Living by Vow

by Shohaku Okumura

  Later I read the biography of a Chinese Zen master, Dongshan Liangjie (Tōzan Ryōkai). Dongshan was the founder of the Caodong (Sōtō) school in China. This is a translation from Denkōroku (The Record of Transmitting the Light) by Keizan Jōkin.

  While still young, [Dongshan] read the Heart Sutra with a teacher. When he reached the place where it said, “There is no eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, or mind,” he suddenly felt his face with his hand. He asked his teacher, “I have eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and the rest. Why does the scripture say that they do not exist?”87

  That was Dongshan’s original question. His biography says that Dongshan’s first teacher was amazed by his question and knew immediately that he was an unusual person. The teacher knew he couldn’t be this boy’s teacher and sent him to a better instructor. I was happy to know that Dongshan had the same question that I did. It’s true we have a nose, eyes, and so forth. Why does the Heart Sutra say we have no such things? This is a very simple, childish question, but if you don’t understand this point the Heart Sutra is incomprehensible.

  The longer version of the Heart Sutra I introduced above begins:

  At that time also the Holy Lord Avalokita, the Bodhisattva, the great being, coursed in the course of the deep perfection of wisdom; he looked down from on high, and he saw the five skandhas, and he surveyed them as empty in their own-being.88

  So the five skandhas exist. Avalokiteśvara saw them. But he didn’t see the self or ego. In our everyday lives we think, “I have a body and mind.” But what is this “I”? Where is this “I” that thinks it is the owner and operator of this body and mind? Avalokiteśvara saw that there is no “I,” only the five skandhas. When the Heart Sutra says Avalokiteśvara saw only the five skandhas it means there is no ego, no “I,” no self. Only the body and the functions of mind exist.

  The Heart Sutra also said that Avalokiteśvara saw that the five skandhas are empty. To understand this statement we have to understand something about the history of Buddhism. Three or four hundred years passed between the life of Shakyamuni Buddha and the beginning of Mahāyāna. During this period Buddhist monks studied Buddhist philosophy and established the system called Abhidharma. In Abhidharma philosophy there is no ego, no “I,” only the five skandhas and the other elements. There are several ways to categorize these elements. One way is into twelve sense fields, another is into eighteen dhātu. The system of Abhidharma philosophy established in the school known as Sarvāstivādin categorizes dharma into seventy-five elements. As a student of Buddhism, I had to memorize this system. There is another system called Yogācāra that analyzes the dharma into one hundred elements. I tried to memorize them all, with their definitions. Traditionally that’s how we studied Buddhist philosophy in Japan.

  In the Abhidharma philosophy there is no ego, no substance. Only the dharmas or elements exist, and they never change. The ego or self is just a collection of elements. Abhidharma philosophers believed that the seventy-five dharmas, which cannot be further divided, have existed in the past, exist in the present, and will exist in the future. In the Heart Sutra or Prajñāpāramitā Sutra, Mahāyāna Buddhists said that even those elements are empty. That is a philosophical way of understanding this passage. There are no eyes because eyes are empty. The objects of eyes, such as color and shape, are empty. Empty means they cannot be grasped. There is no self-being or self-nature, so we cannot grasp the self.

  For instance, we think there is something in front of our eyes when we see a notebook. But our eyes are limited. We can see light waves only between ultraviolet and infrared lengths. This is a small part of the spectrum, but other animals can see a broader range. To them this world looks totally different. Our ears can hear only sounds of certain frequencies; dogs hear higher ones. What we think is quiet could be very noisy for dogs. What we see and hear really depends on our capabilities. We believe that what we see exists just the way we see it, but this is an illusion.

  Our picture of the world is our reality, but we should understand that it is distorted. This is the meaning of emptiness. Our mind is emptiness. Our sense organs are emptiness. Things outside us are also emptiness. Everything is just illusion. The fact that we live with illusion is our reality. When we really understand this and see how illusion is caused, we can see reality through the illusion. Whatever we see, whatever we grasp with our sense organs and consciousness, is illusion. When we see this we are released from attachment to our limited view, to what we have, to what we think we own. We may not become completely free, but we become less restricted by our limitations.

  In our zazen we sit in an upright posture and breathe quietly, smoothly, and deeply into our abdomen. We let go of whatever comes up in our mind. In front of our eyes is nothing but a white wall. This letting go of thought means to become free from what we are grasping, from the objects to which we attach ourselves. This letting go is prajñā or wisdom. It means to become free of our picture of the world caused by our karma. In this way our view becomes a bit broader and deeper. We keep practicing this zazen, sitting and letting go of thought, trying to see things in the most flexible way. This doesn’t mean we negate our delusions. We can never negate them; they are our life. But so long as we fail to see that they are illusory and grasp them as reality, we cannot be free. When we really see the emptiness of subject and object, we can be free from grasping, clinging, and greed.

  Dōgen Zenji described zazen as shin jin datsuraku, or dropping off body and mind. He recorded his conversation with his teacher, the Zen master Rujing (Nyojō), about shin jin datsuraku since it was originally Rujing’s expression. Rujing explained that “dropping off body and mind” means to become free from the five desires caused by the five objects (eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and body)—he didn’t mention mind.

  When the five senses encounter an object, desire arises to grasp or hate it. We think, “I want this,” “I don’t like this,” or “I don’t care.” These are all desires caused by an object contacted through the five sense organs. We are like kids. We see something good, something attractive, and we want it. We try to grasp it. When I go to the supermarket with my kids they run to the toys and take whatever they want and just put it in the cart. When I try to take it back to the shelf, they scream. They are very honest.

  We are not so honest. We pretend that we are not attached to things, but deep in our hearts we cling to what we encounter. We are still childish. We cling not to toys but to wealth, reputation, or to very subtle things in our minds. We want to get these things. Sawaki Roshi called this grasping our thief-nature. We also have buddha-nature. All human beings have both buddha-nature and thief-nature. Depending on our actions, we become a thief or a buddha. When we let go of thought and become free from the five desires, we are buddhas.

  We must see the emptiness of the subject, of things outside us, of our sense organs, our minds, and the delusions or desires caused by the encounter between the sense organs and objects. When we really truly see the emptiness of all this, we become free from the five desires. We don’t get rid of delusion or illusion, but we understand that illusion is illusion and delusion is delusion. We see that we don’t have to satisfy all our desires.

  Even if we are dissatisfied, that’s okay. Just let it go. We can still live. We don’t need to satisfy all our desires. We think that when all our desires are satisfied we will be happy, but if not, we can still be happy if we feel oneness with other people and other beings. Other people’s happiness then becomes my happiness, other people’s pleasure my pleasure, other people’s sadness my sadness. Together we can feel a synthesis called in Japanese hōraku, joy or delight in the Dharma. It is not a pleasure caused by fulfillment of our individual desires.

  Dharma embraces the reality that we are living together with all beings. We are all connected, so there is nothing to gain and nothing to lose. Everything is coming and going in a natural circulation. But human beings create fences or walls between themselves. We calculate how much we gain for our side and how much we l
ose. When income is greater than expenses, we feel happy. This is a fiction, but in human society it works. We don’t need to break or destroy these rules. They’re okay. In human society each person should be independent. But in reality all beings are interdependent. Our life has two layers.

  We usually see only the surface, where we appear independent. We should keep our record of income and expenses. That’s all right. But if we see only this level, our life is no more than a calculation of how much we acquire, how much we lose, and whether we get more or less than others. On a deeper level we are all living together. There are no walls that separate us from other beings. This is seeing emptiness, no separation. The wall is a useful illusion in human society, so we shouldn’t negate or destroy it. Still, we should see that this barrier is just a useful fiction, a means to live together with other people. I think this is a practical definition of seeing emptiness.

  In his “Maka Hannya Haramitsu” (Mahā Prajñā Pāramitā) commentary on the Heart Sutra, Dōgen Zenji quotes his teacher Rujing’s poem about a wind bell hung in a Japanese or Chinese temple. I included it in chapter 5, but here it is again:

  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.89

  This whole body of the wind bell is ourselves. The winds come from all directions, yet the wind bell never discriminates among them. There are many kinds of wind. Spring brings pleasant breezes. In winter a cold north wind blows. In summer the wind is hot. Wind has a different meaning in each situation, each season. All different kinds of wind come to the wind bell, yet the wind bell never discriminates. It abides “Equally with all of them, speaking of prajñā.” The wind bell expresses the prajñā or wisdom that sees the reality of our life. The empty wind bell is hanging in emptiness. When wind comes it makes sound that is prajñā. The last line of the poem, “Ding dong a ling ding dong,” is the sound of the bell. This is our practice of zazen. We are empty, but when we encounter others we make a sound that is prajñā. Together with all beings we express prajñā. This poem is an expression of the reality of our zazen and our lives.

  NO BUDDHISM

  “No ignorance and also no extinction of it, and so forth until no old age and death and also no extinction of them;

  No suffering, no origination, no stopping, no path.”

  As we saw above, these lines refer to the twelve links of dependent origination, the four noble truths, and the eightfold noble path. Dependent origination is one of the essential teachings of the Buddha. It can be expressed as follows:

  All things arise from a cause.

  He who has realized the truth has explained the cause,

  And also how they cease to be:

  This is what the great samana has taught.90

  The twelve links of dependent origination are the final and most complete form of the teaching of dependent origination. This teaching does not refer to objective beings in the phenomenal world around us, but rather to the causes and extinction of suffering in our lives. In early Buddhism, it is called dependent origination, but in Mahāyāna Buddhism after Nāgārjuna, it is called interdependent origination. This is for a reason. In the early Buddhist teachings cause and result flow in one direction only. Ignorance is the cause of action, action is the cause of consciousness, and birth is the cause of old age and death. Old age and death depend on birth, but birth does not depend on old age and death. In Nāgārjuna’s and other Mahāyāna teachings, however, all things are interdependent on each other.

  This teaching does not refer to the objective beings in the phenomenal world around us but rather to the causes of suffering in our own lives and the extinction of them. In the Heart Sutra only the first cause (ignorance) and the last condition (old age and death) are mentioned. The other ten causes and conditions are referred to by the words “and so forth until,” as we saw above. The phrase “No ignorance and so forth until no old-age and death” is therefore a negation of all twelve causes and conditions. They are listed in an order that parallels transmigration through samsara. The sutra also negates the extinction of all twelve causes from ignorance to old age and death, a progression that parallels movement toward nirvana. In one phrase, “No suffering, no origination, no stopping, no path,” the Heart Sutra denies the causes and conditions of both samsara and nirvana!

  The Heart Sutra thus appears to deny the core of the Buddha’s teaching. This negation of Buddhism points beyond Buddhism. In other words, Buddhism negating Buddhism is still Buddhism. The Heart Sutra says that to truly live the Buddha’s teaching, we must negate it. A true student of the Buddha must go beyond the study of his teachings as recorded in the scriptures. When we directly see and experience the Buddha’s truth in our own lives, his teachings and the scriptures are irrelevant. The truth becomes a vivid reality. Seeing the reality of our lives with our own eyes through our practice is the wisdom that sees emptiness. This is the wisdom that is called prajñā. This is why prajñā is called the mother of buddhas.

  What did the Buddha teach with the twelve links of dependent origination and the four noble truths? Why does the Heart Sutra negate all of them? We will start with the four noble truths. The first truth is that everything in samsara is suffering. Suffering (Skt., duḥkha) is categorized into eight kinds. The first four are birth, aging, sickness, and death. The fifth is the suffering we feel when we meet someone we don’t like. The sixth is what we feel when we are separated from people we like. The seventh results when we can’t get what we want. These don’t need explanation because we all experience them often in our daily lives. The last kind of suffering is a result of the fact that our life, a collection of the five skandhas, is itself suffering. This is different from the usual sorts of suffering which are the opposites of pleasure, joy, and happiness. It occurs because we can never make the world completely conform to our desires. Because of continually changing causes and conditions, the world around us must change. These constant changes in the world and our lives are not designed to fulfill our desires. Reality is impermanent and egoless, but we are blind to this and strive to satisfy our egocentric desires. Often reality doesn’t cooperate with our plans. We cannot really control even our own bodies and minds. Even if we are very lucky and successful, eventually we die and lose everything. This is simple reality.

  The second truth is that the basic cause of suffering is desire or “thirst” (Skt., tṛṣṇā). It’s as if we are thirsty and looking for water. There is always a feeling that something is lacking, and we try to fill that emptiness. We believe that if we get the right thing, we will be satisfied. We constantly search for and run after the things we desire. There is no end to our desires. Even when they are temporarily fulfilled, we suffer because we are afraid of losing what we have. The Buddha’s teaching doesn’t make sense until we realize that this constant search for satisfaction is itself suffering. When we see that a life spent in pursuit of something better is empty and meaningless, we begin to seek a spiritual path; we begin to practice.

  For those who have begun this search, the Buddha taught a third truth—the cessation of suffering. We can live without being pulled about by egocentric desires. How? The fourth truth is the path that leads to cessation of suffering, or nirvana. It is called the eightfold noble path and consists of right view, right thinking, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right meditation.

  The lessons of the four noble truths are straightforward. We spend our lives trying to fill the emptiness we feel. When we succeed we are happy and feel as if we are in heaven. When we fail we are miserable as if we are in hell. Our life is a continuous transmigration through the six realms of samsara. The Way leading to release from this suffering is the eightfold noble path.

  The twelve links of dependent origination explain the first two of the four noble truths in more detail. In short, our lives become suffering because we act (create karma) bas
ed on ignorance and desires. This is the teaching of the four noble truths and the twelve links of dependent origination. Why does the Heart Sutra seem to negate all of them? A serious Buddhist practitioner might be offended by this. I don’t think the early Mahāyāna Buddhists wrote this to insult other Buddhists. They felt they had to negate these things to sincerely practice the teachings of the Buddha.

  There are two reasons for this. First, this negation is a criticism of the Buddhist monastic orders of the first century CE, when Mahāyāna Buddhism emerged. These monks believed that to eliminate ignorance and desire, they had to study and practice in quiet monasteries. In ordinary society they would encounter difficult situations that could cause anger, hatred, or competition. This could lead to transmigration through samsara. To become emancipated from ignorance and desire, monks primarily lived apart from the rest of society. They made no great effort to help laypeople who needed their spiritual guidance. To Mahāyāna Buddhists these monks who studied and practiced the Buddha’s teachings only for their own liberation may seem somehow selfish because they appeared to do little for others who were seeking the Way. Mahāyāna Buddhists felt this selfish attitude contradicted the spirit of Shakyamuni Buddha’s practice. Many of the Jātaka stories say Shakyamuni Buddha practiced as a bodhisattva for many lifetimes for the sake of all living beings. And the historical Shakyamuni Buddha walked all over India for forty years teaching.

  Mahāyāna Buddhists referred to the monks who practiced for their own sake as Hīnayāna (the smaller vehicle). Mahāyāna Buddhists believed that practice for the sake of others was more important than eliminating one’s own desires. The theoretical basis for this belief is the prajñā of emptiness. “No ignorance and no extinction of it” means the same as “Ignorance is emptiness and emptiness is ignorance.” The latter expression is used to negate the five skandhas. Since ignorance and other causes are empty from the beginning, there is no possibility of eliminating them. We should not think of them as enemies and spend our lives trying to kill them. The bodhisattva vow to save all beings is more important. Eliminating the negative is less important than nurturing the positive. We can be free from selfish desires without fighting against them when we are trying to help others. This is a more joyful way to practice.