The Undying Lamp of Zen

by Zen Master Torei Enji

  At the time, a novice bodhisattva, hearing the teaching expounded in this Undying Lamp, was filled with doubt and confusion and came to ask questions.

  QUESTION: Is seeing nature and realizing the Way really attaining buddhahood?

  ANSWER: It is really attaining buddhahood.

  QUESTION: The Buddhas all have spiritual powers and radiate lights. If you’ve already become a Buddha, Master, then why don’t you have these?

  ANSWER: I certainly do have spiritual powers and radiate lights.

  QUESTION: Why don’t you show them?

  ANSWER: I’m always showing them; you yourself don’t see. It’s like a blind man’s inability to see is not the fault of the sun and moon.

  QUESTION: Even so, the Buddhas have used spiritual powers and radiated lights to awaken faith in people, manifesting various miracles. Why don’t you do so?

  ANSWER: There are greater spiritual powers and lesser spiritual powers;6 there are greater lights and lesser lights. What I have attained are the great ones; what you’re asking about are the lesser ones. The greater ones are the great functions manifested by basic perception of nature; the lesser ones are just offshoots, extra powers developed in the process of cultivation. Our school only points to the root and does not discuss the branches. When the root is fully developed, the outgrowths appear of themselves. If you want to have branches, foliage, flowers, and fruit without the root and trunk, that is impossible.

  What is more, showing miracles deludes people and actually obscures basic nature. They all think, “He is a saint; this is beyond us,” and wind up unable to believe in the spiritual powers and radiant lights inherent in themselves. For this reason the wise do not use extra powers even if they have them.

  The thirty-two marks of distinction and eighty kinds of refinements, the supernatural powers, radiance, and so on, do not constitute the original body of Buddha; they are signs of excellence, borrowed temporarily to induce admiration in people of lesser faculties. Therefore universal rulers have the thirty-two marks of distinction, while devotees of various deities have supernatural powers and radiance. Even titans, spiritual immortals, powerful ghouls, and foxes and badgers with the power of concentration all perform these magical projections, producing all sorts of appearances.

  By way of analogy, even the water held in cupped hands will reflect things if it’s still, whereas the vast ocean makes no reflections when in movement. Generally speaking, magical projections all come from concentration power. Arhats have spiritual capacities and bodhisattvas have spiritual powers because the lesser vehicles emphasize cultivation of concentration power, so spiritual capacities are easily awakened. The Great Vehicle cultivates comprehensive knowledge and expedients, so concentration power is hard to perfect. Great vessels take a long time to complete, but once their capacities are mature, they are therefore beyond the scope of other vehicles, which lose their shine like a lone lamp under the sun.

  It is like plants and trees, which sprout only when the most mature and well-developed fruits are taken and buried in the earth. Then the cause does not differ from the result, and the result does not differ from the cause. If a cause is at variance with the result, that is not the real cause; if a result is at variance with the cause, that result is random. You just discuss result upon result while remaining at cause within cause; since even the cause is not completed, how could the result be?

  Our school directly distinguishes result within cause and cultivates cause upon result. Since the cause is thus, how could the result not be so? Please try to consider this in terms of the seeding of plants and trees.

  As for bodhisattvas of lesser vehicles who occasionally manifest spiritual powers and demonstrate miracles, because they enjoy the lesser teachings and attain lesser results, because they rely on the power of lesser concentration and release lesser spiritual powers, because they exert a lesser educational influence by less-impressive virtues, they cannot attain the great result, cannot fathom the knowledge of Buddhas, cannot instruct people with greater faculties, and cannot circulate the teachings of the Supreme Vehicle.

  All of them are lesser in faculties, lesser in knowledge, lesser in will and action, mistakenly ignoring the fundamental and pursuing the trivial. Even if they manage to develop spiritual capacities, radiance, and innumerable phenomena on the Way, because these are not perception of nature, they are not real Buddhism, since they are not teachings manifested by one’s own nature. So if you want to attain spiritual capacities and radiance, first you have to see nature.

  As an analogy, it is like the way a good doctor first treats the internal and then treats the external. If you treat the external first and don’t treat the internal, because the root of the illness has not been extracted, even if the treatment has extraordinary effect, the illness will eventually recur.

  It should be realized that treating external maladies always has quick results, while treating internal maladies not only has no immediate results, but also activates and spreads hidden maladies, so external maladies flare up even more. This is why the ignorant first crave quick results and value treatment of external illnesses. For this reason they have many illnesses over the years without ever being able to penetrate the way to real health without illness.

  When the root of disease is deep, then it is necessary to use potent medicine. When an illness is slight, then a single packet of medicine can cure it. So, as the inborn nature of people of high antiquity was full and substantial, they generally had no illnesses; and even if they got sick, they didn’t need a lot of medicine. Since middle antiquity, people’s faculties have been insubstantial and weak; as soon as they get sick, they use potent medicines, or seek various curative methods, before they can extirpate the root of the illness.

  So it is with Buddhism. The ancients were innocent and sincere people, so they could be treated with middling and lesser methods. The present time is different; everyone has deep-rooted illnesses, so but for the medicines of the One Vehicle—seeing nature, differentiation, merging, function, and progressive transcendence—even if the external seems cured, the internal will never be cured.

  Worldly people say that the path of sages existed in the era of the true Dharma, but in the imitative and terminal eras there is no practice or realization at all. How stupid! If you said that even though an illness is severe there’s no need for potent medicine, would that be logical? If you discuss the difficulty or ease of practice and realization, it is not only the teaching of the Higher Vehicle, but also the teachings of the Middle and Lower Vehicles too, that are hard to practice and realize.

  On the whole, difficulty and ease are in the person, not the teaching. It’s like medicine—whether or not it is taken is the responsibility of the person, not the medicine. Those who think middling and lesser teachings are effective because they’re easy to practice and realize are just treating external ailments with quick cures, not getting genuine effects.

  The formulas they sell in common drugstores are inexpensive, yet the effects they claim are still quite remarkable. Even so, when it comes to curing chronic illness, do you think they’ll work? It is necessary to use the marvels of potent medicines and hygienic techniques to cure this. Why would anyone think Buddhism alone is otherwise?

  As for the statement that there is no practice or realization in the imitative and terminal eras, this is just something Buddha said out of pity for people of the terminal era who do not believe in the true teaching.7 It’s like saying that the mental and physical illnesses of the last age are so deep-seated that few get cured even if they take medicines. While this is so, if you willingly stay sick and don’t take potent medicine, madness and disease will intensify, until you can no longer get up.

  Leaving aside for the moment the mad not knowing they’re mad, if you know you’re sick, you cannot but take medicine. Knowing you’re sick, first seek potent medicine.

  As for the mad nowadays, they only believe the words of the mad and do not believe the instructions of the sane. They
can only be pitied.

  Sickness of the physical body, however serious, does not, after all, go beyond this life. Sickness of the spiritual body stays in a toxic sea since beginningless time, inspired by six bandits, enslaved by five desires.8 The fever of anger and the humidity of craving get into the bones and penetrate the marrow, extremely hard to heal. How can ordinary medicine cure this? You need to find the medicine that is really right before you’ll succeed.

  Some say the root of disease is so deep it cannot be cured by one’s own effort, and requires a journey to the realm of the Expert Physician of the West to cure it.9 This is also a temporary expedient. It is like coaxing children who know no better and won’t take medicine, appealing to their likes to induce them to take medicine. Scripture says, “In the buddha lands of the ten directions there is only the teaching of One Vehicle; there is no second or third, except as expedient doctrines of Buddha, just using terms to induce and lead people.”10 So what the Good Doctor of the West gives is also the wonder drug of the One Vehicle. Since that and this are equally methods of the One Vehicle, why bother to go elsewhere?11

  The Buddha saw the insane were not taking medicine, so in his great compassion he devised expedients, first concentrating medicines in the four truths and twelve causes and conditions, and getting them to imbibe these.12 Then he concentrated medicines in the six perfections and recommended these.13 For Lady Vaidehi he concentrated medicines in sixteen visualizations,14 while for people of lesser potential he secreted medicine in rebirth by invocation of Amida Buddha.15

  With this, the insane gradually got a taste for them and took the medicines that suited them, each seeing its effect. Now, seeing the insane gradually revert to sanity, in the Universal teachings he turned around and criticized those medicines as inferior and said these were therefore not real substantial effects; and he praised the effects of the real medicines specially taken by the bodhisattvas.

  When the patients heard of these, they all wanted some, but because they were attached to their previous tastes, after all it was hard to give them up. That is why he added the Dharma medicine of insight, infusing them all equally. Unawares, the patients became increasingly sane, each seeing the effect of real medicine.

  Even so, this was still no more than expedient method; but because they got addicted to substitute medicine and didn’t seek real medicine, he established methods based on the principle of emptiness.

  Later, at the Lotus assembly, he set aside all expedients and administered to all alike the medicine of complete, all-at-once, subtle perception of nature’s real characteristics. The people became very joyful, now realizing they had hitherto been taking substitute medicine in error. From now on, with the Dharma medicine of the ghee of nirvana, he extirpated the roots of all illnesses everywhere,16 so they would be physically and mentally healthy and ultimately reach the realm of great comfort where there is no illness and fully develop the ability to act independently without hindrance. This is called the Flower Ornament universe. The aspect of finishing tasks and returning to repose, abiding stably in self-mastery, is called the mystery of the Mantra. These two scriptures both belong to the Vehicle of Mystic Projection, so they are not verbal teachings of the Buddha.17

  This is called the completion of the tasks of the King of Physicians.18 Now tell me, what about our final bit of transcendence outside of doctrine? What does it illuminate? When you get here, please be equipped with another eye.

  So students of our school have the times of the Buddha’s lifetime of teachings in themselves. When they first hear the verbal teachings of Buddhas and Masters, they are as if deaf and mute, as in the Flower Ornament assembly. Doing Zen meditation, they first understand the principle of emptiness and develop various views, mistaking this for the ultimate. This is like the attainments of the three vehicles of the Agamas. Then, calling them visionary states, repudiating them and taking them away, seeking true realization beyond, corresponds to the Universal scriptures. Spurring on determination further, not choosing among views but deeply seeking the source of attainments, is equivalent to the great sutra on perfection of insight. When the time comes and efforts ripen, it appears without being sought, like the Lotus-sutra’s teaching of One Vehicle. Also finding out the principle of essential nature as clearly as seeing it in the palm of the hand is just like the Nirvana-sutra. Clearly comprehending and successfully penetrating the differentiating statements of Buddhas and Masters is like returning to the Flower Ornament universe. When their state is peaceful, within it’s like entering the Mystic Array. Finally, progressively transcending, having a life beyond, is the experience of our school, communicated outside of doctrine. Isn’t this great?

  Recently, Pure Land Buddhists who have yet to find out the import of the school blindly claim the path of sages is hard to practice and therefore ineffective. They say only remembrance of Buddha is easy to practice and therefore of superior worth. Ho hum. Remembrance of Buddha? This is an esoteric expedient of the Buddhas. Buddha provisionally set up this teaching for a segment of lesser abilities; if he told them about the real vehicle immediately, because of the weakness of their power of faith, their minds would not be focused and they could not perfect absorption and form a deep affinity with it. By emphasizing the power of Buddha for the time being, faith has something to rely on, so absorption is easily developed. Therefore those who simply believe in remembrancing Buddha are assuredly reborn. When they keep up remembrance without concern with affirmation or negation, without mixing in random thoughts, then total absorption will suddenly occur; this is called rebirth.

  When Amida Buddha’s marks of distinction and refinements, radiant lights, and all teachings appear before your eyes, the Land of Bliss, with its arrays of positive qualities and all its outstanding features, fills heaven and earth; every single thought is the Seer of the Sound of the World, the individual in action is the Greatly Empowered One;19 music of twenty-five types fills the ears, food and clothing of eighty-four thousand kinds are provided at every seat; rivers, birds, and woods all remembrance the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Community; and the mountains, rivers, and earth fully reveal the subtle functions of knowledge of principle and phenomena; this is called realization of the highest class of rebirth in the present life.

  As for those whose faith is not complete, because of the power of remembrancing Buddha, they’ll be born in an expedient buddha land. This is called future rebirth. However, it is not beyond the level of middle or lower grades.

  As for those who strive for the higher grades of rebirth and practice progressively as best they can, because their effort is on the cause of understanding, they also attain the highest results. Though born in a buddha land and having become princes of Dharma along with the likes of Manjusri, Samantabhadra, Avalokitesvara, and Mahasthamaprapta, they are content to be lowly, inferior people. As for those who only crave rebirth, their effort is on causal conditions, so they will attain results of lesser vehicles. Even in buddha lands they will still be listeners, solitary illuminates, or lesser-vehicle bodhisattvas.

  As an analogy, suppose there is a country in the East called Tsune and a country in the West called Nori. Now the country of Tsune is in chaos, a military emergency. The king of Tsune, therefore, pitying the people, announces to everyone, “Our country is in turmoil, not fit for ordinary people to live in. Now the king of the country of Nori has great kindness and compassion, and is able to support destitute people. You should hasten to that land; the king of Nori will surely show you mercy, and you will have plenty of food and clothing.”

  Now the destitute who lack firm will all encourage their families to seek to reach that country. That country is far away, beyond a hundred thousand million mountains and seas, so many of them have trouble, and not a few of them die. Only a few among them, those who have the strength of deep faith and those who have gotten aboard the sturdy ship of great vows, ultimately avoid all those hardships. As soon as they reach the other shore, the king of Nori, moved with tremendous pity, gives th
em all goods and valuables, providing everyone with fields and houses, enabling them to enjoy peace, prosperity, and pleasure forever.

  As for the inhabitants of the country of Tsune who have spunk, they say to one another, “Though our country is in turmoil, we’re not without our leader; why should we emulate the ambition of common men to go to the trouble of getting welfare from another leader? We would rather leave our corpses lying at the gates of the citadel than ever trade the path of humanity and justice for personal gain. We should exert our utmost efforts to revive the nation.” With this, they raise an army and launch a righteous war, destroying the enemy’s fortresses, killing treasonous ministers, rectifying injustices, and caring for the common people. Then the king of Tsune, greatly pleased, has rewards for everyone.

  Thus for the knights of justice and principle are the honors of the highest offices and the emoluments of kings and lords; how could their nobility and glory be equaled by the people of Nori? Even the king of Nori, hearing his name, says, “The king of Tsune has an abundance of loyal subjects, which I cannot equal,” and envies him from afar. If he comes for a visit, it is with a great show of respect and reverent offerings of all sorts of delicacies.

  It is also like the case of people in the world who have rather strong will; they can prosper by running their own business, whereas the unreliable give up their own professions and become dependents of rich houses, barely keeping themselves alive. Everyone originally has the nature of a Buddha; everyone is a member of the royal family of Dharma and an heir to a tycoon. How can they be born in that family and yet disavow its character for themselves? How sad! It may be understandable in the intractable and base-minded who have no wisdom and utterly no affinity with good, but what about those with some spunk who know right from wrong—how can they have no concern about this?