Abbot's Teaching
O-Higan
by Zenkai Taiun Michael Elliston, Sensei
May, 2004
O-Higan is the time twice per year when we strengthen our faith in Zen and find the way to Enlightenment. At O-Higan, whether in the spring when the world is just awakening, or in the fall when it is about to die, we stop to evaluate ourselves and to ask if we are truly living a life of Zen.
On this special day, we reflect upon the nature of life and the path we travel through it. We remember that life is momentary — that we can live only in the present moment. The past is gone and distorted; the future is unknown.
“We know no other moment than the present moment. It is always dying, always becoming the past more rapidly than imagination can conceive, yet at the same time always being born, always new.”
Our lives are no different. In a moment, we can be the Buddha — but also in a moment, we can lose the Truth.
So that we do not lose our way, the Buddha instructed us in the Path to be traveled to Enlightenment. He told us of the nature of life — suffering — and of its cause — desire (craving). The way to rid our lives of suffering is to eliminate the cause. The Eightfold Path and the Six Noble Deeds of Zen (the Paramitas) are the way to extinguish desire in our lives. The Buddha taught that this is the world of illusion — we see ourselves as something apart from the rest of the world, and we look at our lives as something that should go on forever.
But as we live and form attachments to the past, we find that it can be no more, and the present, we discover, is gone in a moment. Our desires in this life are not “bad” in themselves; it is the attachment to the things of life, to our desires, that causes pain.
The Buddha taught the Middle Way in his search for Enlightenment and did not abandon it when he became enlightened. He instructed us to see through the illusion of the phenomenal world, and of time. To see through the illusion of our lives, and to find the Enlightened World, we are instructed to persevere in meditation and to keep the Precepts.
On O-Higan, we especially remember the Six Paramitas of the Buddha. The word “Higan” means “the shore of Enlightenment.” At O-Higan season, Zen Buddhists stop to reflect upon the state of their lives as they are being lived each day, and upon the lives that they hope to live as Enlightened Ones. They think about a way to pass from this shore of Illusion to the shore of Enlightenment by perfecting the six spiritual virtues in their daily lives.
The six spiritual virtues named in historical Buddhism are Charity, Morality, Endurance, Perseverance, Meditation and Wisdom. They are the spiritual “work” of Zen. These Six Paramitas are basically simple in themselves, but difficult to practice with perfection.
The first, Charity, asks that you realize that the essence of human life is mutual aid, and that you give of yourself as well as of your possessions. Giving is not just the contribution of money, although this is an important part of it. It also means the practice of benevolence, 1ove, compassion and virtue so that others will he inspired by your example and spirit.
The second Paramita asks us to observe the Precepts handed down to us by the historical or Shakyamuni Buddha. The Eightfold Path of Right Views and Behavior, and the Ten Prohibitory Precepts that prohibit behavior which would harm others, are all given to us an example of a moral life.
The third Paramita, Endurance or Patience, urges us to be humble, tenderhearted and patient, so that a peaceful world can be realized.
The fourth Paramita, Perseverance, is an ideal that urges us to exert ourselves and to continue in any difficulty we may encounter in our lives.
Practicing the fifth Paramita, Meditation, will bring us to have that Ordinary Mind we talked about, so that the potential to become a Buddha — enlightened one — will be realized in our lives.
The last Paramita, Wisdom, is what we are said to possess if we practice all the Paramitas with sincerity. We will have seen things as they really are, with an Ordinary Mind. We will have seen through the illusion of this world and entered that of Enlightenment. We will have attained “Higan,” the life of an Awakened One.
Let us continue in the same spirit today, as we observe O-Higan, and then let us take the same spirit into every moment of our daily lives until we have so transformed them, that they have been turned into Enlightenment.