We now come to the most characteristic feature of Zen Buddhism, by
which it is distinguished not only from all the other Buddhist schools,
but from all forms of mysticism that are ever known to us. So far the
truth of Zen has been expressed through words, articulate or otherwise,
however enigmatic they may superficially appear; but now the masters
appeal to a more direct method instead of verbal medium. In fact, the
truth of Zen is the truth of life, and life means to live, to move, to
act, not merely to reflect. Is it not the most natural thing for Zen,
therefore, that its development should be towards acting or rather
living its truth instead of demonstrating or illustrating it in words,
that is to say, with ideas? In the actual living of life there is no
logic, for life is superior to logic. We imagine logic influences life,
but in reality man is not a rational creature so much as we make him
out, of course he reasons, but he does not act according to the result
of his reasoning pure and simple. There is something stronger
than ratiocination. We may call it impulse, or instinct, or, more
comprehensively, will. Where this will acts there is Zen, but if I am
asked whether Zen is a philosophy of will I rather hesitate to give
an affirmative answer. Zen is to be explained, if at all explained it
should be, rather dynamically than statically. When I raise the hand
thus, there is Zen. But when I assert that I have raised the hand, Zen
is no more there. Nor is there any Zen when I assume the existence
of somewhat that may be named will or anything else. Not that the
assertion or assumption is wrong, but that the thing known as Zen is
three thousand miles away as they say. An assertion is Zen only when
it is in itself an act and does not refer to anything that is asserted
in it. In the finger pointed at the moon there is no Zen, but when the
pointing finger itself is considered, altogether independent of any
external references, there is Zen.
Life delineates itself on the canvas called time; and time never
repeats, once gone, forever gone; and so is an act, once done, it is
never undone. Life is a _sumiye_-painting, which must be executed
once and for all time and without hesitation, without intellection,
and no corrections are permissible or possible. Life is not like an
oil-painting which can be rubbed out and done over time and again until
the artist is satisfied. With a _sumiye_-painting, any brush stroke
painted over a second time results in a smudge; the life has left it.
All corrections show when the ink dries. So is life. We can never
retract what we have once committed to deeds, nay, what has once passed
through consciousness can never be rubbed out. Zen therefore ought to
be caught while the thing is going on, neither before nor after. It is
an act of one instant. When Dharma was leaving China, as the legend has
it, he asked his disciples what was their understanding of Zen, and one
of them who happened to be a nun, replied, “It is like Ānanda’s looking
into the kingdom of Akshobhya Buddha, it is seen once and has never
been repeated.” This fleeting, unrepeatable, and ungraspable character
of life is delineated graphically by Zen masters who have compared it
to lightning or spark produced by the percussion of stones: 閃電光,
擊石火 (_shan tien kuang, chi shih huo_) is the phrase.[6.61]
The idea of direct method appealed to by the masters is to get hold
of this fleeting life as it flees and not after it has flown. While
it is fleeing, there is no time to recall memory or to build ideas.
No reasoning avails here. Language may be used, but this has been
associated too long with ideation, and has lost directness or being by
itself. As soon as words are used, they express meaning, reasoning;
they represent something not belonging to themselves; they have no
direct connection with life, except being a faint echo or image of
something that is no longer here. This is the reason why the masters
often avoid such expressions or statements as are intelligible in any
logical way. Their aim is to have the pupil’s attention concentrated
in the thing itself which he wishes to grasp and not in anything
that is in the remotest possible connection liable to disturb him.
Therefore when we attempt to find meaning in dharanis or exclamations
or a nonsensical string of sounds taken as such, we are far away from
the truth of Zen. We must penetrate into the mind itself as the spring
of life, from which all these words are produced. The swinging of
a stick, the crying of a “Kwats!” or the kicking of a ball must be
understood in this sense, that is, as the directest demonstration of
life, no, even as life itself. The direct method is thus not always the
violent assertion of life-force, but a gentle movement of the body,
the responding to a call, the listening to a murmuring stream, or to a
singing bird, or any of our most ordinary everyday assertions of life.
Reiun (Ling-yün)[6.62] was asked, “How were things _before_ the
appearance of the Buddha in the world?” He raised his hossu. “How were
things _after_ the appearance of the Buddha?” He again raised the
hossu. This raising of the hossu was quite a favourite method with
many masters to demonstrate the truth of Zen. As I stated elsewhere,
the hossu and the staff were the religious insignias of the master,
and it was natural that they would be in much display when the monks
approached with questions. One day Ōbaku Kiun (Huang-po Hsi-yün)[6.63]
ascended the pulpit, and as soon as monks were gathered, the
master took up his staff and drove them all out. When they were about
all out, he called them, and they turned their heads back. The master
said, “The moon looks like a bow, less rain and more wind.” The staff
was thus wielded effectively by the masters, but who would ever have
thought of a cane being made an instrument of illustrating the most
profound truth of religion?
Jōshu was the readiest master for pithy retorts and his “Sayings”
(_Goroku_) is filled with them, but he was also an adept at the
direct method. When he was in his pulpit one day, a monk came out of
the rank and made bows to him. Without waiting, however, for further
movements on the part of the monk, Jōshu folded his hands and a parting
salutation was given. Hyakujo Isei’s (Pai-chang Wei-chêng)[6.64] way
was somewhat different. He said to the monks, “You open the farm for me
and I will talk to you about the great principle [of Zen].” When the
monks finished attending to the farm and came back to the master to
discourse on the great principle, he merely extended his open arms and
said nothing.
A monk came to Yenkwan An,[6.65] the National Teacher, and wanted to
know what was the original body of Vairochana Buddha. The Teacher told
him to pass the pitcher, which he did. The Teacher then said, “Put it
back where you got it.” The monk faithfully obeyed, but not being told
what was the original body of the Buddha, he proposed the question once
more, “Who is the Buddha?” Answered the master, “Long gone is he!” In
this case the direct method was practised more by the monk himself
under the direction of the master, but unfortunately the pupil’s
spiritual condition was not ripe enough to grasp the meaning of his own
“direct method,” and alas, let go “the old Buddha!” Something similar
to this case may be found in the following one:
Sekiso (Shih-shuang)[6.66] asked Yenchi (Yüan-chih),[6.67] who was a
disciple of Yakusan (Yüeh-shan), “If some one after your death asked
me about the ultimate fact, what should I say to him?” The master
gave no answer, but instead called up the boy-attendant who at once
responded. He said, “Fill up the pitcher,” and remained quiet for
some little while. He now asked Sekiso, “What did you ask me before?”
Sekiso re-stated the question, whereupon the master rose from his seat
and left the room.
As some Zen masters remarked, Zen is our “ordinary mindedness,” that
is to say, there is in Zen nothing supernatural or unusual or highly
speculative that transcends our everyday life. When you feel sleepy,
you retire; when you are hungry, you eat, just as much as the fowls
of the air and the lilies of the field, taking “no thought for your
life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body,
what ye shall put on.” This is the spirit of Zen. Hence no specially
didactic or dialectical instruction in the study of Zen except such as
is given below by Dōgo.
Ryutan Sōshin (Lung-t‘an Sui-hsin)[6.68] was a disciple of Tenno Dōgo
(Tao-wu). He served the master as one of his personal attendants. He
was with him for some time when one day he said to the master: “Since
I came to you, I have not at all been instructed in the study of
mind.” Replied the master, “Ever since you came to me, I have always
been pointing to you how to study mind.” “In what way, sir?” “When
you brought me a cup of tea, did I not accept it? When you served me
with food, did I not partake of it? When you made bows to me, did I
not return them? When did I ever neglect in giving you instructions?”
Ryutan kept his head hanging for some time, when the master told him,
“If you want to see, see directly into it; but when you try to think
about it, it is altogether missed.”
Dōgo Yenchi (Tao-wu Yüan-chih) and Ungan Donjo (Yün-yen Tan-shêng) were
standing by the master Yakusan (Yüeh-shan) as attendants, when Yakusan
remarked,[6.69] “Where our intellect cannot reach, I verily tell you to
avoid talking about it; when you do, horns will grow on you. O Yenchi,
what will you say to this?” Yenchi thereupon rose from his place and
left the room. Ungan asked the master, “How is it, sir, that Brother
Chi does not answer you?” “My back aches to-day,” said Yakusan, “You
better go to Yenchi himself, for he understands.” Ungan came to
his brother monk and inquired thus, “O Brother Senior, why did you not
answer our master now?” “You better go back to the master himself and
ask,” was all that poor Ungan could get out of his senior brother.
There was another favourite movement often practised by Zen masters,
which was to call out to the questioner or somebody else. One case
of this has already been given somewhere else in another connection.
The following are the typical and classical ones. Chu, the National
Teacher, called out to his attendant monk three times, to which the
latter responded regularly. Said the Teacher, “I thought I was not
fair to you, but it was you that were not fair to me.”[f132][6.70]
This calling and responding took place also three times between Mayoku
(Ma-ku) and Ryosui (Liang-sui), which at last made the latter exclaim:
“O this stupid fellow!”[6.71]
This trick of calling out and responding was frequently practised as
is seen in the following cases: A high government dignitary called
upon Ungo Doyo (Yün-chü Tao-ying) and asked[6.72]: “I am told that the
World-honoured One had a secret phrase and Mahākāśyapa did not keep it
hidden; what was the secret phrase?” The master called out, “O honoured
officer!” and the officer responded. “Do you understand?” demanded the
master. “No, Reverend Sir!” was his natural answer. “If you do not
understand, there is the secret phrase: if you understand, there is
Mahākāśyapa in full revelation.”
Haikyu (P‘ai-hsiu)[6.73] was a local governor in Shinan (Hsin-an)
before he was appointed a state-minister. He once visited a Buddhist
monastery in his district. While going around in the premises of
the monastery, he came across a fine fresco painting and asked the
accompanying priests whose portrait this was. “He was one of the
high priests,” they answered. The governor now turned towards them
and questioned, “Here is his portrait, but where is the high priest
himself?” They all did not know how to answer him. He then further
asked if there were any Zen monks about here. They replied, “We have
recently a new comer in this monastery, he does some menial work for
us and looks very much like a Zen monk.” He was then brought in the
presence of the governor who at once spoke to him, “I have one question
in which I wish to be enlightened, but the gentlemen here grudge the
answer. May I ask you to give me a word for them?” “I humbly wish you
to ask,” politely requested the monk. The officer repeated the first
question, whereupon the monk loudly and clearly called out, “O Haikyu!”
Haikyu responded at once, “Here, sir!” “Where is the high priest now?”
cross-questioned the monk. This opened the governor’s eye to the sense
of the monk’s counter-question, in which he could now read the solution
of his first query.
The case between Yisan (Wei-shan) and Kyōzan (Yang-shan) was more
intellectual and to that extent more intelligible than this mere
calling and responding. Kyōzan was the chief disciple of Yisan, and
one of the peculiar features of this school was to demonstrate the
truth of Zen concordantly both by the master and disciple. They once
went out picking tea-leaves. The master said to Kyōzan,[6.74] “Picking
tea-leaves all day, I hear only your voice and do not see your body;
manifest your original body and let me see it.” Kyōzan shook the
tea-plant. Said Yisan, “You have only got its function, you have not
got the substance.” Kyōzan said, “Master, how with you then?” The
master was quiet for a while whereupon the disciple said, “O master,
you have got only the substance, you have not got the function.”
“You will be spared of my twenty blows,” concluded the master. In
Buddhist ontology three conceptions are distinguished, as was
referred to previously; substance or body, appearance, and function or
activity. “Body” or _bhāva_ corresponds to the idea of mass or being,
“appearance” (_lakshaṇa_) to that of form, and “function” (_kṛitya_)
to that of force. Every reality is regarded by Buddhist philosophers
as analysable into these three notions. Sometimes, however, the second
conception, “appearance” is absorbed in that of “being,” or “body.”
Without functioning no objects exist, but functioning cannot take place
without something functioning. The two ideas, according to Buddhist
philosophers, are thus inseparable for our understanding of the
universe. But Yisan and Kyōzan were not metaphysicians and would not
argue on the subject. The one shook the tree and the other stood still.
We cannot say that there is Zen in this standing and shaking as we
may interpret them philosophically, but we may glean something of Zen
in their remarks on “body” and “function” together with their direct
method.
So far the direct method has not been of any violent character as to
involve a bodily injury or nervous shock, but the masters had no qualms
if they thought necessary to shake the pupils roughly. Rinzai for one
was noted for the directness and incisiveness of his dealings; the
point of his sword cut through the heart of the opponent. The monk Jō
(Ting)[6.75] was one of his disciples, and when he asked the master
what the fundamental principle of Buddhism was, Rinzai came down from
his straw chair, and taking hold of the monk slapped him with the palm
of his hand, and let him go. Jō stood still without knowing what to
make of the whole procedure when a by-standing monk blamed him for not
bowing to the master. While doing so, Jō all of a sudden awoke to the
truth of Zen. Later, when he was passing over a bridge, he happened to
meet a party of three Buddhist scholars, one of whom asked Jō, “The
river of Zen is deep, and its bottom must be sounded. What does this
mean?” Jō, disciple of Rinzai, at once seized the questioner and was
at the point of throwing him over the bridge, when his two friends
interceded and asked Jō’s merciful treatment of the offender. Jō
released the scholar, saying, “If not for the intercession of his
friends I would at once let him sound the bottom of the river himself.”
With these people Zen was no joke, no mere play of ideas, it was on the
contrary a most serious thing on which they would stake their lives.
Rinzai was a disciple of Ōbaku (Huang-po), but while under the master
he did not get any special instruction on Zen; for whenever he asked
him as to the fundamental truth of Buddhism, he was struck by Ōbaku.
But it was these blows that opened Rinzai’s eye to the ultimate truth
of Zen and made him exclaim, “After all there is not much in the
Buddhism of Ōbaku!”[6.76] In China and in Korea what little of Zen is
left mostly belongs to the school of Rinzai. In Japan alone the Soto
branch is flourishing as much as the Rinzai. The rigour and vitality
of Zen Buddhism that is still present in the Rinzai school of Japan
comes from the three blows of Ōbaku so mercifully dealt out to his poor
disciple. There is in fact more truth in a blow or a kick than in the
verbosity of logical discourse. At any rate the Zen masters were in
dead earnest whenever the demonstration of Zen was demanded. See the
following instance.
When Tō-Impo (Têng Yin-fêng)[6.77] was pushing a cart, he happened to
see his master Baso stretching his legs a little too far out in the
roadway. He said, “Will you please draw your legs in?” Replied the
master, “A thing once stretched out will never be contracted.” “If
so,” said Tō, “a thing once pushed will never be retracted.” His cart
went right over the master’s legs which were thus hurt. Later Baso
went up to the Preaching Hall where he carried an axe and said to the
monks gathered, “Let the one who wounded the old master’s legs awhile
ago come out of the congregation.” Tō came forth and stretched his
neck ready to receive the axe, but the master instead of chopping the
disciple’s head off, quietly set the axe down.
Tō-Impo was ready to give up his life to re-assert the truth of
his deed, through which the master got hurt. Mimicry or simulation
was rampant everywhere, and therefore Baso wanted to ascertain the
genuineness of Tō’s understanding of Zen. When the thing is at stake,
the masters do not hesitate to sacrifice anything. In the case
of Nansen, a kitten was done away with: Kyōzan broke a mirror into
pieces; a woman follower of Zen burned up a whole house; and another
woman threw her baby into a river. This latter was an extreme case,
and perhaps the only one of the kind ever recorded in the history of
Zen. As to minor cases such as mentioned above, they are plentiful and
considered almost matters of course with Zen masters.