dharma

Intelligence and Enlightenment

Gill Washington Buddhist Writings, Enlightenment, Joseph Goldstein, Practice , , , 0 Comment

From Insight Meditation

by Joseph Goldstein

“One of my favorite stories from the Buddha’s time tells
about a disciple of the Buddha who was very dull. His
brother, another disciple, was an arhat, fully
enlightened, and was also very smart. The dullard had
been inspired by the teachings and had been ordained as
a monk. He had the sweetest heart, but his mind was
really slow. Because he was slow, his brother gave him
as his practice a four-line verse of the Buddha’s
teachings to memorize.

The dullard struggled and struggled to learn one line.
Then, as he was trying to learn the second line, it
pushed out the first. One line was all his mind could
hold. This struggle went on and on; he simply did not
have the intelligence to do it. His arhat brother
finally gave up and said, “This is hopeless. You had
better leave the order of monks.” The poor dullard was
totally dejected. He felt so sad, because his heart was
devoted to the Dharma.

As the dullard was walking back to his village, feeling
very low, the Buddha, knowing what had happened, came
and walked by his side. He stroked the poor dullard’s
head and consoled him by giving him a practice exactly
suitable to his condition. “Here’s a meditation subject
for you. Take this white hankerchief and stand out in
the hot sun and rub it.” That was the whole meditation.

So the dullard took the hankerchief, went out in the
sun, and began to rub it. Slowly the hankerchief started
to become dirty with the sweat from his hand. As that
happened, memories awakened in him of previous lifetimes
of practice, when he had seen impurities coming from his
body. As he continued to watch the soiled handkerchief,
a profound dispassion arose and his mind opened. He
became fully enlightened, intelligence and all the
traditional psychic powers came to him, in addition to
deep understanding of the Dharma. The story then ends by
describing some good-humored psychic tricks the former
dullard played on his surprised brother.

I feel great affection for the dullard.”

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Insight Meditation

Gill Washington Buddhist Writings, Insight, Joseph Goldstein, Meditation, Spirituality , , , , 0 Comment

Excerpted from Insight Meditation

By Joseph Goldstein

The insights of insight meditation are intuitive, not conceptual. Intuitive in this sense does not mean some kind of vague feeling about something; rather, it means clearly, directly seeing and experiencing how things really are.

For example, you are sitting in meditation, watching the breath. All of a sudden your mind settles into a different space. Even if it is just for a couple of moments, you feel a deeper kind of calm and peace. Instead of struggling to be with the breath, you begin just to rest with the breath in a very calm, effortless, way.

That is an insight through direct experience into the nature of calm and tranquillity. You do not think about them or reflect on them. You know that daffodils are yellow because you have seen them. You know the nature of calm and tranquillity because you have felt them in your heart.

There are many such experiences, and many levels of each one; and each time we know them directly, it is as if we open to a new way of seeing, of being. This is insight.

But often our mind becomes so excited by each new experience that we start thinking. “Look at that. I’m so calm. This is great Or we start reflecting discursively on impermanence or suffering or whatever the particular insight-experience has been.

We need to take a lot of care. If we fail to note such reflections and become caught up in them instead – and Dharma reflections can become extremely compelling and interesting – they themselves become a hindrance to deepening insight. Sometimes people become obsessed with Dharma thoughts, with reflections about genuine insights they have had.

So try to differentiate clearly between true intuitive insight and thinking about it. Knowing the difference can save you trouble and delay. You do not have to worry about later finding words to communicate your insights. Our mind very rarely has a problem coming up with the words. Simply staying present with each new arising appearance allows the whole Dharma journey to unfold.

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Jewel Beyond All Price

Gill Washington Enlightenment, Huang Po, Zen , , , , 0 Comment

From The Zen Teachings of Huang Po
Edited by John Blofeld

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!

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All Things Are Like This

Gill Washington Dogen, Practice, Zen , , , , 0 Comment

From Enlightenment Unfolds – The Essential Teachings of Zen Master Dogen

Edited by Kazuaki Tanahashi

When dharma does not fill your whole body and mind, you may assume it is already sufficient. When dharma fills your body and mind, you understand that something is missing. For example, when you sail out in a boat to the middle of an ocean where no land is in sight, and view the four directions, the ocean looks circular, and does not look any other way. But the ocean is neither round nor square; its features are infinite in variety. It is like a palace. It is like a jewel. It only looks circular as far as you can see at that time. All things are like this.

Though there are many features in the dusty world and the world beyond conditions, you see and understand only what your eye of practice can reach. In order to learn the nature of the myriad things, you must know that although they may look round or square, the other features of oceans and mountains are infinite in variety; whole worlds are there. It is so not only around you, but also directly beneath your feet, or in a drop of water.

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