zen

That Zen is the root of all forms of Buddhism can be seen in the following basic expressions:

Not relying on words or letters.

An independent transmission outside the teaching of the scriptures.

Directly pointing to man’s Mind.

Awakening of one’s (Original-) Nature, thereby actualizing one’s own Buddhahood.

Zen, likewise, emphasizes contemporaneity with the Buddha, not by virtue of an immediate contemporaneity, but by virtue of an internal contemporaneity. In Christianity, however, the subject of contemporaneity is the Christ, as we see in His words, “I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself” (John XII, 32). In Zen, on the other hand, the subject of the contemporaneity is none other than the person concerned. Not faith in the Buddha, but the Self-Awakening of the Dharma is essential to Zen. Wu-men Hui-k’ai, a Chinese Zen master of the Sung dynasty said: “If you pass through (the gateless barrier of Zen) you will not only immediately see Joshuu (the great Zen master of the past); you will also walk hand in hand with the successive Patriarchs, mingling your eyebrows with theirs, seeing with the same eyes, and hearing with the same ears.” In Zen, to become a contemporary of the Buddha means that one becomes an Awakened One himself by awakening to the same Dharma (i.e., the Buddha-nature) to which the historical Buddha and later Patriarchs awakened. For Zen and for original Buddhism, there is no Buddha apart from one’s own Self-Awakening.

When asked by Lin-chi “Where is Buddha?”, the monk, had he really understood the meaning of ‘Buddha’, should have pointed to the Buddha-nature actualized in himself, and said: “Here is a Buddha.” As it was, however, the monk remained speechless. But how different was his speechlessness from the silence of Fu Ta-shih before Emperor Wu! While Fu Ta-shih’s silence eloquently revealed the Buddha-nature, the speechlessness of the monk exposed only the powerlessness of a Buddhism which relies so heavily upon the scriptures.

In his discourses, Lin-chi addressed each person in the audience as “the one who is, at this moment, right in front of me, solitary, being illuminated, in full awareness, listening to (my) discourse on the Dharma”. “If you wish to transcend birth-and-death, going-and-coming, and to be freely unattached, you should recognize the Man who is listening at this moment to this discourse on the Dharma. He is the one who has neither shape nor form, neither root nor trunk, and who, having no abiding place, is full of activities. He responds to all kinds of situations and manifests his activities, and yet comes out of nowhere. Therefore, as soon as you try to search for him, he is far away; the nearer you try to approach, the farther he turns away from you. ‘Mysterious’ is his name.”[14]

We should not miss the point that it is our true Selves that Lin-chi called ‘Man’ and ‘mysterious’. To awaken to ‘Man’ or “true Self who is, at this moment, in full awareness, listening to this discourse on the Dharma” is nothing but Self-Awakening through which one becomes an Awakened One, that is, a Buddha. Huang-po, Lin-chi’s teacher, and an outstanding Zen master of T’ang China once said: “Your Mind is Buddha; Buddha is this Mind. Mind and Buddha are not separate or different.” Buddha is not separate even for one instant from our Minds.

Let me conclude this paper by mentioning one more story. Nan-chuan, a Chinese Zen master (748-834) was once asked by Pai-chang (720-814), one of his fellow monks, if there was a truth that the sages of old had not preached to men. “There is”, said Nan-chuan. “What is this truth?”, asked Pai-chang. “It is not mind”, answered Nan-chuan, “It is not Buddha; it is not a thing.” To this, Pai-chang replied: “If so, you have already talked about it.” “I cannot do any better”, was Nan-chuan’s answer. “What would you say?” “I am not a great enlightened one. So how do I know what either talking or non-talking is?” answered Pai-chang. “I don’t understand”, said Nan-chuan. “Alas”, said Pai-chang, “I have already said too much for you.”

In this paper, in distinguishing Zen from other forms of Buddhism, I am afraid I too have said too much. But no matter how many words I use, when we talk about Zen, we can never reach it. On the contrary, the more I try to explain Zen, the more I seem to go astray. Since Zen does not rely on words, I ought to be silent. Yet, even if I remained silent, I would be severly beaten by Teh-shan, another Zen master of T’ang China (782-865) who said: “Though you can speak, thirty blows! Though you can’t speak, thirty blows!” This is to say, mere speechlessness is an empty or dead silence. Zen, however, finds itself in league neither with speech nor with silence, neither with affirmation nor negation. We can reach Zen only by transcending speech and silence, affirmation and negation. But what is beyond speech and silence, beyond affirmation and negation? That is the question.

Nara University of Education,
Nara, Japan

NOTES

* This is a revised and enlarged version of a paper originally published, with limited circulation, in Japan Studies No. 11 in 1968. The author is grateful to Japan Studies for permission to republish it. He is also thankful for the invaluable suggestions of Dr. Winston Davis in the earlier stages of the manuscript and of Father John Brinkman and Mr. Robert Grous in its final stage.