The Undying Lamp of Zen

by Zen Master Torei Enji

  Koho’s novelty was prominent, avoiding discussion gone off into the wilds.33 Sensho was made of iron, going through years of harsh treatment; Ian’s fierce personality had the spirit of sitting through seven cushions; Tozen was exceptional in his practice.34 The sun rose in the morning sky and at day’s end hid in a middling mountain.35 Revealing half his body in empty space, he despised the easy approval found everywhere. His resentment put the onus on one heir: of twenty-four schools, most lost their transmission, but the descendants of old Gudo of Kanzan still exist today.36

  Munan’s three-foot sword killed completely, not leaving a body; Shoju wrested it away and polished it for forty years.37 His secret room was airtight; he cut out the subtleties of Buddhas and Patriarchs. He arrested our Kokurin, whose whole body suffered poisonous pains.38 Without you, sectarian style favoring propagation would have burdened descendants forever—where would your angry scolding ever cease?39 In order to resolve your doubts about this, I have listed teachers of authentic succession. I have no way of knowing about the doctrines inherited elsewhere.40

  QUESTION: If even the million savants and sages of Buddha’s time couldn’t understand, and only Kasyapa broke into a smile, why did so many understand after Buddha’s extinction?

  ANSWER: Those who entered by way of doctrinal vehicles had a lot of intellectual obstructions, which stuck to their skin and adhered to their bones, so they could not experience liberation. Those who entered through Zen never set up intellectual objects, so as soon as they applied it in practice it was easy to detach from intellectual objects.

  QUESTION: Then why didn’t Buddha teach Zen first, instead of expounding so many doctrinal vehicles?

  ANSWER: When the Buddha first emerged in the world, people’s faith was as yet immature, and in India there were countless other paths, each with different doctrines, and all sorts of misunderstandings. If Buddha had not expounded the doctrinal vehicles, perhaps no one would have believed. Therefore the Lotus-sutra says, “I reflected that if I only recommended the vehicle of buddhahood, people submerged in suffering would not be able to believe this teaching. As they will repudiate the teaching and disbelieve it, they’ll fall into the three states of misery.”41 Now, though Zen students don’t set up a doctrinal vehicle, they first use the doctrines as objects of faith and make them bases of practice. The sutra spoken by Vimalakirti says, “Just get rid of the sickness, don’t discard the teaching.” Viewed in correct perspective, the five periods, eight doctrines, three vehicles, and one vehicle are equally the Zen master’s single experience of progressive transcendence, with nowhere for you to stick your beak in.42

  QUESTION: There is a teaching called Vairocana’s miraculous empowerment, treating symbolic virtues esoterically. What you have been pointing out reveals the great principle of shutting off feelings. How does the esoteric teaching compare to Zen?

  ANSWER: The Buddha’s teaching of self-experienced samadhi may be illustrated by metaphorical explanations, but he still feared people wouldn’t understand, so he also used a very compassionate expedient in presenting these symbolic forms. So when he spoke of principle, he utterly transcended everything, and his presentation of phenomena was in mystic accord with the characteristics of reality. The embodiment of reality is considered the teacher; the teachings said to be inherent in nature are the features of the exposition. A sphere of objects is called a mandala; this is the Buddha’s esoteric representation of the qualities of the body of reality by means of miraculous empowerment.

  In ancient times the great Nagarjuna went to the immense iron stupa of the South, where he empowered seven white seeds and threw them at it. The door of the stupa suddenly opened, and Nagarjuna was going to enter, but the four guardian kings stopped him. He bowed and apologized, and was at last able to go inside. Then Vajrapani Bodhisattva transmitted teachings to him. Nagarjuna memorized them, and then came out and compiled them. They have been transmitted all the way to the present.

  “South India” means purity of open awareness; the “iron stupa” means basic ignorance. The “seven grains” mean the seven branches of enlightenment;43 “white” means purity. A “seed” means one moment of thought. “Empowerment” means contemplative awareness. The “opening of the stupa door” means the attainment of samadhi. “Obstruction by the four kings” means it is guarded on all four sides by the sense of delight in attaining something, so there is still separation from inherent nature. “Bowing and apologizing” means letting go of your body and giving up your life. “Gaining entry” means initial realization. “The Great Sun [Vairocana Buddha]” means inherent nature; esoteric teachings are the teachings present in inherent nature, so they are said to be expounded spontaneously. “Vajrapani” stands for knowledge attained afterward. “Transmission” means full understanding. Memorizing means never losing it once you’ve attained it. “Exiting” means bodhisattvas don’t stay in the state they realize; it means they help other people.

  If you are able to observe the basic ignorance in the clear mind of open awareness using the pure thought of the seven branches of enlightenment, then ignorance will suddenly break apart and inherent nature will appear. At this time, because of joyfully holding on to a sense of having attained something, you can’t see through your own nature. Only when you let go of gain and loss and affirmation and negation all at once do you see through your own nature. Countless teachings are evident everywhere before your eyes, but if you do not understand them by means of knowledge acquired after, you cannot know the distinct elements of the state of enlightenment.

  So the ability to understand the teachings is all produced by knowledge attained afterward.44 Once you’ve seen through this truth, then all your activities, even casual, are the Great Way, are all teachings. This is called the mind with secret adornments, because it is not another’s experience.45

  Later people didn’t understand this and mistakenly made representational forms. If you want to master this teaching, first you need to see nature. If you want to master this teaching without seeing nature, it won’t be possible. I don’t say the exoteric and esoteric doctrines are all wrong, but they are only on the road discussing the subtle state of enlightenment without being able to experience it in themselves.46 They can’t even attain the reality body, let alone what is beyond the reality body. For this reason the doctrinal vehicles only discuss the near and far of the road, while Zen immediately points beyond the road. Doctrinal vehicles speak remotely of attaining the subtle state of enlightenment, while Zen directly tests the truth of enlightenment.

  Suppose, for example, a pauper talks about the wealth of a rich family. He may talk of it as well as can be, but he can’t spend it himself. So what use is it to him? It’s like commoners talking about the nobility of kings. They may talk of it as well as can be, but they are still commoners. If they want the nobility of kings or the wealth of the rich, they’d better get it themselves.

  When you’re seeking, you don’t pay attention to the nobility of kings or the wealth of the rich, you just consider your own resources and test your own nobility. As you seek it you define it, increasing and advancing as you can. This is why progress and practice may be very different even if the intent is the same.

  If you practice the instructions of the scriptures, you often linger over the tracks of the teachings—when will you experience liberation? It is like the case of a merchant who keeps the conditions under which others have made profits, yet misses opportunities himself and thus makes no profit. There are no conditions for profiting—it is the gain that is valued. It is like a general who maintains the conditions under which others have been successful, yet misses opportunities himself, and so gains no success. Success has no conditions—it is the attainment that is valued.

  I don’t say there are no conditions at all, just that they are not to be held to dogmatically. First find out the underlying intent, recognize what is expedient, observe changes according to the times, take or leave according to suitability. In our Zen school, we don�
�t rely on the tracks of doctrine, but have a special aim. Dealing with people according to their potential, freely, without impediment, is also like this.

  If you want to obtain all the riches of the wealthy, first you must return to the magnate of your own mind; then an inexhaustible treasury of teachings will naturally come into your hands. If you want to attain all the nobility of kings, first you must call on the king of your own mind, and unsurpassed nobility will ultimately accrue to your person.

  Since ancient times there have been those among devotees of doctrine who have understood in this way, so those who have entered by way of doctrine have not been few. Now it is not that way at all. Even though what they discuss may exhaust wonders and plumb mysteries, they repudiate the two vehicles and reject provisional vehicles; they argue over partiality versus completeness, exotericism versus esotericism. On examination, though, they cannot even attain the realizations of the two vehicles, much less bodhisattvahood—when have they ever dreamed of the One Vehicle of buddhahood? Where are the partial and complete, the exoteric and esoteric?

  Our Zen school is not this way. Directly transcending expedients, meditating intensely, as soon as we get the essence, then the exoteric and esoteric teachings of Buddha all appear at once. Then we ram through a number of strong barriers, then come back and read scriptures and treatises, which now seem like we’ve expounded them ourselves. Afterward we raze the forest of wisdom, kick over the site of enlightenment, destroy the transcendental, and cut off the pulse of Buddhas and Patriarchs. Exoteric and esoteric—what idle fancies are these? Even the reality body and the wisdom body still have to withdraw from the universe!

  1. See The Flower Ornament Scripture, book 8, for a comprehensive treatment of the four truths; The Flower Ornament Scripture, pp. 745–48, for the twelve causes and conditions; and Buddhist Yoga, pp. 75–76, for the six perfections.

  2. “The two vehicles” refers to systems based on the four truths and twelve conditions, whose goal is nirvana or individual liberation. The negativity associated with this term is in reference to the relative narrowness of this goal in comparison to that of the bodhisattva, who strives for complete enlightenment for self and others.

  3. Those in the two lesser vehicles contemplate emptiness of person, while those in the third vehicle, the bodhisattvas, contemplate emptiness of both person and phenomena.

  4. The “five natures” refer to the psychologies associated with the three vehicles, plus those of indefinite nature and those with no such nature.

  5. This refers to the Mahaparinirvana-sutra of the Mahayana, the Scripture of the Great Demise, not the Pali Nibbana-sutta.

  6. For an interpretation of this story and the succession stories of the masters whose names follow, see Transmission of Light.

  7. Sinha was put to death by an anti-Buddhist king; the firewood refers to his cremation.

  8. See Transmission of Light for these stories about the second patriarch.

  9. A classic Zen saying has it that Huineng received the robe signifying transmission of Zen mastery because he didn’t understand Buddhism, he only understood the path. This means he didn’t understand doctrine as an intellectual object, but as a guide to practice. See The Sutra of Hui-neng: Grand Master of Zen.

  10. Nanyue, or Southern Peak, is the epithet of the southernmost of the five sacred mountains of China. Many Buddhists and Taoists lived there. For Huairang (677–744) and his famous disciple Mazu (709–88), who is here referred to as Jiangxi after the region where he taught, see The Blue Cliff Record, pp. 566–67. For Mazu’s teaching, see Teachings of Zen, pp. 7–11. For Xingsi of Qingyuan (660–740), see Book of Serenity, case 5. Hunan, also a place name, here refers to Xingsi’s great disciple Shitou (700–790). For Shitou’s teaching, see Timeless Spring. Mazu and Shitou were referred to in their time as the Two Doors of Immortality, and most of the classical Zen masters descended from their schools.

  11. “The golden rooster’s grain of millet” refers to a prediction by Prajnatara, the teacher of Bodhidharma, who brought Zen to China; the colt sent forth refers to a prediction by Huineng (638–713), the teacher of Huairang, about Mazu, whose surname means “horse.”

  12. See The Blue Cliff Record, cases 11 and 53.

  13. Linji is pronounced Rinzai in Japanese; Rinzai Zen is named after the master Linji (d. 867). See The Blue Cliff Record, pp. 590–94; “Zen Master Linji” in Zen Essence; and “The House of Lin-chi” in The Five Houses of Zen. The “blind ass” refers to Linji’s successor Sansheng (n.d.), who compiled the classic Linji lu (Record of Linji). For this story, see Book of Serenity, case 13.

  14. Xinghua (830–88) is reckoned a successor of Linji. The “pinch of incense” refers to respect.

  15. Nanyuan (860–930) was a successor to Xinghua. See The Blue Cliff Record, commentary to case 38, for this allusion.

  16. Fengxue (896–973) succeeded Nanyuan. See The Blue Cliff Record, cases 38 and 61.

  17. This alludes to a verse by Fenyang (947–1024), successor to Fengxue’s successor Shoushan (926–93), mentioned next in this list. For Fenyang’s teaching, see “Zen Master Fenyang” in Zen Lessons; and The Blue Cliff Record, pp. 638–41.

  18. Ciming (986–1039) was Fenyang’s successor. He used to keep himself awake during meditation vigils by sticking himself with an awl.

  19. Yangqi (992–1049) succeeded Fenyang. Baiyun (1025–72) succeeded Yangqi. For teachings of Yangqi, see “Zen Master Yangqi” in Zen Essence. For Baiyun, see Zen Lessons, cases 29–33.

  20. Master Yan is Wuzu Fayan (1024–1104), successor of Baiyun. See Zen Lessons, cases 18–28; “Zen Master Wuzu” in Zen Essence; and Unlocking the Zen Koan, case 45.

  21. Wuzu’s school was called the East Mountain school after its location.

  22. Yuanwu (1083–1135) succeeded Wuzu. Yuanwu is the commentator of the classic The Blue Cliff Record. For Yuanwu’s letters, see Zen Letters. See also Zen Lessons, cases 80–87; “Zen Master Yuanwu” in Zen Essence; and “Yuan-wu, Essentials of Mind” in “The House of Lin-chi,” The Five Houses of Zen.

  23. Huqiu (1077–1136) succeeded Yuanwu.

  24. Ying-an (d. 1163) succeeded Huqiu. See “Zen Master Ying-an” in Zen Lessons; and The Pocket Zen Reader, pp. 76, 83–89, 92–93, 131–32, 157–59.

  25. For Mi-an, see “Zen Master Mi-an” in Zen Essence. “Miaoxi” refers to Dahui (1069–1163), a successor of Yuanwu, who was called a second coming of Linji; see “Zen Master Dahui” in Zen Essence, and Zen Lessons, cases 145–49; Dahui’s famous letters are translated by J. C. Cleary in Swampland Flowers. Songyuan (1139–1209) studied with Ying-an and Dahui, but finally succeeded Mi-an.

  26. “Black beans” is Zen slang for written words; to have “black beans on the right road” means to master both Zen and the canonical teachings. Yun-an (1156–1226) succeeded Songyuan; Xutang (1185–1269) succeeded Yun-an. Xutang was the teacher of the Japanese National Teacher Daio, who traveled to China to study and brought this lineage of Zen to Japan; see “National Teacher Daio’s Letters to Meditators” in The Original Face.

  27. “The razorlike sword of Murasakino” refers to Daio’s successor Daito (1282–1337), whose successor in turn was Kanzan (1277–1360); all three of these masters were designated “national teachers,” a title for teachers of emperors, and this lineage is referred to by the second syllables of their honorific names, as the O-To-Kan school of Zen. Kanzan’s teaching is only known by a single verse, on the ancient story in which a student asks a famous master the living meaning of Zen, and the master replies, “The oak tree in the garden”; to say this has “a thief’s potential” is a warning not to let the mirrorlike perception of being-as-is turn into absorption in objects.

  28. Juo Sohitsu (1296–1380), successor of Kanzan.

  29. Muin Soin (1326–1410) succeeded Juo Sohitsu.

  30. Nippo Soshun (1368–1448) succeeded Muin; he was succeeded by Giten Gensho (1393–1462).

  31. “The apricot of Mount Heng” refers to the ancestral school of
Zen in China. The term “the two marvels” comes from the Tendai school, describing the Hokke or Lotus-sutra; “the two marvels” are relative and absolute: As it is introduced to broaden minds, the teaching of the Lotus is called marvelous in comparison to the teachings that preceded it; this is the relative marvel. As it absorbs the other teachings into a total unity, there is no more comparison; this is called the absolute marvel. “Black beans mixed with an accurate eye,” like an earlier analogue of this expression, refers to combined mastery of Zen and the canonical teachings, such as the preceding allusion to the study of Tendai teachings. “Four heirs” refers to four successors of the last mentioned Master Giten, among whom was the next mentioned, Toyo Eicho (1428–1504).

  32. Taiga is Zen Master Taiga Tankyo (n.d.).

  33. Koho is Zen Master Koho Genkun (n.d.).

  34. Sensho is Zen Master Zensho Zuisho (n.d.). Ian is Zen Master Ian Chisatsu (n.d.); the description of his spirit refers to a famous Chinese master who sat in meditation so long he wore out seven cushions before he attained enlightenment. Tozen is Zen Master Tozen Soshin. (He has been identified with Sekko Soshin [1408–86], but this is problematic. The latter was a successor of Muin Soin [1326–1410], an earlier figure in the lineage.)

  35. This means Zen Master Yozan Keiyo (1559–1629). The reference to “day’s end” alludes to the waning of Zen to near extinction, and the hiding of the sun alludes to the obscurity of this Zen master.