Abbot's Teaching
Fukanzazengi: Opening the Gate to the Original Frontier™
by Michael Zenkai Taiun Elliston Sensei,
July 17, 2001
Introduction
In October of 1999 I attended a conference called "Dogen Zen and Its Relevance for Our Time," sponsored by the Soto Zen School in Japan and the Eiheiji and Sojiji temples, and hosted by the Stanford Center for Buddhist Studies in Palo Alto. During the second day of the conference, I suddenly realized that I really didn't know what I was doing there. I had the usual reasons, of course - to learn more about Master Dogen, see old friends, and so on - but I had a sneaking suspicion that these were not my real reasons. On the flight back to Georgia, I thought, "We could do something like that!" Nearly a year later, seeing the capacity crowd attending the Atlanta conference on Dogen, hosted by Emory University and the Atlanta Soto Zen Center, I realized that I was seeing the main reason I went to Stanford. There is a real thirst for Dogen's Zen - I have it, the audience had it, and we were responding to it. The turnout in Atlanta is evidence of a larger trend - the growing interest in Zen in America. In stark contrast, when I moved to Atlanta in 1970, there was only one active sitting group, an affiliate of Phillip Kapleau.
Followers of Zen in general and Dogen in particular tend to be involved in one of two ways, as a scholar or as a practitioner, and some are in both. These are parallel to the traditional division of Zen practice into two emphases - Ancestor study and zazen - which Dogen suggested we "rub together like two stones, until they become so smooth that there is no gap." Dogen himself was a scholar of the first order, of course, but he was critical of pursuing intellectual knowledge over and above direct experience. My reading of Dogen's Fukanzazengi is certainly not from a scholarly perspective.
The thing that stands out most in my mind today is Dogen's astonishing influence, even after eight hundred years. Who else from the thirteenth century is still alive and kicking today? How many other figures in history have people today all over the world not only feverishly translating, re-translating, and studying their works, but also practicing their methods?
Dogen died at 53 years of age. I didn't, and it makes me feel like I'm living on borrowed time. Dogen is intimidating in this way, considering the written work alone that he accomplished in a relatively brief lifetime, and under relatively primitive circumstances. Although other historical figures are better known for their prodigious output, Dogen's corpus is intimidating to me, both in quantity and quality. Especially after seeing his technology - his brushes and scrolls - when a friend and I traveled to Eiheiji in the late 1980s. What would he have done with a word processor?
Some find Dogen's manner off-putting. Francis Dojun Cook, in How to Raise an Ox , called Dogen "stern…uncompromising", but also "moving…convincing." Cook asked, "How can anyone hope to measure up to Dogen's terribly demanding requirements?" At Stanford, Carl Bielefeldt stressed the need for us to come to terms with the aspects that we don't like about Dogen, not just those we like. Dogen's strictness and orthodoxy can seem downright un-American. He sometimes comes off like a finger-shaking, old scold. But his utter confidence, and his unflinchingly no-nonsense style, are compelling. And his brilliance alone establishes him as the "Einstein of Zen."
Fukanzazengi Placed in a Larger Context
There are four relationships that I feel are important to establishing the place of Fukanzazengi in the greater scheme of things: (1) that of Fukanzazengi to Dogen's own practice and teaching; (2) of zazen to the meaning of Zen; (3) of Zen to the needs of today's society; and (4) of Dogen's transmission of Buddha's original discovery to humankind.
First, as to the importance of Fukanzazengi to his body of work: all of Dogen's corpus is important, and is cherished by practitioners and scholars alike. But Fukanzazengi is uniquely important historically, in that it is his first written work, written shortly after he returned from China, and apparently at the request of his first groups of students in Japan. It is important culturally, as the first document of a culture-transcending transmission of an authentic tradition and lineage of Zen, from China to Japan. It was important enough to Dogen himself that he revisited and revised Fukanzazengi several times, while he was busy with other demands on his time. And it is important to many today who recite Fukanzazengi, along with Genjo Koan, as daily liturgy. It is important to me, personally, as the most direct and compact expression of Dogen's essential teaching of the importance of zazen, and is relatively accessible and simple. (Or so I thought when I chose it as my subject. Now, I'm not so sure.) Because of Fukanzazengi's singular importance to Dogen's legacy, I would recommend it as first reading for any student wanting to study Dogen and Zen. It encapsulates the beginning and end points, the alpha and omega of Zen, blending practical instruction with profound meaning. It captures the essence of beginner's mind by defining the basis of zazen. And it points to the fruits one can expect to harvest from practice. We can return to it time and again to discover new dimensions of Dogen's grasp of essential Zen. Thus it is central to Dogen's legacy, and to the clarification of Zen itself.
Second, as to the importance of zazen to Zen: at the heart of Dogen's Fukanzazengi, and much of his other writings, is zazen. My teacher, Soyu Matsuoka Roshi, known to his students simply as "Sensei," shared Master Dogen's high regard for this method, and he passed that high regard on to me. He would often say, "This is the most you can do," or, "You always have a place to go," meaning zazen. But he didn't mean that it is an escape from the world, or from one's responsibility to the world.
Sensei himself was highly engaged, a global citizen of his time, known here and abroad for his efforts promoting reconciliation between Japan and the United States following World War II. He was also unwavering in his support of civil rights and other issues of social justice, when I knew him in the 1960s. But mainly, he hammered home the central importance of zazen to the future of Zen in this country, and emphasized its beneficial effect upon the individual and, therefore, upon society at large. As to the form of the practice - a focus of vigorous debate today - Sensei was diligent in transmitting the essentials of ritual and protocol, but he always encouraged me to "do it your way." But zazen was his focus; everything followed from zazen.
In my view, which follows from Sensei's, zazen is the most accessible gate to the world of Zen. It is the gate to the original frontier discovered by Buddha, rediscovered by Dogen, and accessible to us all. Wherever we go, there it is. The original frontier is always with us - at the extreme reaches of the planet, in outer space, or in this present space. Now, some people today assert that there can be Zen without zazen. Zenkei Blanche Hartman referred to Fukanzazengi at her talk at Stanford. I asked her how we resolve the apparent contradiction that, with Bodhidharma, we cannot say that zazen is really necessary - and yet we recommend it as the central skillful means. She said, "It may not be necessary for some people, but for most of us, it seems to be." I thought, "Good answer." Maybe some don't think they need zazen - I wish them good luck! Zen cannot be separated from zazen.
Third, as to the importance of Zen to today's society: Zen does not rely on beliefs; it only requires a willingness to confront reality directly. Zen relies almost totally on the individual. It is the ultimate in do-it-yourself, which is very American.
Our culture would be considered by most to be more scientific and rational than that of Dogen's time. And admittedly Zen can be somewhat understood, or at least accepted, rationally, as a scientific, empirical, and open-ended world-view with a method, zazen. But it is a rational approach that ultimately transcends the rational, as mathematics ultimately transcends its axioms. Sensei frequently said that "Zen has no conflict with the findings of science" and that "Zen is the religion of the future."
Sensei also used to say that people come to Zen because "something is missing," something they do not find anywhere else. When they finally come to Zen, they may finally find what they are looking for, what he sometimes called "spiritual confidence." And it might be said that Zen itself is what is missing in America - in our homes, schools, and institutions - and not only our prisons. It is missing in most Americans' lives. But it seems to me that Zen is entirely harmonious with America's pioneering spirit, its ideals of freedom and justice, the modern international mindset, and the increasingly global character of American citizenship.
The urge to explore the next frontier is not exclusively American, of course, but is woven into the history and mythology of the U.S. The promise of exploring a new frontier is part of what makes Zen "as American as apple pie." It appeals to pioneering aspirations and yearning for the next - not to say final - frontier. Like the exploration of any frontier, Zen practice involves a leaving behind, a relinquishing of the familiar - a pivotal jumping-off point into the unknown. When our forebears crossed the Bering Strait, when the Vikings boarded their long boats, when the Pilgrims set out from Europe, or when our astronauts counted down to lift off, they all reached a point of no return. It is the same for Zen. At a certain point in our practice, Zen requires perseverance in the face of great doubt and uncertainty. This point of no return is the pivotal experience of Zen. It is pointed to in the mantra traditionally appended to the Heart Sutra: "Gone, gone, gone to the other shore." The other shore is the original frontier and, as Dogen says, actually it "comes to us" in zazen.
Of course, exploring a frontier is not completely painless. We all seem to experience considerable pain when we first sit in zazen, or at least intense sensation that we interpret as pain. One of many ways of thinking about this is, "this is my share of suffering," this is my slice of the pie of pain. Coming to grips with physical pain in our sitting, we gain the ability to come to grips with the larger dimensions of mental, emotional, and societal pain, the suffering that we experience in everyday life. This was Buddha's experience in his time, and is the primary reason Zen is important to our society today. It is never out of date. This, I believe, is why it is becoming mainstream, and not only in America.
Fourth, as to the importance of Dogen's transmission to humankind: Dogen Zen claims to transmit the essence of Buddha's original discovery of the spiritual frontier to humankind. This point is more complex than the above, and thus is perhaps more debatable.
This world is a mess, much as it was in the time of Buddha and Dogen. We like to think it's even worse today. Buddha's "awakening" signals a revolutionary change in an individual's experience, in the midst of the mess. A "pivot-point" of insight occurs, and changes our view of everything about our "self" - identity; race; ethnicity; nationality.
Further, all conceptual polar opposites, such as "practice and enlightenment," "sacred and profane," "form and emptiness," "stillness and action," morph to non-duality - becoming "not two" - in Buddha's and Dogen's system. This is a principle Dogen emphasizes in his discussion of "yoki" in Shobogenzo.
Dogen points to the pivotal essence, or "yoki" - "ki" meaning mechanism, or present state of the moment, and "yo", the main important point, or pivot. This is the "two arrows meeting in mid-air" from Sekito Kisen's Sandokai - "Identity of Relative and Absolute." Suzuki Roshi, in Branching Streams in the Darkness, says, "The absolute and relative accord like two arrow points meeting." This potent symbol represents the convergence of "ji" and "ri" - thing and principle; phenomena and true nature; one and many - or "Moku-rai." "Moku-rai" was Sensei's favorite capsule expression, capturing the non-duality of stillness-and-action, or "silence is thunder."
Sensei says about Dogen:
"Do you remember that when Dogen returned to Japan from China, people asked him what he had got there?"
(The custom in those days was to bring back sutras and other artifacts.)
"His answer was of the greatest significance. He answered, 'I come home
with empty hands.' By this he meant that Zen is action itself - and it cannot
be captured in 'things.' Zen is quietness - but that silence is not without
action. Zen is silence, but it contains great action.
Dogen Zenji also told us about the duration of Zen. In the Shobogenzo, he spoke
of the 'eternal present moment'. This may be puzzling for Westerners, who are
accustomed to thinking of their lives as a cross-point of time and space, because
in Zen time is just a perception or awareness, not a point on the path on the
past, present, and future.
In Zen, the past and future are contained in the present moment. The awareness
of time in Zen is not static or a point in time but is constantly changing.
The present moment is all that we have, we must live in the present without
attachments to the past or future.
When you are studying Zen, your mind must be empty for its full power to enter
in. You will find it everywhere, in the quiet and motion of the universe."
Please remember this statement, "you will find it everywhere," as we read the first line of Fukanzazengi. In the following, I am going to say a lot of things about Fukanzazengi, and it will seem that I am saying a lot of different things. But actually, I am saying only one thing. Because Dogen was teaching only one thing. He taught it in a lot of different ways. He is essentially saying that Zazen is the gate to the original frontier. Like squeezing an elephant through the eye of a needle - there is a point of convergence that we have to go through to get through the gate, to get to the original frontier.
With that context of in mind, let us turn our attention to Fukanzaznegi - "Universal Guide to the Standard Method of Zazen" - as Nishijima and Cross render the title in the first book of their 1994 translation of Shobogenzo. Let me begin with an explanation of my subtitle, "Opening the Gate to the Original Frontier." In Fukanzazengi and in other writings, Dogen declared zazen to be the practice most pivotal to his followers' experience of Zen. It is pivotal to "opening the gate" to the experience of Dogen's Zen for today's practitioner. The "original frontier" is a term I have coined to express the nature of that experience. It is "original" in that it is both the first and final frontier, the same for the Ancestors as for us, the fundamental mystery we confront in life and death. It is a "frontier" in that it represents a leap into the unknown and, indeed, the unknowable, in conventional terms.
Now when you trace the source of the way, you find that it is universal and absolute. It is unnecessary to distinguish between practice and enlightenment. The supreme teaching is free, so why study the means to attain it? The way is, needless to say, very far from delusion. Why then be concerned about the means of eliminating the latter? The way is completely present where you are, so of what use is practice or enlightenment?
The first line is also rendered: "Now when you trace the source of the way, you find that it is universal and absolute. How can it be dependent upon practice-enlightenment?" This is the trouble with being mono-lingual - you never know for sure that you're getting the whole story when you read a translation. Please compare that stanza to the Nishijima and Cross (N&C) translation, and the version used at San Francisco Zen Center (SFZC):
Now when we research it, the truth originally is all around. Why should we rely on practice and experience? The real vehicle exists naturally. Why should we put forth great effort? Furthermore, the whole body far transcends dust and dirt. Who could believe in the means of sweeping and polishing? In general, we do not stray from the right state. What use then are the tiptoes of training?
Again, please compare to the first version - the meaning of "tiptoes" will become clear:
The way is originally perfect and all pervading. How could it be contingent upon practice and realization? The true vehicle is free and self-sufficient. What need is there for special effort? Indeed, the whole body is free from dust. Who could believe in a means to brush it clean? It is never apart from this very place. What is the use of traveling around to practice?
You may by now be experiencing a little cognitive dissonance from these differing translations. Perhaps by reading between the lines, so to speak, we can begin to get a glimpse of Dogen's original intent, and to appreciate the translators as well. I don't know how they make the choices they have to make to render Japanese into English.
An aside: the task of transliteration must be something like interpreting for inhabitants of different planets - note that I have not attempted to express Dogen's title in English. Several versions of the title and text are now available - the one with which I am most familiar being that published by the Sotoshu. I think we should feel a great appreciation for translators - without their efforts, after all, this great legacy would be inaccessible for most of us. They, like scientists, "do the math." We who can't - or at any rate, don't - should applaud them.
Dogen's four introductory statements outline the self-evident "things as it is" - to borrow Suzuki Roshi's phrase from Crooked Cucumber. Each is followed by a question pinpointing the futility of prevalent presumptions about practice. Dogen hits the ground running here - suddenly we're trying to catch up with the implications - and it's only the first stanza!
The first statement is presented as bald fact - the original frontier is here, there, everywhere. It follow that the necessity and efficacy of practice must be questioned. Here, Dogen is framing the futility of establishing cause-and-effect - that is, the futility of blindly depending on practice to bring about enlightenment.
In the second line, Dogen emphasizes the accessibility of Zen, along with the non-separation of "means and end." The ticket to the original frontier costs nothing - we are already at the destination. Here, Dogen illuminates the futility of attaining.
The third line exposes the non-issue of so-called "delusion" - Jinshu's wiping dust and dirt from the mirror. Conceiving of delusion as delusion is itself the delusion. Nothing is between us and the original frontier. Dogen brings the futility of eliminating delusion - into sharp relief.
Finally, Dogen returns us firmly to our own cushion - "What is the use of traveling around to practice?" No need to go traipsing about looking for the original frontier as Dogen did in China. If it's to be found in India, China, or Japan, it has got to be right here, too. This clarifies the futility of pursuit. This point came home to me with great clarity on the first day of our trip to Japan. Sitting Zazen in a "businessman's hotel" in Tokyo, several thousand miles from Atlanta, it was undeniably apparent that I had not gone anywhere. Wherever you go, there it is - going nowhere, here it is.
However, if there is the slightest difference in the beginning between you and the way, the result will be a greater separation than between heaven and earth. If the slightest dualistic thinking arises, you will lose your Buddha-mind. For example, some people are proud of their understanding, and think that are richly endowed with the Buddhist wisdom. They think that they have attained their way, illuminated their mind, and gained the power to touch the heavens. They imagine that they are wandering about in the realm of enlightenment, but in fact they have almost lost the absolute way, which is beyond enlightenment itself.
The preceding stanza defined four "pivot-points" that may enable us to relinquish erroneous views of practice-enlightenment - by recognizing the futility of establishing cause-and-effect, of attaining, of eliminating delusion, and of pursuing enlightenment elsewhere. It is said that the difference between a world-class scientist and a mediocre one is that the superior person recognizes the futility of a line of investigation sooner. Dogen is preempting our pursuit of four lines of approach that he found to be prevalent in his time, and that he considered to be blind alleys.
I am calling these formulations pivot-points because it is a term that Dogen himself used - yoki (more on this later) - and because I feel, somewhat pessimistically, that they are misconceptions as prevalent today as in the thirteenth century, and optimistically, that they can become turning-points in our practice.
This stanza presents the first - and perhaps most cosmic in scale - of nine additional experiential pivots I have highlighted in Dogen's presentation below. Each of the nine represents a view of Dogen's which was, and is, at odds with the conventional view. Each posits the non-dual reality of apparent opposites, which is revealed through a kind of convergence. Each requires that we relinquish that our opinionated view in order to see what Dogen is pointing at, much as a wato - or "turning word" - uttered by a Master, can goad the student to awakening.
Dogen's "however" is such a turning word. After clearly allowing that these four views concerning practice are true, Dogen says, in effect, "so what?" "However" - even though these points are true, they are true only if we are not entangled in dualism.
But in this "however," Dogen captures much more - he uses it to illuminate the major pivotal point, a moral and spiritual failing, in the history of humankind. I'd like you to visualize an hourglass, as a metaphor for seeing the implications of Dogen's first stanza and its turning-point at "however." The top half of the hourglass is filled with sand draining away - the passing of time itself. You are standing atop the sand.
The four formulations describe the world "before the separation of the enlightened and the unenlightened." From the description of this original state of non-duality, Dogen leads us inexorably to its denial - this horrific, all-too-human "however." Captured in one word is the separation of heaven and earth, nirvana and samsara, the fundamental bifurcation of spiritual reality - harmony with the Way - and the real hell of our self-inflicted separation from it. The measure of the pivot is "the slightest difference …between you and the Way," the point at which the sand runs out, and we fall through the hole. This is the fall from grace - the loss of Eden, of innocence - the origin of the "whole catastrophe," as in Zorba the Greek, of human suffering.
Dogen gives us a real double-whammy here - linking separation-of-self-and-the-Way with dualistic-thinking-as-ignorance. Here is vintage, finger-shaking Dogen. This may be the closest he comes to humor - painting a sardonic caricature of deluded practice. He is not criticizing anyone in particular as far as we know, but simply saying, "if the shoe fits, wear it." Do you see yourself in this picture?
Dogen then makes clear that even those who have been exposed to the Dharma - and should know better - are subject to the delusion of pride. "They imagine that they are wandering about in the realm of enlightenment, but in fact they have almost lost the absolute way…" - while the sand is quickly running out under their feet.
We've certainly seen this pride in contemporary America - in teachers who mislead students, and in students who look for teachers who agree with their views, rejecting the teacher if they do not! As if there's a "market" for Zen, and the customer is always right. Dogen points out that just because we think we are practicing Zen, it does not necessarily follow that we are not messing it up. What is Dogen's answer to this deplorable situation? One guess:
You should pay attention to the fact that even Buddha Shakyamuni had to practice Zazen for six years. It is even said that Bodhidharma had to practice zazen at Shaolin temple for nine years order to transmit the Buddha-mind. Since these ancient sages were so diligent, how can present-day trainees do without the practice of Zazen?
This is pivot-point number two - Dogen's orthodoxy, his insistence on the authenticity of precedent. As Bielefeldt suggested at Stanford, it is one of the biggest hurdles Dogen throws up to Westerners today, with our predilection for "what's happening now," and its corollary, a disdain for tradition.
Dogen gives us a dose of humility - prescribing Zazen for our malady. The giants of history - Zen history, that is - were, after all, humble enough to sit down and face the Truth. (Elsewhere), Dogen reminds us that the behavior and speech of even a Zen master is based on precedent. This attitude flies in the face of the American cult of the individual.
You should stop pursuing words and letters, learn to withdraw and reflect on yourself. When you do so, your body and mind will naturally fall away and your original Buddha-nature will appear. If you wish to realize the Buddha wisdom, you should begin training immediately.
Now the Nishijima and Cross (N&C) rendering - please read again to compare:
Therefore we should cease the intellectual work of studying sayings and chasing words. We should learn the backward step of turning light and reflecting. Body and mind will naturally fall away, and the original features will manifest themselves before us. If we want to attain the matter of the ineffable, we should practice the matter of the ineffable at once.
Pivot-point number three. If we wish to attain "it," we must practice "it." Dogen affirms the ineffectiveness of conventional knowledge about Zen rather than direct experience of Zen. Sensei also warned repeatedly about the dangers of "book-knowledge," especially today, and especially for Americans. We think that if we've read it all, we know it all.
Again, real understanding of Dogen's point comes from direct experience - the convergence of ineffable non-doing with tangible doing. Doing Zazen, non-doing eventually occurs. Body-mind naturally falling away, Buddha-nature will appear - original features will manifest themselves. As if of their own volition - not something we do, not something we can do. (Elsewhere), Dogen declares that the "other shore," actually comes to us - we don't go to it. Here, Dogen is defining the outer limits of "right effort" as this "backward step" - the end-point of conventional doing and the end-gate to the original frontier.
That last word, "immediately." Urgency, yes - no time to waste - but also immediate, immediacy. Right here as well as right now. This is the intimacy that Dogen (elsewhere) points to, referring to Bodhidharma's "special transmission outside of scripture…direct seeing into the nature of humankind" - that even seeing into is still too separate, dualistic. "Seeing itself is the nature," he says. Closer than water to the fish - no wonder we can't grasp it.
Now in doing Zazen it is desirable to have a quiet room, you should be temperate of eating and drinking, forsaking all delusive relationships. Setting everything aside, think of neither good nor evil, right nor wrong, thus having stopped the various functions of your mind, give up even the idea of becoming a Buddha. This holds true not only for Zazen, but for all of your daily actions.
First Dogen prescribes - and now is preparing us for - direct experience. We are getting ready to actually do something. This is a quintessential distinction of Zen - the practicality of method. I found this very refreshing when I started Zen training - there was something to do! To get to the point of non-doing, we must needs begin with doing.
"Forsaking all delusive relationships" (as if some relationships are not delusive) - or "put aside all involvement and suspend all affairs" as in the SFZC version. Not just human relationships, but all delusive ones - the bifurcation into "relationship" itself - created by the discriminating mind. Body/mind, self/other, and so on, on and on. Dogen calls on us to set aside the ordinary, judgmental mind, which exists precisely to discriminate - its very reason for being. It's a survival thing - ask a biologist.
Pivot-point number four - non-reliance on thinking - the ultimate suspension of judgment. Watching a movie, we suspend disbelief in order to vicariously experience the story. In Zazen, we suspend judgment in order to personally experience the original frontier. Using our ordinary discriminating mind to discriminate against discriminating, we use citta to arouse bodhi, the original- or wisdom-mind, as Dogen says (elsewhere). Citta and bodhi are not opposed, but complementary.
Dogen cautions against confusing Zazen with establishing a goal - becoming a Buddha. The last line in the Buddha's first sermon, Setting in Motion the Wheel of the Truth or The Four Noble Truths, declares, "Now there is no more becoming." Becoming itself, according to Buddha, comes to an end. Dogen's point is that replacing the various goals of our conventional mind with another goal, however lofty, is self-defeating. While "self-defeating" is generally considered a good thing in Zen, in this case it is not. Sensei often said, "Zen is round and rolling, slippery and slick." Citta is like this - slippery - we can quite easily delude ourselves.
The last line, "…not only for Zazen, but for all your daily actions" implies the non-separation of daily life and Zen. Here it is stated matter-of-factly, in the context of suspending our usual knee-jerk reaction to events. Later, we will see Dogen return to this point and expand upon it.
The Nishijima and Cross version gives it another spin - "How could this be connected with sitting or lying down?" In other words, "It's not the posture, stupid!" (Elsewhere) Dogen instructs that "Sitting Buddha does not hinder Buddha." But sitting does not produce Buddha, either. No such causality can be established. Just when we are nice and comfy on our cushion, Dogen yanks it out from under us, foiling our tendency to foster complacency.
Usually a thick square mat is put on the floor where you sit and a round cushion on top of that. You may sit in either the full or half lotus position. In the former, first put your right foot on your left thigh and then your left foot on your right thigh. In the latter, only put your left foot on the right thigh. Your clothing should be worn loosely but neatly. Next, put your right hand on your left foot and your left palm on the right palm, the tips of the thumbs lightly touching. Sit upright, leaning to neither left nor right, front nor back. Your ears should be on the same plane as your shoulders and your nose in line with your navel. Your tongue should be placed against the roof of your mouth and your lips and teeth closed firmly. With your eyes kept continuously open, breathe quietly through your nostrils.
This part becomes even more practical, some might say downright prosaic.
As you read these down-to-earth instructions, do you feel yourself sitting up a little straighter? "Leaning to neither to left nor right, front nor back" - this is pure "Dogen" - implying what it is, by saying what it definitely is not.
Now, admittedly, when you read this out loud, it begins to sound a little like - "You put your left foot in, you put your left foot out, you put your left foot in and you shake it all about, you do the Hokey-Pokey and you turn yourself around, and that's what it's all about…" This is where Zen - zazen specifically - begins to beggar the imagination. Our natural reaction is, "Can you seriously be telling me - expecting me to believe - that this is it?" We are incredulous at the stunning simplicity of zazen. It is incredible that "just sitting" could have any real meaningful effect, let alone form the gate to enlightenment.
Dogen's Zen is nothing if not practical, though his attention to detail may seem obsessive to the uninitiated. Dogen recognized the utility of a written reference for the mechanics of Zazen, and produced it. But he also suffused the text with great depth in the rest of his commentary, integrating profound meaning with direct action outlined in his instructions.
In the two versions of Fukanzazengi extant today - one composed early, one late, in Dogen's life - we see some evolution of these instructions. We have seen them evolve even further to this day. For example, it is now usually mentioned that it is permissible to reverse the order of the legs. Not bad for eight hundred years - we are making progress.
Finally, having regulated your body and mind in this way, take a deep breath, sway your body from left to right and sit firmly as a rock. Think of non-thinking. How is this done? By thinking beyond thinking and non-thinking. This is the very basis of Zazen.
Pivot-point number four - non-reliance on thinking - now includes its corollary, reliance on non-thinking. Bielefeldt finds no specific mental technique in Dogen's Manuals of Zen Meditation. But Dogen points to it - again by pointing out what it is not - here using the famous exchange between Yakusan Igen and a monk, discussed in detail in Shobogenzo Zazenshin. Please compare to the N&C version:
When the physical posture is already settled, make one complete exhalation and sway left and right. Sitting immovably in the mountain-still state, "Think about this concrete state beyond thinking." How can the state beyond thinking be thought about? "It is different from thinking." This is just the pivot of Zazen.
In this translation the pivot-point is identified as such. By going beyond both opposed conceptual poles - thinking versus not thinking - we arrive at non-thinking. Sitting without reliance on thinking becomes clear affirmation, for those of us who practice it, that Zazen is not quietism, as its critics have argued. The Zazen of the Soto sect is far from quietism. This "mountain-still state" - samadhi - gives an outer impression of quietism. But as Sensei often reminded us, Zazen "looks like a mountain - but actually is a volcano." Out of stillness springs great action, or kensho, awakening. Anyone who believes Zazen to be a form of quietism simply has not yet penetrated to the level of intensity that Dogen points out as the "very basis" - or "just the pivot" of Zazen. This pivot is the point to which Dogen repeatedly returns.
Zazen is not "step-by-step meditation." Rather it is simply the easy and pleasant practice of a Buddha, the realization of the Buddha's wisdom. The truth appears, there being no delusion. If you understand this, you are completely free, like a dragon that has obtained water or a tiger that reclines on a mountain. The supreme law will then appear of itself, and you will be free of weariness and confusion.
Pivot-point number five - Zazen is not an incremental means to an end. This is his blunt refutation of progressivism. After delineating the steps involved in Zazen, Dogen takes away "steps." Zen cannot be approached as cause-and-effect, though perhaps it may be taught that way. Dogen says (elsewhere) that enlightenment has nothing whatever to do with what immediately precedes it. If it followed from a way of thinking, for instance, we could be taught that way of thinking, and thus be enlightened. If the cause of enlightenment were the technique of Zazen, all who sit Zazen would awaken - yet all who do so clearly do not.
Again, Dogen is saying what Zazen is not, in order to clarify what it is - which does not translate into words. Any expressible mental technique would be, by definition, "step-by-step." Bielefeldt's quest for Zen's mental technique is addressed in the only way possible - by eliminating misconceptions, or "topsy-turvy" views, of it. Sensei used this expression in his translation of the Heart Sutra into English: "Bodhisattvas…go beyond all (topsy-turvy) views, attain Nirvana." Our preconceptions of Zen's mental technique are predictably inadequate.
However, what Zazen is - is the "easy and pleasant practice," Here is the first hint of a benefit - the "realization of Buddha's wisdom." Dogen tells us the true meaning of Zazen - just as it is, nothing left out, nothing missing.
Again, something happens as if of its own volition, outside our control. "The truth appears." "The supreme law will then appear of itself." "There being no delusion." Dogen restates "the Way…is very far from delusion" from the perspective of personal experience, after the fact of enlightenment. "Delusion" is itself a delusion of the human imagination - the only real delusion.
The dragon and tiger are symbols of restlessness incarnate (the agitated state of delusion) - until their world is complete. This means quenching thirst for the dragon, returning home for the tiger.
"Completely free" means free of self-inflicted delusions, and of the weariness and confusion that come with them. Now again - all of these are illustrating one point that Dogen is making. He's bringing us to one point of focus, from many different angles.
At the completion of zazen move your body slowly and stand up calmly. Do not move violently. By virtue of zazen it is possible to transcend the difference between "common" and "sacred" and attain the ability to die while doing zazen or while standing up. Moreover, it is impossible for our discriminating mind to understand either how the Buddhas and patriarchs expressed the essence of Zen to their disciples with finger, pole, needle, or mallet, or how they passed on enlightenment with a hossu, fist, staff, or shout. Neither can this be understood through supernatural power or a dualistic view of practice and enlightenment. Zazen is a practice beyond the subjective and objective worlds, beyond discriminating thinking.
The "completion of Zazen" is not an end of something and the beginning of something else, not an abrupt transition. Dogen implies continuity of effort, moving slowly and calmly. Zazen is not complete in and of itself, but continues into everyday life. The dividing line between sitting, standing, walking - between Zazen and everything else - is simply not there.
Pivot-points number six and seven follow in short order. Six, through Zazen, to "transcend the difference between common and sacred" - points to the direct experience of the Pure Lotus Land - not a belief-based rejection of the mundane, but a religious experience of non-duality, which is the Buddhist meaning of "purity."
Pivot seven - the reality of attaining the "ability to die" while doing Zazen (or for that matter while standing up), which several ancestors apparently did. In the N&C version this historical dimension is made more explicit:
We see in the past that those who transcended the common and transcended the sacred, and those who died while sitting or while standing, relied totally on this power.
In one breath, Dogen conflates the non-duality of sacred-and-mundane with life-and-death. This is really stepping off a hundred-foot-pole.
Now, most of us probably interpret "the great death," as it is known in Zen, as a psychological phenomenon - a concept we can understand. Surely Dogen does not mean really dying, for heaven's sake - that is too morbid. But Zen is experiential. So "dying on the cushion" must mean precisely the same experience as actually dying. We must take Dogen's meaning literally to mean that the "self" does not survive this, and that this experience imparts the actual ability to die at will.
And then, the point of the illogical nature of transmission: "…impossible to understand how the Patriarchs expressed the essence of Zen or passed on enlightenment." It is not logical, it is not supernatural - it is not even dualistic. Any ordinary object works to demonstrate the Dharma, in the hand of a master - for those who have the "treasury eye" to see. Transmission of Mind-to-mind is not mysterious, but ordinary.
Therefore, no distinction should be made between the clever and the stupid. To practice the way single-heartedly is, in itself, enlightenment. There is no gap between practice and enlightenment or zazen and daily life.
Thank you, Dogen - "no distinction should be made between the clever and stupid…" - good thing for us. This follows on the prior statement, "Zazen is beyond the subjective and objective, beyond discriminating thinking." Since it is beyond our discriminating thinking, the values associated with intelligence are rejected - if that, then this. No distinction between clever and stupid - as applied to oneself, as well as to others. We are repeatedly cautioned in Zen against insidious doubt - the sense that we are unable or unworthy, or that others are, which is a projection of the same fear.
The synthesis of self-other implied here surpasses measurable differences of dimensions of intelligence. Ordinary intelligence is, after all, based on the separation of subject and object - in other words, dualistic. Buckminster Fuller defines intelligence as "the ability to extract the general principle from particular case experiences." Dogen calls Zen practice the development of true intelligence (elsewhere).
So what Dogen is doing here is extracting a general, single-pointed principle from particular case experiences. He's showing us that attributes of personality such as cleverness-stupidity cannot be countenanced in Zen - they obliterate each other, like matter and anti-matter.
This whole subject relates to a common misconception of the role and value of Zen, which appears to be afflicting many American beginning students - Zen as self-improvement. But these inadequacies we find in ourselves are like "delusion." Seeing our inadequacies as hindrances is itself delusion, as the 108 Buddhist juzu-beads remind us. Seen clearly, our limitations themselves are paths to enlightenment. As Dogen reminds us, enlightenment requires nothing more than single-heartedness.
Here, and in the next few stanzas, Dogen begins to revisit the points he made earlier, with a different slant. (Elsewhere) Dogen is said to "come at it sideways and upside-down." Where "no gap between Zazen and daily life" was used above to take away dependence on the posture, here it is used to bring the benefits of Zazen experience whole-heartedly into everyday life, something like the last of the ox-herding pictures.
The Buddhas and patriarchs, both in this world and that, in India and in China, have all preserved the Buddha-mind and enhanced Zen training. You should therefore devote yourself exclusively to and be completely absorbed in the practice of zazen.
Pivot-point eight - non-duality of the Ancestors and ourselves. This is recapping pivot number three, the authenticity of precedent. The Patriarchs have all "preserved the Buddha mind and enhanced Zen training." This also efficiently expresses the union of personal and social practice - of Dharma and Sangha - the bridging effect of the practice of Zazen between the Ancestors and us.
In today's climate we see a lot of emphasis on "engaged Zen." But "this is the most you can do," as Sensei said, indicating Zazen. We must devote ourselves exclusively and be completely devoted to Zazen. Otherwise, all our engagements in good works is likely to be just "the blind leading the blind," one of Buddha's famous parables.
Although it is said that there are innumerable ways of understanding Buddhism, you should do zazen alone. There is no reason to forsake your own sitting place and make futile trips to other countries. If your first step is mistaken, you will stumble immediately. You have already had the good fortune to be born with a precious human body, so do not waste your time meaninglessly. Now that you know what is the most important thing in Buddhism, how can you be satisfied with the transient world? Our bodies are like dew on the grass, and our lives like a flash of lightning, vanishing in a moment.
Here, Dogen reprises the futility of studying the means from the first stanza - the trap of focusing on the form of practice. There is only one practice, whatever its various forms. Westerners seem especially prone to getting bogged down in tinkering with form - we want to "Westernize" it. This is an example of the classic avoidance technique - obsessively rearranging the deck chairs as a way of ignoring the unpleasant reality -that the ship is going down.
"Zazen alone" can be interpreted in two ways. From the context, Dogen is re-emphasizing the primacy of Zazen - as the lone, indispensable method. The fact is that ultimately - it must be done alone. Like climbing a mountain, one cannot climb half-way and expect someone else to climb the rest of the way. This "alone" can also represent a personal pivot-point in ones life - as in the renunciation of the monk or nun. In the light of no separation of self and other, "alone" finds its meaning.
Dogen then recaps the futility of pursuit - "no reason to forsake your own sitting place and make futile trips to other countries…you will stumble immediately." There is only one place - the universal and absolute presence of the Way, from the first stanza. Indirect methods - such as pursuing a pilgrimage to "sacred" places - may actually inhibit direct access to the original frontier. Innumerable ways of understanding may turn out to be just so many blind alleys.
Pivot-point nine - "the good fortune to be born with a human body" - the merit of past lives, conjoined with the urgency of mortality. From the N&C version:
We have already received the essential pivot which is the human body: we must never pass time in vain.
This very body itself is the essential turning-point, the indispensable vehicle, to enlightenment. Dogen succinctly clarifies the relationship of understanding Buddhism to the purpose of life itself. This is restating the Buddha's "Above the heavens, below the heavens, I alone am the most honored one," () reaffirming our birthright. But it is not enough to simply believe in this as a doctrine. Unless you get at this experientially, you will never be satisfied. And time is running out, as in the hourglass metaphor. Zen is not metaphorical - it is experiential. This is the essence of convergence in Dogen Zen - the understanding of meaning informed by the urgency of our situation - the pivotal point of the "eternal moment," as Sensei called it.
Here Dogen is also recapping the pride of delusion - backsliding into the whole catastrophe. "Do not waste your time meaninglessly"…"we must never pass time in vain." Again, Dogen is preaching to the choir. Most of us first come to Zen because we think - "Zen is about life; by studying Zen I will learn something about life." While this is true, after some time we realize - "Life is about Zen; actually my life is about what Zen is about." A personal, intimate turning-point. Zen is pointing to what all of existence is really about. What is it? What is this "most important thing" that Dogen is pointing to?
Finally, the last stanza:
Earnest Zen trainees, do not be surprised by a real dragon, or spend a long time rubbing only one part of an elephant. Exert yourself in the way that points directly to your original Buddha nature
Dogen is warning us here of the limitations of partial paths, recapping the blindness of partial paths, the futility of indirect methods - studying only the tail, the trunk, the ear, or the leg of the "elephant." By contrast, he illuminates the reality of the Zen path. The "real dragon" is from a story Sensei used to tell, of a man who was infatuated with statues, images, of dragons; but was startled at the sight of a real dragon.
Another, related story he told is about an artist who was hired by an enlightened abbot to paint a dragon in his temple. The abbot asked the artist whether he painted from real life, or from imagination. "Strictly from imagination," he admitted - he had never seen a real dragon. The abbot had his heart set on a painting from real life, and invited the artist to visit him at his temple, where the dragons ran rampant, he said.
Arriving at the temple, the artist looked for the dragons, but didn't see any. The abbot said, "But the hall is full of dragons - don't you see them?" The bewildered artist admitted that his spiritual development was such that he didn't see any dragons in the hall. The Abbot told him to sit there (in zazen) until he did. As the story goes, he finally did see the dragons, filling the hall.
Well, I'm here to say that I have seen those "dragons," and to testify to their reality. They guard the gate to the original frontier. The story continues with the abbot asking the artist - when he had finally seen the dragon - "Did you hear its roar?" The artist returned to Zazen until he heard the roar of the dragon, and was able finally to capture its likeness. He painted an absolutely masterpiece, full of vitality - a "living dragon" still on view to this day. True story.
This reminds me of a comedy bit Shelly Berman used to do back in the 'sixties for those of you old enough to remember. Puffing thoughtfully on his cigarette, Mr. Berman would misquote master Hakuin's famous koan, solemnly intoning, "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" - then, after a pause for a couple of beats - "I…I know that sound." The crowd would break up. Most people get the joke - perhaps you had to be there. It is said that when a monk comes up with a satisfactory response to Hakuin's "Sound of the one hand" koan, the next question from the master is likely to be, "How big is that sound?" Much like the abbot's second question to the artist.
Respect those who have realized full knowledge and have nothing more to do. Become one with the wisdom of the Buddhas and succeed to the enlightenment of the patriarchs.
Some might disrespectfully interpret Dogen's "respect those who have realized full knowledge and have nothing more to do" as blatant self-promotion - Dogen lobbying for respect for Dogen himself. But if the teacher has "realized full knowledge and has nothing more to do," he or she has arrived at the end of doing - an arhat whose karmic line has run out before the life-line. Nothing more to do, but still doing non-doing, the mysterious activity of the true teacher. Respect, in that case, is called for.
Dogen does not shy from exhortation - "exert yourself in the way;" "Respect those who have realized;" "Become one with the wisdom;" "succeed to…enlightenment." In essence, Dogen is saying, "Do thou likewise." Zen is do-it-yourself.
Dogen here revisits the non-duality of "self and Ancestors" in the context of non-doing - to "become one with" is beyond our doing. "As we are, so they were; as they were, so we shall be" - our relationship to the Ancestors is not two. Now, some interpret this formulation as mysticism, a form of mystical Zen. But this is simply one answer to Daikan Eno's famous, primordial question, "What is it that thus comes?" "It" is Buddha - all Ancestors are Buddha. It all is buddha.
If you do zazen for some time, you will realize all this. The treasure house will then open of itself, and you will be able to enjoy it to your heart's content.
"If you do Zazen…you will realize all this." Dogen's absolutely unshakeable faith in Zazen, expressed to encourage all of us. Zazen is the only thing we have to do. The surface contradiction here is that Zazen is defined as a very specific method - yet in Zen there are no fixed methods. (Elsewhere), Dogen deconstructs "sitting fixedly" to resolve this. Zazen cannot be understood as method in the conventional sense. It allows no separation of means and end - thus it is not "fixed."
"If you do Zazen for some time you will realize all this." Here, in stressing time, Dogen resolves the apparent opposition of the "sudden and gradual schools." If there is enlightenment - if we experience it - that pivotal moment will be "sudden," no matter how gradual the approach. But it will have required all of time, from the beginningless enlightenment of the universe, to come to fruition. So it will inevitably be "gradual" - ripening in the fullness of time. This holds true even in the case of a child, or naturally enlightened person, where no evidence of practice exists. This has been recorded in Zen history - notably in the case of Huineng - and is explained as the seemingly sudden result of "merit accumulated in past lives" - accumulated gradually.
Pivot-point number ten - the fundamental promise of Zen - "the treasure-house will then open of itself." The treasure is already "universal and absolute," and again, not dependent upon practice-enlightenment. No causal relationship is imputed to anything that we can actually do. Action fails us; logic fails us. The resulting reward of Zazen is self-actuating. In Dojun Cook's translation:
The precious treasury will open its doors all by itself, and the treasure will be yours to use as you wish.
"Enjoy" perhaps comes closer to the operative word than "use," as this so-called enlightenment is well-known to be utterly useless - it is certainly of no value in human commerce. Combining both "use and enjoy" is perhaps the middle way. This promise of Zen is also implied in the last stanza of Buddha's first sermon on the Middle Way - "My heart's deliverance is unassailable; this is the last birth; now there is no more becoming." A harmonic convergence of "being and becoming"- enjoyment to our heart's content - the Big Game Lottery payoff!
I have attempted to show that Dogen develops and reinforces, via many expedient examples, a convergent dynamic from duality to non-duality in Fukanzazengi. It is a central principle of Dogen Zen, which he recreates in other essays, with Zazen as its actuator. This same thread, originally expressed as the Buddha's Middle Way, runs through Dogen's teaching as its pivotal essence, through Fukanazengi as its heart, and through all of Zen like a nourishing river, its blood-line. Once again, what is this most important thing in Buddhism that Dogen is pointing to?
My talk has a beginning, middle, and an end - to state the obvious. But this tripartite form seems hard-wired into our experience. For example, the words "be-gin-ning," "mid-dle," and "e-n-d" all have beginning, middle, and ending sounds by which we recognize them. If the beginning, middle or end sound changes - you have a different word, a different meaning.
In Buddhism, all dharmas (entities) are characterized as arising, abiding, and decaying - beginning, middle, and end points. It is that middle part - the apparent "abiding" - that creates the appearance of permanency, or stasis. According to Nargarjuna, "seeing into the flux of arising and decaying" (forget abiding) is awakening - seeing into the flux. Action in stillness - mokurai.
To close - what Dogen is getting at with this dynamic of non-duality is a living, experiential convergence. Two apparent poles - paired opposites - converging into one experiential pivot-point. Like sand through an hourglass, one grain at a time; or light through a lens, or a prism. So completely and intimately converging that they merge into a state that cannot even be called "one," but only "not two."
Perhaps a more timely and apt metaphor is the physicists' conception of a singularity - at the heart of a black hole. This "convergence in extremis" is prefaced by the crossing of an event horizon - a point of no return - followed by a collapse inward, in which the familiar laws of physics break down. This is what happens ultimately in Zazen. The light turns back on itself; the familiar laws break down - but that's a good thing! "The supreme law will then appear of itself, and you will be free of weariness and confusion." So let us go on exploring, together with master Dogen, this wonderful Zazen-gate to the original frontier.
Editor's note : I am not sure what to do with the questions and answers that follow - they may not be important to the text. I may be able to integrate them into the text above, but that will take some more though. Any suggestions welcome.
The point that you made that resonated with me was the part where it said "don't take refuge in thinking or in non-thinking." In my own practice, when I think of "thinking," I'm trying to solve a problem, I'm exercising my mind at this point. When I sit, thoughts arise, but I'm not "thinking." But if I try to suppress the thoughts, or get into a state of "no thought" - is that what he means by non-thinking?
I saw a wonderful tee shirt once - it was "Calvin and Hobbes" - they were doing their usual thing, and it said, "Brains all empty - we don't care!" (Laughter) I think what we're pointing at, here, is not the suppression of thought, but simply that there are -two kinds of thought - intentional and unintentional. Just as there are two kinds of everything: intentional and unintentional - there's natural thought, there's intentional thought.
So it's natural that we have thoughts, it's natural that we have feelings, and so on, but to then pursue them with intent is what turns them into a futile quest. So Buddha's Teaching and Dogen's teaching just keeps returning us back to - this - away from "that," turning the light back the "other way." So, as thoughts come and go, they don't bother us, just like "Calvin and Hobbes."
Well, I'll just make the comment that, coming from a tradition that deals mostly with the sutra teachings, I have kind of a pair of fresh ears hearing this - but it sounds so paradoxical - so full of paradox that I don't know what to do with it.
Dogen said that the universe is constantly chanting all the sutras without letup. When we do Zazen, we don't really start anything, we don't initiate anything - we just return - to what's already going on. This is the "sermon of no words" if we shut up. It's still sutra. This (indicating an object in the room) is expressing the sutra. It can't help it. That's what he meant by the "absolute exertion of a thing."
I just think that for a student, though, with a Western background, that sutra is kind of an easier starting point because we're not schooled…and that has to be filled in with basic dharma teachings. It might be a necessary prerequisite - just like studying advanced physics when you don't know Newtonian physics.
Yes, yes - you need a little shoehorn, or maybe a little oil. Well, I think we all came to it that way - we read a little bit about it and got interested in it. Sensei used to say, "the books about Zen are like the stone that you use to knock on the gate - when they open the gate, you don't need the stone." But he encouraged us to read - if it was inspiring and encouraging. But he said if you find yourself doing Zazen, and just thinking about what you're reading - you know - time to stop reading for a while.
I think of it as kind of like working on a computer. You know, if you read a manual - like the so-called "documentation" that they give you - and you don't work on a computer, it doesn't make any sense at all! But when you work on the computer - then you go back to the documentation - it starts to make some sense.
I can say that this is a bit more focused on what the point of meditation is - where it is just a quiet area between teachings.
Meditation, to my way of thinking - the way Dogen taught it - is the teaching. That's the center of the teaching. It's also in the sutras. He didn't, by any means, reject Ancestor study. Ancestor study and shikantaza are the two parallel tracks of practice that he said to "rub together like two stones," until they are so smooth there is no separation.
What is the importance to having a teacher?
We take the position that - from my point of view, I'm nobody's teacher. But if you come to me and you want to regard me as your teacher, I will honor that responsibility - as Buddha did, as Master Dogen did, and as Matsuoka Roshi did. Our view is: "the Teacher is everywhere" - and the main thing a true eacher does is to point that out.
So it's not really necessary to have a teacher?
Yes, it's very necessary to have a teacher - absolutely critical! And I was fortunate to have one.