Do not try to become anything.
Do not make yourself into anything.
Do not be a meditator.
Do not become enlightened.
When you sit, let it be.
What you walk, let it be.
Grasp at nothing.
Resist nothing.
If you haven’t wept deeply, you haven’t begun to meditate.
The Master instructed the group, saying: “Those who study the Dharma of the buddhas these days should approach it with a true and proper understanding. If you approach it with a true and proper understanding, you won’t be affected by considerations of birth and death, you’ll be free to go or stay as you please. You don’t have to strive for benefits, benefits will come of themselves.
“Followers of the Way, the outstanding teachers from times past have all had ways of drawing people out. What I want myself to impress on you is that you mustn’t be led astray by others. If you want to use this thing, then use it and have no doubts or hesitations!
“When students today fail to make progress, where’s the fault? The fault lies in the fact that they don’t have faith in themselves! If you don’t have faith in yourself, then you’ll be forever in a hurry trying to keep up with everything around you, you’ll be twisted and turned by whatever environment you’re in and you can never move freely. But if you can just stop this mind that goes rushing around moment by moment looking for something, then you’ll be no different from the patriarchs and buddhas. Do you want to get to know the patriarchs and buddhas? They’re none other than you, the people standing in front of me listening to this lecture on the Dharma! “Students don’t have enough faith in themselves, and so they rush around looking for something outside themselves. But even if they get something, all it will be is words and phrases, pretty appearances. They’ll never get at the living thought of the patriarchs!
“Make no mistake, you followers of Ch’an. If you don’t find it in this life, then for a thousand kalpas you’ll be born again and again in the three-fold world, you’ll be lured off by what you think are favorable environments and be born in the belly of a donkey or a cow!
“Followers of the Way, as I look at it, we’re no different from Shakyamuni. In all our various activities each day, is there anything we lack? The wonderful light of the six faculties has never for a moment ceased to shine. If you could just look at it this way, then you’d be the kind of person who has nothing to do for the rest of his life.
“Fellow believers, ‘There is no safety in the threefold world; it is like a burning house.’ This is no place for you to linger long! The deadly demon of impermanence will be on you in an instant, regardless of whether you’re rich or poor, old or young.
“If you want to be no different from the patriarchs and buddhas, then never look for something outside yourselves. The clean pure light in a moment of your mind–that is the Essence-body of the Buddha lodged in you. The undifferentiated light in a moment of your mind~that is the Bliss-body of the Buddha lodged in you. The undiscriminating light in a moment of your mind–that is the Transformation-body of the Buddha lodged in you. These three types of bodies are you, the person who stands before me now listening to this lecture on the Dharma! And simply because you do not rush around seeking anything outside yourselves, you can command these fine faculties.
“According to the expounders of the sutras and treatises, the threefold body is to be taken as some kind of ultimate goal. But as I see it, that’s not so. This threefold body is nothing but mere names. Or they’re three types of dependencies. One man of early times said, ‘The body depends on doctrine for its definition, and the land is discussed in terms of the reality.’ This’body’ of the Dharma-realm, or reality, and this ‘land’ of the Dharma-realm we can see clearly are no more than flickering lights.
“Followers of the Way, you should realize that the person who manipulates these flickering lights is the source of the buddhas, the home that all followers of the way should return to. Your physical body made up of the four great elements doesn’t know how to preach the Dharma or listen to the Dharma. Your spleen and stomach, your liver and gall, don’t know how to preach the Dharma or listen to the Dharma. The empty spaces don’t know how to preach the Dharma or listen to the Dharma. What is it, then, that knows how to preach the Dharma or listen to the Dharma? It is you who are right here before my eyes, this lone brightness without fixed shape or form–this is what knows how to preach the Dharma and listen to the Dharma. If you can see it this way, you’ll be no different from the patriarchs and the buddhas.
“But never at any time let go of this even for a moment. Everything ~ that meets your eyes is this. But’when feelings arise, wisdom is blocked; when thoughts waver, reality departs,’ therefore you keep being reborn again and again in the threefold world and undergoing all kinds of misery. But as I see it, there are none of you incapable of profound understanding, none of you are incapable of emancipation.
“Followers of the Way, this thing called mind has no fixed form; it penetrates all the ten directions. In the eye we call it sight; in the ear we call it hearing; in the nose it detects odors, in the mouth it speaks discourse; in the hand it grasps, in the feet it runs along. Basically it is a single bright essence, but it divides itself into these six functions. And because this single mind has no fixed form, it is everywhere in a state of emancipation. Why do I tell you this? Because you followers of the Way seem to be incapable of stopping this mind that goes rushing around everywhere looking for something. So you get caught up in those idle devices of the men of old.
Someone asked, “What is the Buddha devil?” The Master said, “If you have doubts in your mind for an instant, that’s the Buddha devil. But if you can understand that the ten thousand phenomena were never born, that the mind is like a conjurers trick, then not one speck of dust, not one phenomenon will exist. Everywhere will be clean and pure, and this will be Buddha. Buddha and devil just refer to two states, one stained, one pure.
“As I see it, there’s no Buddha, no living beings, no long ago, no now. If you want to get it, you’ve already got it–it’s not something that requires time. There’s no religious practice, no enlightenment, no getting anything, no missing out on anything. At no time is there any other Dharma than this. If anyone claims there is a Dharma superior to this, I say it must be a dream, a phantom. All I have to say to you is simply this. “Followers of the Way, this lone brightness before my eyes now, this person plainly listening to me–this person is unimpeded at any point but penetrates the ten directions, free to do as he pleases in the threefold world. No matter what the environment he may encounter, with its peculiarities and differences, he cannot be swayed or pulled awry. In the space of an instant he makes his way into the Dharma-realm. If he meets a buddha he preaches to the buddha, if he meets a patriarch, he preaches to the patriarch, if he meets an arhat, he preaches to the arhat, if he meets a hungry ghost, he preaches to the hungry ghost. He goes everywhere, wandering through many lands, teaching and converting living beings, yet never becomes separated from his single thought. Every place for him is clean and pure, his light pierces the ten directions, the ten thousand phenomena are a single thusness.
“Followers of the Way, you take the words that come out of the mouths of a bunch of old teachers to be a description of the true Way. You think, ‘This is a most wonderful teacher and friend. I have only the mind of a common mortal, I would never dare to try to fathom such venerableness.’ Blind idiots! You go through life with this kind of understanding, betraying your own two eyes, cringing and faltering like a donkey on an icy road, saying, ‘I would never dare speak ill of such a good friend, I’d be afraid of making mouth karma!’
“Followers of the Way, the really good friend is someone who dares speak ill of the Buddha, speak ill of the patriarchs, pass judgment on anyone in the world, throw away the Tripitaka, revile those little children, and in the midst of opposition and assent search out the real person. So for the past twelve years, though I’ve looked for this thing called karma, I’ve never found so much as a particle of it the size of a mustard seed.
“Those Ch’an masters who are as timid as a new bride are afraid they might be expelled from the monastery or deprived of their meal of rice, worrying and fretting. But from times past the real teachers, wherever they went, were never listened to and were always driven out–that’s how you know they were men of worth. If everybody approves of you wherever you go, what use can you be? Hence the saying, let the lion give one roar and the brains of the little foxes will split open.
“Followers of the Way, here and there you hear it said that there is a Way to be practiced, a Dharma to become enlightened to. Will you tell me then just what Dharma there is to be enlightened to, what Way there is to practice? In your present aetivities, what is it you lack, what is it that practice must mend? But those little greenhorn monks don’t understand this and immediately put faith in that bunch of wild fox spirits, letting them spout their ideas and tie people in knots, saying, ‘When principle and practice match one another and proper precaution is taken with regard to the three types of karma of body, mouth, and mind, only then can one attain Budhahood.’ People who go on like that are as plentiful as springtime showers.
“A man of old said, ‘If along the road you meet a man who is master of the Way, whatever you do, don’t talk to him about the Way.’ Therefore it is said, ‘If a person practices the way, the Way will never proceed. Instead, ten thousand kinds of mistaken environments will vie in poking up their heads. But if the sword of wisdom comes to cut them all down, then even before the bright signs manifest themselves, the dark signs will have become bright. Therefore a man of old said, ‘The everyday mind–that is the Way.’ “Fellow believers, what are you looking for? This man of the Way who depends on nothing, here before my eyes now listening to the Dharma–his brightness shines clearly, he has never lacked anything. If you want to be no different from the patriarchs and buddhas, learn to see it this way and — never give in to doubt or questioning. When your mind moment by moment never differentiates, it may be called the living patriarch. If the mind differentiates, its nature and manifestations become separated from one another. But so long as it does not differentiate, its nature and manifestations do not become separated.”
Someone asked, “What do you mean by the true Buddha, the true Dharma, and the true Way? Would you be good enough to explain to us?” The Master said, “Buddha–this is the cleanness and purity of the mind. The Dharma–this is the shining brightness of the mind. The Way–this is the pure light that is never obstructed anywhere. The three are in fact one. All are empty names and have no true reality.
“The true and proper man of the Way from moment to moment never permits any interruption in his mind. When the great teacher Bodhidharma came from the west, he was simply looking for a man who would not be misled by others. Later the Second Patriarch encountered Bodhidharma, and after hearing one word, he understood. Then for the first time he realized that up to then he had been engaged in useless activity and striving.
“My understanding today is no different from that of the patriachs and buddhas. If you get it with the first phrase, you can be a teacher of the patriarchs and buddhas. If you get it with the second phrase, you can be a teacher of human and heavenly beings. If you get it with the third phrase, you can’t even save yourself!”
Someone asked, “What was Bodhidharma’s purpose in coming from the west?” The Master said, “If he had had a purpose, he wouldn’t have been able to save even himself!”The questioner said, “If he had no purpose, then how did the Second Patriarch manage to get the Dharma?” The Master said, “Getting means not getting.” “If it means not getting,” said the questioner, “then what do you mean by not getting?”
The Master said, “You can’t seem to stop your mind from racing around everywhere seeking something. That’s why the patriarch said, ‘Hopeless fellows–using their heads to look for their heads!’ You must right now turn your light around and shine it on yourselves, not go seeking somewhere else. Then you will understand that in body and mind you are no different from the patriarchs and the buddhas, and that there is nothing to do. Do that and you may speak of’getting the Dharma.’
“Fellow believers, at this time, having found it impossible to refuse, I have been addressing you, putting forth a lot of trashy talk. But make no mistake! In my view, there are in fact no great number of principles to be grasped. If you want to use the thing, then use it. If you don’t want to use it, then let it be.
“Followers of the Way, don’t take the Buddha to be some sort of ultimate goal. In my view he’s more like the hole in a privy. Bodhisattvas and arhats are so many cangues and chains, things for fettering people. Therefore, Manjushri grasped his sword, ready to kill Gautama, and Angulimala, blade in hand, tried to do injury to Shakyamuni.
“Followers of the Way, there is no Buddha to be gained, and the Three Vehicles, the five natures, the teaching of the perfect and immediate enlightenment are all simply medicines to cure diseases of the moment. None have any true reality. Even if they had, they would still all be mere shams, placards proclaiming superficial matters, so many words lined up, pronouncements of such kind.
“Followers of the Way, there are certain baldheads who turn all their efforts inward, seeking in this way to find some otherworldly truth. But they are completely mistaken! Seek the Buddha and you’ll lose the Buddha. Seek the Way and you’ll lose the Way. Seek the patriarchs and you’ll lose the patriarchs.
“Fellow believers, don’t mistake me! I don’t care whether you understand the sutras and treatises. I don’t care whether you are rulers or great statesmen. I don’t care whether you can pour out torrents of eloquence. 1 don’t care whether you display brilliant intellects. All I ask is that you have true and proper understanding.”
“Fellow believers, do not use your minds in a mistaken manner, but be like the sea which rejects the bodies of the dead. While you continue to carry such dead bodies and go racing around the world with them, you only obstruct your own vision and create obstacles in your mind. When no clouds block the sun, the beautiful light of heaven shines everywhere. When no disease afflicts the eye, it does not see phantom flowers in the empty air.
“Followers of the Way, if you wish to be always in accord with the Dharma, never give way to doubt. ‘Spread it out and it fills the whole Dharma-realm, gather it up and it’s tinier than a thread of hair.’ Its lone brightness gleaming forth, it has never lacked anything. ‘The eye doesn’t see it, the ear doesn’t hear it.’ What shall we call this thing? A man of old said, ‘Say something about a thing and already you’re off the mark.’ You’ll just have to see it for yourselves. What other way is there? But there’s no end to this talk. Each of you, do your best! Thank you for your trouble.”
The Master was entering an army encampment to attend a dinner when he saw one of the officers at the gate. He pointed to a bare wooden gatepost and said, “A common mortal or a sage?” The officer had no reply. The Master struck the gatepost and said, “Even if you had managed a reply, it would still just be a wooden post!” With that he entered the camp.
Though others may talk of the Way of the Bhuddas as something to be reached by various pious practices and by sutra study, you must have nothing to do with such ideas. A perception, sudden as blinking, that subject and object are one, will lead to a deeply mysterious wordless understanding; and by this understanding will you awake to the truth of Zen. When you happen upon someone who has no understanding, you must claim to know nothing. He may he delighted by his discovery of some “way to Enlightenment”; yet if you allow yourselves to be persuaded by him, you will experience no delight at all, but suffer both sorrow and disappointment. What have such thoughts as his to do with the study of Zen? Even if you do obtain from him some trifling “method,” it will only be a thought-constructed dharma having nothing to do with Zen. Thus, Bodhidharma sat rapt in meditation before a wall; he did not seek to lead people into having opinions. Therefore it is written: “To put out of the mind even the principle from which action springs is the true teaching of the Buddhas, while dualism belongs to the sphere of the demons.” Your true nature is something never lost to you even in moments of delusion, nor is it gained at the moment of Enlightenment. It is the Nature of the Bhutatathata. In it is neither delusion nor right understanding. It fills the Void everywhere and is intrinsically of the substance of the One Mind. How, then, can your mind-created objects exist outside of the Void? The Void is fundamentally without spacial dimensions, passions, activities,delusions, or right understanding. You must clearly understand that in it there are no things, no men, no Buddhas; for this Void contains not the smallest hairsbreadth of anything that can be viewed spatially; it depends on nothing and is attached to nothing. It is all-pervading, spotless beauty;it is the self-existent and uncreated Absolute. Then how can it ever be a matter for discussion that the real Buddha has no mouth and preaches no dharma, or that real hearing requires no ears, for who could hear it? Ah,it is a jewel beyond all price!
This dharma as it has been directly entrusted
by buddha ancestors.
Now that you have realized it
you must guard it mindfully.
Snow heaped in a silver bowl,
a heron fading into the bright moon.
Similar but unequal.
Place them side by side
and you will see which is which.
The meaning is not in words.
Inquiring students seek further.
Moving forward creates pitfalls.
Avoidance leads to a standstill.
Faced with a great wall of fire,
turning your back on it and touching it are both wrong.
Expressing it in colorful words
only stains it.
Midnight is bright,
dawn brings no dew.
Things are truth itself
to be used for removing delusion.
This is not created
and yet not inexpressible.
As form and image face each other
in a bright mirror,
you are not it
but it is you.
It is like a baby
perfectly possessing five freedoms:
Not coming, not going,
not rising, not staying…
And goo goo wa wa –
words that are not words.
In the end nothing is grasped
because speech is not precise.
In the double-split hexagrams
the particular and the general integrate.
When the lines are closed they become three,
and its final change makes five.
A blade of zhi grass has five flavors,
A vajra has five points.
Within the general, something marvelous lies.
Drumming and singing go together.
Penetrating the source, penetrating the paths.
Here is a short path, here is a long path.
If you miss it, that’s a good sign.
Don’t neglect it.
What is natural and inconceivable
belongs neither to delusion nor enlightenment.
Causes and conditions right at this moment
shine completely in silence.
So minute that it penetrates any space.
So enormous that it exceeds all bounds.
The slightest difference
puts it out of tune.
Because the basic teachings of sudden and gradual
have been set up,
the Zen school has become divided.
These ways have become standard.
Even though you master such teachings
the truth keeps on escaping.
You may sit still but waver inside –
a tied up horse, or a cowering rat.
The Ancient Teacher pitied us
and transmitted the dharma.
Because of our delusions
we say black is white.
When delusions disappear
understanding reveals itself.
If you wish to conform to the old ways,
take a lesson from the past.
People trying to attain the buddha way
by gazing for ten eons at a tree
are like a tiger with tattered ears
or a hobbled horse.
A greedy mind sees
rare treasures.
A surprised mind sees
raccoons and white bulls.
Legendary bowman Yi with his skill
shoots the mark a hundred paces away.
When arrowheads meet head-on,
is it only a matter of skill?
Right when a wooden man sings
a stone woman gets up and dances.
It’s not within the reach of knowledge
nor does it admit ideas.
Retainers serve their lord;
children obey their father.
Without obedience there is no respect;
without service there is no civic virtue.
Conceal your practice, work inside.
Be ignorant, look foolish.
Just keep on doing it.
This is called host with host.
Enlightenment is like the moon reflected on the water. The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken. Although its light is wide and great, the moon is reflected even in a puddle an inch wide. The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in dewdrops on the grass, or even in one drop of water.
Enlightenment does not divide you, just as the moon does not break the water. You cannot hinder enlightenment, just as a drop of water does not hinder the moon in the sky. The depth of the drop is the height of the moon. Each reflection, however long or short its duration, manifests the vastness of the dewdrop, and realizes the limitlessness of the moonlight in the sky.
1
An ancient buddha said:
For the time being stand on top of the highest peak.
For the time being proceed along the bottom of the deepest ocean.
For the time being three heads and eight arms.
For the time being an eight- or sixteen-foot body.
For the time being a staff or whisk.
For the time being a pillar or lantern.
For the time being the sons of Zhang and Li.
For the time being the earth and sky.
“For the time being” here means time itself is being, and all being is
time. A golden sixteen-foot body is time; because it is time, there is the
radiant illumination of time. Study it as the twelve hours of the present.
“Three heads and eight arms” is time; because it is time, it is not separate
from the twelve hours of the present.
2
Even though you do not measure the hours of the day as long or short, far or
near, you still call it twelve hours. Because the signs of time’s coming and
going are obvious, people do not doubt it. Although they do not doubt it,
they do not understand it. Or when sentient beings doubt what they do not
understand, their doubt is not firmly fixed. Because of that, their past
doubts do not necessarily coincide with the present doubt. Yet doubt itself
is nothing but time.
3
The way the self arrays itself is the form of the entire world. See each
thing in this entire world as a moment of time.
Things do not hinder one another, just as moments do not hinder one
another. The way-seeking mind arises in this moment. A way-seeking moment
arises in this mind. It is the same with practice and with attaining the way.
Thus the self setting itself out in array sees itself. This is the
understanding that the self is time.
4
Know that in this way there are myriads of forms and hundreds of grasses
throughout the entire earth, and yet each grass and each form itself is the
entire earth. The study of this is the beginning of practice.
When you are at this place, there is just one grass, there is just one
form; there is understanding of form and no-understanding of form; there is
understanding of grass and no-understanding of grass. Since there is nothing
but just this moment, the time-being is all the time there is. Grass-being,
form-being are both time.
Each moment is all being, is the entire world. Reflect now whether any
being or any world is left out of the present moment.
5
Yet an ordinary person who does not understand buddha-dharma may hear the
words the time-being this way:
For a while I was three heads and eight arms. For a while I was an eight-
or sixteen-foot body. This is like having crossed over rivers and climbed
mountains. Even though the mountains and rivers still exist, I have already
passed them and now reside in the jeweled palace and vermilion tower. Those
mountains and rivers are as distant from me as heaven is from earth.
It is not that simple. At the time the mountains were climbed and the
rivers crossed, you were present. Time is not separate from you, and as you
are present, time does not go away.
As time is not marked by coming and going, the moment you climbed the
mountains is the time-being right now. If time keeps coming and going, you
are the time-being right now. This is the meaning of the time-being.
Does this time-being not swallow up the moment when you climbed the
mountains and the moment when you resided in the jeweled palace and
vermilion tower? Does it not spit them out?
6
Three heads and eight arms may be yesterday’s time. The eight- or
sixteen-foot body may be today’s time. Yet yesterday and today are both in
the moment when you directly enter the mountains and see thousands and
myriads of peaks. Yesterday’s time and today’s time do not go away.
Three heads and eight arms move forward as your time-being. It looks as
if they are far away, but they are here and now. The eight- or sixteen-foot
body moves forward as your time-being. It looks as if it is nearby, but it
is exactly here. Thus, a pine tree is time, bamboo is time.
7
Do not think that time merely flies away. Do not see flying away as the only
function of time. If time merely flies away, you would be separated from
time. The reason you do not clearly understand the time-being is that you
think of time only as passing.
In essence, all things in the entire world are linked with one another
as moments. Because all moments are the time-being, they are your time-being.
8
The time-being has the quality of flowing. So-called today flows into
tomorrow, today flows into yesterday, yesterday flows into today. And today
flows into today, tomorrow flows into tomorrow.
Because flowing is a quality of time, moments of past and present do not
overlap or line up side by side. Qingyuan is time, Huangbo is time, Jiangxi
is time, Shitou is time, because self and other are already time.
Practice-enlightenment is time. Being splattered with mud and getting wet
with water is also time.
9
Although the views of an ordinary person and the causes and conditions of
those views are what the ordinary person sees, they are not necessarily the
ordinary person’s truth. The truth merely manifests itself for the time
being as an ordinary person. Because you think your time or your being is
not truth, you believe that the sixteen-foot golden body is not you.
However, your attempts to escape from being the sixteen-foot golden body
are nothing but bits and pieces of the time-being. Those who have not yet
confirmed this should look into it deeply. The hours of Horse and Sheep,
which are arrayed in the world now, are actualized by ascendings and
descendings of the time-being at each moment. The rat is time, the tiger is
time, sentient beings are time, buddhas are time.
10
At this time you enlighten the entire world with three heads and eight arms,
you enlighten the entire world with the sixteen-foot golden body. To fully
actualize the entire world with the entire world is called thorough practice.
To fully actualize the golden body – to arouse the way-seeking mind,
practice, attain enlightenment, and enter nirvana – is nothing but being, is
nothing but time.
11
Just actualize all time as all being; there is nothing extra. A so-called
“extra being” is thoroughly an extra being. Thus, the time-being
half-actualized is half of the time-being completely actualized, and a
moment that seems to be missed is also completely being. In the same way,
even the moment before or after the moment that appears to be missed is also
complete-in-itself the time-being. Vigorously abiding in each moment is the
time-being. Do not mistakenly confuse it as nonbeing. Do not forcefully
assert it as being.
12
You may suppose that time is only passing away, and not understand that time
never arrives. Although understanding itself is time, understanding does not
depend on its own arrival.
People only see time’s coming and going, and do not thoroughly
understand that the time-being abides in each moment. This being so, when
can they penetrate the barrier? Even if people recognized the time-being in
each moment, who could give expression to this recognition? Even if they
could give expression to this recognition for a long time, who could stop
looking for the realization of the original face?
According to ordinary people’s view of the time-being, even
enlightenment and nirvana as the time-being would be merely aspects of
coming and going.
13
The time-being is entirely actualized without being caught up in nets or
cages. Deva kings and heavenly beings appearing right and left are the
time-being of your complete effort right now. The time-being of all beings
throughout the world in water and on land is just the actualization of your
complete effort right now. All beings of all kinds in the visible and
invisible realms are the time-being actualized by your complete effort,
flowing due to your complete effort.
Closely examine this flowing; without your complete effort right now,
nothing would be actualized, nothing would flow.
14
Do not think flowing is like wind and rain moving from east to west. The
entire world is not unchangeable, is not immovable. It flows.
Flowing is like spring. Spring with all its numerous aspects is called
flowing. When spring flows there is nothing outside of spring. Study this in
detail.
Spring invariably flows through spring. Although flowing itself is not
spring, flowing occurs throughout spring. Thus, flowing is completed at just
this moment of spring. Examine this thoroughly, coming and going.
In your study of flowing, if you imagine the objective to be outside
yourself and that you flow and move through hundreds and thousands of
worlds, for hundreds, thousands, and myriads of eons, you have not devotedly
studied the buddha way.
15
Great Master Hongdao of Mt. Yao [Yaoshan], instructed by Shitou, Great
Master Wuji, once went to study with Zen Master Daji of Jiangxi.
Yaoshan asked, “I am familiar with the teaching of the Three Vehicles
and twelve divisions. But what is the meaning of Bodhidharma coming from the
west?”
Zen Master Daji replied:
For the time being have him raise his eyebrows and wink.
For the time being do not have him raise his eyebrows and wink.
For the time being to have him raise his eyebrows and wink is right.
For the time being to have him raise his eyebrows and wink is not right.
Hearing these words, Yaoshan experienced great enlightenment and said to
Daji, “When I was studying with Shitou, it was like a mosquito trying to
bite an iron bull.”
What Daji said is not the same as other people’s words. The “eyebrows”
and “eyes” are mountains and oceans, because mountains and oceans are
eyebrows and eyes. To “have him raise the eyebrows” is to see the mountains.
To “have him wink” is to understand the oceans. The “right” answer belongs
to him, and he is activated by your having him raise the eyebrows and wink.
“Not right” does not mean not having him raise the eyebrows and wink. Not to
have him raise the eyebrows and wink does not mean not right. These are all
equally the time-being.
Mountains are time. Oceans are time. If they were not time, there would
be no mountains or oceans. Do not think that mountains and oceans here and
now are not time. If time is annihilated, mountains and oceans are
annihilated. As time is not annihilated, mountains and oceans are not
annihilated.
This being so, the morning star appears, the Tathagata appears, the eye
appears, and raising a flower appears. Each is time. If it were not time, it
could not be thus.
16
Zen master Guixing of She Prefecture is the heir of Shoushan, a dharma
descendant of Linji. One day he taught the assembly:
For the time being mind arrives, but words do not.
For the time being words arrive, but mind does not.
For the time being both mind and words arrive.
For the time being neither mind nor words arrive.
Both mind and words are the time-being. Both arriving and not-arriving
are the time-being. When the moment of arriving has not appeared, the moment
of not-arriving is here. Mind is a donkey, words are a horse.
Having-already-arrived is words and not-having-left is mind. Arriving is not
“coming,” not-arriving is not “not yet.”
17
The time-being is like this. Arriving is overwhelmed by arriving, but not by
not-arriving. Not-arriving is overwhelmed by not-arriving, but not by
arriving. Mind overwhelms mind and sees mind, words overwhelm words and see
words. Overwhelming overwhelms overwhelming and sees overwhelming.
Overwhelming is nothing but overwhelming. This is time.
As overwhelming is caused by you, there is no overwhelming that is
separate from you. Thus you go out and meet someone. Someone meets someone.
You meet yourself. Going out meets going out. If these are not the
actualization of time, they cannot be thus.
18
Mind is the moment of actualizing the fundamental point; words are the
moment of going beyond, unlocking the barrier. Arriving is the moment of
casting off the body; not-arriving is the moment of being one with just
this, while being free from just this. In this way you must endeavor to
actualize the time-being.
19
The old masters have thus uttered these words, but is there nothing further
to say?
Mind and words arriving “part-way” are the time-being.
Mind and words not arriving “part-way” are the time-being.
In this manner, you should examine the time-being.
To have him raise the eyebrows and wink is “half” the time-being
To have him raise the eyebrows and wink is the time-being “missed.”
Not to have him raise the eyebrows and wink is “half” the time-being.
Not to have him raise the eyebrows and wink is the time-being “missed.”
Thus, to study thoroughly, coming and going, and to study thoroughly,
arriving and not-arriving, is the time-being of this moment.
On the first day of winter, first year of Ninji [1240], this was written at
Kosho Horin Monastery.
Traditional teachings about rebirth say that most of us are unwitting prisoners on the wheel of samsara; we keep returning because we have no choice. According to this way of thinking, there are also men and women walking among us who are here of their own conscious volition. These men and women are known as Bodhisattvas. Bodhi means awakening; sattva means being. This is a being who is ready for nirvana but whose compassion is so great that he or she remains on this earth solely in order to reduce suffering and help free others. A Bodhisattva is someone with pure, impeccable intentions – a gentle yet fearless spiritual warrior who strives unceasingly to help everyone reach nirvanic peace and enlightenment.
A transcendent Bodhisattva has seen beyond delusion and selfishness; he or she has felt and experienced the intolerable despair, alienation, misery, and suffering in the world: Because such a person is able to understand that we are all caught in the same existential plight, he or she seeks to alleviate the suffering of all.
In Mahayana Buddhism, one is encouraged to take what we call the Bodhisattva Vow. Taking this vow means you understand the world’s pain, and you commit to work for the enlightenment of all. That means all the people, all the creatures, including all the inhabitants of the air and sea – insects, birds, shellfish, dolphins, whales and sharks, all the shiny little eyes in the dark forests, as well as all the creepy crawly, buzzing things trying to get in and chew on your house or on you.
The first time I heard the Bodhisattva Vow was in I971, and I was at Lama Thubten Yeshe’s monastery in Nepal. I felt overwhelmed by the magnitude of it all. And I’m still somewhat intimidated by it. Lama Yeshe explained the vow very simply. He said, ‘Think of what you want, and realize that all beings want and need the same things. They are just seeking it through different ways.’
If you were to take the Bodhisattva Vow, you would commit yourself in this way:
Sentient beings are numberless: I vow to liberate them.
Delusions are inexhaustible: I vow to transcend them.
Dharma teachings are boundless: I vow to master them.
The Buddha’s enlightened way is unsurpassable: I vow to
embody it.
This is a four-line affirmation sangha members chant and avow every day. To take the Bodhisattva Vow means that at least for a moment, one can see past one’s own problems and preoccupations and elevate the spiritual gaze toward universal fulfillment. The moment you affirm that great intention – to work for the good of all living creatures – whether or not you are always able to follow it as perfectly as you might wish – you are called a Bodhisattva, a child of the Buddhas. When this epiphany occurs, all the Buddhas rejoice. The scriptures say that as soon as you make this Bodhisattva Vow to realize enlightenment and relieve universal suffering; all the Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, devas, angels, and guardians of the Dharma clap their hands and rain down celestial flowers and divine nectar. It’s like you scored a touchdown or hit a home run. As poetic as that seems, I really feel that this is true in a spiritual sense. You can feel it yourself as you open a little more to the joy of spiritual awakening.