The third line of the Bowl-Raising Verse is gekyū roku dō, “for all beings in the six realms.” This refers to all living beings transmigrating in the six realms of samsara: the realms of hell, hungry ghosts, animals, asuras or fighting spirits, human beings, and heavenly beings.
We express our gratitude to the Three Treasures and to all beings that support our life. This eating of food is not an individual action but rather something we do together with all beings. We can live because we eat food. When eaten, food becomes our energy and part of our body. This body and mind is supported by all beings. We in turn should nurture all beings. That is the idea of on, repaying the debt of kindness.
The word kuyō is important in Buddhist practice. Unfortunately, in this translation of the meal chant the final line is rendered as “May all be equally nourished.”Kuyō has disappeared. This word is usually translated as “to make an offering.” Ku means “offering” and yō means “nourish” ot “sustain.” The offering here is not limited to offering monks something material such as food, drink, medicine, clothing, shelter, and so forth. The second chapter of the Lotus Sutra presents a wide range of offerings:
If anyone goes to stūpas or mausoleums,
To jeweled or painted images,
With flowers, incense, flags, or canopies
And reverently makes offerings;
Or if they have others perform music,
By beating drums or blowing horns or conch shells,
Or playing pipes, flutes, lutes, harps,
Mandolins, cymbals, or gongs,
Producing fine sounds and presenting them as offerings;
Or if they joyfully praise
The Buddha’s virtues in song,
Even with just a tiny sound,
They have fulfilled the Buddha way.
If anyone, even while distracted,
With even a single flower,
Makes an offering to a painted image,
They will progressively see countless buddhas.
There are those who worship by prostrating themselves,
Some merely by putting palms together,
Others only by raising a hand,
And others by a slight nod of the head.
All of these,
Honoring images in various ways,
Will progressively see countless buddhas,
Fulfill the unexcelled way themselves.
Save countless beings everywhere,
And enter into nirvana without residue,
As a fire dies out
When the firewood is all consumed.
If anyone, even while distracted,
Enters a stūpa or mausoleum
And even once exclaims, “Hail to the Buddha,”
They have fulfilled the Buddha way.63
In Shōbōgenzō “Kuyō-Shobutsu” (Making Offering to Buddhas), Dōgen Zenji introduced ten kinds of offerings and said:
Such service of offerings we should perform unfailingly with sincere mind. It has been performed without fail by the buddhas. Stories about it are evident throughout the sutras and Vinaya. At the same time, the Buddhist ancestors themselves have personally handed down its authentic transmission. Days and months of waiting in attendance and doing work are just times of serving offerings.64
There are many ways to make offerings. Our practice of zazen is one offering. Acting for the sake of the Three Treasures instead of fulfilling one’s desires is an offering. Because we exist within a network of support, we need to support others. This is what “repaying the debt of kindness” and “making offering and sustaining” (kuyō) mean. How do we practice this? How can we pay our debt to all beings? The next verse, quoted earlier, explains:
The first portion is to end all evil;
the second is to cultivate every good;
the third is to free all beings.
May everyone realize the Buddha’s Way.
At the end of this verse, we bow with our ōryōki bowls and begin to eat.
The Japanese interpretation of the Chinese original is “Ikku i dan issai aku / Niku i shu issai zen / San ku i do sho shu jō / Kaigu jō butsudō.”Ikku, niku, and sanku mean first, second, and third bites. The first bite is to end all evil, to stop unwholesome deeds. The second bite is for he practice of all good things, and the third is for do sho shu jō. This is usually translated as “to save all sentient beings,” but the literal meaning of do is “to go across.” So it means to help all beings to cross the river from this shore to the other. This shore is samsara, in which all beings transmigrate through the six realms. The Buddha taught that we should cross the river to the other shore, nirvana. “To help people” means, in this case, to help all beings cross over to nirvana. This is the first of the four bodhisattva vows. These three points are the same as the threefold pure precepts, one category of the sixteen precepts we receive at the jukai (precepts-receiving) ceremony. The first is the precept of embracing moral codes, the second is embracing all good actions, and the third is embracing all living beings. We receive the threefold pure precepts to become Buddha’s children or bodhisattvas. These precepts become our vow. We vow to live with this guidance, to refrain from unwholesome deeds by embracing moral codes, to practice only wholesome deeds, and to live together with all living things, doing no harm to any.
A question we should ask now is, What is good or wholesome, and what is bad or unwholesome? The definition of good and bad in Buddhism is clear. Any action we take (or karma we make) that causes suffering to self or others is bad (unwholesome). Actions that reduce suffering or bring joy or happiness to self and others are good (wholesome). The original Sanskrit word for pain or suffering is duḥkha, while joy or happiness is sukha. So the definition of good and bad in Buddhism has to do with the relation between cause and effect. It is difficult to tell whether one action is good or bad by observing it in isolation. We need to look at the consequences of many related actions. Depending on its results, an action can be good or bad. We can never be entirely certain whether an action is good or bad. An action with good intentions may cause either a beneficial or harmful result. The best we can do is try to do good. This aim to do good is our vow. If our action based on good intentions causes an unwholesome effect, we have to make repentance and try to avoid repeating the mistake. This is our practice of vow and repentance. Vow and repentance together with the precepts are very important aspects of bodhisattva practice. The precepts we receive are the guidelines for our life as the Buddha’s children.
The final line is “May everyone realize the Buddha’s Way,” or in Japanese “Kai gu jō butsu dō.” Kai gu means “together with all beings.” We should not accomplish or complete Buddha’s Way alone but with all beings. It’s not possible for one person alone to attain buddhahood. When we recite or chant these verses during meals, we renew our vows and reflect on our deeds, our incompleteness, and try to be better. Our practice is to see reality as prajñā, the wisdom that sees the impermanence and egolessness of all beings. In Mahāyāna Buddhism this is called emptiness. We may practice zazen to pacify or calm ourselves, but that is not enough. We have to engage in the activity of our day-to-day lives. Precepts supply guidance for these activities outside of the meditation hall. Precepts, meditation, and wisdom are called the three basic studies of Buddhism. All our activities, all the parts of our lives, should become our practice to accomplish the Buddha’s Way with all beings.
Verse of the Rinse Water
When the preceding verses have been chanted, we begin eating. When finished, we wash our bowls. After washing, we offer water and chant the following verse.
The water with which we wash our bowls
Tastes like ambrosia.
We offer it to the many spirits;
May they be satisfied.
On ma ku ra sai so wa ka.
After we eat food, we clean the ōryōki bowl and other small bowls with a setsu, or scraper. To avoid wasting any food, we clean the bowls with water that we then offer to the various spirits. The meaning of this
verse is almost the same as the verse of offering the food before eating, discussed above: “O spirits, we now give you an offering; / This food is for all of you in the ten directions.” Here the verse says, “The water with which we wash our bowls / Tastes like ambrosia.” I don’t know what ambrosia tastes like. The original word, however, is kanro, which literally means “sweet dew.” Often this word is used as a symbol of Buddha’s teachings, the Dharma. Food is Dharma, and Dharma is food. When we offer food, we offer Dharma; and this water tasting like sweet dew is Dharma too.
“We offer it to the many spirits; / May they be satisfied.” The original word for spirits is ki jin, the same word we saw in the Verse of Offering Food. Although Buddhist philosophy claims there is no soul, Buddhism never negates unseen beings or “spirits.” The Buddha never denied reincarnation or transmigration, according to which there is something that never dies and transmigrates when this body dies. Philosophically, reincarnation and the Buddha’s teaching of no soul, no ego, or anātman appear contradictory. This contradiction has been an important issue in many philosophical arguments within Buddhism and between Buddhism and other philosophies in India as well as in China.
But since a majority of common people believed in ghosts, spirits, demons, and gods, Buddhism didn’t try to eliminate these beliefs but rather accepted them as part of the Buddha’s teaching. Many Indian gods, like Indra, were accepted within Buddhism as guardians or protectors of the Dharma. If you think logically, this may strike you as strange. However, when traditional peoples accept the existence of souls and gods, this is not a philosophical concept for them, but rather a feeling, which we share, that we live together with all beings in nature.
We feel an intimacy with nature and we can communicate with it. If we negate these beings, all nature becomes merely a collection of matter, and there is no way to communicate or live together with immaterial things. And if we think of material things as nothing more than objects of our desire, we will use and misuse them in any way to satisfy ourselves.
The next line is a mantra. In Japanese we pronounce this as On, makurasai, sowaka. In Sanskrit it goes Om mahorase svāhā. We don’t know much about this mantra. Om and svāhā appear in almost all mantras. Om is a word that begins the mantra. It is a holy word in India. Vajrayāna Buddhism, in particular, accepted many practices of this kind from Hinduism. According to a commentary on Chanyuan Qinggui (Zen’en Shingi), mahorase is a compound of mahā (big) and urase (abdomen). Probably this refers to hungry ghosts.
Verse of Purity While Abiding in the World
Abiding in this ephemeral world
Like a lotus in muddy water,
the mind is pure and goes beyond.
Thus we bow to Buddha.
In “The Dharma for Taking Meals” (Fushukuhanpō) Dōgen Zenji wrote that, in Eiheiji, “hearing the tsui chin, the ino chants the ‘Existing in the world’ verse. This is the traditional ritual of Sōjō (Bishop) Yōjō [Eisai], so we are following it for now.”65 Dōgen Zenji basically followed the procedure of formal ōryōki meals described in Chanyuan Qinggui (Zen’en Shingi), but he added this verse, chanted at the end of the meal, from the tradition of Eisai, who was the first Japanese master to introduce Zen to Japan. Eisai was a Rinzai Zen master. Dōgen Zenji first practiced Zen in Japan with Eisai’s disciple Myōzen at Keninji, which was founded by Eisai. However, the verse itself is much older than Eisai. It appears in the precepts-receiving ceremony in fascicle 9 of Chanyuan Qinggui.
The meaning of this verse is important for us as the Buddha’s children. The English translation is a bit different from the original. This is a verse praising the Buddha’s virtue. My literal translation of this verse is “Dwelling in this world like empty space, and like a lotus flower without being stained by muddy water. Purity of the mind goes beyond. Therefore we make prostration to the most venerable one.” In the English translation, kokū (empty space) is an adjective modifying “world,” yielding the meaning “this ephemeral world.” In the original, however, empty space modifies “abiding.” The way the Buddha abides in the world is like empty space and also like a lotus flower.
Like empty space, the Buddha dwells in this world. Empty space or kokū is a symbol of perfect interpenetration. In Buddhism it has three meanings. In a cup, there is a certain amount of water, and above the water there is empty space as a conditioned phenomenal thing. This is a very common meaning of empty space—the space where nothing exists. And yet this space is not really empty. It is filled with air. Empty space in the common sense is not really empty.
Another meaning of empty space in Buddhism is the space that does not disappear even when it is occupied by something. This is considered unconditioned; it never arises or perishes. If a glass is here, the space the glass is occupying doesn’t actually disappear. This space allows all beings to exist, and it doesn’t disappear even when beings disappear. This space never changes, never appears, and never disappears. It’s always there. And this empty space is never defiled or pure. If the space is occupied by dirty things, it is not defiled.
The third meaning of the word kokū is empty space as a metaphor for prajñā or wisdom, the emptiness of all beings. Emptiness means the way the Buddha sees all beings—without self-nature or substance, impermanent, and always changing. This way of being is different from the empty space in the cup, which is a lack of being. It is also different from the space that allows all things to exist. This third kind of emptiness is the way all beings exist without self-nature. Since everything is connected with everything else, the reality of all beings, which is emptiness, pervades and penetrates the whole universe. There is no discrimination, no attachment, and nothing to grasp. This meaning of kokū is used as a metaphor for the emptiness that is the reality of our life. In this verse, kokū means the emptiness of all beings. The Buddha dwells in this world of the five skandhas as emptiness.
Kokū appears in the Verse of the Wind Bell, composed by Dōgen Zenji’s teacher, Tiantong Rujing.
The whole body is like a mouth hanging in empty space.
Not questioning the winds from east, west, south, or north,
Equally with all of them, speaking of prajñā:
Ding-dong-a-ling ding-dong.
Dōgen’s teacher wrote this poem about a wind bell hanging under the temple roof. In the Hōkyōki, Dōgen recorded his conversation with Rujing about this poem.
Dōgen made one hundred prostrations and said, “In your poem about the wind bell, I read in the first line, ‘The whole body [of the wind bell] is like a mouth hanging in empty space’ and in the third line, ‘Together expressing prajñā equally to all beings.’ Is the empty space referred to one of the form [rūpa] elements? Skeptical people may think empty space is one of the form elements. Students today don’t understand Buddha Dharma clearly and consider the blue sky as the empty space. I am sorry for them.”
Rujing replied with compassion, “This empty space is prajñā. It is not one of the form elements. The empty space neither obstructs nor not-obstructs. Therefore this is neither simple emptiness nor truth relative to falsehood. Various masters haven’t understood even what the form is, much less emptiness. This is due to the decline of Buddha Dharma in this country.” Dōgen remarked, “This poem is the utmost in excellence. Even if they practice forever, the masters in all corners of the world would not be able to match it. Every one of the monks appreciates it. Having come from a far-off land and being inexperienced, as I unroll the sayings of other masters in various texts, I have not yet come across anything like this poem. How fortunate I am to be able to learn it! As I read it, I am filled with joy, and tears moisten my robe, and I am moved to prostration because this poem is direct and also lyrical.”
When my teacher was about to ride on a sedan-chair, he said with a smile, “What you say is profound and has the mark of greatness. I composed this poem while I was at Chingliang monastery. Although people praised it, no one has ever penetrated it as you do. I grant that you have the Eye. You must compose
poems in this way.”66
Rujing said that this kokū is not the empty space that disappears when it is occupied by something, which is one of the rūpa elements. Neither is it the second meaning. He clearly says this is prajñā itself. Therefore, I am sure that Dōgen Zenji interprets this kokū in the meal chant as meaning prajñā.
The Buddha dwells in this world with prajñā, which sees the true emptiness of all things as neither having form nor being without form. This line echoes the line in the verse for setting out the bowls:
Now we set out Buddha’s bowls;
may we, with all living beings,
realize the emptiness of the three wheels:
giver, receiver, and gift.
The Buddha dwells in this world like a lotus flower. The lotus flower emerges from muddy water. It is a beautiful flower which mud does not defile. It symbolizes the Buddha’s virtue, compassion, and wisdom. It is a sacred flower and an important symbol in Buddhism and Hinduism.
According to a Hindu creation myth, when the god Vishnu was asleep in water a lotus flower grew from his navel. Another god, Brahma, was sleeping on this lotus. Brahma created this world while Vishnu was asleep. The yogic cross-legged posture is called the lotus position because of this myth.
In Buddhism many Buddha statues are sitting or standing on lotus petals. This is for a reason. Right after the Buddha attained awakening, he hesitated to teach because he thought the truth he found was too deep and subtle for anyone to understand. Then Brahma asked the Buddha to teach. Then the Buddha, out of compassion for living beings, surveyed the world. He saw that there are many different kinds of people.
Just as in a pond of blue or red or white lotuses, some lotuses might be born in the water, grow up in the water, and thrive while submerged in the water, without rising up from the water; some lotuses might be born in the water, grow up in the water, and stand at even level with the water; some lotuses might be born in the water and grow up in the water, but would rise up from the water and stand without being soiled by the water—so too, surveying the world with the eye of a Buddha, the Blessed One saw beings with little dust in their eyes and with much dust in their eyes, with keen faculties and with dull faculties, with good qualities and with bad qualities, easy to teach and hard to teach, and a few who dwelt seeing blame and fear in the other world.67
Living by Vow Page 14
