and their happiness can bring happiness and peace to the world. This is an event where we can share the true meaning of Buddha's birthday," he explained.

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