Here is the place; here the way unfolds. The boundary of realization is not 
distinct, for the realization comes forth simultaneously with the mastery of buddhadharma. Do not suppose that what you realize becomes your knowledge and is 
grasped by your consciousness. Although actualized immediately, the inconceivable 
may not be distinctly apparent. Its appearance is beyond your knowledge.
          Zen master Baoche of Mount Mayu was fanning himself. A monk approached 
and said, "Master, the nature of wind is permanent and there is no place it does not 
reach. Why, then do you fan yourself?" "Although you understand that the nature of 
wind is permanent;" Baoche replied, "you do not understand the meaning of its 
reaching everywhere." "What is the meaning of its reaching everywhere?" asked the 
monk again. The master just kept fanning himself. The monk bowed deeply. The 
actualization of the buddha-dharma, the vital path of its correct transmission, is like 
this. If you say that you do not need to fan yourself because the nature of wind is 
permanent and you can have wind without fanning, you will understand neither 
permanence nor the nature of wind. The nature of wind is permanent; because of that, 
the wind of the Buddha's house brings forth the gold of the earth and makes fragrant 
the cream of the long river.


          My first formal Zen teacher, Genki Roshi saw me chopping wood and he told me that I was in samadhi.  At the time I chopped a lot of wood because my house had only wood for heat and cooking.  I got very good at chopping wood and relished in the activity.  I was fully engaging body and mind in the words of Dogen.  Later Genki told me that the essence of Zen was samadhi, samadhi chopping wood, samadhi playing tennis, samadhi at work, and samadhi sitting Zazen.  This happened a long time ago when I was young, in my 20's.  There is something special about being young,  all that energy and flexability.  The patterns of thought have not be come hardened.  Samadhi may be more natural.  At that time my whole life revolved around my spiritual search and I found it a lot of fun and my zazen was improving.  At one point I noticed that there was space between my constant internal verbalization.  My mind was actually getting quiet.  Not long after, I had my first deep experience and passed my first koan.
          The other day a long time practitioner of Zen told me that maybe it didn't matter how long one practiced or how much effort one put into zazen.  Maybe he thought the grace of enlightenment just fell on people randomly.  Maybe he was just expressing his frustration.  In this last section of the Genjo Koan,  Dogen gives his answer to this delema, the basic delema of all serious practitioners, how does one experience enlightenment? His answer, the answer, is very simple, you must practice.  There are no promises in this game.  No matter how much effort and time one puts into zazen there might never be any dramatic results,  but the conditions for any results is practice.  And there are benefits even when there is no large experience.  
        Some times I feel like we practitioners in the West are all tilling soil for the future.  So few of us seem to attain anything really deep in our practice.  I know many many practitioners who have been working at this for years and have never had that desired big experience.
           And again,  practice is not just sitting in a cushion trying to look good, or going to sleep.  Are you wipping the cart or are you wipping the Ox?  Wipping the Ox is  purifying the mind.  Purifying the mind is engaging fully in practice untill the mind is clear and bright, and then once it is clear and bright we can just sit with this clarity. This is zazen this is practice.
          For Dogen practice is enlightenment, dramatic experiences aside.  Even if we are only to feel the light soothing breeze of the dharma we must fan ourselves.  Buddhist retoric is often confusing.  Yes everybody is already enlightened  and yes we all have Buddha Nature but this is an enlightened view and not properly understood by most.  Dogen makes this clear in this last part of his essey If you say that you do not need to fan yourself because the nature of wind is permanent and you can have wind without fanning, you will understand neither permanence nor the nature of wind.  But if you do practice (fan your self) then naturally your practice  brings forth the gold of the earth and makes fragrant 
the cream of the long river.
          
          

          Hi to all my readers.  In one of the sitting groups I lead we have been reading Dogen Zenji's Mountains and Rivers Sutra.  Some people in the group love reading Dogen others resist Dogen because he is so obscure.  The Sutra talks about mountains walking, how can mountains walk?  Dogen's writings are filled with images like this which seem to make no sense.  Whether loving or hating Dogen few people understand him.  
          I have been thinking it would be fun to do a commentary on something of Dogen's.  The Mountains and Rivers Sutra is too long for a blog commentary.  I have chosen the Genjo Koan more properly titled Actualizing the Fundamental Point. not only because it is shorter but also  because it is one of the most beautiful and profound pieces in all of Zen literature.  The translation I am using is from the San Francisco Zen Center. This translation is from a collaboration of Kazuaki Tanahashi, Robert Aitkin and others
          If you don't know Dogen, he was the man who brought Soto Zen from China to Japan, establishing the Soto Zen sect in Japan.  This was in the 13th Century, a long tme ago, but his writings are timeless.  His thought still has tremendous influence in Soto Zen.   
          In this blog I am just going to present the Genjo Koan without commentary. Soak it up.


GENJO KOAN
As all things are buddha-dharma, there is delusion and realization, practice, birth and 
death, and there are buddhas and sentient beings. As the myriad things are without an 
abiding self, there is no delusion, no realization, no buddha, no sentient being, no birth 
and death. The buddha way is, basically, leaping clear of the many and the one; thus 
there are birth and death, delusion and realization, sentient beings and buddhas. Yet, 
in attachment blossoms fall, and in aversion weeds spread.
To carry yourself forward and experience myriad things is delusion. That
myriad things come forth and experience themselves is awakening. Those who have 
great realization of delusion are buddhas; those who are greatly deluded about 
realization are sentient beings. Further, there are those who continue realizing beyond 
realization, who are in delusion throughout delusion. When buddhas are truly buddhas 
they do not necessarily notice that they are buddhas. However, they are actualized 
buddhas, who go on actualizing buddhas.
When you see forms or hear sounds fully engaging body-and-mind, you grasp 
things directly. Unlike things and their reflections in the mirror, and unlike the moon 
and its reflection in the water, when one side is illuminated the other side is dark.
To study the buddha way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the 
self. To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things. When actualized by 
myriad things, your body and mind as well as the bodies and minds of others drop 
away. No trace of realization remains, and this no-trace continues endlessly.
When you first seek dharma, you imagine you are far away from its environs. 
But dharma is already correctly transmitted; you are immediately your original self.
When you ride in a boat and watch the shore, you might assume that the shore 
is moving. But when you keep your eyes closely on the boat, you can see that the boat 
moves. Similarly, if you examine myriad things with a confused body and mind you 
might suppose that your mind and nature are permanent. When you practice 
intimately and return to where you are, it will be clear that nothing at all has 
unchanging self.
Firewood becomes ash, and it does not become firewood again. Yet, do not 
suppose that the ash is future and the firewood past. You should understand that 
firewood abides in the phenomenal expression of firewood which fully includes past 
and future, and is independent of past and future.
Ash abides in the phenomenal expression of ash which fully includes future and 
past. Just as firewood does not become firewood again after it is ash, you do not return 
to birth after death. This being so, it is an established way in buddha-dharma to deny 
that birth turns into death. Accordingly, birth is understood as no-birth. It is an 
unshakable teaching in Buddha's discourse that death does not turn into birth. 
Accordingly, death is understood as no-death. Birth is an expression complete this 
moment. Death is an expression complete this moment. They are like winter and 
spring. You do not call winter the beginning of spring, nor summer the end of spring.
Enlightenment is like the moon reflected in 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.
When dharma does not fill your whole body and mind, you think 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 midst 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.
A fish swims in the ocean, and no matter how far it swims there is no end to the 
water. A bird flies in the sky, and no matter how far it flies, there is no end to the air. 
However, the fish and the bird have never left their elements. When their activity is 
large their field is large. When their need is small their field is small. Thus, each of 
them totally covers its full range, and each of them totally experiences its· realm. If 
the bird leaves the air it will die at once. If the fish leaves the water it will die at once. 
Know that water is life and air is life. The bird is life and the fish is life. Life must be 
the bird and life must be the fish. It is possible to illustrate this with more analogies.
Practice, enlightenment, and people are like this.
Now if a bird or a fish tries to reach the end of its element before moving in it, 
this bird or this fish will not find its way or its place. When you find your place where 
you are, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point. When you find your way 
at this moment, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point; for the place, the 
way, is neither large nor small, neither yours nor others'. The place, the way, has not 
carried over from the past, and it is not merely arising now. Accordingly, in the 
practice-enlightenment of the buddha way, meeting one thing is mastering it; doing 
one practice is practicing completely.
Here is the place; here the way unfolds. The boundary of realization is not 
distinct, for the realization comes forth simultaneously with the mastery of buddhadharma. Do not suppose that what you realize becomes your knowledge and is 
grasped by your consciousness. Although actualized immediately, the inconceivable 
may not be distinctly apparent. Its appearance is beyond your knowledge.
Zen master Baoche of Mount Mayu was fanning himself. A monk approached 
and said, "Master, the nature of wind is permanent and there is no place it does not 
reach. Why, then do you fan yourself?" "Although you understand that the nature of 
wind is permanent;" Baoche replied, "you do not understand the meaning of its 
reaching everywhere." "What is the meaning of its reaching everywhere?" asked the 
monk again. The master just kept fanning himself. The monk bowed deeply. The 
actualization of the buddha-dharma, the vital path of its correct transmission, is like 
this. If you say that you do not need to fan yourself because the nature of wind is 
permanent and you can have wind without fanning, you will understand neither 
permanence nor the nature of wind. The nature of wind is permanent; because of that, 
the wind of the Buddha's house brings forth the gold of the earth and makes fragrant 
the cream of the long river.

If we listen even once with open heart to this truth, then praise it 
and gladly embrace it, how much more so then, if on reflecting within 
ourselves we directly realize Self-nature, giving proof to the truth 
that Self-nature is no nature. We will have gone far beyond idle 
speculation.


          Hakuin is famous for setting the modern Rinzi Zen training curriculum which consists of a series of Koans that the monk in training must pass.  This was in the 18th Century, not so long ago.  Before this time koans were inconsistently used even in the Rinzi schools. 
           Koans on first glance seem to stress cognitive understanding over quietistic meditation.  Many people seem to think that any issue that they struggle with is a koan, and koans  can become an excuse for lots of thinking.   
          A koan is very specifically a question  ( Koans are not usually presented as questions but as stories, but the question  in this case is always how do you understand the story.)
which is designed to open one to Zen experience and or Zen insight.  Koans cannot be answered through thought alone but can be answered from experience in zazen.  Here Hakuin is pointing to one and maybe the most important insight to be gained from Zen experience, and this insight is the subject of many Koans, 
          Though I might seem to be contradicting what I wrote earlier in this commentary there is one insight that seems to be the demarcation between one who is good at zazen and one who is enlightened.   In Zen terms this is the difference between samadhi and kensho.  But is there really a difference?  The Sixth Patriarch thought there was no difference, they work together as the natural out growth of each other.  But practically speaking sometimes someone needs a kick in the pants for insight to arise from zazen and this is the function of koans. This insight which is so important is the insight into our true self nature.  There are many koans which point to our self nature.  One of the most famous is, "Thinking neither good nor bad what is your true nature?" Even the Koan "MU!" points to our true nature.   Most people think they are what they think and feel but what are you when you stop thought and emotion?  What are you when you are in truly deep zazen?  You might be asking, How can I have any insight if I have stopped thought?  Well, actually thought does not begin with our inner or outer verbal dialogue nor our emotions.  How could it?  Any psychologist will tell you that there is a subconscious element to thought,  and experience in zazen will tell you this.  Some people call it intuition but if zazen is truly deep and clear then it is just seeing clearly with that inner sense of understanding.  It is seeing clearly that the person in front of you is suffering or happy.  It is seeing clearly that someone needs or doesn't need help.  And if one is playing tennis it is knowing that a down the line shot is better or worse then a cross court shot.  There is no need to verbalize.  Now, clearly see who you are.
          The Buddha, 2500 years ago, after his enlightenment talked mostly about happiness, why we are unhappy and how we can become happy, but somewhere in there he verbalized the Non-Atman Doctrine.  Usually non-atman is translated as no soul, and so the Non Atman Doctrine states that we as individuals have no permanent or indestructible essence like a soul, that we are in effect an ever changing and temporary like everything else in the Universe.  Wow, this is unusual to come out of the mouth of a religious leader.  It makes perfect sense but our attachment to our own specialness also makes it difficult to believe.  Only a deep experience like the experience of deep zazen can, like Hakuin states, "giving proof to the truth that Self-nature is no nature." 
          I had been practicing meditation for ten or eleven days in retreat.  Early in the morning I was sitting practicing listening, hearing the morning sounds with an unusual intensity.  My mind was quiet and as sounds arose in my internal soundscape I would hear them appear and disappear like flashes of light adding no extra thoughts to the experience such as identifying the sources of the sounds.  Then with one very large explosion of sound I disappeared.  Even that small bit of self-awareness that functioned in the meditation was gone.  This only lasted a few moments but when awareness returned I clearly understood  that if through the practice of meditation all the aspects of self definition, the inner voice, emotions and consciousness could be turned off then there was nothing left which could be called "I".  With this simple insight an understanding of Buddhism and Zen opened.  The reverberations of this insight have completely changed my way of thinking and my relationship with the rest of the world.  
          Many people who practice Zen and other forms of Buddhism think that there is no real need to stop verbal thought and emotions, that the insight we call enlightenment will just appear after many years of practice.  But there is a logic to this insight.  It will not just appear with out, as the Shakyamuni Buddha would say, the proper causes and conditions.  To truly give proof to this understanding the personal experience must be deep, and this can only happen if everything that attaches us to our normal way of thinking is turned off.  This is sometimes called the Great Death.  It need only last a few seconds and it needs to be reflected upon shortly after the experience for it's transformative power to be truly great.
This is why we have koans.

Hi everyone.  Just a note,  I seem to have plenty of readers of this blog but nobody is leaving any comments.  Please feel free to leave a comment.

          I have been thinking lately about the words Mahayana and Hinayana.  I was doing some research for one of my blogs when I read that many people object to the term Hinayana and don't feel it is appropriate to apply it to the Theravada school.  They think it is a demeaning term and not just a historical demarcation between schools, a very understandable point of view.
          As a historical demarcation we only have the Theravada school existing today as an example of a Hinayana school though I understand that until the fall of Buddhism in India there were many different Hinayana schools.  There are significant differences between Theravada Buddhism and the Mahayana schools of Buddhism but there are also significant differences between the many schools of the Mahayana.  Theravada Buddhism is undeniably closer to the Buddhism that the historic Buddha, Shakyamuni, taught then any of the Mahayana schools.  Their primary literature is the Palli Cannon written in the language that the Buddha spoke and probably very close to the very words the he spoke.  This purity is undeniably one of the attractions of the Theravada school and the Western derivative,  the Vipassina school.  I know, many Western Vipassina practitioners would call themselves Theravada Buddhists but there are enough differences, mostly cultural, between the way it  is practiced in the Asia and the way it is practiced in the West that they really are different schools.  One example is the large number of lay practitioners in the West, many who are woman including many woman teachers.  And then much of the religious formality has been stripped out of the Western Vipassina practice.  The same could be said about Western Zen.  
          One of the most interesting aspects of the American Vipassina School is that many of the teachers are also psychologists and there is now a movement in psychology based around Mindfulness Meditation.  I also know of many psychologists practicing Zen and it is probably also true of the other schools of Buddhism in the West.  It is only natural seeing that Buddha emphasized happiness and pointed a way towards happiness and therapeutic psychology is also about making people happy.  The early teachings of the Buddha, the Four Fold Truths and the Eight Fold Path emphasize the personal search for happiness and individual salvation.  This is why it is called the small or individual vehicle, Hinayana.  One may think that the term Hinayana is disparaging but it is an accurate  descriptor.  This emphasis on the individual runs throughout the so called Hinayana schools.  The great thinkers of these schools focused on individual psychology and the psychology of meditation and produced a great body of literature called the Abhidhamma, which is worth some study.   Even the large number of vows that a Theravada  monk takes points to this individual emphasis.  To disparage this approach would be to disparage the teachings of Shakyamuni.  The so called Hinayana approach is an important leg upon which the Dharma stands.
          At some point some people thought that this individual emphasis had some problems, that this individual  approach was not enough.  They viewed Buddhism from a more philosophic (maybe ontological is a better word) and a more cosmic perspective.  From their concerns grew a whole new body of Buddhist literature  the Mahayana Sutras.  Though it is most likely that Shakyamuni Buddha did not speak the Mahayana Sutras we can see the roots of the Mahayana in his original teachings.  These are: One, the Non-Atman doctrine  that we humans  have no soul which transmigrates from body to body, or gives us special status as a special creation.  Two, that all things, including humans, result from causes and conditions ( an early idea of causation).  Three, that everything is in a process of constant change.   One can see the whole Mahayana as an elaboration of these three original teachings.  And because these are part of the original teachings they also are part of Theravada Buddhism, just not emphasized like in the Mahayana,  And  of course the Mahayana does not ignore the original teachings of the Four Fold Truths and the Eight Fold Path so really the Mahayana and Hinayana result from differing emphasis but contain each other. 
           In my reading I came upon a teaching from a Tibetan teacher that we should not classify different schools of Buddhism as necessarily Hinayana or Mahayana but should understand that it is the individual's approach to Buddhist  practice that is either Hinayana or Mahayana.  Within a Mahayana school one can practice with a Hinayana attitude and within Theravada Buddhism one can also practice with a Mahayana attitude.  Now I am getting close to the point I want to make but first let me tell one of the classic Zen stories. 
          The 5th Patriarch of the Zen school in China wanted to appoint a successor.  He asked his students to submit poems showing their understanding so that he could choose one of his students.  Shen Xui  the head monk submitted this:
      
The body is the Bodhi Tree
The mind a mirror bright 
Diligently polish the mirror
Don't let the dust alight

Hiu Neng the future sixth patriarch submitted this:

There is no Bodhi Tree
Nor is their a  mirror bright
Not a thing exists
Where can dust alight?

         The understanding reflected in these two poems is vastly different.  Shen Shui's poem is  about the individual practice of meditation and mindfulness.  As the fifth Patriarch noted, if you successfully practice this way you will ward off suffering.  But Shen Sui did not become the sixth Patriarch because he had not gone beyond a Hinayana point of view.  He still only saw things from his own individual perspective.  Hui Neng did receive the robe and bowl as the Sixth Patriarch because he had a deeper understanding which transcended the individual perspective.  In his poem he expresses a perspective in which not a thing exists.  In the Mahayana we say this is the perspective of emptiness which is nothing other then the perspective expressed by the Buddha's three teachings of non-Atman, causation, and impermanence.  And with the last line of this poem "where can the dust alight? ",  he is saying that this perspective is where suffering ends, that in some sense it never existed, and if we understand this we can't be touched by suffering.  Hui Neng's perspective was from the other side of the river, enlightenment  This is the Mahayana perspective.
          Now it may seem that that I am touting the superiority of the Mahayana but what I am trying to say is that whether you practice in the Theravada tradition or one of the Mahayana traditions it is important that you don't get caught in an individual perspective, a Hinayana perspective, but rather see beyond our individual perspective with at least a little bit of a Mahayana perspective.  What I mean by a little bit of Mahayana perspective is to take seriously those three teachings of the Buddha, non-Atman, causation, impermanence, and try to understand their implications.  Ask the questions:  What do these three teachings mean for my understanding of my self?  What do these three teachings mean for my understanding of reincarnation? What do these three teachings mean for my understanding of  free-will?  What do these three teachings mean for my place as an individual in the greater Universe?  What do these three teachings mean for the Dharma's place in the Universe?  What perspective do these three teachings give us on the nature of the Universe?  How does this understanding effect practice?  With a careful examination of these questions maybe we can take ourselves a bit out of the individual Hinayana perspective and give ourselves  something of a cosmic perspective.
          The motivation for writing this blog is my experience that many people come to Buddhism with a personal obsession over their own suffering.  This is perfectly understandable for those who experience deep psychological suffering and many of us do.  They think practicing Buddhism will relieve their suffering and it does to some extent but then after years of practice most people discover that for them Buddhism is not a miracle cure  When I ask myself how they can be more successful in their practice I think they some how need to have more of a Mahayana perspective.  Somehow they need to step over the seemingly impenetrable barrier of self.
          Many people think that the Mahayana is all about the Bodhisattva Ideal of the individual who dedicates him/her self to helping others overcome suffering.  The Bodhisattva Ideal is important.  It helps us overcome the self through dedication to others but if one does not see beyond the individual perspective it can also create deep suffering as the suffering of others, through compassion and empathy becomes our own suffering.  We are still caught in an individual perspective.  More important then the individual version of the Bodhisattva Ideal is the cosmic perspective of the Mahayana.  This cosmic perspective can take many forms which depends on the insight and experience of the individual but has to begin with a certain faith.  What is this faith?  It is a faith in the teachings and more then a faith in the teachings it is a faith in the Universe.  It is a faith that the Universe is manifesting in a way it must with a certain perfection.  It is the faith that though we humans are just small ephemeral beings we are part of and take part in this great perfect Universe. 
          It is difficult for us humans to see this perfection of which I write. We see only a small slice of time and our concerns are based around human wants and desires.  We see lots of things that seem very bad.  This is how our small human perspective sees the world.  There is a larger perspective.  In the Pure Land sects of Buddhism there is a faith in the vow of the cosmic Bodhisattva Amitaba to save all sentient beings.  This is a personification of the the type of faith I am writing about.  Amitaba represents the Universe and a  recognizable compassion that exists within the Universe.  This compassion manifests through friend and family, strangers, the society,  and the events that teach us the lessons we need to learn.  It manifests through our own individual Bodhisattva practice.  It manifests through the very nature of life.  It manifests through the very nature of the Universe.  Like a growing child this perfection is an evolving ever changing perfection.  Now I am going to say something that is very out there.  Human suffering is part of this perfection.  We might say it is the price of our human consciousness, the price of our potential to manifest as Bodhisattvas and Buddhas.  
          In our secular society many of us have faith only in our selves in our own intelligence in our own desires.  Many of us come to Buddhist practice with only this faith because Buddhism seems like the one truly rational religion.  But we human beings are not perfect, not fully rational, certainly not smart enough to figure it all out   A long time ago it was recognized that faith in just ourselves was not enough and the various religious traditions filled this gap.  Religion gave us a sort of cosmic perspective which soothed our suffering and fears especially our fear of death,  But, in today's world with the explosion of science based knowledge it becomes more and more difficult to have faith in these old religious traditions and so Buddhism presents itself on a rational foundation, without a faith in any Gods, with the personal psychological discipline of meditation, and is very attractive.  Buddhism appears as a sort of secular religion but still it asks for faith because in the cosmic perspective of the Mahayana it is trans-rational, and trans-individual.  Initially only faith has the power to help us let go of our individual perspective, our individual worries and concerns and especially our fear of death.  Eventually this faith may become something more, through experience transformed into wisdom.